Say, What Is The Scariest Book?

By William Teach October 23, 2025 – 5:13 pm

I have my own pick, but, I’ll get to it

What is the scariest book? 10 horror authors pick the most terrifying stories ever

Joe Hill doesn’t have to go very far to find the scariest book ever. Just up a rung on his family tree.

The bestselling horror author of “King Sorrow” knows he’s biased, but the “correct answer” is still “It” by Hill’s father, Stephen King.

“That’s the gold standard when it comes to scaring the pants off people. No one’s ever going to touch that,” Hill says. “The classics – ‘Dracula,’ ‘Frankenstein,’ ‘Dr. Jekyll and ‘Mr. Hyde’ – I love those books but they were written in a more conservative time. People didn’t go for the throat the way my dad went for the throat in ‘It.’ “

Dracula and Frankenstein are way more scary than the movies, but, yes, written for a different time, much different type of prose. But, hey, there was a vast difference between early Robert Heinlein and 70s and 80s Heinlein. These are from the 10 authors (each one has a description, worth reading

  • ‘Bird Box’ by Josh Malerman (saw the movie, didn’t read the book. Movie was somewhat scary)
  • ‘The Call’ by Peadar Ó Guilín (no clue)
  • ‘Geek Love’ by Katherine Dunn (no clue)
  • ‘The Haunting of Hill House’ by Shirley Jackson (never read, not much into ghost stories)
  • ‘Hex’ by Thomas Olde Heuvelt (never read, looks interesting, downloaded from Kindle Unlimited (lord knows I have enough books to read, though, and many coming out)
  • ‘Let’s Get Invisible!’ by R.L. Stine (heard of Stine, never read, though they were for kids)
  • ‘Penpal’ by Dathan Auerbach (no clue)
  • ‘Rosemary’s Baby’ by Ira Levin (never read, but, the movie is terrifying)
  • ‘The Ruins’ by Scott Smith (this is the same as the movie The Ruins, and, I suspect the book is terrifying, as the movie sure is. Love it)
  • ‘Salem’s Lot’ by Stephen King (I’ve read it, and seen the original mini-series, yeah, pretty scary, especially since I was in my teens when I read it)

Really, one of the scariest I’ve read was King’s Pet Cemetary. I had a broken ankle at the time, remember lying in bed late at night, nothing had really happened yet in the book, but, looking around getting the chills.

TW Brown, who disappeared during COVID, has a 12 book series “The Dead”. It is horrifying, and Brown makes sure you know this is straight fire horror. Very bad things happen during his zombie apocalypse, often coming out of the blue, and he writes in a way that doesn’t strain believability. For instance, in one of the main two groups, one guy gets bit. But, some are immune. He gets sick, gets better, then he and his longtime girlfriend have sex. Whelp, the zombie virus can be passed that way, and she quickly turns into one. In book 3, I believe, Brown kills off the main character in the other main group without fanfare, and just moves on. Because this is the apocalypse. Pig-tailed little girls get it. He did not play.

Bob Howard also has a zombie series, up to 13 books now. Each one tends to have a theme. Shelter For Now includes what happens to the rat population when mankind is not around to keep them down and they have lots of zombie food around. Scream For Now includes spiders (as I wrote in my review at Amazon “Thanks for the nightmares, Bob!”).

L. Marshall James has In Hell. Infected people. With a horrific ending. Stephen King’s short story The Mist, which is where the movie comes from, ends on a horror note. His short story The Jaunt, which I think is being made into a movie (bad idea, better as a short episode), is also horrific. Really, though, I don’t read that much horror, except zombie books. I watch a lot of horror movies, mostly read science fiction, with a smattering of zombie, adventure, and mystery. Though, Greig Beck’s books can go pure horror, like his Mysterious Island series (not sure if he was going to write a 4th book in the series, but, people complained a lot about the horror ending of book 3), and his current series The Devil’s Peak.

What do you think is the scariest book?

Read: Say, What Is The Scariest Book? »

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If All You See…

By William Teach October 23, 2025 – 1:00 pm

…are trees that will soon die from carbon pollution, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is The First Street Journal, with a post on girls refusing to compete against mental illness boys.

