The Heir believes it's time for a likely final assembly on his player.  Everything else appears to be done.  We did a share on his player last month, and we thought it was going to be days rather than weeks, but the Heir made sure to take his time to make sure everything was right.  Keep in mind that this is a beta version of the player.  He wants to get back to it at the right time post-beta, but we're also hoping that once this beta is actually running on a regular basis, we'll be able to make some sort of bookend statement of conclusion to the great era of personal corruption in the culture that's happened nearly the past decade.  So here's that player pending that assembly:

Right now the Heir can't be any prouder to be American than he is right now, and in addition to our gradually getting over Trump and condemning selected instances of personal corruption in the culture, as well as getting back at China and big tech, he's proud that we now have vaccine rollout really rolling out.  More and more people in the U.S. are getting vaccinated over time, so that's yet another thing other countries can't laugh at us about.  The Heir wants to tastefully *not* laugh at the EU for how they're struggling apparently with a third wave of the coronavirus, not helped by member countries rejecting the AstraZeneca vaccine over blood clot concerns.  The Heir's aware that lives hang in the balance, so that's why he wants to have a measured response, but let's face it.  We're talking about countries with cobblestone streets and cultural moratoriums on skyscrapers that are not only known for universal health care, but good smarts and sophistication when it comes to taking care of their citizens.  Despite that, the US is generally ahead of the EU on vaccinations and the US is on track for a decline in the virus as opposed to a third wave in the EU.  So for a number reasons all those who were laughing at the US just months ago, the Heir turns to them and says, "don't hear ya laughin' now."

The Heir is seeing a breakdown in democracy in New York state as 50% of residents there polling as *not* wanting Cuomo to resign.  The Heir wants to ask that same 50%, do they believe the women?  If so, why don't you want Cuomo to resign?  It stands to reason, doesn't it?  That if they believe the women when they say Cuomo harassed them, that Cuomo really has no choice but to resign?  It almost seems to the Heir that this is Mass Stockholm Syndrome, and that Cuomo has bullied the state as well, so the 50% really needs to grow a couple and let that guy drop like a lead pipe already.  The Heir takes it that it's about 45% in the same poll that *do* want Cuomo to resign, and the Heir sees it as an instance of the *minority* being in the right, and the *majority* being in the wrong.  He's hoping that the minority will eventually cure the majority of their apparent pig-headedness already.

The Heir thinks Andrew Cuomo should just resign already.  The Heir doesn't see why we need an "investigation," because is it really going to tell us anything we didn't already know?  Just the fact Cuomo even called for an investigation already means the investigation is not truly independent.  The Heir's hoping that Tish James is wise to that fact, because the Heir sees it as both a fig leaf making it look as if Cuomo somehow cares about accountability, and the means by which he gets to evade that accountability.  Cuomo is clearly hoping the investigation lasts at least one news cycle, so that the negative coverage will just blow over.  It's a form of personal corruption, the same kind we in the Bachelor have been seeing in society at large since Ed Snowden 2013.  Because in the past people have seen how this kind of thing gets played out.  An accuser comes forward against a subject, the subject issues a categorical denial, another accuser comes forward, the subject says OK yeah I did it but it wasn't really serious, and then it just devolves from there.  It wouldn't surprise the Heir if at least three other women come forward in the meantime, and he strongly encourages them to do so.  He wants to remind people about how Cuomo joked about how people should read his book if in a 21-day quarantine during the Ebola Crisis of 2014.  Just do a web search on the terms "read a book or read my book cuomo" and scroll down until you get to search results reading "Cuomo Jokes That People Under Ebola Quarantine Can Pass Time Reading His Book."  That just shows you the mentality that underlies accusations of both sexual harassment and mismanaging info about nursing home deaths.  The Heir has noticed that the media already forgot about that second one, but along with his "read my book" joke it's just part and parcel of the whole Cuomo thing.

