Satyricon may have recorded their 2008 album The Age Of Nero in sunny LA, but it was steeped in bleakness and doom

The story behind Tom Petty’s classic 1979 album Damn The Torpedoes and its follow-up Hard Promises

Not $300 billion. Not $1.3 trillion. Not one cent. The post America Should Pay None of the $300B in Green Blackmail to the Third World appeared first on Frontpage Mag.

Daniel Perry, a former Army Sergeant who was granted a full pardon by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, is speaking out for the first time since he fatally shot an armed BLM protester during the summer of 2020. In an exclusive interview with The Daily Wire, Perry details what happened that fateful night and explains some of the controversies of the case, including the shocking actions of George Soros-funded District Attorney Jose Garza, whom Perry says is victimizing others in Austin. For the uninitiated, Perry, then 30 years old, was stationed with the U.S. Army outside of Austin, Texas, in 2020, and was working as an Uber driver as a side hustle. On July 25, after dropping off a passenger, he found himself in the midst of a Black Lives Matter protest, where at least two protesters were armed. Perry ended up fatally shooting Garrett Foster, 28, who approached Perry’s car window while open-carrying a loaded AK-47. Both Foster and Perry are white and military veterans. Perry was later charged with murder by Garza. Perry was convicted of murder in April of 2023, and a year later, in May of 2024, Gov. Abbott issued a full pardon to Perry and called out Garza for politically motivated actions. Recalling the night of the incident, Perry told The Daily Wire that he had no intention of ending up near a BLM protest, and when he realized he was approaching a crowd of people, he stopped his vehicle. “A guy jumped in front of my vehicle so I couldn’t drive any further and somebody threw a water bottle,” Perry said. “That’s when I honked my horn.” “They start rocking and shaking my car and banging on it with their fists and kicking it,” he continued. “And the guy approached me with an AK-47 and he motioned [for] me to roll my windows. And at this point in time, I’m kind of in a state of shock and I complied with him – I don’t know why I complied with him … I rolled my windows down.” LISTEN to the full interview with Daniel Perry on Morning Wire  The man, later identified as Foster, said something to Perry that was “completely muffled.” “I had no idea what he was saying, and then he takes two steps back and he points – starts raising the barrel of his AK-47 at me. And my body reacted on its own. I grabbed my revolver and I shot him.” Perry said he sped away to try to get to safety and heard gunshots going off behind him. There was a second shooter in the crowd, but Perry thought he had missed Foster and believed Foster was now trying to kill him. The second shooter left three bullet holes in Perry’s vehicle and has since been identified by authorities, who have determined that the person acted criminally. However, Perry said the DA’s office has refused to prosecute the shooter – another suspect decision from Garza. “I honestly thought I wasn’t going to make it out of there alive,” Perry said. “A thought that went through me was that I hadn’t been the most right, righteous Jew in the world, and that I wouldn’t see my parents again and make amends for not talking to them as much as I should.” Perry said that following the incident, he was seeking help to cope with the trauma he experienced and was trying to move on with his life. He never thought he would be charged with murder, since he said he clearly acted in self-defense. But all that changed. Perry started to receive death threats over the incident and said the U.S. Army stationed him in Alaska to protect his safety. At the same time, Perry said Garza was campaigning for District Attorney on a platform that included getting “justice” for Foster. As Perry feared, Garza was elected and secured an indictment against him. At the time, Perry’s defense said that the indictment was politically motivated and “unusual,” since they were unable to present a written presentation to the Grand Jury. “Honestly, I felt like the justice system was going to work in my favor because I believe I did nothing wrong,” Perry described his feelings heading into the trial. “But at the back of my mind, I believed that the DA was going to tip the scales and put me at a slight disadvantage.” The trial was controversial. For example, one of the jurors printed outside research and presented it to fellow jurors. The defense sought a new trial over the issue, but the judge agreed with prosecution that such action from the juror was okay. In another controversy, the lead investigator on the case, Brent Fugitt, testified that Garza’s office tampered with him as a witness. Fugitt said he was ordered to remove almost all exculpatory evidence that would have helped Perry. CHECK OUT THE DAILY WIRE HOLIDAY GIFT GUIDE “I had no idea that the jury instruction was going to be as complicated as they were going to