Choose To Be a Happy Little Cloud

I don’t know why this little story made me smile so bigly. Maybe I’m world weary in general or, more likely, just tired of condescending elitists.

In any event, how bad can things be when a class of middle school art students stage a Paint-Like-Bob-Ross flash mob? The class donned baby blue button down shirts and curly wigs and followed along with a soothing Bob Ross instructional video on how to paint happy little trees. 

The schtick was the idea of their Madison Middle School art teacher Brady Sloane.

Her pre-Advanced Placement eighth-grade students had been stressing about projects and grades but still pumping out high-quality artwork. So Sloane hoped for a way to reward them for all their effort.

She put on her thinking cap. Or, rather, her curly wig.

Sloane became Bob Ross, an art world legend thanks to a resurgence of his public broadcasting television show from the 1980s and 1990s and internet culture's love for memes. – Abilene Reporter

Honestly, how can you not love this? Middle school art students paying homage to a guy that you know every elitist in America looks down their nose at, even if he was on PBS for decades. They refer to his style as “pizzeria art.”

Okay, I see their point

Imagine their contempt if they knew that Bob Ross had an 18 year career in the Air Force as a drill sergeant before launching his art career, where he felt his calm speaking manner would offset the 18 years he spent barking orders at people.

Or that the man who never charged PBS a dime for making the hundreds of painting shows they aired did make millions of dollars on marketing his own line of paints and painting tools to amateur artists. Perhaps that helps explain why he was so vilified in the art world:

"I am horrified by art instruction on television," said Richard Pousette-Dart, an Abstract Expressionist who teaches at the Students Art League in New York. "It's terrible -- bad, bad, bad. They are just commercial exploiters, non-artists teaching other non-artists." He added, "I don't teach a technique or a method, I nurture students to find their own." – NYT

You’ll be happy to know that the painter of happy little clouds ignored his critics. Nor did he exactly have an abundance of respect for some of them either, especially the abstract expressionists, saying: "If I paint something I don't want to have to explain what it is."

So you can see why the man – and his legacy – must be destroyed. I expect we’ll soon be hearing allegations  of cultural appropriation leveled against Mr. Ross (posthumously), Ms. Sloane and her students. You see, while Bob Ross (RIP) was a white man, that head of curly locks? A perm. He didn’t own that Afro any more than Rachel Dolezal.

That’s right, Bob Ross had straight hair.

Bob Ross, in his early Air Force days (l) sported a Tom Brady ‘do

Let the character assassinations begin. I choose to be a happy little cloud today.

Meet Dr. Economics. She’s Not a Real Doctor…

Good morning everyone and welcome to the school of continuous learning. Today we’ll be studying sophomore level economics and by the end of the lesson you too will know how to eliminate poverty, inequity and global warming! And how to get enough money to make that happen. (Spoiler alert!)

“The Federal Reserve can extend credit to power these projects and investments and new public banks can be created to extend credit. There is also space for the government to take an equity stake in projects to get a return on investment.” Green New Deal Resolution

When we’re done with the tutorial you should be able to prove the hypothesis that “while there are limitations on human intelligence there are no such limits on human stupidity.”

Let’s start with the New Green Deal’s plan to eliminate poverty: all you need to do is give everyone everything they need or want by way of a guaranteed basic income and universal health care  “for those unable or unwilling to work,” and federal job guarantees for those who prefer to pretend to work and get a paystub showing what they made before 70% of it is recycled to the Federal Treasury.

That sure sounds good, but won’t that cost like a bazillion dollars?  How will we pay for it? Let’s have Dr. Ocasio-Cortez take it from here: “you just pay for it.” That’s a little something known as an economic “externality.” ¹ Or something.

But Doctor, isn’t this going to be a socialist system that will require massive government takeovers of, well, everything? Absolutely not, not just no, but hell no:

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.) said Thursday that her proposed Green New Deal would not be financed through a "massive government takeover."

"I think one way that the right does try to mischaracterize what we're doing as though it's like some kind of massive government takeover," Ocasio-Cortez said on MSNBC's "MTP Daily." "Obviously it's not that because what we're trying to do is release the investments from the federal government to mobilize those resources across the country."

Which would have been fine, reasonable deniability and all, had she not already let the cat out of the bag earlier in the day when she told NPR Morning Edition host Steve Inskeep that it meant exactly that. And not just yes, but hell yes!

