Month: March 2025

Thinking about Ayn Rand, and Ungrateful Beggars (posted 3/28/25)

I’m working on a column about immigration for Monday, which has involved doing a little research on various immigration acts that the US passed starting in the 1870s, in a period of transition between our early nationhood and the 20th century world power that we became. 

But as I was looking into that topic, an idea kept niggling at me: the explosion of resentful, entitled people who are reacting so hysterically to every aspect of the Trumpkrieg™ that is now two months old.

As soon as I noticed this idea cropping up in many different contexts, I thought of Ayn Rand’s novel Atlas Shrugged, which is a terrible great book.  Or possibly a great terrible book, depending on how you look at it. 

It’s terribleness comes from three primary flaws.  Rand was a curmudgeon, and her grimly doctrinaire atheism makes large swaths of the book an irritating slog.  Her moral worldview is cartoonishly black-and-white, which often makes her characters cardboard stand-ins for intellectual tropes.  And the book is wildly overwritten; my copy comes in at 1168 pages, and it could easily be a tight, fast-moving 250-pager.

But its greatness lies in two strengths. Rand despised totalitarian leftism the way we all should: utterly and passionately.  And the central conceit of the book was an answer to the fascinating question, “What would happen to a corrupt leftist society if its most productive citizens began purposefully disappearing?”    

Written in the mid-1950s, it presciently (if exaggeratedly) predicts the flight of productive citizens from blue to red states that’s been going on over the last 30 years or more.  As CA, NY, and IL get more greedy and socialist, talented people shrug, and vote with their feet, and take their skills and net worth to TN, TX and FL.

The most direct echoes from the book involve the kind of virtue-signaling social justice warriors who simultaneously look down on and criticize the successful people and inventors they depend on.  The book is full of Bernie Sanders-es railing about how the rich don’t pay their fair share, and Musk-hating Tesla-vandalizer types – and the villains totally agree with so many in the “resistance” now.  They’re all convinced that beggars have the absolute moral right to be choosers.    

I’m seeing this phenomenon on many foreign policy fronts, now that we’re learning how much foreign aid we’ve been indiscriminatingly showering on the rest of the world.  Apparently we’ve had a non-stop convoy of C-130 flights going 24-7, shoving giant pallets of cash out the rear cargo hold at 15-minute intervals, all over the world.

And yet the Europeans want to lecture us that we’re not paying enough for the UN, and NATO, and the “March of AK-47s” program to provide Russian small arms to jihadi toddlers in Gaza.  (It’s like the March of Dimes, except that instead of collecting dimes, we’re disbursing rifles.) 

Then, when Trump suggested that we might be shutting down the money flow to Ukraine, many Europeans lost it.  In an earlier column, I referred to the six- or seven-nation poll showing that around 70% of Europeans want Zelensky to get a lot more support… but only around 20% of them want to give him any of that themselves.

Strange.  Putin is an ocean away from us, but right on their doorstep, and they are very adamant that WE do whatever it takes to keep him within his own borders.   

Meanwhile, on the other side of the globe, Australian universities are freaking out after the Trump administration sent them a questionnaire asking whether they’ve got ties to commie or socialist parties, receive funding from China, or recognize genders other than the two real ones.  The wrong answers could potentially jeopardize $386 million US dollars (over a third of what Australia spends on research each year) in research grants.

The Aussie profs have their lab coats over their heads, demanding an “emergency meeting” with their Prime Minister about this.  One of them was “astounded” at the questions, saying that, “if this was any other country, it verges on foreign interference.”

Good lord!  Am I going to have to break out my Sam Kinison filter to explain to that dolt how she could avoid such pesky “foreign interference?”  (“Hey sweetie, you know what you might think about doing?  PAYING FOR YOUR OWN FREAKING RESEARCH! OH!! OHHHHH!!!!!”)

Seriously, why are we paying for Aussie scientists to do research?  Australia is a first-world, Anglophone nation.  They’re not some struggling sub-Saharan country desperately battling a snake-borne diptheria strain (which Fauci probably paid to create in a crumbling lab in Mombasa) that is the leading cause of death among their citizens!

Also, are American scientists broken?  If not, and if expensive research is worth doing, why don’t we do that here at home? 

And it’s not just foreigners who are stamping their feet in their clunky foreign shoes, and cussing us out in their comically non-English languages.  Lots of Americans are also threatening to hold their breath and give us the silent treatment if we don’t pony up the dough they’re used to getting.

Some of them are government workers in the crucial fields of grievance mongering, racial and gender bean-counting, and maintaining a minimal pulse rate while “working” from home.  And some of them are actually doing legitimate work that we can’t afford anymore, now that we’re the brokest nation in the history of nations.  

Woke universities are similarly out of sorts.  They’ve been happily demonizing and excluding conservatives from their programs and campuses, and rhetorically (and for all I know, literally) fellating terrorist supporters and their cosplaying allies, while gorging themselves on grant money provided by the (despised) conservative majority in the country. 

But when Trump said that the federal money flow will stop if they don’t change their ways, they became outraged, and then terrified.  Just like the sanctuary state and city governors and mayors, when they found out that they’re going to have to face the natural consequences of their arrogant defiance of our immigration laws.   

The purest distillation of this attitude appeared in the story of Trump’s proposed changes to the SNAP (i.e. food stamps) program.  The GOP is proposing a bill to ban the use of SNAP benefits to buy junk food and sodas, and the people who rely on you and me to buy their food are not happy about it. 

In a sane world, this wouldn’t require any debate.  We know that the leading health problems among poor Americans – and many non-poor Americans! – are caused by unhealthy diet and obesity, and that taxpayers are already paying exorbitant costs for welfare recipients’ health care.   So who could possibly argue that we need to buy junk food for the poor?

Big junk food companies, beggars who are surprisingly picky eaters, and the Democrats who need the sick-and-fat vote, that’s who! 

A couple of their arguments are transparent dodges.  They say it will be very hard to alter how the SNAP program works in this way.  They also say that nobody can really define “junk food,” because hey man, one person’s junk food is another person’s healthy snack, isn’t it?

Nope. This argument is even easier to debunk than its older counterpart, “How do you define pornography?”  Because you know both when you see them. 

Show any reasonably intelligent adult Stormy Daniels in a g-string, washing down a plate of chocolate chip cookies with a Mountain Dew, and he’ll point and say, “Why is that porn star gorging herself on that junk food?”

But their other arguments are even worse.  They say that the proposed bill limits personal choice, and infringes on the freedom to eat whatever you want.  Which would be true, if you were paying for the food yourself.   

But since you’re not paying for the food yourself, you should get the same offer my dad gave me when I was a kid and looking at a plate of meatloaf (again!) that he bought with his Northern Illinois Gas Company salary:  “You’ve got two choices: take it, or leave it.”

They’re also worried that, and I quote, “The bill could stigmatize SNAP recipients, making them feel judged or shamed for their food choices.” 

Hey kids, you know what else will make you feel shamed and stigmatized?  Walking around looking like J.B. Pritzker, (D)irigible – IL, unable to feel your feet (which you also can’t see), and wondering if that means that the diabetes is almost to the point where the amputations will need to start.

So get yourself off the Mountain Dew, AND the government teat.

You’ll feel better.  And we will too.  

Hamas delenda est!

My Review of Snow White, and Peter Dinklage (posted 3/26/25)

I’m not a professional film critic.

But lest you are tempted to disregard the following thoughts, I do know a thing or two about movies.  For example, I know that Christopher Walken and Denzel Washington are worth watching in pretty much every movie they are in, and that Clint Eastwood hasn’t made a bad movie since that goofy orangutang one a million years ago.  (And even that one had a few moments.)

I know that Quentin Tarantino is super weird but talented, and he’s got the best batting average after Eastwood. 

I know that the first two Godfathers, No Country for Old Men, Unforgiven, and Open Range are five of the best 20 movies ever made.  And that True Romance, Groundhog Day and Field of Dreams are the most overlooked sleepers that should also be on that list.

In fact, if you haven’t seen True Romance, correct that this weekend.   Tarantino wrote it, and Tony Scott directed.  Brad Pitt’s bit part as a stoner is pitch perfect, and an unknown James Gandolfini as a low-level hitman trying to explain what it’s like to kill people is mesmerizing.  And the scene in which Walken interrogates Dennis Hopper is a classic. 

Walken explains the Sicilians’ status as world-class liars, and then – over a delicate underlayment of an opera piece called “The Flower Duet” – Hopper counters with a disquisition on the racial lineage of Sicilians intended to enrage his interrogator.  And it works.  Walken’s bemused, slow-burn reaction is beautiful.

Anyway, I say all that as a preface to a movie review.  Even though I’m not a film critic. 

Sidebar: If you’ve been reading my columns lately – and if not, what the hell, man?  Unless you’re reading ONLY the Bible, Victor Davis Hansen, CO himself and Christopher Silber, what’s your excuse? – you may remember that in addition to not being a film critic, I am also not a map-ologist, an ocelot-ologist, or a sex-change-ologist. 

