Your Betters Always Know Better Than You Do

Year end news: the Democrats finally found an old white guy billionaire they can love. That’s right, Michael Bloomberg, the man who first ran and won New York’s mayoral race as a “Republican” and later as an Independent has decided he might want to run for President - as a Democrat! Why not run the table?

 Michael Bloomberg: demonstrating the need for his ‘Sugary Drinks Portion Cap Rule’

He’s still mad about the New York Court of Appeals throwing his statute out so he’s going to run for Head Nanny in order to right that egregious wrong. Of course he’ll have to get in line and spend a lot of money for that honor, there are a lot of nannies ahead of him.

But regardless of who wins the Democratic nomination, remember this: the size of your soda will always be more important to them than closing our borders in order to control drug running, human trafficking, disease, terrorism and millions of new welfare recipients.

Because, as this dismissive, even derisive tweet from Britain (h/t Francinepink) clearly explains, the left doesn’t believe you are capable of thinking for yourself.

So as you go about your New Year’s Eve celebration please remember to celebrate responsibly: no more than one.

And if it’s a carbonated beverage nothing over 16 ounces.

At a time.

Seize The Day

Things I never knew about when I was young enough to fully enjoy them:

December 30th is National Bacon Day. When I was younger I could eat all the bacon I wanted with neither short or long term consequences. Now I must indulge my bacon urges only periodically.

Butt if you can still afford to do so, by all means go ahead and enjoy bacon all day long. 

Breakfast:

Brunch:

Lunch:

Dinner:

Snacks:

And nightcap:

IBD (that’s International Bacon Day, not Irritable Bowel Disease) is sort of a combination of the Thanksgiving/Christmas holiday tradition of overindulging in food and the New Year’s Eve tradition of overindulging in drink. In short, the perfect storm, so don’t forget to wear your mukluks.

Nike Air Max Posite Bacon Boot

And honestly, after that lovely flush of youth has passed you by

it might be prudent to consider six degrees of separation between yourself and your bacon. Lest you end up, well, looking like this after a long day of indulgence:

But if you don’t heed my advice and wind up overindulging in bacon drinks either today or on New Year’s Eve you might want to check this out, although I filed it away under “things that would have been infinitely more useful when I was (much) younger.” Pedialyte's New Powder Packets Are Basically Made to Cure Your Hangover

Great. Now that I haven’t been awake at midnight on New Year’s Eve for 10 years. I look forward to the cure for wrinkles by the time I’m 90 as well.

White Guilt: Pink Pussy Edition

If you just pulled your PPH (pink pussy hat) out of storage in anticipation of next month’s “Women’s March” in either Chicago or San Francisco you might want to make other plans. Both cities have cancelled their planned marches, for somewhat different reasons.

What do you mean there will be no gathering of pink pussy brains this year to protest the patriarchy?

Chicago organizers cited “logistical issues” but as board member Sara Kurensky conceded, to “further distance the Chicago group from national Women’s March leaders” was an additional “side benefit.” Why?

…infighting across the national Women’s March movement arose after Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan praised Women’s March Inc. co-president Tamika Mallory and declared Jews his enemy during an address in February. The movement has since splintered, with chapter members criticizing the Women’s March leadership’s response to Farrakhan’s anti-Semitic rhetoric as being insufficient.

Wow, it was like pulling teeth to get the group (co-chaired by Women’s March leader, Linda Sarsour, Brooklyn born daughter of Palestinian immigrants and author of A Jihad Grows in Brooklyn) to denounce a well-known anti-Semite. What’s up with that? I’m so old that I remember when Jews were a bona fide discriminated-against minority (just watch Mad Men if you don’t believe), worthy of the left’s protection and concern.

Either the Jewish Anti-discrimination League has really done its job or Palestinians have persuaded the left that the Jews are simply a sub-group of privileged whites who don’t even deserve what they have let alone special treatment.

In light of that, the cancellation of the San Francisco area’s Women’s March makes more sense: Organizers cancel Women’s March Jan. 19 due to ‘overwhelmingly white’ participants. 

 Wanted: More Black/Hispanic Transgendered Men/Women for San Francisco Women’s March

To quote Glenn Reynold’s comment on this story - which he filed under “Annuls of Leftist Autophagy” - “I mean, who else gives a shit about this stuff?”

Indeed, were it not for White Guilt we would not still be trying to clean up after America’s experiment in Socialist Transformation.

“Courage”

"Please don't tell my mother I’m a journalist; she thinks I sell crack at a strip club."

When the ball drops in Times Square New Year's Eve, it will be aimed, at least metaphorically, at all those who are demonizing and attacking journalists and their profession.

