The Ugly Chinaman
Posted On: Thursday - August 15th 2019 1:43PM MST
In Topics: China Geography
It's just an expression!
Before I get far into this post, let's get this Peak Stupidity pre-emptive apology out of the way. "Ugly Chinaman" is an expression, or meme, if you will, taken here from the "Ugly American" one, based on a movie and book from 70 and 60 years ago respectively - hell, read the Wiki. I really shouldn't have to do this, but then, the Chinapeople in question don't know the expression, being not very versed in the culture of the West. That is exactly part of the problem, and where this expression comes into use. It's not about being literally ugly (in the literal sense, for a change, of the word "literal"!). No, the "ugly Americans" were just the tourists throwing their money around, having lots more than the general population of the host countries, acting what the Europeans would have called uncouth, and especially not trying to get into the culture of the place.
Of course, not all American visitors used to, or currently, act in this manner. There are plenty of Americans who "do as the Romans do" when in Rome. No, you don't have to bath regularly ... OK, now I'm the ugly American again, so let me back up. You don't complain that this or that is "not the way we do it at home" and "our way is better". You try the real Italian food, rather than having the iPhone search for and direct you to the nearest Pizza Hut (gotta admit though, NY pizza beats Italian pizza). You learn to relax, and not expect stores to open at any certain time. When they do, you shop for a few items for the day at one of the small markets, and don't complain that there's no Wal-Mart with large cases of Mountain Dew and 40 flavors of deodorant - cause, guess what, you don't need the deodorant - again "do as the Romans..."
There are Americans who even fit in in China and other places in Asia, or at least the Orient. It's not easy. They are different people with much different cultures. Experience it for at least a while, and you'll get a better learning experience than just following the young lady (usually cute, though) with the pennant, explaining this and that which could have been learned off the internet. "OK, now we will all use the toilette. You've got 10 minutes for that and some shopping, and then it's off to ... well, if this is Tuesday, it must be Rome."
As American visitors to Europe were thought of in the past, I believe the dozens of millions of Chinese tourists that traipse around the cities of the world nowadays are the new version - the Ugly Chinamen. They are everywhere, in American cities and elsewhere in the Western world. Just to get some really rough rectally-extracted numbers, let's imagine just 5% of Chinese families with the money and the inclination to travel. I really think it'd be a lot higher than that, but that'd be 70 million. Many take advantage of the tours, as they are just as, or more than, as savvy consumers as Americans. These are the large groups that crowd something as big as the Roman Colosseum (though the arena with the Gladiators, Christians, and lions, is off limits), the hotels, and the sidewalks.
More power to them, I say, as it's great that they have the money to get to see things and the Western ways that their parents just 30 years ago would have no hope of getting to see. Go back 50 years, and even learning about the West was greatly discouraged. With a culture much more alien to Europe, and to America, as America's culture has been to European, then you get this phenomena of the "Ugly Chinaman". These aren't the quiet types you see in math class. The kids can be quite loud, as an artifact from life in China, where people are crowded together, and well, that's not really an excuse, they are just loud. After almost 4 decades of the 1-child policy (recently lifted), there are plenty of spoiled children.
As for the parents, well the people can be quite arrogant, having that 3,500 y/o culture and all, probably more than Americans were even in our economic heyday. They've got to just go see all the standard tourist sites rather than just hang out and experience the culture, they really can't give up their taste in Chinese food even for a week*, (and by God, Italy is not the place for that behavior), and then there's the picture taking.
The latter was bad enough in the days of the Japanese and the 36 pics-per-roll Kodachrome era. Now, with the unlimited photo-shooting, the selfies and especially the Chinese girls posing with one leg forward to accentuate one side of the buttocks and the 50 year-old peace signs, it's really out-of-hand. Peak Stupidity commented on this before, and we'll just have to excerpt this one paragraph:
It's the continual selfies or posed photos everywhere in front of every damn thing that makes me think "do you not think people will believe you, if you said you've been here? Are you taking the pictures to prove it? If not, don't you think you can download a better picture of this place without idiots posing in the way?Is it that you don't think your friends will believe you if you just tell them you've been to the Roman Colosseum?
If you live in a tourist city or go to the big American national parks, than you'll already know about the new hordes of visitors. Yeah, they are mostly good people, and they sure work hard enough to deserve these vacations. Every place it seems, wants that tourist dollar as some easy money. One might find, though, that the residents not in the tourist "industry" and governments that get part of this loot, don't exactly feel the same way. Remember, smiles everyone, smiles!
* Whether they are similarly staffed by mostly illegal aliens as in America, there are Chinese people running Chinese restaurants about every spot on the globe excepting the oceans.
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"Go ahead and visit Vatican City, "
Posted On: Wednesday - August 14th 2019 10:51PM MST
In Topics: AntiChrist So-called Pope Francis
♪♫♬ "We're gonna visit Vatican City,
Go ahead and tour in Vatican City,
like modern men, and modern girls,
we're gonna live in the modern world." ♪♫♬
♪♫♬ "Why worry 'bout the Muzzies?
Why worry 'bout the Commies?
Vatican City's got everything covered." ♪♫♬
I tell ya, get a Tom Petty song in your head, and it's pretty persistent. I'd rather tour his home country of north Florida than the house of the
Granted, it's partly that we've already done a lot of walking and children can't always keep up. It's not like the Vatican is that old, either, the palace itself being, let's see, CCCXXVI - (- XXIX), carry the V, add the ... what the? ... * years younger than the Roman Colosseum**. However, I'd rather not give another funny colored piece of my tourist "dollar" to the house of this ignorant Commie. Were it Pope John Paul II, a man who was instrumental, along with Ronnie, Maggie, Lec, etc, in ending the Cold War, still living in the Vatican City, I'd make a special effort to visit. Right now, I just don't have the stationary supplies for a good sign, saying something like "Is the Pope Catholic?"
We made it at least to one nice Italian restaurant of the style you'd see in the movies. As we ordered some anti-pasta, I had to explain to my boy what that meant. In fact, I gotta admit that I thought the same as my kid, as if this food is "against" pasta, as in some sort of battle of the digestive tract. No, per the menu, this "anti" means "before", so one eats it before the pasta. That's what we did. As for the so-called Pope, well he's most certainly not from before Christ, so his being a potential AntiChrist is not at all like the benign AntiPasta.
The wife gets upset when I get too political while on vacation anyway. We'll let so-called Pope Francis be, this time around.
* More on Roman Numerals in a post to come.
** The Wiki date for the inauguration and finish dates of the Colosseum do not match what we saw there. How can that happen? Are we talking about the same Colosseum? I'll trust the signs inside the actual one over the internet.
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[UPDATED 8/15:] Added anti-Christ paragraph.
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The tourist dollar and funny money
Posted On: Monday - August 12th 2019 2:06PM MST
In Topics: Economics Peak Stupidity Roadshow
I've lived in parts of the country before that are attractive to tourists. There may or may not be a lot more the local economy, but the "tourist dollar" is seems desired by local government and business as easy money. It's true - no real "industry" has to occur, with available resources, a skilled workforce, cheap power or cooling water, etc. You just have to serve lots of food at marked-up prices, have lots of hotel rooms, and make room for double-decker and amphibious buses (usually not the same ones) full of Chinese people*.
The world over wants to make itself full of tourist attractions vs. having real industry creating wealth, simply, well, in the words of Bizarro-era JFK, "we choose to do so, not because it's hard, but because it's easy!" There is an economic point to made that the world can't run just on people showing other people around, just as with people serving each other burgers and expresso, as discussed a bit in long-ago post "Thoughts from the coffee shop ...". Someone's got to create wealth, but this economic stuff can really mess with one's head, if you get into it much, and I'll leave a post on that for another time.