And yet, I’ve offered you what I humbly think are some worthwhile musings on maps, ocelots and sex changes.  (I’ve got range, people.)  So I hope you’ll also bear with me when I tell you that I’m reviewing Snow White.  Even though, technically, I haven’t seen it.

But I don’t need to.  Because I’m just that good at this, and because I’ve watched the coverage of this movie as it’s made his tortuous way to the screen.   I know the original fairy tale, and the 1937 classic version.   And I know that what makes fairy tales find new audiences over centuries is that they contain some eternal truths.  

And I know that Disney made a bad mistake when they hired a hateful little bundle of box office poison named Rachel Ziegler as their leading lady.  She’s a familiar modern type – a social justice warrior who wildly over-estimates her own intelligence and insight – and she has arrogantly assured us that THIS Snow White is not going to be like that beloved old one, with the Prince and true love and all that patriarchal crap.

Nope, her Snow White is going to be a feminist girl boss who needs a prince like a fish needs a bicycle, in a story that’s all about her discovering her own power and awesomeness! 

In other words, it won’t be like the original story with the staying power to last centuries.  It’s going to be a faddish, modernized version, without the staying power to last through an opening weekend.  (Belated spoiler alert!) (Also: Unexpectedly!)

In addition to the audience-alienating leftist drivel that’s been coming out of Ziegler’s pie hole, her casting presents two other significant obstacles:

1. The Evil Queen, who famously asks the magic mirror who is the fairest one of all, is played by the actress affectionately known as Triple-G:  Gal “giggity” Gadot.  And I can buy a lot of conceits in a fairy tale movie, including musical dwarves and magic spells and talking woodland creatures.

But you cannot ask the audience to suspend their disbelief when Gadot asks a magic mirror who’s hotter, and that apparently crystal-meth-snorting mirror says snotty little Rachel Ziegler!

2.  And call me racist if you must, but I’m going to say it: Ziegler is not white!  Normally, who cares?  But when she’s playing a character whose very name – and the title of the story! – requires that she be as white as snow? 

Remember how surprised you were when Disney announced that the titular role in the first Black Panther film was going to be played by Benedict Cumberbatch?  Or when George C. Scott got to play Patton only after Dikembe Mutombo had to back out of the role when the Houston Rockets made the NBA playoffs?  Or when the lead in the Andre the Giant biopic went to Peter Dinklage?

Of course you don’t.  Because those are all ridiculous ideas.  And yet Disney expects their audience to accept that the chick they’re pretty sure was the runner-up in a “Miss Colombia Trump-Hater of 2023” pageant is Snow freakin’ White?  Not smart.

Speaking of Peter Dinklage, I hope everybody in the dwarf community will punch him in the face the next time they see him.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m no DODVE.  (Dwarf-on-dwarf violence excuser. Duh.)  But that Dinklage really rubs me the wrong way.  And about halfway up my calf.

HA!

I like to live by the Golden (thimble) Rule.  “Treat others like you would want to be treated, if they and you were both dwarves.”

And if I were a dwarf actor, I’d be furious with Dinklage.  Because he spouted off, as Snow White was in pre-production, about how offensive he found it that Disney was going to cast little people as the seven dwarves.

Saith the triggered little derringer, “They were very proud to cast a Latino actress as Snow White, but you’re still telling the story of ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.’ … You’re progressive in one way, but you’re still making that [f-ing] backward story about seven dwarfs living in a cave together. Have I done nothing to advance the cause from my soapbox? I guess I’m not loud enough.”

First off, Pete, it’s more of a soap dish than a soap box you’ve got there.

Second, you’re the super-rare little person who’s had a successful acting career, and you’re standing tall (snicker) on that pile of Game of Thrones money.  But there are little-people actors who are struggling to find work, and you might have noticed that there aren’t a ton of acting jobs for them.

There are a few recurring elf roles – Keebler and Christmas – and a leprechaun or two around St. Patty’s Day, but beyond that?  Do you think Hollywood studios are fighting over the rights to a forthcoming Robert Reich biopic?  And if somebody shows an interest and the money is right, Tom Cruise will probably snag that role. 

So along comes Snow White – the first movie since the Wizard of Oz to have a bunch of roles for little people – and Sir Dinklage has to put on his tiny little cape of wokeness and shame Disney for trying to cast dwarves as dwarves.  (The nerve!) 

And spineless, hapless Disney caves, and has their sweat shop full of animators create an uncanny-valley’s worth of CGI dwarves.  And boom! Back to the unemployment line for little people actors. And what are they going to do, protest, or go on strike?

Good luck getting those picket signs noticed, as you wave them around at waist height!

And in case you thought I’d forgotten…

…let me give a rare shout-out to Liz Warren.  Because that delusional pretend-ian could definitely play a convincing Snow White. 

#wemustneverstopmockingher

So skip Snow White, and watch True Romance, and you can thank me later.

Hamas delenda est!

Dems are Super-Racist to the Chinese, & Ben and Jerry’s Have Problems (posted 3/24/25)

The Democrats have been addicted to racism for a long time. 

No, I’m not talking about the way they built their entire economy around slavery, clinging to it like grim death until the Republicans formed a new party, elected a new president, and sent an army south – eventually commanded by a bad-arse future GOP president – to whip them and free their slaves.

And I’m not even talking about the way they stewed about that, formed the KKK and passed a raft of Jim Crow laws that they clung to like grim death for around 80 more years, until another GOP president sent the 101st Airborne to Little Rock to allow 9 black kids to go to a previously segregated high school.  (“I like Ike.  My bike likes Ike!”)

(“Let’s try A. Fonzarelli quotes for $200, Alex.”)

Nope.  I’m talking about the way the Dems have somehow – against all reason, logic and fairness – been able to project their own sins onto the GOP, and cudgel them with charges of racism for the last half-century or so.  Racism became the Dems’ first plan of attack, their Plan B, their Hail Mary, and their best defense. 

You couldn’t point out that Obama doubled the national debt in 8 years because math is racist.    You couldn’t point out that Jamaal Bowman obstructed a congressional vote by yanking a fire alarm, because fire suppression systems are racist.

You couldn’t point out that Que Mala could not excrete a sentence with a recognizable subject verb and object, because many African cultures have a rich traditional heritage of practicing ojibah-ahwoo-gawaymee.  Which is Swahili for “word salad.” 

And before you can look that up, I have to warn you that fact checking is racist!  

Which brings me back to my initial point: the Democrats have become addicted to racism.  And I’ll bet you can guess how they’ve been clinging to it.

That’s right: like grim death.

But as with most addictions, what once used to bring pleasure can start to go sideways. 

Maybe a guy used to enjoy a little bourbon – the brownest of the brown liquors – every now and again.  Like to celebrate special occasions, or to cope with a virulent strain of poison ivy that would kill a lesser man.  Or maybe to loosen the adhesions a bit when he’s sitting down to write a bit of deathless, comic political prose.

Well I’m not talking about that.  Because that’s some high-functioning, medicinal-quality self-care right there.  And I didn’t produce four insightful yet hilarious columns in just the last week, only to be told that I can’t imbibe in a little Kentucky inspiration in my own home!!

Perhaps I’ve said too much.  But let’s not get sidetracked. 

The Dems’ racism problem is the classical addict’s dilemma: as their dependency grew, they needed more and more racism, just to keep it together, and the supply could not keep up with their demand.  And now it’s interfering with their job, their quality of life, and their electoral performance.     

They’ve become so delusional that they look at a minimally racist country and see prejudice everywhere.  They’re like an anorexic looking into a mirror at her xylophone ribcage and instead seeing a Whoopi Goldberg-esque blob.

They don’t recognize how off-putting it is to claim that voter ID laws are racist, because black people could not possibly get an ID, like a normal person.  Or that DEI and quotas are essential, because without them no black person would ever be able to get into college or the job market again.  

Even when they try to pose as anti-racist in contexts that involve other ethnicities, they screw that up.  Liz Warren has made herself a national punchline by insisting that she’s as Indian as Sitting Bull, when anyone can see that she’s as Indian as Bull Conner.  (#wemustneverstopmockingher)

But my favorite recent example has surfaced as the Dems’ covid origins lies have been exposed.  When Trump – and many, many others – suggested that the virus escaped from a Chinese lab where viruses were studied and experimented with, DC Democrats got their backs up immediately: “Are you suggesting that Chinese researchers and scientists could have been dropped the ball in the lab? That’s RACIST!!”

So what was their enlightened, diversity-embracing, anti-racist alternative to the Chicom-phobic lab-leak theory?  Drum-roll, please…

The Chinese people are basically a cross between Gollum, Ozzy Osbourne, and carnival geeks, furtively stalking through grisly “wet markets” wolfing down every pangolin, muskrat and ocelot they could get their bestial claws on.

That sounds nice, doesn’t it?

Okay, I’m no ocelotologist – it was between that and English, and I chose what turned out to be the less lucrative field – so I don’t know if China is rich in ocelots.  But if the enlightened Dems are correct, the voracious untermenschen Chinese probably gobbled them all up long ago. 