The Times Square Alliance and Countdown Entertainment, which together orchestrate the iconic midnight celebration, says that the event this year will officially celebrate "journalists and press freedom" by making the Committee to Protect Journalists its official charity. That is the group that, before President Trump was elected, took the unprecedented step of declaring the Republican candidate a threat to press freedom "unknown in modern history.” – Multichannel News

Well move over 2018 #MeToo victims, journalists will be taking your place as next year’s objects of victimology. Accepting the award for 2019’s grievance group will be Brian Williams and Dan Rather.

But seriously? Honoring JournOlists on New Year’s Eve? I don’t think that’s the sort of “Adoration of the Magi” Da Fabriano  had in mind.

Nor do I think that any journalist today is worthy to be called magus (not to be confused with maggot).

Right, because the last one sunk under it’s own weight.

“Courage”

FLOTUS Friday on Thursday

FLOTUS Friday on Thursday: yes, I can do that. It was an executive order. Christmas week is all screwed up anyway so why wait till Friday when we’ve got great photos today?

But how dare he? How dare PDJT ruin the media’s Christmas narrative by flying to Iraq right after they wrote the BIG story “Trump First President Since 2002 to Not Visit Troops at Christmas” and then he goes and makes a trip to Iraq. And Germany. With Melania. To see the troops. Again I ask, How dare they?

Quick change-out of headlines then to a new narrative: Trump treats trip to visit troops like a campaign trip (CNN), Donald Trump Twitter Account Video Reveals Covert U.S. Navy SEAL Deployment During Iraq Visit (Newsweek), Donald Trump Finally Visits Troops in Iraq For Christmas (The Root) and, um, “your mama wears combat boots!”

I had a pair just like Melania’s back in the late 60’s! Well, mine were from K-Mart so maybe not just like them

Besides, it’s no big deal, every FLOTUS does it, right? Remember that time Michelle visited a war zone with Buh-rock the magic negro? Yeah, me neither. Although I do remember when Michelle visited several foreign countries:

Russia, the Vatican, Ghana, France, Cambodia, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, England, Ireland, Italy, Colombia, Costa Rica, Saudi Arabia, El Salvador, Spain, Sweden, Germany, Tanzania, Japan, Indonesia, India, Mexico, South Africa, Botswana, Liberia, Morocco, Qatar, Canada, Senegal, Norway, Netherlands and Cuba. And I’d include Aspen (7 times)  because that’s for all intents and purposes a foreign country too.

But Iraq? Afghanistan? No. Why would she go there?

And remember the good times when Barry visited the troops overseas and they all cheered “USA, USA!” when he walked out? Yeah, me neither.

I wonder why?

Anyway, Melania now joins a very small, elite group of First Ladies of the United States, including Martha Washington and Hillary’s personal seer, Eleanor Roosevelt, who have ever visited an actual combat zone. So she has a more legitimate claim to “dodging bullets”  than Hilz ever had.

And she makes it look so easy.

Transmogrifier Boxing Day

Don’t get me wrong, Christmas was wonderful: from the Nutcracker performance on the 23rd right through the turkey dinner with all the trimmings + five late yesterday.

And now it’s Boxing Day, and that’s where I’d like to be: nestled down in a box to sleep for about 48 hours. As my batteries grow older it seems to take longer to recharge them once they’ve been run down.

And I feel I need a full charge to deal with people who told us in 2016/17 that PDJT was a warmonger who would entangle us in conflicts all over the globe and are now mad at him for announcing he intends to wind down two conflicts. One of which we’ve been engaged in for 17 years under rules of engagement that prohibit winning.

Glenn Greenwald, notable lefty, has an interesting take:

Even that level of reality check immediately brings out the left’s lunacy:

Mr. Greenwald responds:

To which I’d add that I also strongly suspect that neither TJ nor TJ’s family are directly involved in fighting in any of these “perpetual wars” seeking to provide rights for “marginalized” people that he finds suddenly so compelling.

So we are now supposed to listen to the people who excoriated General Mad Dog Mattis when President Trump tapped him to be Secretary of Defense, but now feel his departure is the singularly worse thing that’s ever happened in the history of the republic. It seems somewhat peevish to point out that they voted against General Mattis before they voted for him.

Almost. Or maybe they all got transmogrifiers for Christmas:

Me, I’m off to enjoy Boxing Day. With a nice big cup of covfefe.

Feel free to join me.

Christmas Tidings of Great Joy

And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. 

For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord.  And this shall be a sign unto you; ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

Merry Christmas from MOTUS, Raj and Little Mo to all of our wonderful friends who have assembled a very special family here and who are very dear to our hearts. 