The point here is about the spending habits of tourists. I've been there, and we've mostly all been there. You're over in London or Rome, Shanghai or Santiago, and you've budgeted some extra money to make the trip enjoyable and memorable. One thing most people don't want to do is spend a majority of the time comparing prices and trying to get the best deal on the lodging, transportation, and souvenirs, oh, other than those Chinese "tourists" at the outlet malls. I've been there (no, not the outlet malls so much) a few times, realizing later that, yeah, I know the best way to stay in this foreign city, but I'm on the way home and may never come back. Leave that work for the people that write the Lonely Planet guidebooks and that. It's time to let go, and add it all up when you get home to help plan for the next one.
Therefore, you're bound to be a spendthrift while on vacation, especially on foreign trips. The tourist cities know that, as that's how they come up with the big bucks. Historic Charleston, S. Carolina won't make as much money off foreigners from New York than off of honest-to-God foreigners from London or Shanghai.
There's another reason though, that I thought about just recently. It's the funny money. When you go to Europe for example, you may know the exchange rate to the penny** and be keeping up with it during your two-week vacation. It doesn't matter though, when you get a bundle of that colorful, different-sized*** funny money. You tend to think of it as you do Monopoly money. "Well we got this wad of this money stuff, we need to use it while we're here, and I don't feel like thinking much about it." You may even do the conversion in your head every time you consider or make a purchase. Still, it's this funny stuff, and it just doesn't FEEL like money. (As if the US Dollar, represented by pieces of green paper, IS!)
"Here I can't read this coins with the fine print - take a few of them. Yeah, OK, so it's 2 purple papers and 1 orange one - here" Is this possibly how the Federal Reserve Board members feel?
* I did have some experience with a Chinese tour here in America that, though purportedly to see the sights, just took everyone to a couple of outlet malls for shopping ... a three hour tour ♪♫♬ ...
** Speaking of that, if they're not getting tight with the giving out of visas, now would be a good time to tour China, with the exchange rate being 7 Yuan to a US Dollar, about 8-12% more favorable than it's been through the last decade.
*** It's a good feature for the blind, don't get me wrong, but those different-sized bills piss me off, as they always get away from each other when folded up in my pocket. They are asking to get dropped on the ground.
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In My Time of Dying
Posted On: Saturday - August 10th 2019 8:48PM MST
In Topics: Music
Just to be timely tonight, the well-connected, charlatan-financier Jeff Epstein, supplier of sex of all sorts to the elites, "killed himself" in prison today. He was off his suicide watch, you see. As with tornadoes, a suicide watch is pronounced when the conditions are right, and a suicide warning is pronounced when a suicide has been observed in progress. I guess it was the latter today.
No, really, there are so many people that didn't want this guy to ever say another word that there has probably been a glut of special assassins on the market, bringing bargain basement prices. It's not much of a conspiracy theory if we all saw this coming.
Peak Stupidity will have to be very light on posts this coming week, we are sorry to say. In the meantime, we have been shortchanging music fans of the Zeppelin, so this one is a long-distance dedication (yeah, long, long distance) to Jeff Epstein:
In My Time of Dying is from Led Zeppelin's 1975 album Physical Graffiti. It's an 11 minute song from a double-long album, as this band was part of the Album Oriented Rock crowd. A.O.R. was one of the widely implemented radio "formats" through the mid-1980's at least, and regular people knew what "AOR" meant even. The idea was "we're not putting this on one of those single 45 rpm discs" (even if it were a song of normal length). "Buy our whole album or screw you!" The albums were usually well worth it back then.
Peak Stupidity has featured this greatest of bands before with Houses of the Holy, Ramble On, and Misty Mountain Hop and The Battle of Evermore. Only the best for the Peak Stupidity readers. Have a good night.
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Blondies have more fun
Posted On: Friday - August 9th 2019 9:51PM MST
In Topics: General Stupidity Music Humor Feminism
Per the always informative and stupid, UK Daily Mail (much like the junk mail I get daily here in The States, we read about the latest activities of the past-prime musical artist Debra Harry, aka, "Blondie". (Actually Blondie is the name of the band too, and should get more credit than bands usually do.)
In a scene very reminiscent of The Office's Dwight Schrute CPR scene*, Blondie, the 66 year-old singer cut open some naked dummies of herself at the Museum Of Contemporary Art Gala and "both shocked and disgusted attendees". No, I doubt it. I don't think you can shock and disgust people in the Art or Rock & Roll business.
We're not sure what message this action was supposed to convey but it was successful in shocking the crowd.Mmmmm, red velvet cake is my favorite.
Fortunately the wounded dumby [sic, hahahaa!] didn't spurt blood as Harry reached into its chest and withdrew its heart.
As Debbie held the heart in the air it was revealed that it was in fact made of red velvet cake.
It's a party, and so long as it's not the taxpayers paying again, party on Debbie. Ohhh, wait...
The act proved controversial as some audience members began to chant: 'Violence Against Women! Violence Against Women!' in protest to the simulated violence.Hey, ya big dummies, dummies feel no pain. Their hearts are made out of red velvet cake, for cryin' out loud. Appalling, no Black Forest cake for the lungs, which could sure belt out a good song back in the day.
One insider described the event as 'controversial and unnecessary' and added: 'This is appalling for women all over the world who suffer domestic violence.'
Peak Stupidity already featured our favorite Blondie song, disco-rocker Heart of Glass, but here's her (IMO, of course) 2nd best. As we dream of an end to the stupidity, "Dreaming is free":
This was from the Eat to the Beat album (previous Blondie song featured, Heart of Glass, was from Parallel Lines. Hey, Wiki says this song was inspired by the sound of ABBA, so it ties in with the previous post.
The band at its peak:
Debbie Harry - Lead vocals
Fred Smith – Bass (1974 - 1975)
Nigel Harrison – Bass (1978–1982, 1997)
Gary Valentine – Bass, guitar (1975–1977, 1997)
Frank Infante – Guitar, bass, backing vocals (1977–1982)
Billy O'Connor – Drums (1974-1975)
Clem Burke - Drums (1975 - )
Jimmy Destri – Keyboards, backing vocals
* part of Peak Stupidity's fun First Responders expose series: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, and Part 6
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Importing a civil war, in Sweden
Posted On: Friday - August 9th 2019 9:10PM MST
In Topics: Immigration Stupidity World Political Stupidity
"ABBA-Lou Akbar!!"
We're used to the immigration stupidity here at stupidity-central. We've only got 162 posts on this stupidity with said topic key. I'd thought we'd seen it all. Sure, the Western nations' taking in of huge numbers of people from extremely far away in distance and culture is apparently just what you do. America has been going on with this stupidity for well nigh (actually over, but I just wanted to write "well nigh") 5 decades running.
If it came to awards of some sort here, Sweden could very well take this one. We've commented on the stupidity of the changes of this decent, though Socialist, country of ABBA's time turning into a vibrant violent place, in The ruination of Sweden - "Finally facing our Waterloo!" and Feminist Cops vs. African "Refugees" - venue: Modern Sweden. In that latter post, the un-Swedish-like violent disagreement was one for which we could root for both sides ... to lose, that is. "You go, girl! You go, bro! Yeahhh! C'mon, you're both losers!"
