And We Have a Winner! Plus, a Note to My Loyal Subscribers

Better late than never

FIRST THE WINNER!

For new subscribers, the post below is from January 26, and it was a follow-up to the contest originally announced on January 16. No one was originally able to identify the long-haired mystery man on the far right. After I posted a more current picture (also below) on January 26,

Jodie Glore

was first out of the gate with a close guess. The mystery man is indeed a judge in a Trump case but not the judge and case that Jodie said. And, as a former infantry officer and proud Vietnam veteran, Jodie knows better than most people where close counts. Sorry, Jodie.

A short time later,

Amdream23

chimed in. I don’t know Amdream23 personally, so I have no idea if he or she has ever thrown a hand grenade, but he [that’s the generic pronoun, since using “he or she” repeatedly gets unwieldy] knows that close doesn’t count so he scored a bullseye: Arthur Engoran. Art (to his friend) is the attention-seeking judge who presided over the phony fraud case against Trump featuring the valuation of his Mar-a-Lago estate.

I will resist the temptation to drift off into a discussion of that travesty of a trial but will just come through and honor my promise: Amdream23 will not only get this public recognition but will get a complimentary free subscription to this Substack account.

AND NOW THE NOTE TO MY LOYAL SUBSCRIBERS

Having made a complementary paid subscription the grand prize, it needs to be worth something, no?

As I have explained previously, I did not begin writing here with the idea that I would make any money from it. Because that was not my objective, I originally set up this account for free subscriptions only. But then some people began attempting to pay for subscriptions. I knew that many of these just wanted to show their appreciation for the time and effort that goes into most of my articles posted here. And because I wanted my writing to reach as large an audience as possible, I continued to make almost all of my post available to everyone, both paid and unpaid subscribers.

I am now going to modify that practice somewhat by beginning to post more articles that are available to paid subscribers only. I am doing that for two related reasons: (1) If people care enough to want to support my writing financially, I feel morally obligated to give them something more for their $$$; and (2) Even though I am not doing this out of a money-making motive, when someone does like it enough to donate, then frankly that motivates me and gives me additional incentive to work harder and to produce something worthwhile.

I also am going to reduce the cost of paid subscriptions from the $80 annual or $8 monthly that Substack sets as the default rates, to $50 annually or $5 monthly.

Like most rules, this one has exceptions: (1) if one of my paid-subscription-only articles is published by a national platform such as The Federalist, it will then be available to all the world. If that happens (as it did recently here), then I will modify that Substack post to make it available to everyone. (2) If anyone would like to have a paid subscription but is experiencing such financial difficulties that they cannot afford it, then I will comp them a free subscription for some period of time. If that applies, just email me privately at johnalucas6@outlook.com. I trust everyone and will not question or attempt to vet anyone who tells me that. Honor system rules apply.

So, if anyone cares to get a paid subscription, that is fine and I appreciate it. I will try my best to give you value for your hard-earned money. But for those who don’t, please stay on. I anticipate that most of my articles will remain available to everyone.

Thanks to all.

Bravo Blue

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The prior post:

On January 27 [sic] [this date was a typo], I posted the above photo. I offered a complimentary year’s paid subscription to this Substack to the first reader to correctly identify the person on the far right by putting their name in the comments.

Votes are now in. The contenders are:

Squeaky Fromm; Mike Flynn; Patty Hearst; Bill Gates; Peter Frampton; Pablo Escobar; Ron DeSantis; John Kerry; Anthony Blinken; and Jake Sullivan.

And the winner is ……… NO ONE!

So the field is wide open again. Please submit new entries in the comments section below. You do not have to have participated the first time in order to try now. Here are a couple of hints:

The person clearly is a never Trumper. That doesn’t narrow it down much though, does it?

So, here is a somewhat bigger hint – a more recent photo below.

To avoid overloading the inboxes of readers who are not interested in following this (more the pity), until we have a winner I will post any additional hints in the comments section of this post, instead of in a new post going to everyone. So if you are interested, keep your eyes on the comments section below

Here he is again.

Oh, and tell your friends, too.