be,” Perry said. “And I had no idea that there was a jury member bringing in outside information to the trial to use it to change the mind of the other members of the jury. I also had no idea about the witness tampering. [The DA’s office] also did not allow the police support in my trial, and they did not allow the lead detective to give his professional opinion about my case.” Perry was convicted on April 8, 2023, for the murder of Foster, and was later sentenced to 25 years behind bars. “I felt like I was betrayed by the American people, even though that’s not really true,” Perry told The Daily Wire. “It was just the city of Austin.” “My entire belief system of the justice system was destroyed, because I felt like it was weaponized against me. I felt that I was never going to see my parents again alive,” he continued. “I broke up with my fiancée, because I thought I was never going to see her again. I told her that I cannot provide her the family that she deserves, so she needed to move on and find a husband who can help her raise a family. That was the hardest thing I ever had to do.” After Perry was convicted, Gov. Abbott announced that he would be asking the Texas Parole Board to review Perry’s case, and if a recommendation was made, he would move swiftly to give Perry a full pardon. “Texas has one of the strongest ‘Stand Your Ground’ laws of self-defense that cannot be nullified by a jury or a progressive District Attorney,” the governor said. Perry spent 13 months behind bars before Abbott received the go-ahead from the board to grant the full pardon. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton reacted to the pardon, saying online, “Soros-backed prosecutors like Jose Garza do not get to pick and choose the rights we have as Americans, and I am relieved that justice has prevailed.” Perry, who is Jewish, said it was his faith in God that got him through. “I felt that God had answered my prayers,” he said. “I don’t know many prayers by heart, but I did the Shema three times a day. And then a few days later, I found out that the governor actually said that about me and actually brought me hope. I felt like I was blessed, to be honest.” Perry also noted how Garza and his office have taken actions against him that he feels are both politically motivated and personal. In one instance, Perry believes Garza’s office was behind the push to get him a less-than-honorable discharge from the military. “The district attorney got involved with my discharge process to ensure that I wouldn’t get an honorable discharge,” he said. “I wish I still had a copy of my discharge packet. There was a letter with the official ‘District Attorney of Travis County’ letterhead on it stating that the government’s statements about me being innocent were just political and that I am, in fact, a convicted murderer.” Perry’s attorney, Doug O’Connell, said that the move to discharge Perry after the conviction was “wildly premature,” noting that there was still a motion for a new trial pending and there was no formal paperwork labeling Perry as guilty, Military Times reported. Moreover, the initial police report labeled Foster’s death a “justified homicide.” “He won the conviction,” Perry said of Garza. “He didn’t have to take the extra step to make sure that all my military benefits would be stripped away from me. My unit, they tried their hardest to make sure that I would stay in so there’s a place for me to return, but the Army legal office got involved and took it out of their hands.” Garza also released some of Perry’s private messages after Gov. Abbott said he was looking to issue a pardon. Perry says the messages were mostly with his military buddies and were taken out of context, and believes they were released as “retaliation.” Some of the private messages discussed guns and shooting protesters if they were to attack him, and other messages were racial in nature and offensive. The messages soon became the prevailing narrative around the case. At the time, Perry’s defense issued statements from two black males, Sgt. Traveon Napper and former Army member Ronald Wilson, who defended Perry. “I can confidently say that Daniel Perry is not a racist. I have known Daniel for over five years as a colleague and a friend. I have known him to be nothing but a professional, hard-working soldier whose statements are being taken out of context. I know Daniel Perry would take a bullet for me,” Sgt. Napper said. Wilson said in a statement, “While in the Army, I witnessed Daniel interact with people of many different races and he treated everyone the same. Anyone who knows Daniel will tell you that he’s the definition of the Army values: loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity and personal courage. I know Daniel would do anything for me and I would do anything for him.” Perry told The Daily Wire that there were racial memes sent and received to and from his black military buddies, and emphasized how guys in the military like offensive humor. “We don’t see race in the military,” Perry said. “We see something funny – doesn’t