Read: If All You See… »

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Shutdown Follies: Food Aid Is The Next Thing To Run Out, Putting Democrats On The Hook

By William Teach October 23, 2025 – 10:30 am

Let’s remember, Democrats voted for a clean funding bill numerous times before deciding not to vote for the exact same thing, wanting a fight. Now, their constituents who Dems like to keep poor and voting Democrat will get hit

Food-aid cliff bears down on Democrats as shutdown nears 1-month mark

Missed paychecks, canceled infrastructure projects and mass firings haven’t yet convinced congressional Democrats to change their government shutdown stance. But they are now facing down another pressure point threatening a program they’ve long championed benefiting millions of Americans.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which helps feed more than 40 million people, will start to run out of funds Nov. 1, President Donald Trump’s USDA is warning. At least 25 states plan to cut off benefits starting on that date — including California, the overwhelmingly Democratic state with 4.5 million SNAP recipients.

The food-aid cliff has largely flown under the radar as Democrats focus on another Nov. 1 development: the launch of open enrollment for Affordable Care Act insurance plans in most states. They believe massive premium hikes prompted by the expiration of key federal subsidies will compel Republicans to relent and negotiate an extension at that time.

So far, despite the possible food assistance fallout in just over a week, top Democrats are pushing ahead and refusing to shore up the votes to reopen the government.

Asked Tuesday if the cliff would change his party’s calculus, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said it would not: “It should change Republicans’ calculus, that they should sit down and negotiate — negotiate a way to address this crisis.”

Let’s not forget what this is all about, as Speaker Johnson notes

(Breitbart) Let’s remember the true origins of the boondoggle that is American health care. Under Obamacare, Democrats wrote that bill. They passed it into law without a single Republican vote. During the COVID pandemic, Democrats created temporary Obamacare credits, again without a single Republican vote. Democrats then voted to extend those credits. They set the expiration date on and then when they held the majority in the Senate, it was Democrats who chose not to extend those credits beyond this year. Now, as we approach their own self imposed expiration date, now they are breathlessly insisting to you and on all the interviews that somehow it’s a Republican crisis.

They created this issue to start with. All the data said this would happen, though, COVID skyrocketed the costs, which was not part of the initial assessments. And here’s Hakeem Jeffries

Host Chris Hayes asked, “What do you say to people who say, look, the subsidies at issue were first passed during COVID as an emergency measure. They have been extended now, it’s 2025. Is there some fundamental failure of the Affordable Care Act or the entire system, if, absent this kind of band-aid, you’re going to see these sort of price spikes?”

Jeffries answered, “Well, listen, we believe that our healthcare system is broken and it’s in need of comprehensive reform. Republicans, of course, have aggravated that situation in the most extraordinary way and in a variety of [ways], largest cut to Medicaid in American history. Their policies are closing hospitals and nursing homes and community-based health clinics all across the country. Of course, they’re assaulting medical research, have basically shut that down in the country. They want to trigger the largest cut to Medicare at the end of the year, $536 billion. And, of course, this issue with their refusal to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits. (part of a much longer quote)

Wasn’t Ocare supposed to fix the health insurance system? Or, was it the whole healthcare system? No one was ever clear on that during the debate over Ocare all the way back when it was passed up through when it went into effect in 2013. Maybe they should be negotiating on how to actually fix the mess, not throw more and bigger subsidies. Perhaps the answer to this shutdown should be “let’s keep the subsidies for a year, let’s make sure people get their food assistance, work towards creating an insurance system that actually works, and open the government.”

Healthcare for illegals, DEI projects in foreign countries, get rid of border security, and more.

Read: Shutdown Follies: Food Aid Is The Next Thing To Run Out, Putting Democrats On The Hook »

Posted in Barking Moonbats, Democrats | 11 Comments | Trackback URL

Oh Noes: Climate Doom Driving Concern In Real Estate Market Or Something

By William Teach October 23, 2025 – 7:15 am

Not sure about you, but, I know plenty of real estate agents and people who have bought and plan to buy homes, and none of them are mentioning ‘climate change’ as a concern

After Helene, climate concerns ripple through North Carolina real estate market

When floodwaters from Hurricane Helene tore through western North Carolina last year, the damage extended far beyond washed-out roads and broken homes. It also changed how many people think about where they live and what their homes are really worth.

Now, climate risk is emerging as a new force in the state’s housing market, influencing everything from insurance premiums to buyer confidence. Real estate agents say the conversation has shifted, with stormwater maps and flood histories becoming nearly as relevant as square footage and school districts.

Ashley Rummage, a Raleigh-area Realtor who grew up in Boone, said Helene was a wake-up call.