Is anyone else getting flashbacks to NPR’s “Ask Dr. Science! segments?

You know, the one where a citizen calls in and asks a science question that is then answered by the “expert” except the answer is always wrong and frequently nothing more than a meandering non sequitur on the way to a joke? The tag line is always “He knows more than you do.” and the skit always closes with the disclaimer: “I’m not a real doctor, but I do have a degree in…science!”

Doctor Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s deserves her own tag line. Her answers are always like that too: wrong, non-sequiturs - only not funny.

¹ Excerpt from AOC’s interview on Morning Edition:

INSKEEP: As you know, Congresswoman, one reason that people who are politically conservative are skeptical of efforts to combat climate change is that it sounds to them like it requires massive government intervention, which they just don't like. Are you prepared to put on the table that, yes, actually, they're right, what this requires is massive government intervention?

OCASIO-CORTEZ: It does. It does. Yeah. I have no problem saying that. Why? Because we have tried their approach for 40 years. For 40 years, we tried to let the private sector take care of it. They said, we got this, we can do this, the forces of the market are going to force us to innovate. Except for the fact that there's a little thing in economics called externalities, and what that means is that a corporation can dump pollution in the river and they don't have to pay for it, and taxpayers have to pay for cleaning up our air, cleaning up our water and saving the planet.

And that my friends is a fine example of a non sequitur so don’t say you didn’t learn something today: Rep Ocasio-Cortez does not just suffer from the Millennial vocal fry, she also has the brain fry to go along with it.

Nihilist Democrats Believe In Nothing

If Democrats believe in something other than sheer raw power you’d be hard pressed to figure out what it is. Their vacillation on most everything is more indicative of pragmatism than ideology. I remember when their battle cry for abortion was “safe, legal and rare” – now they’re on board with “late-term abortion” and infanticide. Should you ever need a quintessential definition of “slippery slope” this is it.

Democrats seem to fervently believe in whatever appears to be expedient for the purpose of retaining power at the moment. Think of them as the party of “whatever” -

the political equivalent of vocal fry valley girls.

So help me out,  I’ve literally lost count of the things Democrats were  for before they were against – and vice versa. Here’s my partial list, which starts sometime before “Bushes War.”

• Racism – Need I say anything other than “Jim Crow South?” Go back a bit further than that and there was the issue of the Democrats’ rejection of the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments, as well as the 1957 Civil Rights Act. And don’t forget the venerable Dem Senator, Robert Byrd, who filibustered the Civil Rights Act of 1964 with the full-throated support of Democrat icon Senator Strom Thurmond. But they’re against racism now, as it would not be politically expedient to be for it.
• Iraq war – Many of the Democrat critics of the war voted to authorize it - before it became politically expedient to oppose it (including John Kerry and Hillary Clinton, to name two Democratic presidential nominees).
• The Patriot Act – Democrats go back and forth on this one regularly depending on who’s in power and how they can use it to their advantage, but they mostly voted against it when Bush’s administration proposed it. But they’re pretty much all in when political expediency dictates it can be used to take down their arch enemy (Trump).
• The Wall, and illegal immigration – the Dems support for the wall and opposition to illegal immigration received at least nominal support before Donald Trump made it his central theme and before Madam Pelosi forbade them to support such positions. Now, like their party’s history of racial discrimination, it is completely forgotten in the re-writing of history.
• Jobs, and rising wages. I always thought Dems were for jobs and higher wages until Tuesday night when PDJT announced the creation of 2.4 million new jobs and the end of stagnant wages. And you would think announcing the lowest black unemployment ever would at least get the Black Caucus on their feet. But no, it wasn’t politically expedient to celebrate such a milestone.

Other things that Democrats once supported but are now no longer politically expedient include the First Amendment (must ban “hate speech!”), the Second Amendment (must “control” guns!) and the Electoral College (must have “one man, one vote” democracy!). I actually have no proof that they were ever really supportive of the Constitution as they seem to be at constant war with the very federalism that the Framers hardwired into the Constitution. The Electoral College is just one example of the measures the Founding Fathers used to dilute democracy and preserve the individual states’ power. The Senate structure  of 2 representatives per state regardless of size ins the most prominent.