We love each and everyone of you and wish you all a blessed Christmas day filled with both the merry and the bright - For God has blessed us, everyone.

It’s a Marshmallow World

Marshmallows scream “Christmas!”

They needn’t come from bags, apparently you can make them yourself. And if you are truly OCD you can even make them into marshmallow snowflakes.

What a great gift for all the, um, snowflakes in your life.

They come in multiple flavors of the season:

chocolate caramel, peppermint, gingerbread

as well as multiple species:

But is there any marshmallow as cute and fun as the snowmen?

When I saw these little guys I immediately recognized them as a modern adaptation of the puffy little Christmas decorations I made one year when I was in high school. I tracked their provenance back to the pages of the December 1960 Better Homes and Gardens. Raj found me an archival magazine website that has every issue, ever published, of dozens of iconic magazines.  And there they were, on page 58, in an article titled:

In my house the December issues of the “ladies” magazines were never disposed of, they were stashed away after Christmas to emerge again every year as inspiration for the upcoming holiday season. What didn’t get baked or made one year might just make it into the rotation in a subsequent cycle. And so it was in 1966, a sad year for my whole family as my dad had died late that summer, I finally set about to make the marshmallow men that made their debut 6 years prior.  While Gingerbread Snowflakes’ updated version uses colored markers to make eyes, nose and buttons, the original BH&G specs are far less benign. Check out the materials listed for the construction of the original snowmen:

Glass-head pins!!!! In cute little marshmallow men that look like confections?! Can you imagine what the publication’s lawyers would say about that today? In 1966 however I headed off to the fabric store to procure my glass headed pins and non-digestible green sequins without batting an eye. And what? - white resin glue! That’s awfully toxic isn’t it? Pretty sure I used Elmer’s because that’s what we had, not because you can eat it.

I remember my creations being adorable, if not quite perfectly constructed. In fact they were probably more than a bit rough around the edges because crafting has never really been my forte. But I remember them making me happy for the first time in what seemed a lifetime. They were a tiny part of learning that life goes on, that pain never goes away but it does abate. Although oblivious to it at the time I was beginning to discover, as Deborah’s Palm has reminded us time and time again, that we choose life and blessings, not the other way around. Choose wisely.

I wish each and every one of you a wonderful Christmas Eve…and a marshmallow world.

Oh, the world is your snowball, see how it grows
That's how it goes, whenever it snows
The world is your snowball just for a song
Get out and roll it along

It’s a Marshmallow World: the Abbreviated Disco Version

IHC:  I hate computers. I was working on a post and all of a sudden it disappeared; completely, irrevocably, irretrievably; the victim of an undefined ERROR. So here I am, leaving at the crack of dawn and I don’t have a post ready. So this is going to be necessarily brief.

All the discussion yesterday about sweet potatoes with/without marshmallows got me thinking… about marshmallows! Aren’t marshmallows a great Christmas theme? So I selected some seasonal marshmallow music - Mark Steyn & Jessica Martin’s disco version of “It’s A Marshmallow World”

Unfortunately that’s pretty much all I’ve got time for today. I’ll have to reinvent the rest of my festive marshmallow themed post for tomorrow. Here’s a little tease of what’s in store: these are my two little woolly Christmas snow-buddies, added to the collection about 20 years ago. If you look closely you can see that they’re roasting marshmallows around the campfire.

That’s part of my Rosenthal star candleholder collection in the background with some of those micro-mini rice light strings. They make the crystal shimmer and are much less messy than drippy candles. They may never see the glow of candlelight again.

So have a good day everyone. I’m packing my sleigh and heading out shortly for the western side of the state. Check back tomorrow for more marshmallow memes.

The Senate Tosses Its Budget Salad: Hold the Dressing

Gee, the suspense is killing me. Will the Senate pass a Continuing Resolution with a whole $5 billion earmarked for a border wall? Allow me to end the speculation: no, they won’t. And I can’t even believe we’re talking about “shutting the government down” over a rounding error in the federal budget.

So despite being in favor of border security before they were against it, the Democrats will vote, as a block, against it and the majority Senate Republicans, as blockheads, will ensure its defeat. The world has gone mad.

 

So once we “shut down the government” – as if anyone could actually do that – we’ll take the fight to troop withdrawal. Again, remember when the democrats were for troop withdrawal in the Middle East before they were against it? They don’t.

Considering the general tenor of the world at large and the proximity to Christmas I suggest that today might be a good day to highlight Famous Recipes from Previously Famous But Now-defunct Department Stores. For my contribution I submit the dish the once grand Hudson’s was most famous for: the Maurice Salad.