“We really have an ethical duty to our clients to be more informed about sustainability and the built environment,” she said. “We need to be educated on how to advise people when it comes to where to look for floodplain information.”

In other words, an excuse to jack up home prices more, which are already up 150% since COVID.

Traditional FEMA maps, long used to determine flood risk, are now being supplemented and sometimes contradicted by new predictive tools. One example is the First Street Foundation database, which is integrated into Zillow listings through a “climate check” feature that estimates a property’s future vulnerability to flooding or wildfires.

The websites are the ones pushing this, but, the buyers mostly do not care. Now, they might care about purchasing in a flood zone, just like always. When I bought my townhome back in 2009 it was a concern, being pretty close to the Neuse River, but, those maps show me in a once in 5000 years zone. You’d really have to get like 30-40 feet of river rise to come close.

That kind of extra effort has become more common in a state where climate patterns and real estate trends are changing together. Sharon Gupton, president of the Raleigh Regional Association of Realtors, said awareness has grown dramatically among both buyers and builders since she started selling homes in the 1980s.

“Every homeowner and home seller is more inclined now to understand that weather affects so much of our properties,” Gupton said. “As agents, we talk through that with them. The public is just much more knowledgeable about how the environment affects our homes.”

It’s rather a good idea to understand flood patterns, is it not? Something that has always been a concern (though, ignored at times, like the idiots who build homes on the Outer Banks, which, being barrier islands, move), and, with all construction becoming denser, more roads, more pavement, etc, causing runoff patters to change, yeah, it’s a concern. Doesn’t have to be climate doom.

In North Carolina, those questions are colliding with the realities of rapid urban growth. Cities such as Raleigh and Wilmington are rewriting long-term development plans that integrate stormwater design, tree canopy protection and denser, more efficient housing.

“We’re seeing places flood that have never flooded before,” Gupton said. “So municipalities are rethinking zoning, in some cases going higher instead of wider.”

Nothing to do with climate, natural or anthropogenic. I saw flooding in a spot that I’d never seen flood when we had some seriously hard rain because it was running off from a construction site, where all the vegetation and trees were eliminated. These people are acting like this stuff has never happened before. Because they’re a cult.

Read: Oh Noes: Climate Doom Driving Concern In Real Estate Market Or Something »

Posted in AGW Scaremongering, Global Warming, NC News | 1 Comment | Trackback URL

Bummer: SCSF Next Target Of Immigration Operation

By William Teach October 23, 2025 – 7:00 am

I still maintain that the Trump admin should prioritize going to areas that voted for him to scoop up the illegals first, but, you do have to utterly enjoy and be entertained by the apoplexy from Democrats when the target is a liberal city like Sanctuary City San Francisco

Major federal immigration operation headed to San Francisco Bay Area

The Trump administration has dispatched more than 100 federal agents, including from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, to Coast Guard Base Alameda and they will begin to arrive Thursday, according to a source familiar with the operation.

In other cities, National Guard deployments have come in support of immigration enforcement operations, which President Donald Trump has said are critical to protecting U.S. jobs and public safety.

The surge of federal agents could set the stage for a potential showdown between the Trump administration and San Francisco’s leaders, who have said the city does not need federal intervention and have vowed to sue to block any National Guard deployment.

The source spoke to the Chronicle on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. The Coast Guard is part of the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees Customs and Border Protection.

Yeah, well, in a showdown SCSF loses, as Los Federales have primacy on immigration matters as stated in the US Constitution.

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday responded to the surge of federal agents on social media.

“California has seen enough,” Newsom wrote. “President Trump and Stephen Miller’s authoritarian playbook is coming for another of our cities, and violence and vandalism are exactly what they’re looking for to invoke chaos. Help keep yourself and your communities safe. Remain peaceful.”

It would have been more fun if the deployment was in Sacramento, the capital of the People’s Republik Of California. Anyhow, one estimate is that illegals, adults and children, cost the PRC almost $30 billion a year. That’s $7K per legal resident. Another hard left estimate states illegals contribute $8.5 billion yearly. How’s that math work out?

(Mercury News) In San Francisco, Mayor Daniel Lurie on Wednesday threatened to sue the Trump administration if it sent National Guard troops to the city, and he announced an executive directive ordering city agencies to coordinate in support of immigrant families. At a news conference, he said the influx of federal agents would only undermine efforts to combat crime and the city’s drug crisis.