Perhaps now would be a good time to remind Democrats that of the 3141 counties in America 3084 voted for Trump.

It’s a Republic, Ma’am, if you can keep it

Democrats: they believe in nothing which means everyone else must sacrifice everything. Which is a pretty good definition of nihilism.

How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Enjoy Global Warming

In the midst of the polar vortexes swirling down from Canada it seems the real threat is still global warming. So don’t get comfortable driving your own (fossil fuel) car, heating your home (with fossil fuel) and consuming unconscionable amounts of tomahawk steaks and hamburgers. The threat still looms large.

NASA and NOAA released their analysis of the global climate in 2018 on Wednesday, revealing that 2018 was the fourth-hottest year on record. The other four in the top five all happened in the past five years, a reminder that we’ve seen a lot of rapid warming lately. And the planet will warm further, especially since greenhouse gas emissions are continuing to rise. [ed. subtext: we’re all going to die!!!] 

Some of that heat came in the form of heat waves that took hundreds of lives. The heat also helped fuel record-breaking disasters, like the Camp Fire in California, that wiped out cities and left thousands homeless. [ed. subtext: did I mention we’re all going to die!!!] – from Vox, the official Millennial news outlet

And it must be true, because …the UN said so! And Yahoo News reported it! As did NPR! And everyone else around this ever warming planet.

The UN's World Meterological Organization said in November that 2018 was set to be the fourth warmest year in recorded history, stressing the urgent need for action to rein in runaway planetary warming. 

So, we’re up to “planetary warming” now. That sounds much more dire than global warming. No wonder Alexandria has given us only 12 years to “just fix it.”

Of course other (real) scientists disagree with the data and conclusions, but that’s irrelevant because, well, shut up.

In other weather news, Park City is at the tail end of a 3 “weather emergency” meaning lots of snow and arctic cold. I haven’t measured snow fall totals at our house but the local ski resorts (one of which is across the street from us) are reporting 3 day total snowfalls of 44 inches. Other areas, like Alta, got 60 inches. That’s a lot of snow I don’t care where you are.

And that’s good news because after 3 years of blaming global warming for a lower than normal winter snowpack we’re on track to refill the severely depleted reservoirs. The good citizens of Park City Utah can relax; it’s not the end of snow (as the global alarmists around here have been predicting for years) after all.

So what do people do here when it snows, besides ski (downhill and cross country), board, and snow-shoe through the mountains? Well here’s what the kids on my street did a couple days ago, in the late afternoon when dad got home from work. Watch for it:

Here he comes!

Looks like he might be transporting contraband.

Wheeeeeeee!

Dad actually spent over an hour taking turns hauling 6 kids around the block, one at a time on their snow saucers. Yes, it seems it could be a little dangerous, and maybe stupid. But remember, these kids already hurl themselves down mountains at breakneck speeds on a regular basis. And on the adult’s behalf I will say 1. there isn’t much traffic in our sub. 2. The streets, although plowed earlier were so rutted from fresh accumulations that nobody could drive faster than 10 mph. 3. He wasn’t going any faster than that. 4. He had a spotter sitting in the open hatch watching everything. And 5. The kids were having a blast.

Try that in a Tesla.

See? Life is still good when you unplug - turn off the TV, the iPhone, tablet and computer and just go outside to play in the snow – behind a big honking gas guzzler. What better way to enjoy global warming?

P.S. We got at least another foot of snow after these shots were taken. It’s a magical world when everything is blanketed in freshly fallen snow.

We Still Have A Lot Of Stupid Out There

Was that a great speech or what? I don’t know what more an American would want to hear from their President

• The State of the Union is strong.
• We’re still going to build a wall.
• We will not have late term abortion in this country.
• Partisan investigations are misdirecting our attentions away from our enemies who would do us harm.
• We will have the world’s strongest military
• Our economy is strong and growing stronger.

Who could find fault with that other than a Socialist?

Speaking of which, AOC was among the suffragettes in white. She brought as her guest to the SOTO the rude woman (“activist”) who trapped Jeff Flake in an elevator with  convenient TV cameras rolling to get him to denounce Brett Kananaugh over fake allegations.

Cute: they dressed alike too! (Take your hands out of your pockets @AnaMaria)

“I’m proud to announce that my #StateOfTheUnion guest will be @AnaMariaArchil2. Ana Maria is the NY14-er who famously jumped into the elevator with Sen. Flake to elevate the stories of survivors everywhere. She‘s living proof that the courage within all of us can change the [world].” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted of her guest.