matter how bad it is, we share it with each other. If you were ever able to sit in a room full of active duty soldiers, and you hear the conversations they have when they’re bored, a lot of people will be offended. It’s like for other soldiers or veterans, we like dirty jokes in the military. We like offensive jokes in the military.” Perry also said he shouldn’t have “advocated for violence” in private messages about riots, but said he believes that violence is necessary for self-defense and to protect your family. The 37-year-old has not spoken to any media about the incident or the pardon, until now. Perry said he’s only speaking to The Daily Wire because he thinks Garza is unjustly prosecuting others for political reasons, specifically police officers. Notably, Garza has indicted more than 20 Austin police officers for their actions during the violent 2020 BLM riots. “I am completely terrified and I’m worried that they might retaliate, just because I’m talking to you guys,” Perry said. “But if nobody speaks up against the injustice that he’s bringing, nobody’s going to hear my story and more officers and more law-abiding citizens will face his wrath. I’m not his only victim.” Perry specifically brought up the prosecution of Austin police officer Christopher Taylor. “He got three hung [grand] juries and then they didn’t indict him a fourth time, so they decided to pursue another shooting he was involved in that happened a year prior with an armed man who was armed with a knife,” Perry said. Taylor’s defense attorney said online that he’s never seen a more “clear cut self defense case involving an officer,” and posted during jury deliberations, “The jury must be improperly considering the other-unproven allegations made by this same anti-police DA.” Perry is still facing one misdemeanor charge — a deadly conduct charge punishable by up to one year behind bars — in connection to Foster’s death. He closed the interview by telling The Daily Wire that he feels like he has nothing to lose by speaking out about Garza. “My reputation is already ruined. My career is already ruined. The only thing they could take away from me is, maximum, some jail time,” Perry said. “But I don’t see they could take any more away from me.” Perry’s next hearing is set for December. LISTEN to the full interview with Daniel Perry on Morning Wire

Our article “20 Best Songs With The Word ‘Beautiful’ In The Title” showcases a diverse list of artists who have used the word “Beautiful” in their song titles. Beautiful is a powerful word, so these artists put their songwriting to the test when they use a word with such meaning. While some seem to take it more seriously than others, I think it’s safe to say that the 20 songs we selected for this list all represent a group of songwriters and performers who have taken the word quite seriously and, of course, at times dedicated it to some of The post 20 Best Songs With The Word ‘Beautiful’ In The Title appeared first on ClassicRockHistory.com.

It was twenty years ago this week (November 23, 2004) that CBS News announced Dan Rather would be leaving as anchor of the CBS Evening News after 23 years at the helm of a once top-rated newscast that had tumbled to third place during his tenure. CBS’s announcement came amid an investigation into his pre-election 60 Minutes attack piece about Republican President George W. Bush’s National Guard service. The story relied on modern-looking documents presented by Rather as 1970s memos created on a typewriter. CBS’s investigation into the scandal, released January 10, 2005, found “fundamental deficiencies in reporting,” but stopped short of finding a political bias against Bush. Yet anyone watching Rather over the years couldn’t help but notice how he relentlessly twisted the news to help Democrats and liberals, while punishing Republicans and conservatives. In an era when news bias was more subtle than today’s in-your-face cable clamor, Rather’s awkwardly obvious partisanship stuck out like a sore thumb. Rather once told CBS Evening News viewers that the Republican agenda was “to demolish or damage government aid programs...[for] children and the poor.” He advanced the desperate notion that the late ’90s impeachment of Bill Clinton for perjury and obstruction of justice was “a kind of effort at a, quote, ‘coup.’” He fawned over Democrats. “If we could be one-hundredth as great as you and Hillary Rodham Clinton,” he told Bill Clinton in 1993, “we’d take it right now and walk away winners.” In 2001, he insisted to FNC host Bill O’Reilly that Bill Clinton was “an honest man” because “you can be an honest person and lie about any number of things.” He stubbornly refused to acknowledge his bias. “Anybody who knows me know that I not politically motivated,” he told USA Today in the midst of the phony documents scandal. After finally leaving CBS News in 2006, Rather continued to push his views onto the public, including on social media. CNN and MSNBC often invited him on as a guest, attempting to recast him as a iconic journalist, rather than as a disgrace to the profession. In his 80s, Rather didn’t even try to sound even-handed. “People say, ‘Well, I’m not sure President Trump is racist.’ But racist is as racist does,” he baldly asserted on CNN in 2019. Rather’s decades of biased reporting did much to hurt the media’s reputation for fairness, and he taught at least two generations of journalists how to spin the news to advance a liberal agenda. Here, from the MRC’s archives, are just some of quotes that show how Rather persistently pushed the Democratic Party line from the 1980s into the 2020s: ■ “You and the President were being party to sending missiles to the Ayatollah of Iran. Can you explain how — you were supposed to be the — you are — you’re an anti-terrorist expert! Iran was officially a terrorist state....The question is — but — you made us hypocrites in the face of the world!...How could you sign on to such a policy?!”— During a live interview with Vice President George H.W Bush on the CBS Evening News, January 25, 1988. ■ “If we could be one-hundredth as great as you and Hillary Rodham Clinton have been in the White House, we’d take it right now and walk away winners....Tell Mrs. Clinton we respect her and we’re pulling for her.”— To President Bill Clinton, via satellite, at a May 27, 1993 CBS affiliates meeting, referencing his new CBS Evening News co-anchor Connie Chung. ■ “I hear you talking and, as I have before on this subject, I don’t know of anybody, friend or foe, who isn’t impressed by your grasp of the details of this [health care] plan. I’m not surprised, because you have been working on it so long and listened to so many people.”— Interview with Hillary Clinton, 48 Hours, September 22, 1993. ■ “It is not just Congress that is taking a sharp turn to the right. The surge to the right on Capitol Hill is making waves all over the country on openly politically partisan, and sometimes racist, radio.”— CBS Evening News, January 4, 1995. ■ “There was no doubt Republicans in the House had enough votes tonight to pass another key item in their agenda to rip up or re-write government programs going back to the Franklin Roosevelt era. It is a bill making it harder, much harder, to protect health, safety, and the environment.”— CBS Evening News, February 28, 1995. ■ “The new Republican majority in Congress took a big step today on its legislative agenda to demolish or damage government aid programs, many of them designed to help children and the poor.”— Leading off the March 16, 1995 Evening News. ■ “I’m all news, all the time. Full power, tall tower. I want to break in when news breaks out. That’s my agenda. Now, respectfully, when you start talking about a liberal agenda and all the, quote, ‘liberal bias’ in the media, I quite frankly, and I say this respectfully but candidly to you, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”— To Denver radio host Mike Rosen, November 28, 1995. ■ “Republicans kill the bill to clean up sleazy political fundraising. The business of dirty campaign money will stay business as usual.”— CBS Evening News, February 26, 1998. ■ “Is or is there not some concern of the public perception, in some quarters, not all of them Democratic, that this is, in fact, a kind of effort at a, quote, ‘coup,’ that is you have a twice elected, popularly elected President of the United States, and so those that you mention in the Republican Party who dislike him and what he stands for, having been unable to beat him at the polls, have found another way to get him out of office?”— Interviewing former GOP Senator Warren Rudman during CBS’s live coverage of the start of President Clinton’s impeachment trial, January 7, 1999. ■ “Once a political lightning rod, today she [Hillary Clinton] is political lightning. A crowd pleaser and first-class fundraiser, a person under enormous pressure to step into the arena, this time on her own.”— Profiling Hillary Clinton on 60 Minutes II, May 26, 1999. ■ “While Fidel Castro, and certainly justified on his record, is widely criticized for a lot of things, there is no question that Castro feels a very deep and abiding connection to those Cubans who are still in Cuba and, I recognize this might be controversial, but there’s little doubt in my mind that Fidel Castro was sincere when he said, ‘Listen, we really want this child back here.’”— During live coverage of the Elian raid, April 22, 2000. ■ “Nineteen days after the presidential election, Florida’s Republican Secretary of State is about to announce the winner — as she sees it and she decrees it — of the state’s potentially decisive 25 electoral votes. Katherine Harris will officially certify the state’s election returns....The believed certification — as the Republican Secretary of State sees it — is coming just hours after a court ordered deadline.... The certification —  as the Florida Secretary of State sees it and decrees it — is being signed.”— During CBS News live coverage, November 26, 2000. ■ “Good evening. Texas Governor George Bush tonight will assume the mantle and the honor of President-elect. This comes 24 hours after a sharply split and, some say, politically and ideologically motivated U.S. Supreme Court ended Vice President Gore’s contest of the Florida election and, in effect, handed the presidency to Bush.”