I'm Starting to Believe In Conspiracy Theories

 

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This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny — the Stickies — to advise 'em now, haunt them after I'm deleted.

Trigger Warning: This column is rated SSC-65: Sexy Seasoned Citizens   

About 

Glossary 

Featuring {Dana}: Persistent auditory hallucination and charming literary device 

"If I don't run for presidnet, we'll all be OK." -Joe Biden (2015) 

"I don't want to be president." -Donald Trump (1987)

Dear Stickies (and gentlereaders),  

Quick! 50 years from now, what will professors, pundits, and scholars...

{Oh my!}

...Say were the major accomplishments of the Obama presidency?

{The fact he and the little woman were worth about a million and a half in January of 2008 and are now worth about $70,000,000 and own four houses comes to mind. I'll bet his daughters aren't dealing with college loan payments.}

I haven't given the infamous Choom Gang's most famous alumnus much thought lately, however...

{Choom Gang?} 

Well, as far as I know (I haven't read any of his books) although Mr. Obama has freely admitted that, unlike Slick Willie, he did inhale, and he did do a little blow, he hasn't gone into great detail about the Choom Gang, which is what he and the dudes he got stoned with in high school called themselves.

However, some of them did, and in case you missed it, google Choom Gang, and all sorts of different tokes takes on the story pop up. But who knows which details are true, which are exaggerated, and which are made up? Or, more importantly in my semi-humble opinion, why did his friends feel compelled to snitch and not avail themselves of a "no comment."  

{Right? With friends like those etc., hey you're not gonna claim that... Wait-wait-wait. Choom?}

Hawaiian slang for smoking weed (pakalolo), Dana, to choom is to smoke weed (at least when Mr. Obama was in high school, I don't know about now). It has other meanings in other contexts. The "gang" traveled around town in a VW Microbus owned by one of its members they called the Choomwagon.    

Big BUT, Mr. Obama it seems, has no shortage of friends in the news media willing to mind their own business these days when it comes to what The Swamp's most famous resident gets up to when he has friends over.

{He still lives in D.C., full-time?}

Looks that way, but honestly, I don't know. I googled my brains out but that information is hard to come by.

{Probably a Secret Service thing.} 

Perhaps. 

Not long ago, I was in the process of pursuing input via my daily morning routine of carefully constructed input inputting...

{You were sucking on your first cup of Cafe Bustelo while treading water in the Dizzinformation Ocean, yes?}

That's what I said. Anyway, I was reading a Holman W. Jenkins Jr. column in the Wall Street Journal about... 

{Holman who?}

A columnist I follow who writes a column, twice a week, for the WSJ. I'm a fanboy. 

The column was primarily about Mr. Jenkins's opinion that President Biden needs to find a way to push Kamala Harris aside and add a strong VP candidate to the ticket to solve some of the problems standing between Biden and a second term. 

{I see where you're going but I don't see Obama agreeing to be Uncle Joe's VP candidate.}

I don't think so either, although it would be interesting. But my buddy Holman happened to remark in passing on the fact that Obama declined to follow tradition and get out of Dodge, and out of the way, of his successor. 

Instead, the tribune of the downtrodden residents of the Southside of Chicago bought himself an $8,100,000 mansion in D.C., two miles from the White House, one (last time I checked) of four high-end houses he owns.     

{To be fair it's a relatively small mansion. It only has 9 bedrooms and 8 bathrooms... your buddy Holman?}

Yeah... if not for some obviously very bad karma. Holie's point, although it wasn't the point of his column, was that it's strange, that given there are hungry herds of reporters roaming the streets of Washington in search of prey, apparently none of them stake out the Obama House. 

Rather curious given that it seems to be the favorite domicile of our former commander and chief... but I can't say for sure because of the paucity of information referred to above. You can go a-googlin' if you don't believe me. 

Allegedly, there are frequent gatherings of former Obama minions (and others) who are now Biden minions who work at a different but much better-known, D.C. house. 