I still can’t figure out either what made her courageous or how she changed the world, but whatever, as our little Alexandria would say. The media is still falling all over themselves in praise of the First Term Socialist’s clothing choice. These are the same people who didn’t “get” Melania’s take on a cape when she wore one and are equally perplexed over the First Lady’s SOTU style:

The first lady was met with a welcoming round of applause as she entered the House chamber and made her way to her seat, but eagled-eyed social media users were quick to wonder as to why Melania was only wearing one glove.  - AOL

Written by a Millennial who may be eagle-eyed but apparently knows nothing about manners; it is considered  impolite to shake hands with a gloved hand. And there is much handshaking on the way in to a SOTU.

I still have confidence in President Trump’s ability to right the ship of state, but when you can’t get the entire chamber of Congress to stand to the rallying cry of “America will never be socialist” there is still a whole lot of stupid out there to overcome.

And here sits a lot of it.

Saving Our Bacon

You might think that VSG-PDJT is directing the migrant hordes in Mexico for his own purposes. Why else would there be thousands of migrants currently planning to swarm the Texas border where there is no fence, no wall, no official entry point for processing?

Mexican authorities in two border states announced the arrival of nearly 2,000 Central American migrants who are part of a caravan headed for the border cities Piedras Negras and Nuevo Laredo. The area between those two municipalities does not feature any type of fencing or barriers like the ones a previous caravan encountered in California.

State officials in Coahuila announced the arrival of more than 1,700 members of a migrant caravan that recently left Honduras. They are slated to be ferried by bus to the Texas border. The Nuevo Leon government is preparing shelters and security.

The migrants are traveling with the intent to request asylum on U.S. soil, thus making any detention by border authorities irrelevant. The group is expected in Eagle Pass and Laredo, Texas, however, since the region lacks any fencing or physical barriers, some could successfully storm the border with little effort. – Breitbart

Why, yes - it does appear to be an orchestrated move. Just not by President Trump but rather by the One World Order SJW crowd, who seem to have more money to advance their cause than the entire U.S. government. Just remember when there is a clash on the border that this is what PDJT has been trying to get the lunkheads in Congress to avoid for the past 2 years.

Pentagon deploys an additional 3700 troops to the Mexican border

He keeps telling them and they keep not hearing.

So this is a big day: the President’s State of the Union this evening, as well as the kick-off of the Chinese New Year – 2019 marking the Year of the Pig.

Leave it to the Chinese to not only get away with cultural appropriation but to celebrate it. It’s fine with me though, a whole year of bacon – what could go wrong?

That’s right, nothing.

So get yourself some popcorn, flavored with bacon grease, and prepare to watch President Trump try once again to save our bacon even as the Democrats squeal that they’d prefer the slaughter house. 

Hot buttered and baconed popcorn

You Can’t Fool Mother Nature

It’s been a cold winter, the result of “Climate Change” if we are to believe the disciples of the Church of Global Warming. How then do you explain the inconvenient truth of the attendant problems of the electric motor car due to, uh, frigid weather? It seems that despite all the hype and hope electric cars are still subject to all the same laws of physics which bedevil the rest of us:

Disgruntled owners of (Tesla) Model 3s have been widespread on social media and online forums, talking about numerous issues they’ve had with cold weather on their vehicles. People have complained about battery range draining and Model 3 door handles freezing up.

Problem #1: where do I plug in my hairdryer?

A new report by Fortune highlights several Tesla owners pointing out their issues: "My biggest concern is the cold weather drained my battery 20 to 25 miles overnight and an extra five to ten miles on my drive to work. I paid $60,000 to not drain my battery so quickly," said New Jersey based Model 3 owner Ronak Patel. – Zero Hedge

You have to wonder: were the Tesla owners simply unaware of how energy works? Or did they honestly believe that Elon Musk not only rode the zeitgeist of the postmodern post-industrial world to the bank but also managed to drive the laws of thermodynamics¹ to a new terminus? Unfortunately he did not. Although others are working on solutions to address all these issues:

Remember: always warm up your Tesla before actually trying to drive it

Don’t let any of this discourage you though if you’re inclined to save the world from global warming. What’s a little inconvenience when we’ve only got 12 years left to save the planet?