Come to think of it, that’s probably why the wooly mammoths are extinct.  “Siri, please explain the connection between disgusting Chinese dietary habits and the extinction of the mammoth?”

Annnnddd… that’s why the Chinese can’t have nice things, like sabre tooth tigers, mammoths, and pet pangolins.  Because of their unspeakably barbaric gustatory predilections. 

So to summarize, here is the Democrats’ position:

The hypothesis that Chinese scientists followed insufficiently rigorous containment protocols?    Horribly, horribly racist.

The idea that Chinese people are essentially troglodytic creatures fighting in a muddy moshpit over the chance to devour baskets full of squealing critters alive as if they were living chum thrown to Hannibal Lecter’s bloodthirsty hogs? 

Obviously true, and you’re welcome, inscrutable Asian friends. 

Nice job, non-racist-stereotyping leftists!   

Speaking of leftists eating their own… did you hear that Ben and Jerry’s CEO just got fired for being too much of an extreme leftist whack job?

(Thank you, Kentucky distillers, for that top-notch transition!)

I know: that sounds like the setup for a joke.  Getting fired from Mao and Jerry’s – I would also accept “Ben and Lenin’s” – for being too far left is like getting kicked out of the Sex Pistols for extreme rudeness. 

But Ben and Jerry sold their crunchy little business to corporate giant Unilever a few decades ago – way to rebel against the Man, you hippy hypocrites! – and like sane businesses everywhere, Unilever prefers not to lose money.

Enter B&J CEO David Stever, a leftist who chafes at having to consider customer preferences when there is social justice virtue signaling to be done.  He and his supporters have had several run-ins with Unilever because of his hostility to Israel and soft spot for “Palestinians.” 

(Unilever’s first clue should have been when the wokesters introduced “Jihadi Crunch,” “Cookies and IED,” and Hamas-cicles.)   

They’ve also aligned themselves with lefty activist groups, put out a Fourth of July message that declared that the US was “founded on stolen indigenous land,” and supported Kamala for president.

The last straw was apparently a recent social media post celebrating – and I swear I am not making this up – “National Abortion Providers Appreciation Day.” 

I would have loved to eavesdrop on the meeting that took place between a few adults from Unilever and the Social Justice Warrior Hippies after that post went viral:

Unilever Adult 1 (UA1): Why the hell would you post about National Abortionist Day?!

SJW Hippie (SJWH) 1: Do you think it’s gotten too commercial?

SJWH 2: It’s about appreciation.

UA2: Yeah, appreciating abortionists!

SJWH 1: Should we have said “health care providers?”

UA1 (palming his forehead): What do you think we sell?

SJWH 2: Raised consciousness.

SJWH 3: Our truth.

SJWH1: Moral superiority.

UA 1: We sell ICE CREAM!

SJWHs (chastened): Of course.  Ice cream.

SJWH 4: I was going to say that.

SJWH 2: Shut up, Bruce.  (quietly) Brown noser.

UA 1:  And who do abortionists kill?

SJWH 1 (hesitantly): I don’t like the word “kill.”

UA 2: I don’t care!  Who do they kill?!

SJWH 1: Unwanted tissue masses?

SJWH 2: Part of a woman’s body?

SJWH 3: Zygotes?

UA 1 (rubbing his temples): I don’t want the answer your grievance study professors gave you.  I want the real answer.

SJWH 1 (fidgeting): I’m feeling triggered right n-

UA 1 (in a low, ominous tone): If you don’t give me the real answer, I’m going to drop a dime to Hulk Homan™ about the USAID grant you spent on smuggling in those illegals for your Pride Week S&M Festival last y-

SJWHs 1-4: KIDS!  Abortionists kill kids!

UA 1: That’s right.  And who LOVES eating ice cream?

SJWH 4 (looking at the others):  Martin Simpson?

UA 1: That’s right, it’s ki–  Wait, what?  Who is Martin Simpson?

SJWH 4: Hilarious genius, national treasure, writes for Cautious Optimism?

SJWH 2: Has a real problem with ice cream.  Loves the stuff.

SJWH 3: That and bourbon.

UA 2: How do you–  Nevermind. Why would I ask you about his eating habits?

SJWH 3 (looking at the others and shrugging): No idea.

SJWH 4:  Yeah, I wondered where you were going with that.

UA 1: Shut up, Bruce!  I wasn’t going anywhere wi–  Look, the point is, KIDS love eating ice cream.  And abortionists kill kids.  Do you get that?

SJWH 1:  Yeah… So?

UA 1: SO STOP POSTING ABOUT HOW MUCH YOU APPRECIATE THE PEOPLE WHO ARE KILLING OUR CUSTOMERS!!  YOU MORONS!

SJWH 4 (bursting into tears):  I’m triggered!  I’m triggered! 

UA 1: Shut up, Bruce!  You’re fired!  You’re all fired!!

SJWH 2: You can’t do that.

UA 1: I just did!

SJWH 3:  We’ll see what the judge has to say about that.

UA 1: What?  What are you talking about?

SJWH 1:  Maybe you haven’t heard.  But Judge Boasberg is now in charge of all firing in the United States.

SJWH 2:  Yeah!  He’ll make you give us all our jobs back.

UA 1 (diving over the table and grabbing SJWH 1’s throat):  Arrgggghhhh!

SJWH 4: You’re invading his personal space!  INAPPROPRIATE!

Everyone in the room: Shut up, Bruce!!

And, scene.

Hamas delenda est.

Tesla Vandalizers Are Exactly Who You’d Expect Them to Be (posted 3/21/25)

Yesterday was the two-month anniversary of Trump’s swearing in.  Can you believe it?  Only two months!  I’ve got column ideas piling up like productive citizens caught in a traffic jam fleeing New York, California or Illinois, and I don’t know how I’ll get to most of them.

Columns about crime.  Columns about schadenfreude.  Columns on evergreen political topics, leavened with a dusting of humorous observations about Liz Warren being whiter than Edgar Winter singing A Whiter Shade of Pale in an igloo during the winter solstice. 

#wemustneverstopmockingher

But I can no sooner get a few sentences out before something funnier or more satisfying happens.  I’m just trying to keep my head above water over here!

Joy Reid gets fired, but before I can make a joke about her sitting on the street with a cardboard sign saying, “Will hate whitey for food,” some MSNBC host is asking why Trump has been in office for 12 minutes and egg prices are still so high?

I start brainstorming some sort of a “you didn’t mind a president whose brains were scrambled, but…” thing that’s not working, before Bret Baier notes that egg prices just dropped 10%. 

HA!  How ironic that—What’s that?  Margaret Brennan just said that the Nazis only took power in Germany because they loved free speech so much?

Okay wait, I’ve got something for that.  Yes, the Nazis were world-renowned for their passion for the free exchange of ideas.  “Ein volk, ein reich, ein free-wheeling debate,” that was their–   

Annddd…egg prices are down 25%. 

And Tampon Tim Walz was just celebrating that Tesla stock is way down…until someone pointed out that Minnesota government workers’ pensions have a bunch of Tesla stock in them.  D’oh!

I give up.  It’s too much winning.  I’ve got to start somewhere, so I’m sticking with Tesla for this one.

You’ve probably heard about all of the leftists who are very angry with Elon now.  They don’t like his fetish for free speech at Twitter/X; they don’t like his exposing and cutting leftist waste and corruption in government; they don’t like him rescuing astronauts, for some reason.

So they’re taking to various public fora (“archaic Latin plurals for 500, Alex”) with logically coherent, rhetorically persuasive critiques to change public perception through rigorous, democratic debate.

 HA! I kid. 

Actually, they’re threatening Tesla drivers, vandalizing dealerships and setting charging stations and cars on fire.

A few of these criminal masterminds have already been caught, and you’ll never guess what they’re like.  If by “you’ll never guess” I mean “you absolutely know.” 

Which I do.

Consider Contestant #1, Justin Thomas Nelson, who allegedly vandalized and threw Molotov cocktails at a Colorado Tesla dealership several times, before getting arrested on a return trip there several weeks ago. 

In keeping with my policy of giving you trigger warnings before you look these people up – remember “the bowling ball with eyes” illegal immigrant from Wednesday’s column? – I’ll paint you a picture, and you can proceed at your own risk. 

Justin looks like what would happen if Penn (from Penn and Teller) and Herman Munster somehow had a baby, and that baby grew up and got breast implants. 

You heard me.  Justin has got a Stage-4 case of gender dysmorphia, and I don’t think he’s been taking his meds.  He goes by the name “Lucy Grace Nelson,” and one look at his picture will bring out the Ricky Ricardo in you.  (“Luuuccy, you got some ‘splainin’ to do!”)  (“Timely comic references from 1952 for 100, Alex.”)

Nelson was listed on “her” driver’s license as “female,” which doesn’t fill one with confidence in the DMV.  I’m guessing that if I moved to Colorado and listed my gender as “marmoset,” some beaten-down Loveland cop would listlessly play along the next time I got caught speeding. 