“Having the military posted in front of our schools, restaurants and office buildings will hinder our progress and let chaos get in the way of our recovery,” Lurie said in a virtual news conference.

Too bad, judges keep ruling in favor of the National Guard deployments. Hey, it might decrease the crime in SCSF.

Read: Bummer: SCSF Next Target Of Immigration Operation »

Posted in Illegal Immigration | 9 Comments | Trackback URL

UN Head Unhappy Skeptics Are Allowed To Speak

By William Teach October 22, 2025 – 2:56 pm

This is the same guy who took a long, fossil fueled trip to Nepal to take a publicity photo. And Antarctica. The same guy who oversees 40,000+ heading to UN IPCC COP conferences in far off places, this year being in Brazil, where they razed a section of the Amazon to build a road

UN chief calls for ‘fight’ against climate disinformation

Green Climate Thought PoliceGuterres issued a robust defence of “clear-eyed” climate science and data, without which, he said, the world would never have understood the emergence of the “dangerous and existential threat of climate change”.

“We must fight mis- and disinformation, online harassment, and greenwashing,” Guterres said at the UN’s World Meteorological Organization (WMO) weather and climate agency in Geneva.

“Scientists and researchers should never fear telling the truth.”

Guterres’s remarks will be seen in some quarters as a riposte to Trump’s speech at the United Nations in New York last month, in which the Republican president championed fossil fuels and derided green technologies.

“Fight” gives climate cultists the green (sic) light to attack people physically.

“Global warming is pushing our planet to the brink,” said Guterres.

Except for the 40K attending COP conferences. And all the Warmists who drive fossil fueled vehicles.

The UN secretary-general said countries needed strong domestic climate action plans in time for the summit, urging nations to address the problem of climate disasters at source.

Countries had those, and so many are now backtracking, not wanting to destroy their economies.

(Tribute India) He advocated three areas of urgent action worldwide.

Governments, he said, must embed early-warning systems across their policies, institutions and budgets by bringing together meteorological and hydrological services into national disaster risk reduction mechanisms, including through legislation.

To reach every community globally, he said, requires a surge of financing and cited the consensus at The Financing for Development Conference in Sevilla in June to “unlock more finance for developing countries” and to “reform global financial institutions so they better meet the needs of developing countries.”

More money and control of financial institutions via the government. Funny how it’s always about Modern Socialism and never about Warmists practicing what they preach.

Read: UN Head Unhappy Skeptics Are Allowed To Speak »

Posted in AGW Socialism, Global Warming | 3 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach October 22, 2025 – 1:36 pm

…is carbon pollution infused world killing beer, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Jihad Watch, with a post on investigators finding no actual evidence of famine in Gaza.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 1 Comment | Trackback URL

Democrat Running To Defeat Susan Collins Has Nazi Tattoo

By William Teach October 22, 2025 – 10:30 am

Remember all the furor over Pete Hegseth’s Christian tattoos from the US media, how they said it was disqualifying? Weirdly, I’m not seeing any of that with this guy

Sanders-backed Democrat who accuses Israel of ‘genocide’ has Nazi ‘Totenkopf’ tattoo

An oyster farmer and progressive military veteran running an insurgent campaign for Maine’s Democratic Senate nomination admitted this week to having had a Nazi tattoo for nearly two decades.

Graham Platner shared a video of himself shirtless, sporting the tattoo, on a popular progressive podcast. He denied that he himself ever held Nazi views, instead claiming he had gotten the tattoo while “inebriated” as a young adult without knowing what it meant.

Since launching his campaign this summer, the 41-year-old Platner has picked up steam in left-wing circles for his populist positions, including calling Israel’s military campaign in Gaza a genocide.

The political neophyte has won endorsements from progressive leaders, including Vermont’s Sen. Bernie Sanders, who is Jewish. Morris Katz, the Jewish campaign strategist behind Zohran Mamdani’s digital ads for New York City mayor, made a campaign launch video for Platner.

As of Sept. 30, according to campaign finance records, Platner led his Democratic rivals in campaign donations with $3.2 million in contributions. At his rallies, the biggest applause comes when he delivers lines like “Our tax dollars can build schools and hospitals in America, not bombs that destroy schools and hospitals in Gaza.”

No calls from the NY Times or Washington Post for him to drop out, not even performative ones, because the Democrat base supports the aims of Nazis, as they’ve aligned themselves with the Islamists and Jew haters.

