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!
Martin Simpson 