“I see here that you’re a 6-foot-tall marmoset with green eyes and brown hair.  You still live on 5th Avenue?” 

 Anyway, Nelson’s booking sheet also lists him as female.  Because of course it does.  Aggravatingly, even the nominally conservative NY Post uses female pronouns to refer to Nelson in its story, and many media stories never mention that this “woman” ain’t one.

At least Nelson’s dad – Claiborne “Jerry” Nelson – seems to understand that he’s got a son. 

By the way, I’m not sure that Claiborne understands how nicknames work.  I get calling a Joseph “Joe,” or a Thomas “Tommy,” or even a Martin “Martacus.”  But how do you get “Jerry” out of “Claiborne?”

Though in his defense, it’s a lot shorter jump from “Claiborne” to “Jerry” than from “Justin” to freaking “Lucy!”

Where was I?  Oh yeah.  

Claiborne/Jerry describes Justin/Lucy in what I think may be the first-ever instance of a “5-implied- unexpectedly” paragraph.  To wit:

“He changed his name to Lucy a few years ago. [unexpectedly]  He’s in his early 40s, but has been living with this mother who has been taking care of him. [unexpectedly] He has emotional problems [unexpectedly] He hasn’t been able to keep a job. [unexpectedly!] Our entire family support[s] the Democrat party. [UNEXPECTEDLY!]”

There are pics in Justin’s social media labeled “baby gets her first bra” and “baby gets her first dress,” and you don’t want to see them.  But spoiler alert: they will NOT remind you of Jennifer Grey in Dirty Dancing.

Because sometimes somebody DOES need to put baby in the corner.

…of a room with bars on the door and windows.

Meanwhile, in South Carolina, Contestant #2 – Daniel Clarke-Pounder, 24 – also had the brilliant idea to attack a Tesla dealership with Molotov cocktails.  Ironically, he apparently throws more like a girl than Justin/Lucy does, or else he is easily fatigued.  Because he managed to set himself on fire with his fifth Molotov cocktail.

Sadly, all he lost was a burned shirt, and what little dignity he had.  

While his mug shot doesn’t have the “She’s a MAN, baby!” shock value of the Justin/Lucy pic, he does give off a bit of a Buddy Repperton vibe. (“I’ll take 1980s Stephen King movie references for $200, Alex.”)

Unfortunately for him, he looks a little softer in his social media photos.  He’s facing charges that could result in 20 years in prison, and if those old “Scared Straight” shows are accurate, Daniel might find that “Clarke-Pounder” is not only his last name, but his new cell-mate’s eventual nickname.

Can you imagine how it must feel to be a Democrat today?  Their political leaders are Ken-Doll Newsom, Jasmine “Fake-Lashes” Crockett, and Juicy Booty.  Their men are women, and their women are crazy.  They were just swept in the swing states, DOGE is derailing their gravy train, their bag of dirty tricks is as old and ineffective as Imhotep Pelosi, and their approval ratings are in the toilet. 

And it’s only been TWO MONTHS!

Hamas delenda est!

From Corrupt Agencies to Illegals to Murderers, the Left Can’t Choose the Right Side (posted 3/19/25)

This is my third column of the week, and I’ll have one more on Friday, and attentive readers may notice that there has been one through-line in many of my recent ramblings: the left’s perplexing inability to choose the morally or even politically correct side in any conflict.

If there’s a clash between law breakers and law abiders, they’ll back the former.  Give them an illegal immigrant over a legal one, a gang-banger over a choir-boy, and creepy dude in a dress over a schoolgirl trying to shower unmolested every time.

I don’t get it, but bless their hearts, they may never win another election if they keep this up.  And wouldn’t that be grand?

Three quick examples from the last week:

1. Even a political neophyte knows that the Department of Education has made itself toxic.  The lion’s share of all education decisions are made and money is spent on the state level, which is as it should be.  The Ed Dept is crammed full of well-paid and insular educrats in DC, where the rotten 98% give the other 2% a bad reputation.

Since its founding in 1977, $1.4 trillion (!) has been spent on the Ed feds, and the proof of the pudding is in the gagging.  As our education has become more expensive, student test scores have plummeted.  Our students can somehow count all 57 of the 2 genders, but nothing else.  They read few classics, and most of the history they “know” just isn’t so.

As the great Dennis Miller once noted, the fact that only one of the “Three Rs” actually starts with the letter “R” tells you everything you need to know. 

Enter Grandma Squanto Warren, being asked for her reaction to Trump’s much needed culling of the Ed Department last Friday.  A smart politician would have said something like, “I welcome any efforts to scrutinize the department, because it can definitely do a better job than it’s been doing.  But Trump is taking the wrong approach blah blah blah.”

So what did Warren say?   Watch the 45 second video of her quasi-teary, content-less mush of glittering generalities that never comes within a mile of the reality of the grift-apalooza that is the DC education establishment.

I haven’t seen a fake Indian that sad since the Italian-American actor with the stage name “Iron Eyes Cody” (his real name was something like Rocco Vincenzo Corleone) made those commercials crying over littering in the 1970s. 

But what else would we expect from the empty headdress from Massachusetts?  (#wemustneverstopmockingher)

My only disappointment was that she didn’t take the time to emote about her fond memories of the one-room school-tepee where she learned her ABCs (A- always, B- be, C- Cherokee) back on the wide-open prairies of Martha’s Vineyard.  (#neverstop) 

2. The latest example of the MSM ineptly trying to elicit sympathy for an illegal comes from Philly, where Virginia-Basora Gonzalez, 36, sobbed as ICE agents re-arrested her.  If you google her name, I’ve got to give you a trigger warning on opening that picture without preparing yourself.

Because, yikes! 

Some say that she looks like a bowling ball with eyes.  She got picked up wearing sweats and a large shirt that… how can I put this?

You’re going to need a bigger bowling bag. 

Okay, I apologize.  I just did a thing that lefty “journalists” always do, and that drives me crazy, when I said that “some say” she looks like a bowling ball with eyes.

It’s me.  I’m the one who says that.   Because you look at her, and tell me that she’s not a Brunswick 16-pounder with an insanely long stretch between the thumb and finger-holes when you’re looking for a smooth-rolling 12-pounder on league night and you forgot your ball at home. 

Before you can say anything, I know: I shouldn’t criticize anyone’s appearance, especially when I look like this.  Sure, I’m not as bad as I was a week ago, when I was more poison ivy than man.  But I’m still not the matinee idol that you’ve come to know and love over here, either.

Anyway, forget all that.  I mock her only because she’s been criminally playing our system, in very familiar ways:  first arrested in PA for 40 grams or more of fentanyl and aiding and abetting in June of 2019.  (I don’t know what she was aiding and abetting, unless it was helping somebody bowl three perfect games in one night.) 

After serving out part of a short sentence, she was deported back to the DR, only to illegally re-enter and get caught again last week.  And yes, I know that my lefty pals will say that lots of Americans deal drugs too.

Yeah.  We know.  We’ve got plenty of our own drug dealers, which is just one reason why we don’t need to import more of them.  Especially ones that, when you drop them in your backswing, they’re going to take out several people sitting behind the ball return. 

3. To hear him tell it, Jessie Hoffman Jr. 46, is a peaceful man, deeply devoted to his Buddhist breathing and meditation rituals, and put upon by SCOTUS’ unwillingness to respect his religious beliefs. 

But to hear me tell it, Hoffman is a worthless POS who – if Buddha were here right now, and not too rotund and apathetic to dish out a righteous beating – would dish out a righteous beating to Jessie Hoffman Jr. 

(What is the sound of one hand clapping?  I don’t know.  But I do know that the sound of two hands in a blur of quick jabs using Jessie Hoffman’s stupid head like a speed bag is the sound of justice.)

What’s my beef with Jessie Hoffman, Jr., you might be asking?  Just that in 1996, he kidnapped 28-year-old Mary Elliott, a young wife who had just gotten off work, forced her to withdraw $200 from an ATM, then drove her to a lonely spot in the country, terrorized her, raped her, and shot her in the head. 

Last night, 29 years later – i.e. one year longer than Mary Elliott’s entire time on earth – the state of Louisiana finally executed Hoffman.  It made the news because they used the novel method of administering nitrogen gas through a respirator mask until Hoffman died of nitrogen hypoxia.

On one hand, I’m all for the kind of federalism that means that all 50 states are free to experiment with various and sundry ways to kill the many vicious murderers and rapists who desperately need killing in these United States.  So I appreciate this kind of outside-the-coffin thinking.

I might also note that we’re only trying new methods because an endless stream of morally disordered bleeding hearts have been kvetching over every existing execution method like a sociopathic Woody Allen.  (I mean, a Woody Allen way more sociopathic than the actual Woody Allen.)

“Gas can make people choke, and nooses are really scratchy.  Some gunshots are so loud they could give you a heart attack.  And don’t get me started on electrocution!  I once walked across some carpet in my stocking feet and touched a lamp, and I thought I’d die!”