So here's the current pic of that Third Pillar Player the Heir has made available for me the Mentor to post here on our shares base.  The Heir's been working on it for roughly four years as the central element in his Bachelor Recovery from the personally corrupt 2010s.  When we asked him when it's going to be done, he couldn't give an exact ETA, but said to think of it in terms of days, not weeks.  I the Mentor think it's been nearly three years since we've put out an actual episode on audio, because the Heir needed time to get with the Player.  It was priority number one all this time, but we're hoping we can get back to doing actual episodes on audio sooner than later, as opposed to just doing shares on this base.  Also expect us to make a declaration in some form for when the Heir's Bachelor Recovery is over, and the meaning of the Recovery as a response to all the things he thinks went wrong in this culture in the past decade or so.

The Heir has at least one addendum to his Post-Pardon Paul Manafort Strategy, and he's listed that below.  When he placed that addendum clause in his original list the other day, he didn't mean addenda *just* from other people, but he also refers to himself doing so.  He's pretty sure most good and moral people will remain outraged about the Manafort Pardon almost indefinitely, and they may have good substantive and workable ideas to get to the unfinished business of justice.  But that's not why he got me the Mentor to do this entry.  He's been looking back over a month ago at the Capitol Riots, and he believes that the progressives between 2006 and 2013 were strongly considering something similar both to consummate their late 2000s purism, and in doing so emphasize their case that nothing Obama ever did was good enough.  But the Heir sees Ed Snowden as having taken the wind out of their sails when they felt it was just easier to circle the wagons around Ed Snowden, so they apparently shelved this plan until 1/6, when someone else did it for them.  But now the Heir observes they want to act like the White Hat types on this one, and they don't fool him for one second.

"Increase legal resources by 20%!"

Increase targeted enforcement and prosecutorial resources against mid- and high-level business crimes by 20%.

The Heir has gotten wind of the fact that the New York State Supreme Court has turned Cyrus Vance down flat on bringing state charges against Paul Manafort, so now the Heir has vowed to keep justice coming after Manafort.

"Here are suggestions I have for people, listed below."

1. Citizens bringing lawsuits against the State Of New York in response to the latter's court system's letting go of Manafort.
2. Citizens bringing lawsuits against Manafort to pay back the taxes he cheated on, plus interest, arguing against any kind of legal relief afforded him by having been pardoned, since the facts in prior court cases still remain.
3. Encouraging Paul Manafort's estranged daughter to seek full emancipation since she apparently had changed her last name after he took "blood money" from the Kremlin.
4. Encouraging social justice groups to pursue commutation or pardons for excessive felony convictions for misdemeanor offenses *specifically* because Manafort was let go, amounting to inequality.
5. If Paul Manafort were to die before he pays back the taxes he cheated on, civil lawsuits against his estate to pay back those taxes.
6. A historical society posting near Manafort's grave listing what Manafort was all about, contrary to any accolades he may give himself on his tombstone.
7. Anything equally as reasonable and legally feasible as the above the Heir may have missed.

So here's the Heir's promised followup to our Hail To The Chief a week ago.  As was with Obama, the Heir fully expects the progressives to tear Biden apart on anything they can, just because they could.  He doesn't buy, even for one second, that the progressives have somehow miraculously gained some measure of magnanimity because of the country's experience with Trump.  He highly doubts the progressives ever said, oh, I guess it's partly our fault Trump got in there and was as bad as he was.  Maybe if we as a movement didn't get with Big Tech or Ed Snowden, or looked the other way when the culture was steeped in personal corruption during the 2010s, unreparated in the 2020s, maybe we wouldn't have had Trump, but now that we have, now we should probably make some kind of concessions???  No, ain't gonna happen, is the Heir's thinking.  Instead, he fully expects the progressives to use a kind of "born-again" logic that somehow the past doesn't "objectively" exist, and therefore any of their actions in that same past they don't need to be held accountable.  So one way in which the Heir's observing the progressives making good on their upcoming War On Biden is via the social justice issue, in trying to kind of focus-group the talking point of Not Good Enough.  What if Biden's DOJ under either Merrick Garland or Mr. Garland's current acting predecessor implements all of BLM's recommendations they issued last year to answer for and prevent excessive force?  Not Good Enough.  What if Biden indicates he would never legalize pot nationally or Defund The Police?  Well then he's just Trump Lite.  This is probably tentative, and maybe not the final Anti-Biden Progressive talking point that would actually pick up steam, but the Heir's 90% sure there's going to be something.  And once there is, he's not going to be the least bit surprised.