This week, a recent video of a shirtless Platner also surfaced in which he can be seen sporting a chest tattoo of a Totenkopf, a Nazi-era skull-and-crossbones design favored by SS officers. “Totenkopf,” or “Death’s Head,” was also the name of the division of officers who guarded the concentration camps.

He claims he got while drunk as a skunk while on leave in 2007 without knowing the meaning. And that is what he is telling the media in the US, which do not seem very interested

However, quoting an anonymous former acquaintance of his, Jewish Insider reported on Tuesday that Platner had referred to the ink as “my Totenkopf” more than a decade ago and would frequently take his shirt off at the Washington, D.C., bar where he worked at the time. “He said it in a cutesy little way,” the source said. Jewish Insider additionally reported that Platner had met with other men with Nazi links, including one neo-Nazi who is running for a seat on Bangor City Council.

Huh. He claims he is going to have it removed. You know, now that he is busted. But, will he? Will Democrats vote for him? Are we surprised by him being accepted by the Democratic Party?

Read: Democrat Running To Defeat Susan Collins Has Nazi Tattoo »

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Washington Post: Hey, You Need To Stop Eating So Many Burgers

By William Teach October 22, 2025 – 7:15 am

Someone seriously spent time putting this “study” together. Hopefully not with taxpayer money

Your diet’s impact on the planet depends on where you live. Look up your city.

climate cowResearchers have documented for years that eating beef, pork and chicken has a significant environmental impact, especially when it comes to heating the planet.

But it’s far from a uniform impact. What you eat, and where you eat it, can have a big effect on how much you’re contributing to climate change, according to a study published Monday in the journal Nature Climate Change.

For the first time, researchers calculated the planet-warming pollution emitted from raising the beef, pork and chicken Americans eat — their carbon “hoofprint” — for every town and city in the country.

Across the country, eating beef is the bigger contributor to harmful pollutants. But it’s not as simple as that. Its origins matter. Eating a steak or a burger in Milwaukee, where the meat comes from nearby dairy cows, generates fewer emissions than in Oklahoma City, where beef tends to come from feedlots.

Mind your own business, but, this is interesting

Can you guess the top three emitting cities in this analysis? Hint: They’re where the most mouths to feed are: New York, Los Angeles and Chicago. When adjusted for emissions per capita, though, researchers found little connection between how much a town eats and its climate impact.

So, three massive Dem cities full of lots of climate cultists. Weird!

What lowers the hoofprint?
“You don’t have to cut out any single meat to have really significant shifts in your hoofprint,” Goldstein said, adding that just swapping half of the beef you eat for other protein can move the needle. The researchers modeled impacts to emissions from simple lifestyle changes that can add up to a 51 percent drop in one’s hoofprint.

“The average American eats five servings of beef a week,” Goldstein said. “So, all right, you can still have two burgers a week.” Goldstein is not a vegetarian, he said, and has a burger once in a while.

Or, you can mind your own f’ing business, and leave the rest of us alone.

Read: Washington Post: Hey, You Need To Stop Eating So Many Burgers »

Posted in AGW Idiocy, Global Warming | 10 Comments | Trackback URL

Met Police Refuse To Allow Anti-Immigration Weekend Protest

By William Teach October 22, 2025 – 7:00 am

The UK is lost

Same police have no problem with anti-Jew and anti-Israel protests. Sure, they might arrest a lot of folks (who mostly are let go without charges), but, do not seem to do much about calls to kill Jews and erase Israel

(BBC) A planned demonstration by the UK Independence Party (UKIP) has been banned by the Metropolitan Police from taking place in an area with a large Muslim population.

The force said the move was because the gathering, due to take place in east London on Saturday, bore a “realistic prospect of serious disorder”.

Initially advertised as a march from Whitechapel station and later revised to be an assembly in the same area, it was part of a series of events to “reclaim Whitechapel from the Islamists”, the Met said.

UKIP said the police had “caved into the Islamists and violated our democratic right to peaceful assembly in Whitechapel this Saturday”.

Public Order Act conditions mean UKIP cannot hold its protest in Whitechapel or anywhere else in the borough of Tower Hamlets.

The Elites bring in millions of people incompatible with Britain, people who demand Britain assimilate to them, who allow Sharia law and all the rest, but, if you are a British citizen and do not like what is happening to your country you are banned.

Read: Met Police Refuse To Allow Anti-Immigration Weekend Protest »

Posted in Europe, RoP | 6 Comments | Trackback URL
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