State authorities chose nitrogen because it’s supposedly painless and humane.  The murderer-sympathizers aren’t satisfied though, worrying that if the respirator mask isn’t fitted tightly enough around the vicious animal’s face, enough oxygen might seep in to prolong his death, or make him nauseous, or even cause him to choke on his own vomit. 

I’m serious.  That’s what keeps them up at night.  The murdering rapist might die with a tummy ache, or go out like Jimi Hendrix, John Bonham and Bon Scott.  (And those guys ROCKED!) 

Too soon?  Perhaps I’ve said too much.

Anyway, I cannot imagine caring if Jessie Hoffman was a little uncomfortable right before he died, only 29 years too late.  In fact, if you told me that inhaling nitrogen caused the sensation of being kidnapped at gunpoint, driven to a lonely spot, stripped, raped and shot in the head execution style, the only other question I’d have is whether we could tweak the nitrogen mixture so that those same sensations would intensify, and last longer.

“So Martin, what was that Buddhist angle you mentioned earlier?” you might be asking.  In which case I’d thank you, because I’d forgotten about that part.

One of cowardly rapist Jessie Hoffman Jr.’s reasons for appealing his death sentence was that the nitrogen would violate his religious freedom because – and I swear I’m not making this up – “nitrogen hypoxia would interfere with [his] Buddhist breathing and meditation during his final moments alive.”

Hey Jessie, you know what else interferes with breathing and meditation?  [begin Kinison filter] BEING DRAGGED OUT INTO THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE AND SHOT IN THE HEAD BY A HEARTLESS, 0RECIDIVIST PIECE OF CRAP!  OH! OOOHH!!! [end Kinison filter]

Tragically, Hoffman appears to have died painlessly. 

But still, let’s all synchronize our watches, in anticipation of Melting Face Maxine Waters stepping up to a microphone to announce a protest to honor civil rights martyr Jessie Hoffman Jr., who was killed by the most white-supremacist of all elemental gases: Nitrogen.

In 3… 2… 1…

Hamas delenda est!   

The Dems Can’t Help Themselves, Especially Gavin Newsom (posted 3/18/25)

Well, the Dems continue to compete in a hilarious triathlon of political ineptitude.  They start by jumping on bikes and ramming into one pothole after another, then dismount and vigorously run for 100 meters through a lane full of rakes, then shoulder an Olympics-approved rifle and begin firing into their own feet.

But before I get to that, how fun was it to watch Elon’s son X bouncing excitedly alongside Trump as they walked to the Marine One helicopter together the other day? 

It was so cute that even the most hard-hearted MSM hack had to almost say, “Awww,” before furiously catching herself.   “NO!  That’s Hitler and Lil’ Hitler! Must…not…feel…authentic…emotion.”

Of course the beauty of that moment came partly from the question of contrast that instinctively struck anyone watching: “Can you imagine letting your kid into Biden’s custody to walk him over to a helicopter?” 

The question answers itself.  [Cue Doctor Evil, humming up in his gliding chair and then pausing dramatically.  “How about NO?!”]

Biden managed to make walking across a butter-soft lawn – in his specially-designed, codger-friendly, waffle-stomper shoes – look like hold-your-breath-while-Wallenda-tightropes-over-an-active-volcano high drama. 

And the idea of Biden lifting a kid to put him onto a set of aircraft stairs?!  Just trying to navigate the stairs by himself turned into something that looked like a montage of out-takes from the Eiger Sanction and a frontal assault on El Capitan.

Hey, here’s a question for you: How do we know that Gavin Newsom is smarter than a Hezbollah terrorist who STILL answers calls from unknown numbers on his Samsung De-Crotch-ulator 3000 pager?  (Yell-o?  Allahu akb-OUCH!)

It’s a trick question, of course, because we don’t.  In fact, the only credible evidence that can be asserted in defense of that hypothesis is that he was at least smart enough to apparently agree in an interview with Charlie Kirk that allowing males to stomp women in sports obviously unfair.     

But how do we know that Gavin Newsom is smarter than LA Mayor Karen “rhymes with” Bass? 

First, because just about every sentient being is smarter than Karen Bass.  (Although I wouldn’t bet a single lonely dollar on an IQ-off among Bass, Que Mala, AOC and any patient chosen by random lottery from a head trauma ward at a major metropolitan hospital of your choice.  So, yeah.)

Second, because Bass managed to be in Ghana – which my crack team of mapologists tells me is pretty far away from Los Angeles – when the fires very predictably broke out, but then parlayed that idiotic move into a series of ever worsening idiocies.  

Despite a boatload of public records laws requiring that she preserve all governmentally significant communications for at least 2 years, she…wait for it… “set her phone NOT to save text messages” during the crisis. 

“Martin, who does that?” you might ask. 

Until you think for a nano-second, and the question answers itself: 

1. Bill Clinton on a “Welcome to the White House, New Interns” group chat.  2. Hunter Biden conducting a shady, “How much am I offered for this crude finger-painting?” group auction on a “Go-Corrupt-Me” fundraiser with a dozen dirty foreign officials and oligarchs.   

And 3. The mayor of a horribly run blue city on a private plane in international airspace as she flop-sweats through an inauthentic dashiki while her city is burning to the ground.

Duh.   

Then, back on the ground but air-headed as ever, she gave a press conference amidst wisps of acrid, blowing smoke on what looked like the Gone With the Wind movie set showing the aftermath of Sherman burning Atlanta:

Bass: “I’m demanding a complete investigation into the mayor’s actions during this crisis.”

Reporter: “Isn’t that you?”

Bass: “What now?”
Reporter: “You’re the mayor.”

Bass: “Um, yes.  And I’m going to leave no stone unturned to get to the bottom of my actions.”

Reporter: “Couldn’t you just tell us that, now?

Bass: “Well, there are a lot of records to go through, and I want to be super-thorough.”

Reporter: “So you’ll be releasing all your texts, emails and phone calls?”

Bass: “Um, yeah.  About that…”

Ugh.  Remember that Hezbollah dullard I mentioned earlier?  He’s sitting in a hospital in Lebanon, wrapped in gauze from neck to ankles, his face blackened by smoke and his eyebrows singed off, trying to explain what happened to his family members gathered around the bed.

“These telemarketers are driving me crazy!  I’ve gotten three calls today, and now I’ve got one eye, one testicle and three fingers left!”  (There’s a ring-tone of “Hava Nagila” from his bedside table.) “Oh wait a second, I’ve got to take this.”

And his uncle grabs the pager, and rolls his eyes at the other family members, who are all face-palming themselves.  “Hey, at least he’s still smarter than Karen Bass.”

But now Ken Doll Newsom has been asked for his emails covering the same period, and Mr. Featureless Plastic Crotch is not dumb enough to try the ol’ “the dog ate my text messages” defense.  Instead, he’s going with a claim that “they’re exempt from disclosure under the California Public Records Act.” 

Apparently, his lawyers are suggesting that if you read the fine print closely, you’ll find that under the California Public Records Act, public records in California may be hidden from the public, at the whim of any Dem corrupticrat who might be revealed as a nice haircut on top of an empty head in an empty suit, if his public records were to be revealed.  In public.

Newsom isn’t even trying to meet the bare requirements of the law by designating which records he’d like to hide and for what reason.  This despite the fact that the CA constitution was amended in 2004 by Proposition 59, which asserted that “the people have the right of access to information concerning the conduct of the people’s business” as a foundational principle.  This proposition was known as the “Sunshine” amendment.

But Veneer Boy’s lawyers have an answer for this too, as you’ll see in this quote that I am totally making up, yet which still communicates their meaning perfectly: “We are fully abiding by the Sunshine amendment, which we interpret as enshrining any Democrat Governor’s inalienable right to cloak his public records in an impenetrable, Stygian darkness.  Hail Satan.” 

That guy is the current front-runner for your party’s nomination for President in 2028, Democrats.  And may God have mercy on your souls.

Oh, did I mention that it’s been revealed that Newsom secretly funded a $97,000 bust of himself that was recently placed in the San Francisco City Hall?

Because of course he did. 

David Hogg/Gavin Newsom ’28!

Also, Hamas delenda est!

Crime & Punishment in El Salvador vs. Indiana (posted 3/17/25)

Quick note: I’ll post columns on Wednesday and Friday, because I’m trying to keep up.  Also, I’m through the worst of the poison ivy, though my forearms still have a swollen, Popeye-esque appearance…if Popeye had been resting his forearms on a table in the Chernobyl cafeteria on that fateful day.

But I don’t like to complain.

The Ides of March gave me my favorite story of the month so far, even though there’s been stiff competition already: Rosie O’Donnell deporting herself to Ireland. South Carolina granting that double-murderer a firing squad send-off.   The Gators stomping their way through the SEC tournament like Sherman through Georgia.

But the new leader in the clubhouse is… Trump’s deportation of nearly 300 Venezuelan gang-bangers to El Salvador!

