Flip The F*cking Table Over And Scream

Submitted by QTR’s Fringe Finance

I had an old friend who used to be a bouncer at one of the bars where I worked in Philadelphia many years ago. We got along decently outside of work because we both had the same mutual interests in our twenties: beer, sports, gambling, and women.

The big differences between us were that he had a much shorter temper than I did, a much tougher time controlling his emotions and a much larger appetite for alcohol. As would happen given those differences, as the years went by, we eventually lost touch, only to bump into each other randomly at the airport one day after we hadn’t seen each other for about ten years.

I was returning from a trip I had taken for my job, and he was on his way outbound to some tropical destination I can’t remember. After the perfunctory catch-up, I asked him why he was taking what seemed like a random vacation during the middle of the week.

He told me that days prior, he had been at the local casino in Philadelphia playing poker and had won $30,000 from the bad beat jackpot, so he was celebrating.

I asked him how it happened and what he did when he found out he’d won.

He told me: “Chris, that place has taken so much money from me that when I finally won, I flipped the f*cking poker table over in the middle of the room, while all eight people were sitting at it, and screamed at the top of my lungs.”

Then, he told me, they paid him out and asked him to leave and never come back.

Anybody else might easily write this story off as someone with a flair for the dramatic, but having seen my friend flip a table once or twice under far less exciting circumstances (or for no reason at all after multiple shots of Jameson), I knew he wasn’t making it up.

Heading into the weekend, I kept thinking about metaphors to make some type of big statement about how important I think Tuesday’s election is for our nation. No matter how many ways I tried to word it, all I could think about as an analogy to a potential Trump victory was my friend, sitting inside a casino he’s probably lost a zillion dollars in, finally scoring a big win against the house—the machine that always has the odds in its favor—flipping that table, with the chips, drinks and cards on it, and then getting kicked out carrying a massive Publisher’s Clearing House-style novelty check.

I don’t like that this is how I think of the government, the Democratic party and the media, conjoined as one unbeatable, dystopian chimera with the odds always in its favor—but I can’t help it. What else could you possibly call a ruling party of elites, using one hand to rig their primary process while using the other to write diatribes about the importance of democracy? What else could you call the party that blankets its deeply flawed policy prescriptions under the cloak of the moral high ground? What do you call the party that used to preach freedom of choice, speech and liberty that now takes its cues from giant pharmaceutical corporations and the military industrial complex? How about the party that outright lied in 2020 to the public about the president’s involvement in a Chinese influence-peddling scam days before the last election?

And then, what can be said about almost all of the major media networks that have enabled, and run cover for, these actions, all while making concerned looking faces like they actually give a shit about the truth and can’t believe how stupid we are?

ABC News' David Muir And Linsey Davis To Moderate September Presidential  Debate

Just last week, I watched the media arm of the Democratic Party, consisting of all the major news networks with the exception of Fox News, accuse Jewish people at President Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally of being Nazis. This week, I’m watching them tell the public that Trump said Liz Cheney should be executed when he said nothing of the sort.

Over the last four years, there have been countless instances like these — the “very fine people” hoax, the never-ending live coverage of the Russia collusion hoax, and CNN putting a yellow filter over Joe Rogan’s face and telling the world he was taking horse medicine when they knew he was not. I wrote it days ago: the media has sacrificed what’s left of its credibility at the altar of an un-elected woman who thinks the PCE deflator is something you sit on at a party that makes a farting noise and that “Strategic Petroleum, Reserve” is a brand of top shelf vodka.

National Review said it pretty well last month:

The media has gotten so much wrong over the last four years that not only is it bleeding viewers to alternative media, but major networks like CNN have been forced to lay off staff and completely rethink their programming. It’s a phenomenon that we saw continue last week, with Jeff Bezos making a point not to endorse a political candidate at the Washington Post because, in his words “Americans don’t trust the news media”.

Among the dead weight purged from CNN some years ago was anchor Brian Stelter. This week, probably without even knowing it, he made a very cogent point when he quoted an anonymous TV executive who said:

“If half the country has decided that Trump is qualified to be president, that means they’re not reading any of this media, and we’ve lost this audience completely. A Trump victory means mainstream media is dead in its current form.”

Stelter doesn’t know it, but he’s onto something much bigger than he thinks. He’s presenting that statement out of protest because he believes that mainstream media really is the authority for objective truth and the moral high ground.

Of course, what the last decade has proven to us is that he’s wrong — deadass wrong. He may not know why he’s wrong, but the point he makes still stands: as I wrote days ago, at some point, the bias and outright lying are going to hit such a fever pitch that even independent and center-left viewers and voters are going to take notice.