Spoiler alert: extreme heat also depletes battery power. Robert Frost reflects, you decide:

¹Warning: math required. And I’m not talking Common Core

How I Intend To Spend Super Bowl LIII (Hint: I’ll Be In Janice’s Corner)

Well, here it is, Super Bowl Sunday. I know a lot of you don’t care. Even so, you might care about CNN’s ace reporter on all forms of racial/gendered bias (Don the Lemon) grilling of Gladys Knight on why she is being a disloyal black b***h by singing the National Anthem at the start of the game.

Um, because she’s a singer and that’s what she does?

Little Don came to within a hair’s breadth of coming right out and accusing her of being whatever the proper gender-neutral term for “house slave” is. As always, Ms. Knight was classier by half:

“People are going to have their opinions about whatever, and all I can deal with right now is what my heart says, I just want them to know that we have a country that’s worth standing up for.”

All I can deal with right now is the fact that a major news network believes that an entertainer must justify their decision to sing the national anthem at the Super Bowl to anyone let alone a third-rate Fake News outlet.

And mark my words, there will be people on the other side claiming Lemon is racist because he didn’t demand the same justification from Alan Levine, the lead singer for Maroon 5, the all-white group providing half time entertainment, or at least what passes as half-time entertainment these days.

Not that others haven’t demanded an explanation from Levine: Colin Kaepernick’s attorney Mark Geragos called him out on Good Morning America, saying that Levine’s half-time performance was a “copout” (interesting choice of words):

“When you start talking about, ‘I’m not a politician; I’m just doing the music.’ Most of the musicians who have any kind of consciousness whatsoever understand what’s going on here.”

Yes Mr. Geragos, we do know exactly what’s going on here. That’s why there will be so many people not watching the Super Bowl today.

For his part, Maroon 5’s spokesman did try to explain he wasn’t a politician, just a tunesmith simultaneously holding an olive branch out to the NFL kneelers, dealers and appeasers:

He seemed to promise that his show would acknowledge the protests against the NFL, which include national anthem kneelers and Kaepernick’s apparent ban from the league for being the initial leader of the kneeling movement.

As if anyone needed another reason not to watch Super Bowl LIII. Well, I’m still watching the game. Unfortunately I’ll have to switch off the half-time show to prevent indigestion form all the gameday goodies.

Here’s my entry to the SB LIII Hall of Fame:

Cheesey Chorizo Caramelized Onion Dip Recipe

Ingredients:

2 cups onion, chopped

3 tablespoons butter

1/8 teaspoon thyme

½ chorizo sausage, about 6 ounces

8 ounce package of cream cheese

¼ cup mayonnaise

1/3 cup mozzarella cheese

¼ cup chopped chives or green onions

kosher salt

Instructions:

1.  Remove chorizo from casing and cook in a medium skillet over medium high heat for about 10 minutes, chopping with spoon and stirring occasionally. Set aside. If greasy remove excess grease.

2.  In another skillet, melt butter over medium heat and add onion. Add thyme, season with kosher salt and lower heat to medium-low and cook onion for about 20 minutes until onions become soft and caramelized.

3.  In a medium sized bowl add cream cheese and mayonnaise and mix well until smooth. Add mozzarella cheese, caramelized onions, green onions and mix well. Gently fold in chorizo. Pour into a 2 cup baking dish.

4.  Place on a baking sheet and bake at 350 degree F for 12-15 minutes or until dip is golden and bubbly. Garnish with additional green onion and serve with baguette slices or tortilla chips.

Even if you are boycotting the game you can still enjoy a Super Bowl spread; just because a bunch of lunkheaded millionaires decided to bite the hand that feeds them doesn’t mean you don’t have to eat. So, what are you fixing for game day?

Oh, and one last thought from commenter Bennie Sprouse re. the SB entertainment controversy:

Why would ANYONE have to DEFEND their singing OUR National Anthem? … Most of the nitwits who "protest" don't even know WHY - I would say "monkey see - monkey do"… but SOME people relate everything to RACE so I won't say that!

But I will.

“I drink, and I know things, I’m basically not a nice person.” – Janice the Elder, RIP 2018

Hoping to see everyone over in Janice’s Corner at one time or another today.