It’s got everything:  1. Trump deporting nearly 300 Venezuelan gangbangers; 2. An arrogant cranial-rectal-inversion-suffering leftist judge who thinks that someone has appointed him King of America, and 3. A great response by my all-time favorite Nayib in world history.

The first point is beyond obvious: giving foreign thugs the heave-ho is clearly a fundamental good.  If Conan had been asked what are the FOUR best things in life, he would have kept the big three – to crush your enemies, see them being driven before you, and to hear the lamentations of their cis- and trans-gender women – and added “to cuff and stuff a bunch of Tren de Aragua dirtbags into the cargo hold of a large aircraft and get them the hell out of my country.” 

Duh!

Second, until SCOTUS steps in and squashes some of these narcissistic district judges – And what’s the hold up on that, anyway? – it was sweet to see far-left D-bag “Judge” James Boasberg’s will thwarted. 

Q: Does the “D” stand for “Democrat,” “Dreadful,” or “Douche?”

A: Yes.

By the time Boasberg gave his haughty order to return the Con Air flights to America, both planes were already off the Yucatan Peninsula.  And even though I’m no map-ologist, I’m pretty sure that’s outside of American airspace.

But Emperor Boasberg the Impotent was undaunted.  You’d think that maybe a DC District Court judge’s rulings might be limited to, oh, I don’t know… [begin Sam Kinison filter] INSIDE THE DC DISTRICT?! OH! OHHHHH!!!! [end Kinison filter].

But no.  When His Highness Boasberg gives an order, it’s a Biblical-adjacent command, to be enforced throughout the four corners of the earth.  It requires obeisance from all, including the fish that swimmeth in the seas, the beasts that creepeth upon the earth, and the fowl – and US aircraft – that flieth through the international airspace.

Yes.  He demanded that any flights should be turned around mid-air.  “This is something that you need to make sure is complied with immediately,” saith the activist cosplaying as a jurist.

The Trump administration’s response?  “Suck it, your ‘honor.’” (And let the transcript reflect that there were sarcastic quotation marks around ‘honor.’)

Okay, that was my paraphrase.  What they actually said, according to a report of the administration’s internal discussion, was, “They were already outside of US airspace.  We believe the order is not applicable.”  Thus, the “suck it” was only implied. 

But very clearly so.

The cherry on this schadenfreude sundae was the part played by one of my international heroes, and the finest of all Nayibs throughout history, El Salvador’s president Bukele.

And yes, there have been other “Nayibs” – including 10th-century Persian poet and scholar Nayib al-Hamadani and 12th-century Islamic theologian Nayib al-Isfahani, of course.  (I do my homework, people.)

But from now on, when you say, “Nayib,” I say, “BUKELE!” 

I love this guy!  He took 23 MS-13 El Salvadoran killers, along with the 238 TDA gangsters from Venezuela, and he’s going to punish and work them hard.  We’re paying him a small fee to take the TDA ghouls, and he spelled out his Trumpy plan for them. 

They’re going into a giant “terrorism confinement center” where they will be “engaged in various workshops and labor under the Zero Idleness program.” (As opposed to American Democrats’ nationwide fiscal black hole of a soul-shriveling welfare system, the “Maximum Idleness Program.”)

He explains the details, ending with, “We continue advancing in the fight against organized crime… [while] also helping our allies, making our prison system self-sustainable, and obtaining vital intelligence to make our country an even safer place.  All in a single action.  May God bless El Salvador, and may God bless the United States.” 

(You say, “Nayib,” I say, “BUKELE!”)

Oh, and Bukele also sent a tweet in response to Jimmy Boasberg ordering the gangbangers’ return to him: “Oopsie… Too late.”  Followed by a “crying-laughing” emoji.  Perfect!      

I expect the Dems to scream and fight about Trump’s illegally ignoring this creepy judge’s diktat, and we need to save this story for campaign ads in ’26 and ’28.  Since January 20th, our lefties have been taking the 20 side of every 80/20 issue, but on this one, they’ll be taking the 1 side on a 99/1 issue! 

Their clear, undeniable argument is, “Don’t you dare remove the violent criminals we invited into the US!  Bring back those thugs, right now!” 

“But Martin,” you might be saying to yourself, “where’s your American pride?  Shouldn’t you be praising our own prison system, instead of sounding like the president of the local Nayib Bukele fan club?”

First of all, we call ourselves, “The Bukele Bunch,” and meetings are on Thursdays at the nearest library.

Second, you wouldn’t be suggesting that if you had read the article that CO himself posted on Saturday, telling the story of Indiana “transgender” inmate Jonathan Richardson (he prefers “Autumn Cordellione”) who wants taxpayers to pay for his “sex change” surgery.

Even if you only scrolled past the story, you probably remember this looker.  Bald, full facial and skull tattoos, unconvincingly drawn-on eyebrows.  One eye looking at the camera, the other at next Tuesday. 

Yeah.  That baby-strangling freak.

And I’m not just using that phrase as rhetorical exaggeration. He strangled an 11-month old baby several decades ago, so naturally we’re still feeding him.  And Judge Richard “everyone calls him Dick” Young has ordered that “Ms. Cordellione” receive “gender-affirming surgery at the earliest opportunity.” 

Yes, Young was appointed by Bill Clinton. (UNEXPECTEDLY!)  Why do you ask?      

Obviously, we should immediately do whatever we can to try to recall or impeach this moron judge.  But in the meantime, can’t we find a way to comply with the letter of the law, while sparing Indiana taxpayers a huge bill?

I’m no Sex-change-ologist – I completed the coursework for that, but never managed to pass my certification test – but I like to think I’m an out-of-the-box-thinking Renaissance man.  Call me a gringo Nayib Bukele, if you must.  And I have a proposal. 

Send an Indiana cop to the nearest DOT maintenance shed and pick up whichever set of pruning shears and loppers are lying around on the dirt floor closest to the door.  Don’t bother washing them, or testing them for poison ivy oils on the handles or blades. 

Stop at a local still for a mason jar of hi-test grain alcohol.  (If there is a warning label on it mentioning possible side effects such as blindness, remove that label.  But spoiler alert: there is no such label.)

I am volunteering to do this next step myself, if you will just pay my airfare to Indiana. 

I’ll put the baby killer into a small, soundproof cinderblock room at the prison, containing only a wooden chair and table.  I’ll put the above-mentioned items onto the table, along with three band-aids and several towels, which I may or may not have doused with poison ivy oil. 

Then I’ll read the following statement to the prisoner: “Here are some surgical tools, some grain alcohol, some towels and band-aids, which the taxpayers of Indiana have provided for you. You’re welcome.  My advice is to drink half of the grain alcohol for anesthetic purposes, then have at your junk with the shears, or the loppers, or both. 

Once you’ve completed the removal – around here we call the result either a “total Gavin” or “the complete Newsom” – rub the dirt from the tool blades on the wound, because my high school football coach assured me that that always helps when you’re in physical discomfort.  Then douse the affected area with the germ-killing (if a tiny bit astringent) remnants of the grain alcohol, and firmly press the towels against it to stop the bleeding.

By the way, the band-aids are to put over your mouth, to prevent your cries of agony from annoying the other prisoners.”

Then I will step out of the room.  And because research says that it takes no more than 20 minutes to bleed out after accidentally opening one of the major blood vessels in the groinular region, I’ll check in again on the prisoner.

In 25 minutes. 

Hamas delenda est!  

Poison Ivy and Good Political News (posted 3/14/25)

Before I get into today’s helping of good news, I have to share a brief story, and only because it comes with a moral.

For the last 10 days, I have been enduring a bout of poison ivy that would kill a lesser man, and drive many men to madness.  I received this affliction because I tried to do a good thing for my community. 

Our little neighborhood has a small and charming pond in it, and a few weeks ago, our neighbors called for a community “clean the pond” day.  We would have happily joined in, except that they scheduled it on a Sunday morning, and I was in church on Sunday morning, repenting of my vicious mockery of Democrats that you have all witnessed many times here in CO-ville.  Along with many other sins which are not important now, so tend to the log in your own eye and mind your business.

Anyway, when the clean-up was over the neighbors had piled limbs and pond fronds and other debris around the pond, and I took several truckloads of that stuff to our local dump.

But because I like to go above and beyond, and because my wife bought me a chain saw for Christmas – after 35 years of marriage, that woman really gets me – I offered to cut down two dead crape myrtles that were leaning precariously over the pond.  And apparently, concealing some of the most virulent poison ivy known to man.

Before I realized what was happening, I had scratched both of my forearms, one side of my neck, one cheek, and a spot a few inches below one eye.  And then the blisters and the maddening itch came, and after 5 days of what turned out to be totally inadequate doses of steroids, I am now on a much stronger regimen.

The facial outbreak has kept me from shaving for a week, so I’m rocking a scraggly hobo beard that only partly distracts your eyes from the angry red blistering.  And my forearms are tough to look at.  They would easily win a “Worst Forearms in a Leper Colony” contest.  And that description still doesn’t do them justice.

The closest I can come is, if Maxine Waters’ melting face was a pair of forearms…

Yes.  Exactly.