{Well, perhaps they're just being nice and giving him some space.}

Nice national reporters? In America? In 2023? There's no feckin' way that...

Wait a second!

Your dimwitted columnist has an aha! moment.

Given that the WSJ is a national newspaper that's so committed to old-school, traditional, objective journalism they print the real names of people (subscribers only) who comment on articles and op-eds, with millions of readers, and 1,800 or so reporters in 45 countries... 

Why aren't they staking out the Obama's D.C. digs?

{I hear Secret Service agents carry weapons.}  

As it turns out, the street in front of Mr. Obama's house is blocked off, and only approved (and I assume carefully vetted) visitors and approved (and I assume vetted, at least I hope so) delivery drivers are given access. 

But why aren't any lean and hungry reporters monitoring who attends what are supposed to be regular gatherings at the Obama House just by staking out both ends of both streets and keeping track of who is coming and going?

{What if they do but they're being chased off?}

That would be a story unto itself.

{What if they're aren't any regular meetings/gatherings/whateverings at the Obama House?}

I thought of that but according to Mr. Jenkins, who's in a position to know, this is common knowledge in Washington. Perhaps he was nudging his bosses at the WSJ. 

{Whatever. Why should I/we care?}

Well, let's review. A former POTUS, despite multiple decades of tradition, lives a couple of miles from the White House in a home that's apparently his primary residence and hangs out with former staffers who are now current White House staffers (and who knows who else) and the rabid press isn't interested?

Never mind, I'm probably just paranoid. I gotta go, someone's knocking and holding up a Secret Service badge in front of the Ring camera on my front door. 

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

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Dear Uncle Joe & the Donald

An open letter.

Image by Marc Hatot from Pixabay 

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids — the Stickies — eventual selves to advise them and haunt them after they've become grups and/or I'm deleted.  

Trigger Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — Perusal by kids, callowyutes, or grups may result in a debilitating meltdown.  

About 

Glossary 

Featuring Dana: Hallucination, guest star, and charming literary device  

"Politics is the attempt to achieve power and prestige without merit." 

                                                                                              -P.J. O'Rourke

Dear Uncle Joe & the Donald,

Gentlemen, many of your fellow Americans believe that one of you clearly suffers from age-related cognitive decline and that the other is a megalomaniac. 

Never having met either of you, and since the closest I've come to medical training is driving by a highway exit sign for the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, far be it from me to judge.

However, I do know that the Donald (6/14/46) is barely young enough to be a Boomer and that Uncle Joe (11/20/42) is too old to be one.  

I also know that regardless of the state of your physical and/or mental health, biologically speaking, like me, you're old. More importantly, you've both led unusually full lives compared to the average American H. sapien. It's time to get off the stage and give the kids a chance to show us what they can do.

You've both become the face of powerful, polarized factions within your respective parties and are both exploited by the purple press and armies of tireless algorithmites on duty in the social media platforms, both of whom serve the Outrage Industrial Complex.  

Too many Citizens of the Republic have forgotten, or perhaps have never learned, that for a democratic republic to thrive and survive, constant compromise combined with a willingness to live and let live is required. 

For the sake of the Republic, if I were the benevolent, primarily ceremonial monarch that I should be, I would order that you two...

{Ahem.}  

For the sake of the Republic, the two of you should announce, together, that you've both decided that neither of you is running for president in '24, that given the current state of overheated political polarization, you've decided to step aside. 

That you hope this will set an example for both major parties to offer the nation younger nominees who publicly commit to seeking a compromise on the issues that divide us. 

That it's time, across the board, for Boomer pols to get off the stage, and for Americans of all ages to step out of their comfort zones and readopt the attitude of the country that put a man on the moon in less than a decade when we worked together.

That it's time to reconsider what's happened since: embracing self-centeredness and safetyism while simultaneously culturally shooting ourselves in the foot on a daily basis.

Perhaps you could even suggest all politicians over the age of 70 currently serving at all levels of government from dog catcher to senator not run in '24, and that going forward, this becomes a tradition, and if necessary, a law.