In a timely article by Jake Bowyer of VDare*, Trump Vindicated—Immigrant Violence Getting REALLY Bad In Sweden, I ran into something that is even worse than the usual immigration stupidity. Mr. Bowyer gives a lot of stats on the Moslem violence directed against each other and the (REAL) Swedes, with particular focus on Stockholm, Goteburg, and Malmo. Among all the numbers of people from all over the shitholes of the world, I came to:
Stockholm, population 910,000, is home to 16,400 Iraqis and 11,600 Iranians.Yeah, sure, that's what you want. You import, in close to equal numbers, a bunch of Iraqis and a bunch of Iranians. Weren't these people in a big war in the 1980's**, that even involved poison gas attacks? See, Iraqi Moslems and Iranian Moslems are of some different sects that do not get along. It's thought by the left-wing Swedes (OK, most of them) that it'll be different when they come to lovely white Socialist Sweden. "It's different here. We hope to have them around the bonfire at city center holding hands and singing Kumbaya like the rest of us Swedes."
We've imported large numbers of unassimilable immigrants of some extremely-foreign places ourselves, so who are we to lecture the Swedes, you may say. Yeah, but have we been importing both sides of a civil war before? Is this just a new version of the Neocons' theme "We need to bring them over here so they won't fight over there and can fight each other over here ... or something"? Is Sweden just bored with the stupid sport of soccer - is that what this is about?
PS: The reason I called this post "timely" is that Peak Stupidity commenter Ganderson will very shorty, if not already, have boots on the ground in-country to report to us on the situation. OK, if not boots, maybe Birkenstocks on the ground, as is more likely for a Dead Head ;-}
* The name sounded just a tad familiar when I read it. I see that this writer has been mentioned before as a writer of a review of Tucker Carlson's Ship of Fools.
** That was one that America should have stayed way out of (even more than for the usual reasons), but didn't. We should have let them beat the hell out of each other.
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Superpower Battle of the Chicken Titans - Sanders v Tso
Posted On: Thursday - August 8th 2019 8:17PM MST
In Topics: Humor China Americans
That'd be Colonel Sanders vs. General Tso. A commenter on unz a few days ago added some humor to my oft-mentioned (not on PS) comments about these 2 well-known chicken-sellers. He suggested an epic rap battle in the spirit of one of the few I've seen, the econ-rapping of Free-market Libertarian Fred Hayek vs. Keynesian John Maynard Keynes. (I hate rap, but it's pretty fun and even educational for some.)
Peak Stupidity doesn't do rap, but, in the spirit of Shark Fest week, we'd still like to have a contest between these 2 high-ranking chicken officers. The odd thing is, per the Biblical quote from Jesus, that a prophet has no honor in his home land, the Kentucky Colonel Sanders is well known in China* just as that face on the KFC signs and maybe some of the food wrappers. Then, though the Chinese may know very well the history of General Tso, they would never have heard of the chicken dish attributed to him in America in places that sell Americanized (extra salty and sweet) Chinese food.
(Sanders! ... anders! ... ers!)
This man was a "Kentucky Colonel", an appellation given to men of note and accomplishment in that Commonwealth (that's what it's called vs. a "State") Harland Sanders did not command a division or battalion of soldiers, though he did spend 6 months in the US Army, driving wagons in Cuba. His background included dozens of jobs, fights with law clients, and shootings, before he developed his pressure-cooked chicken recipes and then built up his Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise, as documented on this Wiki page.
(Zontang! ... tang! ... tang!)
(Our apologies for the image - damn cheap Japanese cameras.)
General Zuo (Tso), from the Commonwealth, no, Province, of Hunan, was a famous General, instrumental in the Qing dynasty's winning of a huge war to put down the mid-19th-century Taiping Rebellion. This war was so huge, with dozens of millions killed, and the Taiping folks so interesting, that it deserves a Peak Stupidity post to come. Mr. Zuo's background was spotty in its own right, as he failed the exam to attend the Imperial Academy 7 times, before changing his direction in life. It is thought that he is not likely to have had time, between fighting and running provinces, to cook a whole lot of chicken, much less a bucketful.
"Get a bucket of chicken, it's a barrel of fun.
Good-bye ho-hum."**
After fattening up Americans for 7 to 8 decades running (depending on where you live), Kentucky Fried Chicken is working on fattening up the Chinese peasants a bit. The chicken tastes the same, but you may want to hold on some of the sides. It's not only differing tastes requiring tweaks to the recipes, but perhaps some cheap unauthorized ingredients that make finger lickin' a really bad idea. However the late Colonel (he died almost 40 years back) is kicking ass in the Middle Kingdom.
(No, Communist Central Government, we're absolutely NOT changing it to General Zuo's chicken. It's bad enough about freaking Peking!)
[This post is making me hungry!! - Ed]
Like every "Chinese" dish one can get at the $10.99 buffet, there's gotta be some cheap chicken in it to make the numbers pencil out under the table. Next time you go, check how many of the dishes involve chicken. This one doesn't have the kick of your Kung Pao, but it must be something special what with the name of the famous General Zuo Zongtang of the Qing Dynasty behind it, oh and the extra MSG.
At this point, the Peak Stupidity judges have called it. It's Colonel Sanders by a drumstick! More Chinamen (and women!) know this Colonel Sanders, than Americans know of General Tso, much less the tremendous Taiping Rebellion/War, for that matter. Granted, most of the Chinese who see Colonel Sanders up on that sign reckon this was the man that led the American All Volunteer Group in flying materiel to Generalissimo Chiang Kai Shek over the hump, or possibly the guy that ordered the atom bombs to be dropped on Tokyo. That is, if they even know who won WWII.
Oh, and then there are the spices and the side orders. KFC for the win! Chickenfest is over for the season.
George likes his chicken spicy!:
* McDonalds and Kentucky Fried Chicken, AKA KFC, have made the most inroads in the Chinese fast food business. They seem to be everywhere over there - I've seen nary a Burger King, Carl's Junior/Hardees, and damn if the Chinese would ever get the In-and-Out
** Song written by 1970's heartthrob artist Barry Manilow - I shit you not.
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Half-mast flags as a signal to the neo-Nazis
Posted On: Wednesday - August 7th 2019 7:30PM MST
In Topics: Trump Pundits Media Stupidity
I guess that means to the 5% of them that aren't FBI agents. OK, Peak Stupidity really needs to give out some trophies, plaques, or SOMETHING. An NBC TV pundit named Frank Figliuzzi really deserves the gold for the rolling calendar year. Per Russia Today (can you imagine saying that 30 years ago? "From Russia Today ..."?), NBC pundit says Trump’s order to fly flags at half-staff after shootings could be nod to Hitler. Okaaay, then.
Trump issued a proclamation to lower flags to half-staff at the White House and other government and military buildings on Sunday to mourn the victims of shootings in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio. The flags will return to full-staff on Thursday, August 8 — but former FBI assistant director for counterintelligence turned-NBC pundit Frank Figliuzzi has seen a possible conspiracy in the date.
Figliuzzi explained that the number 88 is “very significant in the neo-Nazi and white supremacist movement”due to the fact that ‘H’ is the eighth letter of the alphabet and“the numbers 88 together stand for Heil Hitler.”
Yeah, all those non-FBI-informant neo-Nazis will get the signal clearly, as we all watch those flags go down and back up, right? This is, in fact, a a sore point for Peak Stupidity, as we can't stand any more of this flag-lowering crap to begin with. First it's the death of ex-Presidents, then scumbag Senators that just wouldn't leave office (see Juan McAmnesty - Rot In Place). Then, the flags stay down for WEEKS at a time, not just one day, as the guy gets buried. This business is out of hand, as now the flags being lowered represent what exactly? If we regularly lower them for murder victims, then the cities of Detroit, Chicago, and Baltimore ought to just buy shorter flag poles to begin with!