I told you there was a moral to this story, and there is: Never do good deeds for your community.

HA!  I kid.  The real moral is one of the offshoot benefits of an optimistic outlook: Having something taken away for a time makes you appreciate it much more than you otherwise would.

Growing up without money can make you appreciate hard work and thus getting a little money.  Being lonely for a time can make you appreciate finding a good friend or good spouse.  Being bullied can make you stronger and more empathetic, and inclined to intervene when others are bullied. 

And being sick for a little while makes you appreciate good health in ways that you never would otherwise.

For example, I normally have a regularly passable face and two normal forearms, none of which I’ve given much thought to.  But in a few weeks, when this hideous cup of disfiguring hives and scrofula has passed from me, I’m going to look in the mirror and wink at my suddenly handsome self, and then go out in public and look for an excuse to point to things in front of other people, just to show off my pristine forearms.    

Okay, now on to good political news: the Democrats are continuing to shoot themselves in the feet in various and sundry ways. 

For example, for a day or two, a succession of MSM talking heads tried to argue that Trump was hiding from or avoiding the press because he didn’t want to take questions about the stock market downturn.

Exhibit A was CNN’s Kaitlin Collins, who I find intriguing, mostly because of an odd, chameleon-like quality she has.  From some angles, she looks like an attractive woman, but then the camera moves slightly, and she’s got a mannish transgender thing going on. 

On Tuesday, she did a snarky little segment about Trump “keeping the press away.”  Which was ridiculous, as many commenters immediately pointed out, by way of giving the numbers of press questions answered in their first month in office by Obama and Biden (a little over 100 questions each), as compared to Trump’s… wait for it… 1006!

Then, within 30 minutes of her criticizing Trump for avoiding media, he took questions from the media for 30 minutes!  D’oh!

Speaking of biased media figures, there are a lot less of them still employed lately.  A partial list of the resigned or fired includes Joy Reid, Jim Acosta, Norah O’Donnell, Chuck Todd, Jonathan Capehart, Lester Holt, Chris Wallace and Andrea Mitchell.  In addition, the inaccurately biased polling outfit 538 has been shut down, and the entire NYT editorial board is out. 

Which reminds me of the old joke, “What do you call 1000 Hezbollah terrorists getting blown up by pagers?”  Answer: “A start!”

In a story I missed the other day, Rosie O’Donnell has deported herself to Ireland.  Which is great news for us, but a tough break for the Irish.  First the potato famine, then the Troubles, and now this!

Other Europeans are also coming to some well-deserved grief.  Recent stories came out that would shame many virtue-signaling Ukraine supporters, if they were capable of feeling shame.  Polls of 7 nations show that they all strongly think that Ukraine should receive more support – in numbers ranging from 52% up to 66%.  But the same polls also show that they think that THEIR COUNTRY should pony up support for Ukraine by much lower numbers, ranging from only 11% to 29%.  Hypocrites!

Reports also show that the Europeans who trumpet their support for Ukraine most loudly have also been giving more money to Putin – buying Russian natural gas and oil – than they’ve given in support to Ukraine.  Which is something that Trump warned them about 6 or 7 years ago, and they laughed in his face. 

My favorite example of those with delusionally high opinions of themselves is an Austrian economist named Gunther Fehlinger-Jahn.  Partly because of his ridiculous name.  “Gunther” is a perfect start, followed by what sounds like a hyphenated term for a German sex crime.  (“Und vat vere you doing when Gretchen accused you of fehling her jahn?”)

But mostly because he said this in an actual tweet that I swear I am not making up: “I call to confiscate all American military assets in Europe and hand it over to our emerging European Army in case of America leaving NATO.”

Oh, is that what you’re calling for, Gunther?  I’d love to see you try it. 

I picture a battalion of whiny Greta Thunbergs being whacked in the head with rifle butts by a battalion of Pete Hegseths. 

Meanwhile, in blue cities in America, Democrats continue to make bad choices.  While they actually have an opening to hit Trump over his ad-hoc-seeming tariffs and the falling stock market, they decide instead to focus their attention on… wait for it… defending Hamas supporting antisemites like Mahmoud Khalil, garden variety criminals, and illegal aliens.

Within the last two weeks, Boston Mayor Michelle Wu (as in “woo doggy, is she stupid!) has championed the latter two groups, in what looks like an ambitious campaign to single-handedly debunk the stereotype that Asians are all really smart.

On March second, one Lemark Jaramillo – 32, with a criminal record dating back to his high school days – chased two terrified people into a Boston restaurant with a knife.  Luckily, an off-duty Boston cop was there, and after Jaramillo wouldn’t follow orders to drop the knife, shot him.

I wouldn’t have thought it possible for anyone to say anything more idiotic than what his girlfriend, Jennifer Geddes, said after Jaramillo assumed room temperature. She said, “Lemark was a good guy.  He didn’t deserve this.”

A local story reported, “The two had been dating for a decade, and Geddes said he was loving and close to her children.”  

Then… wait for it…

One.  Sentence.  Layter…

“Geddes had however taken a restraining order out against Jaramillo in 2018 after he was charged with assaulting her…and pulling out a knife.” 

Because of course he did.

So how did Mayor Wu top that clueless statement?  By giving a press conference in which she said, “My condolences and all of our thoughts are with the family of the individual whose life has been lost.” 

Perfect.

Ten days later, in a Boston Public Radio interview, Wu blew off criticism that she has also been releasing criminals wanted by ICE, because ICE hasn’t presented her with completed warrants before she can release the miscreants back onto the streets. “ICE is choosing not to go and get these criminal warrants, [and then claiming] so and so was extremely dangerous and a threat to the community.”  

You had arrested them and were holding them in your jail, which we know you are generally loath to do, and ICE then identified them as wanted illegals.  But that wasn’t good enough for your tender sensibilities, so you released them, forcing ICE into the more dangerous situation of having to chase them down and arrest them in public.

But as grim as this story is, I’m an optimist, and can look on the bright side.  

Someday soon, my face and forearms will be returned to attractive good health.  But these Democrats will be self-beclowning, rake-stomping boneheads until the day they die. 

Hamas delenda est!

Leftist Moral Inversions are Finally Being Corrected (posted 3/12/25)

One of the worst things about the Biden years – in addition to the whispering Crypt-Keeper-looking serial fabulist who was our Cadaver in Chief, and in addition to his sidekick the Cackling Banality, and in addition to the dudes dressed like women and the skyrocketing inflation and the porous border being over-run daily by illegals, and in addition –

Okay, now that I think about it, there were way too many terrible things about the Biden administration to even narrow down a Top 10 Worst Things list.  So let me start again.

One terrible aspect of the four-year plague of Biden-ness that descended on our land was the reversal of conventional morality that came to characterize much of our public life.

When terrorist-supporting radicals harassed and intimidated other students, our universities coddled the radicals and refused to help the students.

When thugs and rioters attacked police and businesses, the politicians forced the police to allow the lawlessness.

When disordered males invaded women’s sports and locker rooms, authorities chastised the women who complained, and gave their trophies and control over their privacy to the disordered males.

All of these cases and many more demonstrate that the old stereotype that conservatives are unfeeling while liberals are the cliched “bleeding hearts” is wrong.  Both groups sympathize with others, and we conservatives aren’t bothered by lefty bleeding hearts.  We just object to who they’re always bleeding for. 

When progressives see a criminal fighting a cop, they side with the criminal.  They don’t champion the cause of legal immigrants, but they’ll take to the streets to fight for illegal ones.  They prefer shoplifters over shop owners, and squatters over landlords, and subway attackers over a Marine who defends the passengers.

That’s why the last couple of months have been so invigorating for us.  After four years of escalating moral inversions, things have suddenly turned right-side-up again.  Consider several good-news stories from just the last week:

With Biden in office, sweethearts like “Palestinian” “activist” Mahmoud Khalil seemed to be running woke Ivy League campuses.  He has been a high-profile leader of campus protests, a participant in the “tent-ifada” encampment at Columbia, and an advocate for all sorts of Jew hatred and intimidation. 

In addition to being a “political affairs officer with UNRWA” – the corrupt, UN-funded entity that has helped Hamas at every turn – he has still been living in campus housing, even though he graduated in December.  As recently as last week, he participated in a takeover of a Barnard building.

But it’s a new day, and order is being restored.   ICE agents arrested Khalil last Wednesday, and revoked his visa and his green card.  When the news came out that the Trump administration is going to deport him, a lefty judge tried to stop that, but reports are that the administration had already moved him to a jail in Louisiana, where extremist NY judges are rightly ignored.  Beautiful! 

Columbia put out a whiny statement saying that it will not cooperate with ICE agents except where required by law.

And before I could yell, “Take away their funding!” the Trump administration took away their funding.   Or at least $400 million of it, in the form of grants and contracts. 

New SecEd Linda McMahon came off the top rope, citing the requirement that schools comply with federal antidiscrimination laws, and pointing out that universities have flouted that requirement for too long.  “Today, we demonstrate to Columbia and other universities that we will not tolerate their appalling inaction any longer.”