People are simply not going to stand for one-sided fact-checking at debates, “60 Minutes” deceptively editing interviews, and political anchors injecting their politics into the “news.” In fact, longtime Washington Post contributor Hugh Hewitt walked off the set of one of his live streams and quit the Washington Post just hours ago because of exactly this: Democrats are not even hiding their bias anymore and completely lack finesse in their attempts to sway public opinion, as I have noted in a previous article.

For a glance at how left-wing mainstream media is imploding, watch the entirety of this four minute clip.

Now that we have the miracle of the internet and alternative media, when that moment comes, mainstream media will have officially crossed to the other side of the adoption bell curve and will begin its slow descent into irrelevance. Before that descent can begin, tolerance for the media must hit a zenith where viewer interest peaks, then ever so slightly starts to fade toward alternative media. This election could very well mark that apex officially moving behind us. Here’s how I see it:

A GOP victory on Tuesday not only flips the media’s figurative table over, it flips over the table of government in favor of empowering people. It flips over the table that is addicted to spending and racking up trillions of dollars in debt every year. It flips over the table that spends those trillions of dollars on other countries while increasing taxation on American citizens. It flips over the table that cleans up San Francisco for when China’s president arrives but can’t do so for American citizens. It flips over the table of every lie you’ve been told about Joe Biden’s mental health when you could clearly sit at home and watch with your own two eyes how poor of a state he was in. It flips over the table of identity politics and looking at everybody by their race, gender, ethnicity, and sexuality under the guise of fighting discrimination. And most importantly, a victory for the GOP on Tuesday flips over the table of trying to stifle the most important God-given right of them all: our right to free speech.

I’m not going to make some sensationalist claim like if the Democrats win, it’s going to be the end of the world. It won’t. That’s why we have three branches of government and, frankly, there are far too many lazy and incompetent people in government to effectively make too many negative changes quick enough for our nation to deteriorate much quicker over the next four years than it already is. But I bet even the Democrats who are going to vote for Kamala Harris know in the back of their mind that the nation isn’t on the right path right now, and that’s the way we will continue under a Harris administration. Only faster.


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If the GOP wins this election, I believe it will be far more consequential to the nation. It feels as though a dam is about to break in the United States and the magnetic poles of the two parties are about to shift. Joe Rogan alluded to this while interviewing Trump when he said:

“The rebels are Republicans now. You want to be punk rock? You want to buck the system? You are conservative now. The liberals are now pro-silencing criticism. They are pro-censorship. They talk about regulating free speech. It’s bananas to watch.”

There’s no question the left is pulling us further and further left and, at some point, the nation will snap back in the other direction, regardless of whether it is this election cycle or not. But I’ll be damned if it doesn’t feel like we are right on the doorstep of making a statement that’s bigger than politics by reelecting Donald Trump.

Sure, it’ll be a statement that we want lower taxes, our freedom of speech, less regulation and small government. But most importantly, it would be a rebuke of all of the names that Democrats have called Republicans, all of the blatant lies they’ve told us and then scolded us like children for not believing, and the party and media machine’s assumption it could serve up whatever candidate it wanted, without a primary, and because they have the moral high ground and the media machine backing them, the country will just shut the fuck up and swallow it.

When my friend lost money consistently at the casino for years and years, he just “shut the fuck up and swallowed it” and kept coming back for more. The games were rigged, but hell—he was in there taking his shot. And when he finally had the chance to take the house, big, not only did he take some of that money back, but he made a statement in doing so. And while I don’t usually condone destructive behavior, deep down, I know how good it felt for him, and I’m glad he did it. Now, I wonder if the nation can do the same.

Note from QTR: This will be my last post about politics at least until after Election Day. If you haven’t yet, I urge you desperately to get to the polls on Tuesday and make your voice heard. Just like in 2020, this election may come down to single-digit numbers of votes in many places.

QTR’s Disclaimer: Please read my full legal disclaimer on my About page hereThis post represents my opinions only. In addition, please understand I am an idiot and often get things wrong and lose money. I may own or transact in any names mentioned in this piece at any time without warning. Contributor posts and aggregated posts have been hand selected by me, have not been fact checked and are the opinions of their authors. They are either submitted to QTR by their author, reprinted under a Creative Commons license with my best effort to uphold what the license asks, or with the permission of the author.

This is not a recommendation to buy or sell any stocks or securities, just my opinions. I often lose money on positions I trade/invest in. I may add any name mentioned in this article and sell any name mentioned in this piece at any time, without further warning. None of this is a solicitation to buy or sell securities. I may or may not own names I write about and are watching. Sometimes I’m bullish without owning things, sometimes I’m bearish and do own things. Just assume my positions could be exactly the opposite of what you think they are just in case. All positions can change immediately as soon as I publish this, with or without notice and at any point I can be long, short or neutral on any position. You are on your own. Do not make decisions based on my blog. I exist on the fringe. The publisher does not guarantee the accuracy or completeness of the information provided in this page. These are not the opinions of any of my employers, partners, or associates. I did my best to be honest about my disclosures but can’t guarantee I am right; I write these posts after a couple beers sometimes. I edit after my posts are published because I’m impatient and lazy, so if you see a typo, check back in a half hour. Also, I just straight up get shit wrong a lot. I mention it twice because it’s that important.