Russia Today again:
“So we’re going to be raising the flag back up at dusk on 8/8. No one is thinking about this,”Figliuzzi said, warning about the “language and messaging” of the decision.Oh, the quotes are not just from "NBC pundit Frank Figliuzzi", but from "former FBI assistant director for counterintelligence turned-NBC pundit Frank Figliuzzi". Is that Assistant Director of Counter Intelligence or Assistant to the Director, Counter to Intelligence? Where do I send the trophy?
It is true that white supremacists use the number 88 as an abbreviation of ‘Heil Hitler’, but perhaps “no one is thinking” about it in this context because most people don’t think in terms of everything being a coded shout-out to neo-Nazis?
Figliuzzi said Trump did not necessarily pick the date “deliberately” but said it was still an example of the “the ignorance of the adversary” (white supremacists) that is being “demonstrated by the White House.”
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Is Donald Trump a woman trapped inside a man's body?
Posted On: Wednesday - August 7th 2019 7:03PM MST
In Topics: Trump Liberty/Libertarianism Female Stupidity
Hey, we've come up with a number of theories for why this President is such a tremendous let-down for the patriotic American people: He's been "Neoconned", though Deep-Stated is probably a better term (more here). He is just a bullshitter who sucked us in during the campaign. Along with that he's a blowhard who compares himself favorable to Ronald Reagan*. He sucks at the art of the deal. He doesn't understand the urgency and magnitude of the existential immigration-invasion problem. He's very easily distracted. Instead of 5-D chess, he's barely competent at tic-tac-toe. It could be a any combination of the above.
We will now add another theory, just going by the talk out of President Trump's mouth after the El Paso shooting. This was documented very well by VDare's "Washington Watcher" yesterday in Trump Blows El Paso Response, And Maybe The Election. He Better Hope Congress Fails to Pass His Terrible Proposals. What I read was pretty disgusting. This guy no longer seems to be on our side, maybe for some of the reasons linked-to above. Some of the commenters under the Unz Review's posting of the article told me not to worry, as Trump changes his mind daily.
That brought up the point of this post. Trump reacts emotionally to things such as the terrible mass shootings of the last couple of days. I wish I could say that it is just pandering to the emotional among us (the women voters and the ctrl-left), but I think this guy genuinely can't think straight and runs his mouth based on his feelings. That brings up the tweeting, the obsessiveness of this habit of the President being another female-personality thing. It's always this constant blabbering about this slight or that, making fun of his (and our) enemy, the Lyin' Press (not wrong, but just make the corrections, don't get emotional), rather than his using the tweets as a tactic and part of the "bully pulpit". From one of the Ronnie vs. Donnie posts, we explained this a bit:
... Trump's problem seems to be, as I mentioned in that intro. post, that he thinks the talk is all that's necessary sometimes. Encouragement, when all about you, the media establishment puts out it's usual lies, is a good thing. It is no doubt very helpful in rallying the base to vote, but what good is voting if the politicians you successfully elect don't really do any good for you? That's what happened - two years of President Trump and a GOP House and Senate, and what ?? Nada. Nada whole lot. I wish the current President would use the bully pulpit and (yes, sigh..) even the tweets to target Americans to help him get the work done - "Impeach Judge X in this district in California." "Tell Congressman Y to vote YES on ABC, or you will not re-elect him." That would need some attention to detail, which Trump doesn't have, and his traitorous underlings refuse to take part in.There is that changing his mind every few days thing too. That's a very female trait too.
We have 3 female traits, the emotional responses, the blathering about non-essential business, and the changing of one's mind regularly, that seem to be "trending" with this guy. Therefore, my latest theory is that this guy is acting like a woman, psychologically anyway. Hey, I know he was a man's man and a playboy, etc., in the past. Is too much soy being used in the White House kitchen, perhaps?
After reading Mr. "Watcher"'s article, I sure hope the President didn't mean all of his statements of late. If that Red Flag law stuff (written about here and here) gets passed and Donald Trump signs it, he will have become another political enemy.
* Peak Stupidity's comparison between President Reagan and President Trump, the Ronnie vs. Donnie series, continues here - Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and a Conclusion.
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A post of 2 sketches
Posted On: Monday - August 5th 2019 10:51AM MST
In Topics: Lefty MegaStupidity Humor Political Correctness ctrl-left Socialism/Communism
Steve Sailer posted a tweet from a guy named Pavel who infiltrated a meeting of the Democratic Socialists of America. Now, we don't do tweeting here, but I was able to find the video on youtube. Watch this 39 seconds and try to convince me that these people shouldn't be drinking sippy cups, waiting right now for 5 O'Clock for Judge Wopner to come on in the great room of the crazy house. Go ahead, convince me (in the comments - put "PS" first!)
I really would never have expected an Oriental woman, or man, for that matter, to actually be a part of this. Is is possible this woman is really a part of this shitshow? I just see Chinese people as NOT having this extreme PC stupidity as, way too many, Western white people, and I know many of both. I gotta admit, though, that the Chinese INVENTED the cultural revolution, so ....
A good commenter there on unz named BenKenobi, in this comment pasted in a video from an early 1990's Kids in the Hall show. (Some of the actors look really familiar.) Peak Stupidity has commented on the old TV show Seinfeld a number of times. That show was from that same time, and our post Not as much PC back in '93, featured the hilarious Indian Giver ('excuse me, Native American Giver) episode from exactly the same year, 1993, as this Kids in the Hall sketch.
This is so unintentionally prescient of the current-era Political Correctness madness, that it's scary.
ewww! What is this even doing on youtube?! I can't even!
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Jumping the shark with Shark Mania
Posted On: Monday - August 5th 2019 8:22AM MST
In Topics: TV, aka Gov't Media History Americans Bread and Circuses
First, I thought it was just the fact that we had watched some TV the other day. As related last week in our 2nd post (3rd one if you go way back) on what is now "Nat Geo", there is this Shark Fest week or period of weeks going on. I don't think this is just the one channel. I saw a guy (not a kid, mind you) with a Shark Fest t-shirt on. Other people I know have heard about it.
I'll repeat this here, and as many times as it takes to wake people up about it, sharks are not our friends: As ranted about in Eat Mor Shark, Peak Stupidity stands firmly on the side of the shark hawks - sharks are ruthless killers with a 300,000,000 year-old mindset - they eat people, and we should eat them back, well, pre-emptively that is. They taste like, hell, BETTER THAN, chicken. If this ruins your immaculately-planned Shark Fest festivities, well so be it!
Like the Hammerhead above, who can see in almost all directions (per our kids books), I am a noticer. I don't have eyes like a Hammerhead, but, as is our mandate, I've been noticing the rise in stupidity in this country for years, and stupidity lies in the details. One of these details in my memory is of what was "trending" (we didn't use that word then) on TV and other media infotainment back 18 summers ago. It was 2001, remember that? Besides some long story about a congressman suspected, though later exonerated, of kidnapping a young pretty intern in Washington, there were a series of stories about shark attacks. Peak Stupidity's rants against these evil fish aside, shark attacks on humans are less of a threat than things like lightening strikes.
It was just the usual bread & circuses that summer 18 years ago, to keep the idiot boxes (the idiot "plates" were not around just yet) turned on, newspapers sold, and the eyeballs on the web-pages (the internet WAS around, and going like gangbusters). It was all sharks, sharks, sharks, though, until that September morning, when the country changed, or more accurately, WAS CHANGED, permanently for the worse.
Is this Shark Fest week nostalgia for that summer of 2001? It's probably just the usual distractions from the reality of our rise toward Peak Stupidity, but maybe something else big is coming. Like those Great Whites, either the world's elites are very very smart, or very, very dumb.
