It has been depressing to watch politics over the last several weeks, but the Christmas season reliably pulls me out of all that. We’ve put up the tree and trimmed out our new/old house, and I’ve had the first few fires in the fireplace lately. As is my tradition, I’ve re-read The Christmas Carol, and I’ve been listening to a lot of great Christmas music.
This year I’ve got Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring (you can’t go wrong with Bach) and Come Thou Long Expected Jesus (my favorite recent version is on a website called Reawaken Hymns), in heavy rotation. But I also appreciate secular seasonal songs, and I’ve been enjoying various versions of ephemera like Santa Baby.
Also, in the wake of the recent leftist idiocy about Baby It’s Cold Outside, I’ve immersed myself in that one again. Would it shock you to know that Ray Charles probably did it best? Not if you’ve been paying attention.
I guess I’m saying that I’m a pretty ecumenical celebrator of Christmas, and I spurn no one of good will.
Except Zoroastrians. They know why.
But enough about that contemplation of a loving God and our eternal souls – there’s a screwed up culture to discuss.
On the “reap what you sow” front, let’s look at two stories:
1.The Boy Scouts of America are filing for bankruptcy. On the one hand, that is a sad commentary on our current cultural hostility to the kinds of values that scouting used to be associated with, and it might have been inevitable. But recent attempts to fashion a new, “woke” Boy Scouts certainly didn’t help.
Brief aside: As someone who loves the English language, I beg you to stop mis-using “woke.” It is NOT an adjective. It’s the past tense of the verb “wake.”
As in, “When I woke, I found that I’d pummeled into unconsciousness the hipster doofus who’d told me that I need to be more woke about the environment.”
Back to the Boy Scouts:
So they decided to admit girls in 2013, confusing many of us. “Wait a minute,” we said, pensively. “So you’re a girl. And you’d like to join some sort of a scouting organization? Gee it’s too bad that no one has invented such a group for girls. I mean, they could call it the Girl Scouts, and then girls would have a place to–. Oh, wait.”
Then they decided that admitting gay scouts, and later gay scout leaders was a great idea. Because the higher-ups in scouting were trying to teach the benighted people of America that there are really no differences between the sexes, and no reason to take sexual attraction into account when putting a bunch of adolescents together in such activities as staying away from home overnight, sleeping in cabins, swimming and showering together, etc..
And now the benighted people of America have given their response to the BSA: enjoy bankruptcy, you morons.
- The Weekly Standard is closing. This one saddens me too, because they hosted a lot of very smart thinkers and writers, and I once respected Bill Kristol. But he has lost his mind about Trump, and for some reason the Standard has gone full Titanic, steering toward the Trumpian iceberg. But the original Titanic, once it hit the iceberg and started taking on water, did not circle around and intentionally hit it again, and then again.
And the original captain did not ask his first mate, “Hey, who are all of those people jumping over the side?” To which the original first mate did not reply, “Our subscribers. They don’t seem to want to keep crashing into the iceberg over and over again. Plus, the iceberg is now wearing a giant red hat and calling us all losers!”
But Bill Kristol was all, “Full speed ahead! Republicans should vote for Hillary!”
And now, the icy waters of bankruptcy close over the wake (not the woke!) of a once-lively conservative publication. RIP, Weekly Standard.
“Yes, Martin,” I’m sure that you’re saying. “You’re obviously right. Again. When groups and individuals make bad choices and fail miserably, they are punished. Also, I agree that you got screwed on that People magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive 2018 thing. If you and Idris Elba both had sexy 2019 calendars out, I would totally buy yours.”
First, thank you for your support. But it’s too little too late, because in the lead up to the award, I became a little over-confident, and gave a vanity publisher a big down payment. And now I’ve got a garage full of unsellable “People’s Sexiest Man Alive: Martin Simpson” 2019 Calendars sitting where my car should be, and my wife is furious.
But to your first comment: I’ve noticed that there is one place where failure is rarely punished: the Left.
I know you’ve heard it a million times, but socialism has turned huge swaths of the planet into rust belts and gulags and graveyards, and college kids are still wearing Che t-shirts. Socialized medicine has led to first world countries with third world hospitals, but half of our citizenry is still clamoring for it. Decades of exclusively leftist governance has turned once-proud American cities into blighted wastelands, but the lefties who flee the hellholes they created vote for Beto O’Houlihan McMurphy to try to do the same thing to Texas.
Ugh! Even on an individual level, lefties tend to fail upward. Bernie Sanders never had an honest job in his life, until he started getting elected to local office as a socialist in Vermont in his 40s. And he was almost president!