And speaking of mandatory retirement, how about suggesting that the members of the legal deep state, the millions of unelected bureaucrats we're at the mercy of, should also retire by age 70. We could be spared future Anthony Fauccis (82), who until his recent retirement, was better paid than the presidents he worked for. 

{Hey, are you aware that his wife, Christine Grady (71) is the chief of "the Department of Bioethics at the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center?" and is paid $234,284 per year?}

Yeah, I am, Dana. But to be fair I must mention that she and her husband worked for different agencies of the NIH before he retired.

Unfortunately, I suspect that even such a noble and virtuous gesture on your part, although it would likely result in the historians of the future treating both of you gentlepersons more kindly, I'm not holding my breath.  

And even if my fantasy somehow came true, it would be unlikely to make more than a small splash in Lake Zeitgeist given the current state of things. The purple press/social media would both move on as soon as the partner of the love child of a cousin of someone famous for being famous (and who once dated Madonna) died from an overdose of _______.

Perhaps the politicians and "influencers" who are members of the three generations born since the Boomers arrived could form the Neodemocratic and Neorepublican parties and take out the donkey and the elephant in the room with a tranquilizer dart.

I'd suggest they begin repairing the Republic by first freezing the national credit card and ending inflation by living within the nation's means so they don't spend their whole lives paying off their forefather's foreperson's bills. 

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

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The Never Ending Abortion Debate

Howsabout a compromise?

Image by Augusto Ordóñez from Pixabay 

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids — the Stickies — eventual selves to advise them and haunt them after they've become grups and/or I'm deleted. Best perused on a screen large enough for even your parents to see and navigate easily.   

Trigger Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — Perusal by kids, callowyutes, or grups may result in a debilitating meltdown.  

About

Glossary 

Featuring Dana: Hallucination, guest star, and charming literary device

"Wait a minute! Perhaps we should hold off on deciding this [issue] until cheap birth control is available at every convenience store and science develops a morning-after pill that’s available over the counter." -me

Dear (eventual) Grandstickies and Great-Grandstickies (and Gentlereaders),

This is the third time I've written a column about abortion, "but I'll repeat myself at the risk of being crude..." -Paul Simon, from the song 50 Ways to Love Your Lever.

{Wait-wait-wait. It's leave your lover not love your lever, and there's no such word as howsabout.}

Po-tay-toe, po-tah-toe. 

{And I only recall one column.}

Well, the first was written in 2015, and you hadn't been born yet, Dana. It was the first time I suggested that perhaps a civilized compromise was the best way to resolve a controversy that's been raging since 1973 when the Supremes, invoking pretzel logic, declared that the Constitution guaranteed a woman's birthing person's right to have an abortion. 

{Well, it's obvious where you stand on the matter.} 

Yes, obviously the Constitution doesn't guarantee the right for birthing persons to have an abortion any more than it guarantees the right for gay Homo sapiens to get married. 

{I meant that you're obviously pro-life.}

I mean that I'm pro-Constitution. 

The founding pasty patriarchs codified the fundamental Rules&Regs — including a bill of rights — that apply to all the kids on the playground and that can't be altered without going to a great deal of trouble. 

They were aware of the power of the K.I.S.S principle (keep it simple stupid) more than 150 years before the late, great engineer Kelly Johnson named it and applied it masterfully in the middle of the last century before America started losing its mojo. 

The unspecified details were left up to the individual states, where the people actually lived, for the sake of what nowadays might be called that liberty thing. But I drift.

{Goes without saying. Hey, what do have against gay people?}

Nothing, and I don't care if gay H. sapiens get married. In fact, if I were king, I'd authorize generous (means-tested) tax deductions for every child gay couples were willing to adopt that had been created by illegitimate parents and/or were innocent victims of circumstance. 

{And?}

And what?

{This is where you would normally mention that you had a gay roommate back in the late 70s long before having gay friends was officially cool, a fact which you never seem to tire of mentioning.} 

I don't know what you're talking about.