The Heir believes that the coverage regarding these new variants is considerably blown out of proportion.  Because he heard it on audio, he's able to isolate where he thinks the media got it wrong.  If there was accompanying visual, everyone else is going to go, oh my gosh, there's these variants, we're all doomed!  Instead, he believes this to be a case of Mozart Study Syndrome, in which the layperson media glances over a synopsis of initial studies done on the variants, and comes up with an almost completely different takeaway from the study writers' own conclusions, and then put words in the writers' mouths accordingly.  Like with the Mozart Study back in the 90s, the Heir hopes the writers will come back and say, no we never said the variants were "more contagious," we said it could be more easily caught for those who don't have the proper antibodies, as opposed to the coronavirus proper, or something that's similarly nuanced and measured as per actual professionals' wont.  So the Heir thinks the media should honor the memory of Jamal Khashoggi, and not give themselves a black eye for their tendency *not* to level with their readers/listeners when it comes to medical accuracy.

We wish Biden/Harris the best of luck.  We do expect to follow up in coming days about what the Heir at least thinks we should expect for a post-Trump America.  Stay tuned.

We at the Bachelor condemn the violence at the Capitol a couple days ago, even though the Heir wasn't entirely sure it was over until about this morning.  But he wants to add a couple points to let all of you know that this isn't your boilerplate condemnation.  He also criticizes the progressives' apparent stance leading up to the riots of "our criticism of Trump was only and cynically political all this time so now that he's leaving office let's pretend he never existed."  The Heir's pretty sure that if the progressives really cared about law and justice, they wouldn't have turned a blind eye to what one in hindsight might see as discernible signs that something bad was going to happen in the form of Trump Pardonees like Michael Flynn, and George Papadopoulos, and the Heir's thinking also Roger Stone making speeches at rallies preceding the riots, one of which was the one that Trump made the apparent incitement to violence.  Seeing how at least five people died, including a Capitol police officer, the Heir's wondering whether those Pardonees could be implicated in involuntary manslaughter type charges, as well as aiding and abetting incitement to violence, thereby undoing their pardons with new charges.  If so, the Heir doesn't think the prosecutors should hold back on the Pardonees' criminal records in an opening statement in a trial, even on things they were pardoned from.  It's important that in this way at least the law not recognize the pardons.  The Heir believes the pardons were corrupt simply because Trump made them, period, because the crimes that were pardoned are a bad example for the children.  It's not even about a specific theoretical reason why Trump made the pardons, so the Heir thinks the analysts need not look too deeply into that.  So you heard that one right, that the Heir is getting with the Rachel Lovejoy defense, What About The Children.  Interestingly, the Heir observes that's the reason Betsy DeVos gave for her resignation, that she sees the riots themselves as a bad example for impressionable children, the Heir not being a Betsy DeVos fan by any means, seeing how Marco's Grandmother wants DeVos on charges for the past four years.  So besides getting me the Mentor to post the above, the Heir's thinking about what kind of actionable response he wants to write to his congresswoman with.

"Okay, Mentor, gimme some good ideas on this one.  Oh I meant to say please on that one, and to have reworded my request entirely so I'm not looking like such a spoiled brat, so that Trump isn't being a bad influence here.  Remember that thing at the Boy Scouts jamboree four years ago?  What was he *thinking*!?" 

 Happy New year from The Bachelor!