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Time Passages
Posted On: Saturday - August 3rd 2019 9:05PM MST
In Topics: Music History
I'd forgotten that Peak Stupidity already had an Al Stewart / History Rock week back 2 summers ago. Time sure passes quickly in the blog world. This title song from Mr. Stewart's great album Time Passages will end this week on a good note.
Because it must be hellacious to search for anything (so far) on this site, unless one is the lead blogger, I'll just list the posts with the Al Stewart songs Peak Stupidity has featured in the past. Yeah, I know, it's all on youtube anyway.
Roads to Moscow
Nostradamus
On the Border
Warren Harding and The Palace of Versailles
A Man for All Seasons
Over 40 years has passed since Time Passages, and it sure brings back memories.
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Little Landen in Minneapolis
Posted On: Saturday - August 3rd 2019 8:29PM MST
In Topics: Race/Genetics Bible/Religion
(pictures straight from Vdare)
This is a hard post to write. It's not Peak Stupidity's usual thing. There's no humor, very little snark, and more evil than stupidity to write about. Really, it's about sadness, compassion, and now some hope.
This story is about the boy named Landen (last name kept anonymous) who was thrown over a railing 40 ft. down to the floor below in Minneapolis' Mall of America 4 months back by a sick/evil man named Emmanuel Deshawn Aranda. Hey, where's that guy from? What's he doing in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in the great white north, with a name like that? Good question. We all want diversity, I guess
VDare's Jame Fulford (along with Steve Sailer) wrote a couple of posts about this right after it happened, one being Black Privilege Is Ultimate Cause Of Minnesota Mall Atrocity. I might have forgotten about it, but for an article about a month ago that gave the condition of the boy. It was very sad to think about all he is going through.
“Up until now we have let our hopes govern what we have revealed to the public,” they wrote in a GoFundMe update. “However, the injuries and severe complications have now resulted in more than 15 separate medical procedures or surgeries, including surgeries for two broken arms and a broken leg, removal of his spleen, procedures for fluid in his lungs and stomach, as well as for facial and skull fractures; and just this past weekend, he had a stent placed in a vein that runs through his liver because of the serious complications he continues to endure.”At the time I'd read the above, there was no certainty Landen would live through it all. I felt some serious sadness for this kid and his family. It's not the usual thing for me, but I prayed for this beautiful little boy. He probably won't be ever "just fine", but maybe he can come close, after many more months or years.
Well, People magazine, not any kind of publication you'd normally read about on Peak Stupidity, reported yesterday*: Boy, 5, Out of Intensive Care Nearly Four Months After Being Thrown from Mall of America Balcony. I was so glad to hear this. Landen is not OK, by any means, yet, but he's in a full-time physical re-hab facility.
The man who did this horrific act did this with premeditation. He's said by his Mother to have been mentally ill since 3 y/o, but you normally don't read something like the following, even from a really sick fuck:
Investigators said Aranda had gone to the mall “looking for someone to kill” and felt driven to aggression after being rejected by women he’d tried to speak with there, according to a criminal complaint obtained by PEOPLE. Aranda told police he had first considered choosing to kill an adult at the mall the day before the incident “because they usually stand near the balcony,” but that did not “work out,” the complaint states.This article is unusual for a Peak Stupidity post in that it is just a very specific story, using the tragic story of this one boy to arouse compassion, something a woman, or, well, People magazine, would write. It is kind of a fluke that I took this one so personally. Is this not anything different from what Herr Merkel, Globalist, Commie of Germany did with that dead boy washed up on the beach of the Mediterranean a few years back (causing her to invite in millions of unwanted, unassimilable, young-male refugees from Africa)?
Yes, it most certainly is. I look at this story and try to get down to the root causes. In the case of little Landen, a man this violent and crazy should not have been in a position to do this - that means he shouldn't have been out of a crazy house . Next, whether it's PC or not, you've got to get serious and fix the root causes, if you REALLY don't want to see this happen again, and you're not just signaling your great compassion to the world. Even for just this one guy, 19 years in prison, meaning possibly his getting out in half that time, means we haven't fixed this problem. I don't really know if any weapon would have helped to defend against a sudden attack like this, but more carrying of guns by good people can help.
In Merkel's case, there was another story on the fate of that boy that just wan't told in one picture. As I recall, the kid's Dad had done a stupid stunt taking him across the Mediterranean from Africa to the beaches of Italy (there's more to that). As to the next poor kid having this fate, what you do is send these boats home. It's not compassionate for the relatively few on those first boats, but it sure is, in terms of stopping more such stupidity. As far as fixing the real problem, any thinking German knew that this invitation of the future bums, robbers, and rapists was a bad idea. It did not fix any problem, but caused so many more, in the name of compassion for show, with no serious thinking.
If you're the type, pray for this boy Landen to get through all of this with no serious permanent physical pain and a normal life. How could you go a day without thinking what you could have done differently that one day at the mall, were you the Dad or Mom? That's some mental pain there. Nonetheless, 10 years from now there will be some extremely compassion Minnesota snowflakes who, in their extreme compassion for Emmanuel Deshawn Aranda, will help him get back loose. Compassion + Stupidity = Evil. Hug your kids.
* The quote about his previous condition is from People too and jives completely with what I'd read a month back. I'll give People a lot of credit for a plain just-the-facts article. The comments are pretty "based", as the kids like to say too. Some mention specifically what caliber round should be used to shoot this guy in the back of the head - amazing in this day and age.
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He who manufactures the globes, controls the maps ...
Posted On: Saturday - August 3rd 2019 9:27AM MST
In Topics: China Geography
... or something. I'd like to have a big old globe, on which Burma was still Burma the first time*, Cambodia was still Cambodia the first time*, Sri Lanka is still Ceylon, and maybe even China is still Cathay. It would be mounted on a nice hardwood stand, and I could spin it like the guy on The Rocky Horror Picture Show, hopefully without being called an asshole**.
Instead, the WalMart- or Target-bought globe we have was made in China, like about 95% of the material in said stores, and it held up for a few years and served it's instructional purpose. I thought about something regarding this globe's depiction of China and its environs the other day.
(Note: This is not our globe, as ours has more terrain features.)
The globe depicted above has a basic political map. That's not to mean "political" in the expected (from this blog) sense - "political" is a word used in mapmaking for just boundaries, as opposed to more stuff like topography or special features. What I noticed is that Taiwan, Hong Kong, Tibet and Xinjiang are all depicted in the same color as mainland China is. Now, I'll give them Hong Kong - a 99-year deal is a deal, right - though, from what I'm reading, the Hong Kongese won't!
I've written in posts before that Tibet and Xinjiang are what make the area of China look closely comparable to the continental US, but those places are relatively uninhabited mountainous and high-desert lands, respectively. Tibet is probably a cause lost to China for now, except in the minds of those latte-drinking Americans with those bumper stickers. Xinjiang, Moslem stronghold, well, who cares, honestly. Taiwan is the real stickler. Listen, you'll get no argument from me that the US has absolutely no business backing up Taiwan militarily. The Cold War has been over for 30 years, so it's not our business, and the US is broke so we won't be able to afford those electronic parts from China (maybe some old ones from Taiwan, ROC) to put our hardware where our government's big mouth is. It's just that these places are still NOT the same country at this point.
It's just a coincidence! We were running out of colors anyway.