I'd also proclaim that unrestricted abortion be available for the first trimester, with exceptions for rape, incest, and health problems beyond that. It just so happens that a majority of my future royal subjects feel the same way, and I'm a very responsive and benevolent monarch. 

{But meanwhile, back in the real world...} 

Let the people decide, state by state. 

{But the pollsters say most people don't want Roe v. Wade overturned.}

Well, then the people's representatives to the Swamp are going to have to pass a law. But given that Congress these days tends to be more performative than productive, don't hold your breath. Twice a year, year after year, they threaten to decide whether to make daylight savings time permanent or get rid of it and save us all a lot of unnecessary trouble and aggravation.  

So far, no good. And speaking of threatening...   

{I knew it! You're an alt-right extremist!}

Nah, just a center-right, slightly cranky (more or less) Normie endlessly striving to keep my epigenetic mordancy under control so as to retain some semblance of the cardinal virtues — as passed on to me by the late, great Sister Mary McGillicuddy  — in the midst of a culture currently in decline.

{Doesn't Pfizer make a pill for that?}

Now, where was I? Oh yeah, speaking of threatening, Uncle Joe has recently announced his support for pro-choice members of the IUPPPP&PPVTTOT (International Union of Professional Perpetually Protesting Protestors & Perpetual Victims of This, That, and the Other Thing) taking it to the streets. 

The streets where the judges and families of the Supreme Court of the United States of America live — as long as the protests are peaceful.

However, according to federal law...

"Whoever...with the intent of influencing any judge...pickets or parades...in or near...a residence occupied or used by such judge...shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both."

It would appear that Uncle Joe has encouraged people to break the law.

{That sounds eerily familiar... Maybe Congress should launch an open-ended investigation.}

I just hope that the protesters are more peaceful than the mostly peaceful protesters of 2020.

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

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I Call Bullshit!

Image by underworth from Pixabay 

This is: A weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids and my great-grandkids — the Stickies — to advise them and haunt them after they've become grups and/or I'm deleted.

Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — A Perusal by kids, callowyutes, or grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering. Viewing with a tablet or a monitor is highly recommended for maximum enjoyment.  

About

Glossary 

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlereader 

"I was kind of secretly hoping one of my kids would go out and make a million bucks. So when they put me in a home, at least I'll have a window with a view." 

                                                                                                -Joe Biden

Dear (eventual) Grandstickies and Great-Grandstickies (and Gentlereaders),

[I am shock-ed and appalled. A true gentleperson would not use the word bullshit in a missive that will be read by the general public, particularly in the title — not to mention his grandkids.]

Forgive me my delicate little flower, henceforth I'll use B.S., Dana. But sometimes, a full-throated I call bull... B.S. is called for. I call B.S. on Uncle Joe's call to spend trillions on top of the trillions already spent by him and the Donald.  

[Wait-wait-wait. I don't recall you sending back your share of the latest tranche of the Money for Mobs program. Any number of reputable charities would've been happy to put that money to work for ya.]

I'm tempted to say I needed it because I really needed it. Of course, the reality of my claim is between me, God, and the IRS. But I'm certain that almost all of the people who didn't need it also kept it, and I don't blame them. 

 [That doesn't make any sense.]     

Sure it does. Without congressional term limits, we're doomed. Well, I'm probably (hopefully?) not since I'm pushing 70 and according to The Social Security Administration I'm likely to be deleted when I turn 84.7. 

I wonder if I were to have a sex change operation and became a full-fledged (well...) female if I'd live to see my 87.0th birthday...

[Did you stop taking your meds again?]

To paraphrase a Shakespeare misquote, read on Macduff.

Uncle Joe — with the help of no shortage of lefty pseudo-journalists of the purple press  — ran as a traditional, moderate, steady as she goes center-left Depublican. 

The Donald, they told us, was the creepy uncle, the racist, xenophobic old letch kept at a careful distance by all the women and girls at family reunions. Uncle Joe was just a lovable, harmless old hair sniffer prone to occasionally blurting out embarrassing remarks. 