So here's the Heir's take on predictions that China will overtake the US economically by 2030.  Even if it does happen in the way the economists forecast, the Heir doesn't believe it'll last, maybe 2-3 years at the very most, and then he believes the US and China will be roughly tied for first before swapping first place every other year or so.  The Heir references the Atlantic article Why The US Will Outcompete China along with a Pew Research poll showing Unfavorable Views Of China Reach Historic Highs, but he also cautions the westernized type-a economists not to view cultural interactions with the severely limiting assumptions as he sees them doing.  For one thing, those who care about ongoing US independence need to brainstorm those things the US can do that China can't and never will.  For example, free speech and free and fair elections.  This past election the Heir observes as the most secure election that has possibly ever taken place.  This should set aside our reservations about our election process enough for China to be sick with envy that we even have elections at all.  Secondly, free speech demonstrations like the ones with Black Lives Matter.  Even with things like Lafayette Square, you still can't have our kinds of demonstrations in China.  If you tried, BLM's leadership would be captured and tortured and held indefinitely in a labor camp.  That's something China should be ashamed of, and should be dangled in front of them any time they want to play economic hardball, because then we'd make it clear to them we know whom we're dealing with.  This is the reason why the Heir believes China is in the basement on public opinion around the world as per the Pew poll, because public image does ultimately matter if China wants to do business with the free world.  Thirdly, the US stands ready to have its first woman of color head of state.  Maybe there was a 2 year empress in China's history 2000 years ago, but nothing like that in the past 100 years.  And you're never going to see the first Uighur Chinese president or the first Tibetan Chinese President like the way we had the first black President in 2008.  These the Heir points out as reasons why if China has any real hope of competing with the US economically, they also have to compete culturally, and that they can't do without a Chinese perestroika of some sort, which China already ruled out in the 2000s under Hu Jin Tao.  So the Heir proclaims, China take your first place if you really think it'll do you any good, because you should be careful what you wish for.

The Heir believes we as a culture need to be more proactive about the Trump Pardons, and is proposing, among other things, a Pardon Watch Committee.  He doesn't have specifics as to who should be on this committee or a charter, but for every hardened criminal Trump pardons, the Heir wants this Committee to propose alternatives for legally pursuing each criminal, until the very last one is brought to justice.  This he sees as an alternative to the more mild objections or endless analysis of the pardons, because he sees the analysis type responses as a waste of time.  The Heir observes that there are number of legal tools at the Committee's disposal, including pursuing state and local charges, bringing class action suits to the criminals' estates, and organizing protests outside each public appearance the criminals make.  One detail the Heir is 70% sure about is the estate suits, because it means America can pursue the criminals even beyond the grave.  He ensures that death is not the ultimate pardon on any given criminal, and that a response to an out-of-time criminal death be officious in nature.  In short, the Heir wants to make it clear to Stone/Flynn/Manafort that they will find absolutely no peace or comfort in the Trump Pardons.

"...until the very last one is brought to justice."

The Heir wants to respond to something an acquaintance of his said online regarding crime.  That person seemed to imply that just because crime stats have been steadily going down over the past 20-30 years crime itself shouldn't be taken seriously enough.  A person replied to the acquaintance saying that concerns about crime are only signs of emotional insecurity on the part of the concerned, and that it's indicative of a certain group of people.  The Heir has never believed that the progressives really believe in law or justice, and with this one he believes they proved it.  For one thing, it's been observed that any time you see crime stats, it's only *reported* stats.  There's crime that goes on that never gets reported, so the Heir doesn't think the decline in statistics is meaningful for this reason alone.  Also, it's never been unusual for progressives to dismiss the concerns of others that the progressives themselves don't share.  So much for compassion.  It was four years ago that the Heir really laid into one of them regarding the importance of sincerity on the part of public figures.  That person dismissed the value of sincerity as something that the Attack Dog News Network would value, but the Heir said, no it's not about the Attack Dog Network, because *I* value sincerity in public figures.  That person looked real embarrassed when the Heir told him that.  So now just before the New Year after a major election, the Heir's looking at those junk political emails that keep getting sent, and now he has an idea that he'll unsubscribe from most of them.  He sees it as a way of getting out of certain kinds of bad relationships.  He doesn't owe the progressives.  He believes they owe *him* and all Americans, and since they've not conceded accordingly, he wants nothing further to do with them.