I don't really argue with Big China's claims. It's just this insidious map-making practice that kind of irks me. Who actually created the map images that are put on these made-in-China globes? Did the Chinese doctor them up a little bit? Bad Q/A? That's not out of the question. What I see is reminds me of a related story Peak Stupidity reported on a year ago in Western airlines bow down to China Commies' petty whims. and a prequel post here . (Yep, it's a prequel.) This is not 1985 or even 2010. When China says "you American airline companies must make your seat-back-pocket magazines show Taiwan same color as China.", then guess what, the US Airlines say "
* These 2 countries tried their own, incredibly un-mellifluous names, and, well, they didn't take. OK, I'm not completely sure if Burma is back, after that experiment with the name Myanmar (named by Microsoft, perhaps?), but Cambodia is back in - Kampuchea is out.
** Sorry, without the reader having attended a "showing" (more like rice-throwing, water-pistol shooting, party) of this movie, this joke will mean nothing. No, don't watch the movie on netflix or DVD - it doesn't work that way!
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GhettoGate
Posted On: Friday - August 2nd 2019 1:03PM MST
In Topics: Humor Trump Race/Genetics
There's something they call "the luck of Trump". By "they", I mean commenters I've read on the blogs, you know ... around. This is the factor that has President Trump getting lambasted by the ctrl-left/Lyin Press for letting slip a little bit of truth and getting vindicated the next day or same week by a happening somewhere. As an example, Trump had said something about the Moslem crime in Sweden, a very real thing, which has changed that whole country. The Lyin Press gave him grief for his racism, and then another of the killings or rapings by immigrants happened hours or a day later.
The latest Trump Luck occurrence must be this hilarious story, of Congresstard Elijah Cummings, or such stories as the rage against the President for his disrespecting of Cumming's Baltimore district as rat-infested and worse. I'm not sure if Trump really meant rats, BTW. As Peak Stupidity caught up with the story, the latest tweet across the tapes from President Trump about Baltimore had the sentence "How much is stolen?" in it. Haha, well, the detectives may not have fully inventoried Representative Cummings' house yet, so the answer is "a lot, and I had a brand new iphone and those used to be granite countertops."
They (the dirty rats) took 'em all.
What luck that is for Mr. Trump, the news of this burglary coming out? Did I just write burglary? Wow, man, I'm having flashbacks to the summer of '74 with all those complaints about that burglary in that hotel in Washington, FS... it was made into such a big deal, when they've gotta have what, 50 burglaries a day there ... what the heck was the name of that place again?
It was one of those dash-gate scandals, you know Contra-Gate, Climate-Gate, it's on the tip of my tongue ... Oh, yes, WATERGATE. See, the US President was involved in a arranging a burglary. It was Nixon last time, but could President Trump be "pushing his luck" here? Did he think we all have forgotten about those summers sweating our asses off with no A/C, trying to watch Hogan's Heroes when those boring-ass hearings would come on TV all day long. Perhaps Javanka did the wet work, and this burglary of the Congresstard was done to support those tweets.
This "Trump-Luck" story is just part of the cover-up - remember, the cover-up is worse than the crime. Did the administration really think they would get away with this, with this meddling website Peak Stupidity, and bloggers Woodwind and Brinestein on the case?
There will be investigations, committees, hearings, and committee hearings! Just you wait. Do you really think you're going to use youtube next summer to listen to old ELO albums? No, we will saturate the media with committee hearings ... what did Trump tweet and when did he know what he was tweeting? Trump! Tweets! It's a Travesty!
Wait, just this in, after clicking below the ad:
The burglary at Cummings’ home happened prior to President Trump’s tweets about the Congressman.Awww, rats! There goes our summer! OK, Russia! Collusion! On the other hand ... wait, this is even better. President Trump had the burglary done beforehand to make sure the job would not be botched - G. Gordon Liddy had to slip a mickey into the drink of the ADT alarm system girl, and the homies had to be paid off to steal the TV's cause nobody wants that crap anymore, and plumbers had to be called in to, like, fix the leak under the tub (just coincidental, that last part).
You read it here first, folks. This seemingly innocent everyday "burglary gone right" in the rat-infested 7th district of Baltimore was in reality a lot more. It was another in a long line of corrupt practices by the Administration. The Congress must take Javanka down! (Please!)
Because the burglary occurred in the ghetto (7th district of MD), and you may be reading this on a Bill Gate(s)-
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Immigrant murder in Germany
Posted On: Friday - August 2nd 2019 7:55AM MST
In Topics: Immigration Stupidity
This involves an immigrant DOING the murdering, if that wasn't clear, which is almost always the case these days.
(Photo taken directly from VDare)
James Kirkpatrick of VDare reported earlier on this week on another mess of blood on the hands of Angela Merkel, with NIGHTMARE: Mother Watches 8-Year-Old Son Die After Being Pushed On Train Tracks By Eritrean Migrant.
The tragedy took place on one of the platforms of the central railway terminal in the German city of Frankfurt – the nation’s second busiest railway hub. An eight-year-old boy and his mother were waiting for a train when they were suddenly attacked by a 40-year-old Eritrean. The assailant grabbed the woman and the child and threw them on the rail tracks right as the high-speed intercity express (ICE) was pulling into the station.That was Mr. Kirkpatrick excerpting Russia Today's story. This man from this southwest bank of the Red Sea country (just trying to insert in my geography lesson, as per the Yahoo style book here) should never have been in Germany. Would this murder of an innocent 8 y/o boy have happened if Herr Merkel had not opened the floodgates to strange foreigners due to her COMPASSSION?! Yeah, where's your COMPASSION now, you stupid, stupid broad?
The 40-year-old woman managed to escape near-certain death as she made it to the pathway between two tracks. She tried to reach out to her son when the train ran over him, a witness told German media. The boy died at the scene...
The perpetrator also tried to force another person onto the railway tracks but his third would-be victim escaped. The attacker then attempted to flee the scene but was pursued by a group of passengers and eventually detained by police outside the terminal.
Sure, the reader may retort*, "But this is just one Eritrean guy. There are 10's of thousands, and none others have pushed any 8 y/o little boys in front of subway trains." Yeah, maybe not (though I'm sure they're not making Germany a better place even so). However, ZERO Germans have pushed 8 y/o boys in front of subway trains (looking at Kirkpatrick's other incidents, the perpetrators don't seem to be Germans). That's 0 vs some small percentage, but that small percentage resulted in this needless horrific murder.**
Germany's Interior Minister, Horst Seehofer, cut his vacation short due to the incident and was due to address the public on Tuesday. He is set to meet Germany's top security chiefs and discuss "[s]everal serious crimes during recent time."I see that the muckety-mucks seem to be taking this seriously, but is that just because the word got out. I bet they would have like to treat this as the British authorities had for many years with the pimping of underage girls in Rotherham by Moslems. Then, the man notes that "the public have already formed a judgment of this incident". Yeah, the German public should should have started forming judgments long ago. If these ministers ever listened to said judgments to begin with, this young boy would be with his parents today.
On Monday, Seehofer pledged that the attacker would be "called to account with all means of the rule of law." However, the minister also warned against drawing premature conclusions about the Frankfurt attack, after his ministry shared that the attacker was an Eritrean citizen.
"I note that some parts of the public have already formed a judgment of this incident," he said, adding that judgement should be reserved until the background of the attack is clarified.
You never know what kind of thing it will take to get the Germans actually riled up again. If this kind of murder, along with all the other unpleasantries of life caused by massive immigration of unassimilable types from strange-ass places like Eritrea, keeps ramping up, some crazy guy with a funny mustache may present himself, to initial acclaim. Were I the Dad of this kid, I wouldn't be waiting around for any guy with a funny mustache.
* OK, not OUR readers, but some hypothetical morons that may peruse these pages.