"If you have a problem figurin' out if you're for me or Trump, then you ain't black!"

[Maybe you misunderstood. Maybe...] 

From a Chris Cillizza piece at CNN (.com) posted just after (11.17.20) the election:

"Biden told everyone — the left included — exactly what sort of president he would be. One who believed Trump was an anomaly, that Republicans were good people who could be dealt with in a post-Trump era and that deal-making and centrist politics were the right way forward."

And then the Depublicans used a parliamentary trick to pass the stimulus bill without a single Republicrat vote.

The Republicrats, the same Republicrats that gleefully ran up the deficit when the Donald was in charge, went ape... poop crazy. 

Thus my use of the world-famous quote," Without congressional term limits, we're doomed." -Me Clearly, both the Blue team and the Red teams are suffering from an epidemic of constipation.

This brings me to spending/printing/borrowing trillions and trillions (please pronounce like you're Carl Sagan). 

Call it what you will, stimulus/democratic socialism/socialism/whateverism, as George Will has pointed out, "The political class is more united by class interest than it is divided by ideology. And the class interest is to give the American people a dollar's worth of government and charge them 80 cents for it."   

That's how you buy a political career with other people's money. 

As best I can tell (for some reason the Goog makes it hard to get a straight answer) approximately 24,000,000 people in America are working for a government entity in some form or fashion.

This means that one out of every 14 people has a government job. But this column is about the people at the top, the ones with real power. It's not about your average low-level government employee, most of whom are just like you and me. 

It's not even about the teacher's unions, the primary source of institutional racism in America (HT: Scott Adams) so I probably shouldn't have mentioned it.

[Then what exactly is your...]

Sorry... It's quite simple really. 

There aren't nearly enough rich people/evil corporations to fund Uncle Joe's dreams.

And corporations — large, small, evil, and otherwise — get their money from us, their customers. 

They employ us and are usually owned by us, their shareholders, because The Fedrl Gummit has made it impossible to grow a nest egg the safe, boring, old-fashioned way — savings accounts and compound interest. 

The European social democracies that the progressives like to point to are funded by high taxes on everyone at every level of exchange. If that's what we really want, fine, let's do it.  

BIG BUT.

To pretend that utopia can be financed by the 1% (who paid 38.5% of all income taxes last year) without the bottom 90% (who paid 29.9% of last year's income taxes) kicking in a lot more dough is bullshit. 

[Gasp!]    

Incidentally, the phrase "over ten years" is also complete B.S. since the US doesn't have ten-year budgets (the Swamp can't even pass a one-year budget anymore) and even if he lives long enough, Uncle Joe will be gone in less than eight years even though he'll only be 86. 

Speaking of bushwa:

Uncle Joe, recently giving a speech to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Amtrak (the heavily taxpayer-subsidized gummit railroad that loses money every year) told a heartwarming story about his relationship with an Amtrak conductor, and taking the train home to visit his sick mom around 2014 or 2015 when he was the vice president.  

Slight problem. His mom died in 2010 and the conductor retired in 1993. 

Why would a dude with FU-level wealth and the most powerful job on the planet continue to tell dubious boring old man stories (I'm an expert on this topic...)? Mansplaining? Toxic masculinity? Perhaps some other problem?

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

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640 African Elephants Balancing on the Tip of a Ballet Shoe

 A Random Randomnesses column 

                                   Image by Mystic Art Design from Pixabay

This is: A weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids and my great-grandkids — the Stickies — to advise them and haunt them after they've become grups or I'm deleted.

Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — A Perusal by kids, callowyutes, or grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering. Viewing with a tablet or a monitor is highly recommended for maximum enjoyment.

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About 

Glossary 

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"People say she's crazy she's got diamonds on the soles of her shoes." -Paul Simon

Dear (eventual) Grandstickies and Great-Grandstickies (and Gentlereaders),

[Get comfortable... it's another long one.]

The title of this column, 640 African Elephants Balancing on the Tip of a Ballet Shoe, is a line from an article written by Sara Spary I found on (at?) CNN.com. As soon as I read it I knew I had to pass it along. Just because. 