— Beginning the December 13, 2000 CBS Evening News.      ■ “President Bush tonight outlines his cut-federal-programs-to-get-a-tax-cut plan to Congress and the nation.”— CBS Evening News, February 27, 2001. ■ Bill O’Reilly: “I want to ask you flat out, do you think President Clinton’s an honest man?”Dan Rather: “Yes, I think he’s an honest man.”O’Reilly: “Do you, really?...Even though he lied to [PBS anchor] Jim Lehrer’s face about the Lewinsky case?”Rather: “Who among us has not lied about something?”     O’Reilly: “Well, I didn’t lie to anybody’s face on national television. I don’t think you have, have you?”Rather: “I don’t think I ever have. I hope I never have. But, look, it’s one thing - “O’Reilly: “How can you say he’s an honest guy then?”Rather: “Well, because I think he is. I think at core he’s an honest person. I know that you have a different view. I know that you consider it sort of astonishing anybody would say so, but I think you can be an honest person and lie about any number of things.”— Exchange on FNC’s The O’Reilly Factor, May 15, 2001. ■ “Today, on the Internet and elsewhere, some people, including many who are partisan political operatives, concentrated not on the key questions of the overall story, but on the documents that were part of the support of the story. They allege that the documents are fake....The 60 Minutes report was based not solely on the recovered documents, but on a preponderance of the evidence, including documents that were provided by what we consider to be solid sources....If any definitive evidence to the contrary of our story is found, we will report it. So far, there is none.”— CBS Evening News, September 10, 2004, two days after his 60 Minutes reporting alleging President George W. Bush failed to fulfill his National Guard service. ■ “Anybody who knows me knows that I am not politically motivated, not politically active for Democrats or Republicans, and that I’m independent. People who are so passionately partisan politically or ideologically committed basically say, ‘Because he won’t report it our way, we’re going to hang something bad around his neck and choke him with it, check him out of existence if we can, if not make him feel great pain.’ They know that I’m fiercely independent and that’s what drives them up a wall.”— Rather quoted in USA Today, September 17, 2004. ■ “One way a reporter in this country should be judged is how well he or she stands up to the pressure to intimidate. I remember the first time someone accused me of being an ‘N-lover.’ There was a lot of that during the ’60s when I covered the civil rights movement....Then, when Watergate came into being....was the first time I began to hear this word ‘liberal’ as an epithet thrown my way....People who have very strong biases of their own, they come at you with a story: ‘If you won’t report it the way I want it reported, then you’re biased.’”— Near the end of his one-hour CBS News special, Dan Rather: A Reporter Remembers, which aired on his last night as CBS Evening News anchor, March 9, 2005. ■ “I know that it’s widely believed that CBS, NBC, ABC chock full of liberals. Not true. What it’s chock full of is people who wanted to give honest news, straightforward news, and voted both ways in many elections.”— Appearing on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show, May 30, 2012. ■ “The central thing to keep in mind is his [President Obama’s] opponents — you talk about taking them out to dinner, making nice with them — these people, politically, want to cut his heart out and throw his liver to the dogs.”— On The Chris Matthews Show, May 5, 2013. ■ “To call Trump a con man, as many have, is a disservice to the art of the con. By its definition a con requires deceit. But Trump has not tried to hide his lies or the sheer unrealistic audacity of his cartoonish policy positions.”— In a post-debate Facebook post, September 27, 2016. ■ “We haven’t had a president this psychologically troubled — I’m trying to use my language real carefully — we haven’t had a president this psychologically troubled in this way since at least Richard Nixon.”— Talking about President Trump on MSNBC’s The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell, June 1, 2017. ■ “Look many things about the age of Trump will make the stomach sicker than bad oysters.”— On TBS’s Conan, December 4, 2017. ■ “People say, ‘well, I’m not sure President Trump is racist.’ But racist is as racist does.”— On CNN Tonight with Don Lemon, August 5, 2019. ■ “What this presidential election is about is whether the country’s going to move more in the direction of white supremacy, or whether it’s going to move more in the direction of a multiracial, constitutional republic based on the principles of freedom and democracy.”— On MSNBC’s AM Joy, September 13, 2020. For more examples from our flashback series, which we call the NewsBusters Time Machine, go here.  