Or take an even better example: the google-eyed It Girl of the Left, Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez. She’s almost 30 years old, and her curriculum vitae so far consists of being an incompetent bartender. (I have it from very reliable sources that if you ordered a scotch and soda from her, you’d be equally likely to get a glass of Pine-sol and a sugar cube, or a V-8 with a dandelion garnish.)
After an undistinguished career in drink mixery, she decided to run for a House seat in a heavily blue district against the semi-animated corpse of a soul-less leftist hack who hadn’t stepped foot in the district since the close of hostilities in the Spanish-American War. Because it was an off-year primary and voter turnout was very low, she managed to win with a get-out-the-vote effort that focused primarily on a tight-knit group of both Ocasios and Cortezes.
So now she’s off to Washington to represent the people of her district, whom I wish well in their ongoing efforts with their methadone treatment. (The plan’s not going to work unless you work the plan, people.)
A few weeks ago she spoke to a temple in Queens, and came out with the startling news that she’s recently discovered that she is Jewish. (Hat tip to Bill Leggott, who reminded me that I’ve missed this golden opportunity for mockery.) I haven’t been able to find video of this speech, but if anyone finds it, PLEASE post a link.
But even without seeing the link, I’m going to put my wizard hat on (Yes, I’ve got a wizard hat. I keep it on the top shelf of the closet, between the sombrero and the conquistador’s helmet.) and predict what it looks like: Big smiles from Alexandra that show off her undeniably cute dimples, hugs to sweet little Jewish ladies, some ridiculous platitudes delivered with energetic obliviousness, followed by her standing there with an expression that you’ll recognize if you’ve watched a recent NFL game, when a player was being taken into the tent for a concussion protocol.
If the rabbi allowed her to try lighting the menorah, I’d say there’s a 50/50 chance that she partially burned her own clothing.
In other news, the leaderships of both Jewish and Italian-American anti-defamation groups have recently opened high-level negotiations. So far, the Italians have suggested that they will claim Ocasio-Cortez, if the Jews will take Michael Avenatti. But the Jewish response was, “Whoa. Hang on. Give us a chance to think about this. You might need to take Michael Cohen, too.” The Italians came back with, “Only if you’ll accept the Mooch.”
The talks are still on-going.
But lest we despair about the way things are going here, let’s remember that it could be worse. We could be the English.
Consider the story – which I swear to God I am not making up — that a British school will now be teaching primary school children “that ‘all genders’ can have periods.” The story goes on to say, “Advice on menstruation will be issued to boys and girls after Brighton and Hove City Council passed a motion to help minimise discrimination against the trangender community.
So the next time that obnoxious British guy in the next cubicle is mocking you because Americans have elected Maxine Waters and Nancy Pelosi, you now have a pre-loaded reply: At least our schools aren’t teaching our sons how to handle their periods!
Come on, England! You gave us Magna Carta, Shakespeare, Churchill, the Beatles, and Benny Hill. Has it really come to this?
And it’s not just literature and government and great music and hilarious videos of nurses running around in lingerie. Look at the history of medicine, and you’ll find an over-representation of great British docs and discoveries. They came up with first way to measure blood pressure and the first smallpox vaccine, they pioneered the use of general anaesthetic, and on and on.
In fact, a Brit (Stephen Hales, 1677-1761) first came up with surgical forceps, and 200 years later a group of British pharmaceutical chemists working in Kent first synthesized Viagra.
And now you’re telling me that British school boys are being taught that they can benefit from the use of forceps to gently ease the delivery of the children from their non-existent wombs, while British school girls are being taught that Viagra can help them increase their sexual performance with the genitalia that THEY DON’T HAVE! ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND?! OH! OOOHHHHHH!” (Yes, English people, you could all learn something from a late, great American named Sam freaking Kinison!)
My only hope is that the kids are going to be smart enough to recognize their educrat overlords for the leftist dolts they are, and ignore them.
And if any British schoolboys happen to be reading this column, I have two messages for you.
First, yes, Nigel, I know that Idris Elba is British, and he was once in contention to be the next James Bond, but I don’t care: he’s dead to me.
Second, if you ever find yourself bleeding profusely from your genital region, ignore the idiotic mewlings from your teachers that this is just a natural part of the process during which a young boy becomes a woman. Put down the chain saw and pick up your severed body part, and go to the closest hospital straightaway.
If, 30 days later, you find yourself bleeding from the genitalia again, this is NOT a sign that Aunt Flo is back for her monthly visit. It’s a sign that you need to take a good long look in the mirror, and determine whether you’re the kind of person who should be operating power tools.
On that terribly inappropriate note, I want to wish all of CO nation a very Merry Christmas!
Martin Simpson 