It was suspiciously similar to my favorite Maurice Salad that which came from the Buhl Cafe on the corner of Griswold and Larned, just a few blocks from the Woodward Avenue spot where the mighty J.L. Hudson flagship department store once stood and where their chef allegedly created it sometime in the 1930’s.

J. L. Hudson's Maurice Salad

(serves 6-8)

2 tsp. white vinegar

1 1/2 tsp. lemon juice

1 1/2 tsp. onion juice (grate onion with fine grater)

1 1/2 tsp. sugar

1 1/2 tsp. dijon mustard

1/4 tsp. dry mustard

1 cup mayonnaise

2 tbspns. chopped fresh parsley

1 hard cooked egg, finely chopped (I use 3-4, I like eggs)

salt to taste

14 oz. ham, cut into strips

14 oz cooked turkey breast

14 oz Swiss cheese

1/2 cup slivered sweet gerkins

1 head Iceberg lettuce, shredded

12-16 pimento stuffed olives

Combine the first 6 dressing ingredients and stir to dissolve the sugar. Add remaining dressing ingredients and mix well.  Combine the ham, turkey, cheese and pickles together in a large bowl.  Toss together with the dressing.  Divide lettuce among the plates, top with salad and garnish each plate with 2 olives.  Serve with fresh bread.

As I mentioned previously, garnish with tomato wedges, hard boiled egg wedges, radishes and olives and you have The Buhl Cafe version. 

While post-modernists like to deconstruct it and serve the dressing on the side like so:

I assure you a properly prepared Maurice requires it to be well tossed, by the chef, in the kitchen. Is it as pretty? Well, art is in the eye of the beholder. But to me this looks as divine as it tastes.

As an added feature it makes use of leftover Christmas ham and turkey, and is very low-carb diet friendly.

So what’s your favorite Famous Department Store dish?

FLOTUS Friday: Yes, I’m Going There. This is Your Only Warning

Fake news is a type of yellow journalism or propaganda that consists of deliberate disinformation or hoaxes spread via traditional print and broadcast news media or online social media. -  Wiki

Example of a hoax: perpetuating the myth that former FLOTUS Michelle Obama is a svelte, pulled together fashion icon of goddess status.

“Michelle Obama literally dazzled at her Barclays Center appearance in Brooklyn, New York, on Wednesday night to promote her bestselling memoir, Becoming.

The former first lady, who spoke alongside moderator Sarah Jessica Parker, wore a gorgeous, bright yellow gown from Balenciaga’s spring/summer 2019 collection. There’s no doubt that Carrie Bradshaw would covet this outfit.”

No doubt

“Obama’s silk dress featured large sleeves and a massive slit in the front,

which showed off her showstopping, thigh-high boots. The $3,900 stilettos, also from Balenciaga, shimmered in metallic gold.” - Huffpo

I was picturing something a bit more…aquatic:

I didn’t bother to see what was said about her wardrobe on the rest of her “book” tour, but it looked to me to consist primarily of different sets of pajamas and bathrobes:

“She was a boundary-pushing style icon as First Lady too, famously insisting on her sleeveless dresses and inspiring workout routines named after her arms. But, as she writes in Becoming, her self-expression was still largely constricted under the pressure of her former life as the first black First Lady.” - Vice

And then we have another type of fake news which is closer to true propaganda and disinformation. From Vogue, regarding the Trump’s Christmas card photo:

According to the Vogue article, which was written by an unnamed author, the rather wholesome, traditional photo of the First Lady and President Trump "feels so strangely off" while asserting the couple looks "almost like cardboard cutout versions of themselves."

"They are very, very smiley—despite this season of indictments, and the dissolution of their flagrantly fraudulent charity organization," it says. "They are also holding hands, a move that is famously out of character for them. [another false narrative promulgated by fake news]

Media Research Center vice president Dan Gainor told Fox News that Vogue's decision to make the author anonymous was an act of cowardice. "Notice how no one at Vogue was brave enough to put their name on this utter piece of garbage? This isn’t journalism, its crap. It belongs in the same sewer that Vogue inhabits," he said. "Major media have done more to discredit legitimate journalism than anything their critics -- even Donald Trump -- could ever do." -  Fox

So, to be clear, according to Fake News this is hot:

…and this is not:

So who are you going to believe, Fake News or your lyin’ eyes?

Yellow journalism,

“The optics of looking fresh to death are clearly not lost on Obama…her bold fashion choice on Wednesday made sense in a book tour that's largely about the politics of expressing yourself.”

or the simple truth of a golden goddess?

I’m going with gold.

And I don’t want to hear any complaints, I warned you in the title.

P.S. Is it any wonder that every publication at Condé Nast, including Vogue is going down the crapper?