** It's one that reminds me of the Minneapolis mall incident, which I will write about when I get up the heart.
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We've lost the Somalian President
Posted On: Thursday - August 1st 2019 5:29PM MST
In Topics: General Stupidity Immigration Stupidity US Feral Government
Keep this shit up, Americans, and we're gonna be a hollow shell of our former selves ... wait, that's not so bad....
Peak Stupidity has just been informed that the President of Somalia, Mr. Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo, has RENOUNCED his American citizenship to
(Well, that's the way you do divorce over there.
You'd think telling the IRS to go stick it would be easier ... you'd think ...*)
Can it get any stupider?! I mean, I have plenty of stupidity to write about here, and now this comes across my
Really, a foreign president, not just of Canada as kind of a friendly gesture, like Trudeau being made a Professor Emeritus of Gender Studies or something, being ALLOWED to be a dual citizen. Which country would you think he'd be loyal to? I mean, just take a wild guess here. This is what Mr. President, Moe Farmajo, was made to swear in front of, well, probably some other foreigner who works at the CIS office a convenient nearby city to that of Mr. President Farmajo:
I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen; that I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will bear arms on behalf of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform noncombatant service in the Armed Forces of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform work of national importance under civilian direction when required by the law; and that I take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; so help me God. [So help me, Allah, I'm gonna blow the livin' hell outta this ...." is accepted to, in Somalian and English, per new-citizen preference.]That is the Oath of Allegiance that we have millions of people a year from around the world swearing to. They wouldn't ALL lie to us, would they? Hell, just look at that "... support and defend the Constitution ..." verbiage. You can't even get 95% of Americans to agree to that, or even understand the concept.
Maybe that verbiage should be arranged a little more in line with current-era America, perhaps "... to support the people from my home and go back and defend that place on behalf of some other guy named Moe if need be ... or, just go on the offense here, 6 and a half dozen or the other thing ...".
I haven't even put a link in yet, so in addition to Steve Sailer's post I found this Yahoo one called "Somalia Leader Renounces U.S. Citizenship Amid Trump’s Rhetoric". PLEASE DON'T CLICK ON THE YAHOO LINK. I only put it in to demonstrate their ridiculousness yet again. Really, being "amid Trump rhetoric" is what made this guy renounce his citizenship. Isn't it more about keeping his money out of the grubby hands of the IRS, something for which I totally sympathize, to put it in some other foreign country in case Somalia's Shit Hits The Fan again soon?
That's just funny though. Yahoo wants its readers to be mad at Trump for running this poor guy out of the country, by God! Hahhaaa! I see that headline in a slightly different light, as giving Trump some partial credit for this man's departure. Kudos, Mr. President! Who? Why, both of you, of course!
Though I give the IRS a hard time, down below, and always, as a matter of fact, I'm still here. This Farmajo had no business ever being let in here, other than as a tourist or diplomat. From the article, by Yahoo/Bloomberg beat reporters Mohammed Omar Ahmed and David Malingha:
The renunciation comes about two weeks after President Donald Trump attacked four minority freshmen congresswomen including Somali-born Ilhan Omar, whom he asked to return to the Horn of Africa nation.Oh, verbally attacked, OK. I guess you cleared that up by including that President Trump asked them to return to the Horn of Africa nation (what, Somalia, say it. Oh, built-in geography lesson there). Yeah, but they've got to do more than return. They must renounce, renounce, renounce, till it hurts.
Buh bye, Mr. Faramajo. Don't let the screen door bust your filament on the way out."** Oh, and bring that Congresstard Omar with you and those other 3 ... hundred thousand."
Your nation sprays its tsetse flies for you.
Whoo hoo hooo!" ♪♫♬
* On this IRS thing: They really do want to get their hands on Americans' money, no matter when the last time you worked an hour in the country. People pay a coupla thousand dollars and have to do paperwork, then show up for an INTERVIEW(!!)*** just for the privilege of not having the Infernal Revenue Service hound them for the rest of their natural-born lives.
That Moslem form of divorce could be quite welcome here too for both spouses and Tax Revenue organizations.
** Man, we are really having a hard time with this. Peak Stupidity again apolgizes for the PIC remark on the light-bulb headed Somalians. Incandescent bulbs are being replaced by CFLs and LEDs the world over and are an invention from America's racist past. In the future, Peak Stupidty will endeavor with great alacrity to be enclusive of other forms of luminescence.
*** I can see that now: "Do you feel that you have been rehabilitated and are able to live outside of America on your own. Keep in mind - you will not be tracked and taxed by the IRS! This is your last chance to un-renounce."
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Trump Tweets Torque-off Baltimore Backers
Posted On: Wednesday - July 31st 2019 7:45PM MST
In Topics: Humor Trump Race/Genetics
Yep, we don't get these tweets so quickly here at Peak Stupidity. President Trump's tweets often take 5 to 7 business days to reach our headquarters, and we don't do business that many days ... Apparently this came across the wire just after publication date yesterday:
Why is so much money sent to the Elijah Cummings district when it is considered the worst run and most dangerous anywhere in the United States. No human being would want to live there. Where is all this money going? How much is stolen? Investigate this corrupt mess immediately!
Signed -- the President of these various United States, on this July 27th in the Year of Our Lord Two Thousand Nineteen.
The ctrl-left does have a point on this one: The President was really singling out Rep. Cummings' city of Baltimore in this tweet. All American inner cities run by black people are the most dangerous places in the United States, yes, including the Southern border, hell, including the Southern border of freakin' North Korea. It's been this way since just after the riots of the 1960's and '70's, so this should not be news. It was wrong of the President not to equally give a tweet-out to Detroit, Philadelphia, Memphis, etc, etc.
You try to fix the places up, and you are lambasted for this gentrification. Here you go, the pretty colors are already there on the exterior walls, but you can't make it nice without changing the colors of the interiors:
You've read Peak Stupidity give our President a big rash of shit on a regular basis lately for not doing anything serious to act on his campaign promises. We stand by any and all remarks in this regard. As much as he runs his mouth and two thumbs though, much of it just BS talk rather the walking of the walk, some of the stuff is very good for the country, just being said. These tweets are a good example. Some would put it as "moving the Overton Window back to the right". I see it as better than that though. The Overton Window is about what is in the mainstream as far as conversation goes. This talk by Trump about the ruin of America's cities is more like some awakening for the politically unaware. These are the people who are not interested in politics, and likely to find out too late that politics is interested in them. It'd be nice to get them aware ahead of time.
Keep mouthing off, Mr. President. A blind squirrel still finds a nut. Keep making these ctrl-left nuts nuttier by the day with this stuff!
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Those Sharks that Swim on the Land
Posted On: Tuesday - July 30th 2019 10:11PM MST
In Topics: Music Treehuggers
Let us throw a little chum out to the Parrotheads tonight. After all that talk about sharks, we'd be remiss in not including this Jimmy Buffet song off of his fun album Volcano (from 1979). Jimmy Buffet is no erudite history rocker, but he knows his sailing, and flying too. Which would be a more fun life, that of a Man of all Seasons enlightenment scientist or that of a "Son of a Son of a Sailor" like Jimmy Buffet? It's a win either way, IMO.