Christian philosopher Rene Girard once suggested that we face two types of evil: The evil of the far right, which he labeled as "Satan," and the evil of the far left, which he labeled "antichrist." The idea is that Lucifer was overtly proud and power-hungry. The Nazis were possessed by the Luciferian spirit.But the far left is more subtle. Its evil is also Satan-inspired, but it’s more deceptive because it seeks to pretend to be more Christian than Christianity. It’s antichrist because it uses the teaching of Christ like love for the individual, concern for the marginalized, and justice for the oppressed and seeks to redress these issues while denying the person of Christ and the saving message of the Gospel.The apostle John wrote about these kinds of teachers, saying, “They went out from us, but they were not of us” (1 John 2:19), and we can know that “This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son" (1 John 2:22).The conceit of the far left is to take the values and moral intuitions of the Bible while denying their connection to Christ himself.These antichrist doctrines give us compassion without sin, judgment without forgiveness, and love without salvation.This reveals that behind these movements is not just another satanic power-grab but one that works better in a society heavily influenced by Christian ideals. Concepts like compassion, empathy, and love are being untethered from the Gospel, truth, and the rest of Scripture and are being weaponized against those who actually follow Jesus.These antichrist doctrines give us compassion without sin, judgment without forgiveness, and love without salvation. They try to achieve justice through injustice, to overcome racism through racist acts, and to enforce equality through unequal application of the law.John was the last apostle to write his New Testament books, and he saw that the greatest threat to the church would not come from those teaching the antithesis of Christ but those who distort the message of Christ. Even in his day, he warned that “many antichrists have come” (1 John 2:18).That’s why we’re seeing Christianity succeed in Asia and Africa — because of its power to overthrow satanic strongholds — while at the same time shrinking in the West because the Western church hasn’t learned to overthrow the spirit of antichrist.One example that I’ve seen personally is how many churches are afraid to teach biblical truths about the family because it might make those experiencing broken families feel bad. This is empathy weaponized against the truth.Many churches want to be a hospital for the broken by neglecting our call to train disciples. It’s like a country deciding not to teach reading out of compassion for the blind. This is not Christ — this is antichrist.Yes, we need compassion and empathy for those who are suffering, but without falling prey to the strategy of antichrist to use kindness to shame us from speaking the truth.Antichrist in the West is growing and splitting up families, churches, and whole denominations.So when you hear Christian leaders hiding clear teachings in Scripture out of a toxic compassion, you can know that “this the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and is now in the world already. Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world" (1 John 4:3-4).This essay was adapted from an article originally published at Jeremy Pryor's Substack.

If you give me the choice between a game that offers me freedom, and the opportunity to shape the story and the direction with my own choices, versus a game that limits my freedom, and insists that I play and behave in a certain way, I’m always going to pick the latter. I like direction. I like vision. Fallout, Grand Theft Auto, and Red Dead Redemption 2 might be some of my favorite games of all time, but if I had to choose a side - if I had to belong to one kind of ‘church’ of videogame structure - then I’d be an acolyte of shorter, more linear, and more organized and governed games where my own agency is sacrificed for greater thematic cohesion. I’ll take the original Metal Gear Solid over Metal Gear Solid 5. The narrow corridors of the first Half-Life are more impactful to me than the gorgeous, wide-open world of No Man’s Sky. Continue reading XCOM 2 is the greatest strategy game I’ve ever played, and this is why MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Best strategy games, Best RTS games, Best 4X games

MSNBC's Kyle Griffin Trying to Pretend Trump's Win Wasn't ACTUALLY a Big Deal Goes All SORTS of Wrong