And before I could yell, “More funding cancellations, please!”  the Joint Task Force to Combat Antisemitism announced that, “More funding cancellations are likely to follow.”  YES!

The NY Post reports that the Feds “have more than $5 billion in grant commitments with the Ivy League university that are currently under review.”  As of Monday, an audit has begun, and I would love to be a fly on the wall in the faculty lounge right now!

The same FAFO process is happening all over the country.  At DHS, where some treacherous employees have been aiding illegals by leaking information about upcoming ICE raids, Kristi Noem has started polygraphing employees to catch the insurrectionists.  As of last Friday, two leakers have been found, and they’ll be facing felony prosecutions, and up to 10 years in federal prison if convicted. 

I’m sure that the talking heads in legacy media are howling about that, but I’m unable to hear them over my laughter.

Amidst the steady stream of illegal immigrants being sent back home, a bad hombre named Diego de la Vega beat Hulk Homan™ to the punch by deporting himself back to Colombia in December.  (The country, not the feckless university.)

If you haven’t heard of Vega, he might have done as much damage to our country as any of the criminal deportees you’ve heard about, including Mahmoud Khalil and the various face-tattooed gang bangers of Tren de Aragua.

Because Diego de la Vega was… wait for it… the former Communications Director for AOC!

Which raises a few questions about the Juicy Bootied One (her words, not mine), since it is not legal to hire illegals (duh!).  It might be too much to ask for, but how great would it be if Homan’s Heroes burst into Sandy’s congressional office right in the middle of her next “Choose Your Fighter” video and slapped the cuffs on her?      

Amidst all of these tales of the scales of justice being properly re-balanced, I have one last one for you.  It’s the story of Brad Sigmon, 67, who died last Friday in South Carolina’s electric chair. 

Sigmon had been on death row for 23 years, since he beat his ex-girlfriend’s parents to death with a baseball bat.  He’d planned to kidnap his ex and “take her away for a romantic weekend that was to culminate in a murder-suicide.”  I know: Brad had an unusual take on “romantic.” 

Anyway, there’s one thing about his story that makes Sigmon a little different than your garden-variety evil man who needed killing.  And that’s his method of execution.

Because while South Carolina’s death chamber is fitted out with an electric chair and a lethal injection set-up, Brad chose Door Number 3: a firing squad.  Because Brad Sigmon is old school! 

I mean, “was.”

He was placed in the electric chair and hooded, and a white target with a red bull’s eye was pinned to his chest.  Then three DOC employees with rifles gave him a 21-gun salute.  (Minus 18.)

I hope that his long delayed but well-deserved death gave some peace to his victims’ families, and I like to think that in his last moments, Brad Sigmon did his part to bridge our raucous political divide. 

Because he gave us one bleeding heart story that most conservatives can get behind. 

Hamas delenda est!

The Democrats are Struggling with Social Media (posted 3/10/25)

Once again, fast-moving events are giving me more to write about than I can keep up with.  So I’m bumping a few good news stories to a Wednesday column, and discussing another topic today: the Dems’ fascinating recent attempts at social media outreach to voters. 

If by “fascinating” I mean “gut-churningly cringy.” 

Which I do.

Remember when Obama and the Dems were running rings around the GOP with social media and their savvy (if shallow) appeals to the savvy (if shallow) youngster voters?  That seems like a thousand years ago now, and after the podcasting/new media-driven election of 2024, I was curious to see how the lefties would respond, now that they’ve had four months to lick their wounds and regroup.

Annnndddd…they’ve got nothing.

Actually, worse than nothing.  They’ve got Rosa Delauro.    

DeLauro is one of the spry, “fresh blood” types in the Dem House membership – clocking in at 82 years young, and serving only her 18th term.  She often wears her hair dyed an unconvincing black, with a lot of equally unconvincing blue/purple.  She sometimes wears glasses, which are always bizarre.  And she recently made a TikTok video beginning with the words, “Yo, this is the ranking rizzler on Appropriations…”

And it somehow got worse from there. 

Delauro’s painful “oldster trying to relate to young folks” video follows the trail blazed by our favorite Indian scout, Grandma Squanto (#wemustneverstopmockingher), in her infamous, “I think I’m gonna have me a beer” home video. 

In both cases, each old pol had to realize the vast cognitive gulf (definitely not the Gulf of America, in this context) between her wizened appearance and her ridiculous slang usage.  So maybe they’re going for kitschy, or self-aware irony?  But if so, that’s a wild swing and a huge miss, the kind that leaves a batter corkscrewing herself into the ground after several complete turns on the follow-through.

But those are individual loons, each failing in their own inimitable way.  What’s even more interesting to me is the psychology behind the Dems’ coordinated efforts, as you’ve probably seen in the “choose your fighter” debacle.  

In this video, a variety of Democrat congresswomen imitated video game characters, dropping into the most unconvincing fighting stances you’ve ever seen in your life.  The only way they could have looked more ridiculous would have been if they’d been dropped directly onto a rake, causing the wooden handle to rocket upwards, flash between their tiny, clenched fists, and knock them unconscious with a satisfying “croquet-mallet-whacking-a-coconut” WHAP! 

But just when it seemed like that self-beclowning incident was as bad as any collaborative video could get, someone at DNC headquarters must have said, “Hold my 180-proof grain alcohol dosed with meth and watch this!”

And that poor soul came up with the “Sh*t that ain’t true” video, a vulgar, ungrammatical script that features a politician reading a laundry list of what he sees as Trump’s failures during his first month in office.

As a stand-alone clip, it’s standard political fare: “My opponent has screwed up in the following ways…”  But it’s not a stand-alone clip, because it turns out that around two dozen Dem pols recorded the exact same script, delivered in almost identical ways. 

Each one holds a little microphone in front of her, sits at the same time, uses the same moronic gestures.  “Prices are up (point thumb up), not down (point down).” Apparently nobody in the leftist brain trust remembered the prime directive of “talking to the camera” political ads: you want to look like you’re actually speaking frankly to your viewer. 

But by putting out the identical ad read by a series of politicians, they reveal and emphasize that these are all bad actors reading from the same script.  That strategy shows how utterly disconnected these people are from the American people.

A fundamental part of Americans’ self-perception is that we are stubbornly independent people.  We came here to follow our own lights when it came to religion and speech, and revolted to get out from under too-strict control from our British forebears and their monarchy.  “Rugged individualism” is stamped into our national DNA, aspirationally if not always in everyday practice. 

Conversely, “conformity” and “marching in lockstep” are phrases in our national language with negative connotations.  We disrespect those who lack individual initiative as soulless “company men.” We often derisively call people who follow the crowd (or more demeaningly, “the herd”) metaphorically insulting names like “puppet” or “robot.”  Comparisons of humans to “lemmings” – all mindlessly going over a cliff together – are not compliments.

And I don’t think it’s a coincidence that when these thoughts take on any kind of political connotations, they are usually associated with totalitarian leftism.   In the novel 1984 – and in the iconic Apple commercial from that year that borrowed that novel’s trappings – the citizens under the sway of Big Brother/government were colorless drones, clomping alone in unison or standing motionless in uniform, undifferentiated columns.

Conformity is an inevitable part of politics – a major party wouldn’t be a major party without some kind of “party line” that must be followed to some extent.  But we also push back against too closely hewing to the party line.  We deride repeated and cliched responses as “talking points” and “marching orders,” and we don’t like candidates who transparently follow them. 

But not the Democrats!  Those dopes have been addicted to talking points, and ham-handedly incapable of hiding the fact that they are slavishly repeating them.  Remember when George W was perceived as a lightweight presence on the political stage, and within 2 minutes of each other, every national Democrat on tv was saying that he “lacked gravitas?”  Despite the fact that none of those dolts had ever heard the word “gravitas” before?

Or when Tim AWOLz called the GOP ticket “weird,” and then every room-temperature-IQ lefty was all over the airwaves repeating it?  Or when some drone from the leftist Borg decided that the word-salad-spewing empty-skirt that was Que Mala was suddenly “brat,” and that her campaign was overflowing with “joy?”  Within minutes, you couldn’t swing a dead cat on the Dem convention floor without hitting three septuagenarians prattling on about the joyful brat-ness of the proceedings.     

And now, after four months to engage in some serious self-reflection, the Dems come up with the “Schiff than ain’t true” trainwreck, which combines the off-putting insistence of a crank’s manifesto and the warm authenticity of a hostage video.

Keep it up guys.  You’re doing great.  If you listen closely, you can probably hear the vast rumbling of tens of millions of voters coming over to your side, led by the wildly enthusiastic “youth” who are attracted to your vibe, and your squidgy, or whatever the hell else the kids are saying these days.

Oh, and here’s the memo with next week’s talking points.  The official phrases for March 17th – 24th are going to be “Ignorance is strength,” “War is peace,” and “Trump is a fascist.” 

Now go out and spread the word. 

Robotically.

Hamas delenda est!