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Originally Posted at; https://www.zerohedge.com//


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Former NATO Spokesperson Says Europe May Need To Spend 5% Of GDP On Defense

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A former NATO spokesperson has said members of the 32-nation bloc may need to spend 4 or 5 percent of their GDP on defense in the coming years, especially if the United States pulls back on its commitments under President-elect Donald Trump.

The Epoch Times’ Chris Summers reports that Oana Lungescu, who worked at NATO between 2010 and 2024, told a Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) briefing in London on Thursday, that a majority of America’s allies in NATO were spending at least 2 percent of GDP on defense.

But she said, “Obviously, we’re in a better place than we used to be, but is 2 percent enough? Does anybody here think that 2 percent is enough?”

She was speaking as the Ukrainian military claimed Russian forces struck the Ukrainian city of Dnipro with an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) on Nov. 21.

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Amid the apparent escalation of the Ukrainian conflict, Lungescu, said: “I would think that there will be a big push towards 3 percent and frankly, we should not need Donald Trump to tell us that we need [to spend] 3 percent.

“Frankly, if there is any change or moderation of the US commitment to Europe … we will need 4 percent and 5 percent of GDP on defense.”

Lungescu said: “Interestingly, there’s a new poll in Germany just the other day showing that 50 percent of those asked said that 3 to 3.5 percent is about right, which is a huge, huge mindset change for Germany.”

In February, Trump told journalists in New York that “NATO countries have to pay up.”

“The United States is in for $2oo billion and they’re in for $25 billion,” he said. “They’re not paying what they should, and they laugh at the stupidity of the United States of America.”

Thursday’s briefing, hosted by the British defense think tank RUSI, was headlined “The impact of the U.S. presidential election on European security.”

Jim Townsend, a former U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense for European and NATO policy under President Barack Obama, said the world situation was very different from when Trump left office in 2020, partly because of the growing relationship between Russia and China.

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He said, “There’s a lot of things that Putin is doing right now to express his displeasure over ATACMS sure, but also to message to the incoming administration, ‘don’t think that we’re close friends with you guys and you’re going to roll over us, Trump.’”

Townsend said Russia was angry with the United States and he described the Kremlin’s reaction as: “We’re not happy with the West. We’re not happy with what you’re doing, and you’re going to see our fists about this.”

Max Bergmann, director of the Europe, Russia, and Eurasia program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), described the relationship between Trump and Putin as a “bromance.”

He predicted Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) would be Trump’s choice for secretary of state, and he pointed out Rubio had voted against President Joe Biden’s $95 billion funding package for Ukraine in February.

Bergmann said the nominations Trump has so far made for his Cabinet suggested that in his second term, “the dial is turned up.”

“It is time to … take Trump very seriously about what he has indicated that he wants to do,” he said.

He added there had been lots of discussions about China’s leader Xi Jinping’s intentions with Taiwan, and “there was a common refrain, ‘You should read what he says and take them literally.’ And I think that’s true with Trump.”

Bergmann said the president-elect wants to fundamentally change U.S. policy on European security, on Ukraine, and Russia.

“I think when it comes to NATO that means basically a major paradigm shift.”

NATO spokesperson Oana Lungescu (L) and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg arrive for the NATO summit at the Ifema congress centre in Madrid on June 29, 2022. Javier Soriano/AFP via Getty Images

Lungescu, a Romanian former journalist, predicted: “The next four years will be turbulent, will be complicated, and there may be many things that we don’t like.

“But ultimately, if you look at the growing alignment between Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, these authoritarian states, which are all adversaries to what the U.S. stands for, and to what Europeans stand for.

“It’s in our interests to stay calm, to plan, and to invest in what unites us, rather than in what divides us,” she added.

Rutte Is ‘Friend of Trump’

Lungescu said the new NATO secretary general, former Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte, had a “good working relationship with Donald Trump” and described himself as a friend of Trump.

She said, “So I would expect Mark Rutte to try to go to Washington as quickly as possible to meet not just the new administration, but also the new Congress.”

She said bipartisan support for NATO will be part of the calculus in terms of how the administration proceeds.

“He will need to make the case … of why NATO is a good deal for the United States,” added Lungescu, who is now a senior fellow at RUSI.

Lungescu said she thought the NATO summit in The Hague in June would be shorter than originally planned.

She said Trump’s nomination of Matt Whitaker as the next U.S. permanent representative to NATO was “interesting” and “could be a positive sign.”

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