About the sharks now, and I'm not even going to mention those other sharks that swim on the land, with those JD degrees and ambulance-chasing BMWs. Way back, in a post called Eat Mor Shark, Peak Stupidity urged the reader to watch a movie like Jaws and get back to us about these vicious Apex predators. If you ever have the experience, and I hope you have, of being too close to a Great White, with it's 1 1/2 in. teeth in rows of hundreds, you'd probably be the first to raise your hand during the Friends of the Sea Creatures board meeting and just tell the Chapter President:
"Listen, I don't give a crap about the ecosystem, man, that shark was 2 seconds away from taking my arm off! I will be the first man to sell shark steaks, shark fin, shark eyeballs, and shark intestines at wholesale, hell, at a loss. I'll do whatever it takes to make these godless, Communist, 300 million y/o old-species bastards wish they'd never seen my face. They will be the most endangered species Friends of the Sea Creatures has ever had to raise money for, more endangered than the Dodo Freakin' Bird, man! Take my lifetime membership card and shove it up your ass! [We're gonna need a bigger blog.]That was just my interpretation of shark-induced PTSD at a meeting of the treehuggers.
Without any further weirdness, here you go, Parrotheads, I'll just throw this off the stern for y'all:
"Can't you feel 'em circlin', honey?
Can't you feel 'em schoolin' around?
Fins to the left, fins to the right,
and you're the only bait in town."
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Nat-Geo and the once great Royal Scientific Societies - Part 2
Posted On: Tuesday - July 30th 2019 9:42PM MST
In Topics: Music TV, aka Gov't Media Humor Media Stupidity Geography Science Bread and Circuses
(continued from this post)
It just so happens that it's SharkFest week on the Nat Geo channel, and being out at the relatives place, there is a TV. The thing's not on often, as we're mostly on the same page with the whole Bread & Circuses thing, but with kids, especially 8 y/o boys, well, somewhat coincidentally, I can report on SharkFest tonight. This is another intro. about TV, this time to the 2nd part of this post that WILL get to Royal Scientific Societies, I promise you, old chap!
The kids like this animal vs. animal stuff, and for us, we've got a few of the books ... more than a few ... shark vs. salt-water croc., rhino vs. elephant, spider vs. dung beetle, etc. One of them is even set up like the NCAA playoffs with single-elimination (Nature is a cruel mofo) tournaments starting with 16 animals in the bracket(?).
The "scientists" on this TV show sound like freakin' World Wide Wrastling* Federation announcers, not at all like I imagine the 1850's president of the Royal astrophysical society did, even disregarding the accent. I mean, how many times do I need to hear "this one is an apex predator in its own right"? It was said for any animal, as this makes the guys (and one token lady) sound like scientists I suppose. I guess even minnows are apex predators, if it gets the kids' attentions - how about that lizard in the car insurance commercials, apex predator or not? "Next up on Nat Geo, (geo, geo, geoooo (with a lot of reverb)), it's Geico Gecko vs. Aflac Duck in a cage match, no holds barred, fight to the death. Post-fight wrongful death lawsuits to be shown next week in SHARK FEST (Fest,... fest .... fest...)"
Oh, BTW, in that Octopus vs. Spiny Dogfish Shark match-up that I had 3 large riding on, at the end of it, one of those loud
So, yeah, I was guessing yesterday, but, the "National Geographic Channel", aka "Nat Geo" is now another animal channel. Kids, and lots of adults too, LUV LUV LUV the animals, so it was probably not a bad move. Changing the name to reflect what's on the shows - "nah, too expensive, and dammit, if the magazine's gonna suck, at least our name stands for exciting TV."
About that magazine now, again, here is a cover from an issue from a different time:
"It was a different time, you see... " Yes, truly it was. Compared to the bitch-fests of today (about our killing the planet, about too many white men in this field and that field, explaining why these people arguing with our science are not scientists) in that magazine, in the past science was in a different world. Just go find other back, and I mean BACK, issues of National Geographic and see some science and reporting from the last vestiges of the age of reason.
I don't remember much of the age of enlightenment. I wasn't there, or it's a hazy blur, but I do remember my reading of proper scientific publications back in the day that, themselves, often pointed back to that golden age. I think of the Royal Society of Astronomy, and others for Physics (eventually branching out, I'm sure) and a Royal Geographical Society of some sort. Sure, geography is not a science, but there was science involved, as the reader may want to read about in "Eclipses and the Galilean Moons of Jupiter in the Age of Exploration" - Part 1 and Part 2. Even without the science, Geography was a great part of this age of not only reason, but discovery.
See, these societies were composed of truly educated men who really sought the truth, most of who would put their lives on the line for science and discovery. On the science side, there were men theorizing and proving (or trying to prove **) basic physical principles. Nowadays, there are loads of little inventions and apps coming around every day, but the real thinking behind them is minuscule in comparison to what the men of science did during the enlightenment. After some serious thought, some glasswork, some cork, a piece of steel, a thermometer (the simplest of things, but the best available) could be used to discover an important physical law - in an afternoon of solid fun!
The adventure of it was things like: astronomers sailing in uncertain conditions to the Southern Hemisphere just to observe new nebula, or to use the position to make discoveries based on parallax, botanists sailing around the world to the Galapagos Islands to study the turtles, OK tortugas, archaeologists riding camels across Egypt to get to some never-before-seen-by-folks-who-give-a-shit caves with bones of who knows till we get the stuff back to the lab, and chemists blowing up things in the lab to understand exothermic reactions, or really just for the sheer fun of it.
For the geographers, there was a whole world to explore and report on. Expeditions were sent to the north and south poles. People went into the high mountains of the Andes and Himalayas, not to be just the 1st transgendered climber to bag a 20,000 ft. peak on a Tuesday, without oxygen, but to find out what even WERE the highest mountains. Groups went to observe the Bushmen of the Kalahari, with that, albeit small, risk of going native.
Now all the educated and adventurous men would, if they had made it back alive, come to London and give exciting and enlightening reports back to their Societies. The audience could ask questions of all sorts and admire and be inspired by these Men of Reason. Then, the information learned could be disseminated via the Journals of these Societies to others around Europe, American and whatever other tiny pieces of enlightened world existed yet.
As a slight aside, in those old days, one didn't even have to stick to a very specific field, like the Anthropologist who only studies those Bushmen, or the Astronomer who specializes in variable stars, or the Chemist who studies certain polymers, as is the case today. In that age, from the 1500's to 1900 or so, one could dabble, and even be an expert in, almost every new thing becoming known to man. Leonardo Da Vinci was even a great artist, yet did his human biology and physics too. One could truly be a "Man for all Seasons". Basically, it was one hell of a time to be a scientist, anyway!
Back to the journals of the days of enlightenment, Scientific American, going back to its beginnings 130 years ago, was the American version, being published by this august organization, the National Geographic Society. American were already playing a big part in the age of science and discovery by the 1880's. The point of the organization was not to sell magazines. It was about the world of discovery. These were the eminent men sending explorations to the poles, to high mountains, to deepest China and Africa, and having them come back to regale the folks in Washington with their findings. The journal may have started out being just for other scientists, but as a magazine, with the best (later on) color glossy photos and stories of places never seen by Western man, National Geographic magazine brought the age of discovery to the common man. Then, around the mid 1980's, it went PC and, well, end of story. Well, we still got our SharkFest*** for the next 3 weeks on Nat Geo, so there's that, right? The Age of Reason is well behind us now.
"So what if you reached the age of reason,
only to find there was no reprieve?
Would you still be a man for all seasons?
Or would you just disbelieve?"
I guess it is History Rock week here at Peak Stupidity, and to do this right, you're gonna need pretty much all Al Stewart, 24/7. As I wrote yesterday, the Time Passages album had a lot of great songs, and this is one of them.
* Spoiler alert: That shit's fake!
** The theory of the substance of phlogiston comes to mind. I want to write a post on it, as many just disparage as stupidity this theory, but it was the best and most ingenious theory at the time. Back Bunsen burner for this one ...
*** but I'm not putting any more of my money down on any invertebrates, I tells ya'!
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