The reason I read the article — Science can create diamonds at room temperatures in minutes — in the first place is that I've long been fascinated by the willingness of my fellow H. sapiens to spend a not-insignificant amount of money on pretty rocks to commemorate a given couple plighting their troth to marry each other.

Or, worse yet, purely for ornamentation, given that it's common knowledge that diamonds, in general, are not particularly rare, can be manufactured, and the average schmuck can't tell the difference between a "real" one and a manufactured one.

However, my dear Stickies and gentlereaders, never underestimate the power of good marketing and/or the pursuit of status.

It seems that a team of scientists has figured out a way to manufacture real, high-quality diamonds using a unique method in which they apply 640 elephants worth of pressure to carbon at room temperature. 

The manufacturing of real, high-quality diamonds has been around since the 1980s but the process requires high temperatures. Note the phrase real, high-quality. We're not talkin' pubic zirconias' people. 

[It's cubic zirconias, not...]  

I know, Dana, and I apologize. 

Fun fact! According to Wikipedia the current primary method for manufacturing pubic zirconia stones is called the Skull-Melting method because it requires temperatures of over 3,000 degrees. 

How cool is that?

- Is the fact that the Titans of Tech not only have more money than God but also have the sort of power the so-called Robber Barons of a century or so ago could only dream of, slightly concerning? 

[Oh great, yet another article about cancelation/censorship by social media, Big Tech, and/or the Purple Press. Or are you worried that the Goog has noticed you have tens of regular gentlereaders and is about to cancel you?]

Being a disciple of the late, great Alfred Enigma (What, me worry?) Newman, 1895 - 2018, I cultivate, albeit not always successfully, not worrying as a virtue. 

However, I do find non-nonprofits of Citizens of the Republic like Laurene Powell Jobs and her ilk, a bit worrisome.  

[What's a non-nonprofit and Who's Laurene Powell Jobs?]   

Non-nonprofits are organizations set up by gazillionaires that at first glance look like traditional nonprofit entities that have to report where the money comes from and where it goes. 

However, they're LLCs, private limited liability companies. For example, the business of the dude/dudette/person that owns your favorite local restaurant is probably structured as an LLC... assuming, of course, the plague/gummit hasn't destroyed it. 

So, a non-nonprofit "charity" can spend its money any way it pleases, even try to generate profits.  

[Wait... you made up the term non-nonprofit didn't you?] 

Guilty as charged.

[Who's Laurene Powell Jobs?] 

Steve Jobs' widow. Net worth $19,000,000,000 more or less. 

According to Wikipedia, she's the "... executive and the founder of Emerson Collective, an organization that, among other investing and philanthropic activities, advocates for policies concerning education reform, social redistribution and environmental conservation, and a major donor to the Democratic Party candidates including Kamala Harris and Joe Biden."

[So? It's her money and she can spend it any way she pleases.]

    

When you're right you're right, Dana. Must be me. 

Just because she bought herself an American literary institution, The Atlantic (Est. 1857), Lord Jeffrey (net worth $180,000,000,000) bought his favorite newspaper, the Washington Post ('cause he could), and Mr. and Mrs. Zuck-erberg (net worth $90,000,000,000) have also set up a non-nonprofit... well... that's not necessarily a disturbing trend, right?   

   

 

- Uncle Joe is wasting no time. He's crankin' out executive orders and memoranda faster than a newly enthroned divine right monarch on meth. Perhaps the reports of cognitive decline are bogus. 

No, I'm not going to comment on wiping out 11,000 jobs with the stroke of a pen by canceling the Keystone pipeline that so many people are bitching about. We're in a climate crisis and the little people who don't need private jets to save us from ourselves must do their part to compensate for the carbon footprints of those who do. 

For example, John Kerry (net worth a mere $250,000,000... of course his better half, another wealthy widow, is worth about a billion) Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, needs his private jet to buzz around the planet to attend meetings with his colleagues from other signatories of the Paris Climate Agreement. Hey! it's not actually a treaty, per se, so screw that Senate approval crap... and stop your whining. 

For the record, I do have a favorite Executive Order.  

“Children should be able to learn without worrying about whether they will be denied access to the restroom, the locker room, or school sports.” This is a line from the Executive Order on Preventing and Combating Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation. 

[Catchy title.]

Boys who self-identify as girls want the right to choose which restroom or locker room they use, or which team they join, and Uncle Joe stands with them. What could possibly go wrong? Right?

And, a favorite memorandum...

The following is from a memorandum titled Modernizing Regulatory review, a masterpiece of bafflegab destined to be enshrined in the Deep State Hall of Fame. 

(i)    identify ways to modernize and improve the regulatory review process, including through revisions to OMB’s Circular A-4, Regulatory Analysis, 68 Fed. Reg. 58,366 (Oct. 9, 2003), to ensure that the review process promotes policies that reflect new developments in scientific and economic understanding, fully accounts for regulatory benefits that are difficult or impossible to quantify, and does not have harmful anti-regulatory or deregulatory effects; 

My emphasis. You've gotta read the whole thing to fully appreciate it.  

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

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He's Baaack

 A Random Randomensses Column

                                         Image by janeb13 from Pixabay

This is: A weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids and my great-grandkids — the Stickies — to advise them and haunt them after they become grups or I'm deleted.

Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — A Perusal by kids, callowyutes, or grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering. Viewing with a tablet or a monitor is highly recommended for maximum enjoyment.

Please Note: If ya click on an Amazon ad, thus opening a portal to Amazon, and buy anything, Lord Jeffrey will toss a few pence in my direction and you won't have to feel guilty about enjoying my work — well, hopefully — for free. Win/Win.  

About 

Glossary 

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"Money is not the only answer, but it makes a difference." -Barack Obama 

Dear (eventual) Grandstickies and Great-Grandstickies (and Gentlereaders),

I'm a Gerard Baker fanboy. 

[Who?]

Gerard Baker? Former Editor-in-Chief of the Wall Street Journal? Now writes a weekly column for the paper called Free Expression? 

[Oh, right. I guess. Um, why?]

A lengthy quote from a recent column if it pleases the court, or even if it doesn't.

"There’s a larger point here about the rot in America’s institutional leadership that, in part at least, the Trump administration was elected to undo. In its largely celebratory coverage, the press is unwittingly emphasizing what this restoration represents: the triumph of its own class. It is highlighting how completely in lockstep the various elements of the new and old establishments now are: the media and tech platforms, the global corporate bossocracy, the vast, overfed Washington policy crowd, whose different characters pop in and out of government with a change of president without leaving a footprint on the receding sands of American leadership."

My emphasis, and my admiration. 

I'd also like to point out that if one is not familiar with the WSJ the quote above might come as a pleasant(?) surprise. Oh, and "global corporate bossocracy"? Yes, indeed. In an alternate universe, in which I was Mr. Baker's editor, I'd change it to "money-grubbing, faux Wokie, global corporate bossocracy." 

[Hmm. "...if one is not familiar"? I seem to remember you writing somewhere that you don't like using one as a gender-neutral indefinite pronoun...]

Show off. 

[That it sounded too snobby for American English, or words to that effect.]

Well now that the Intersectional Inquisition has ruled that one is supposed to use gender-neutral pronouns if at all possible, and since the words you and your are under house arrest for promoting individualism to the detriment of officially authorized collectives of victims, I'm playing it safe.

You may have noticed I've taken to writing him/her/them or he/she/they for the same reason. 

Psst... You didn't hear it from me, but I've heard that the word one is on double-secret probation till the Intersectional Inquisition decides on an official and acceptable all-purpose pronoun that won't trigger any-one.

Remember secular stagnation?

[No. Seeing as how church attendance appears to keep declining the phrase doesn't even make any sense. We seem to be suffering from religious stagnation, not secular stagnation.]

Your confusion is understandable, my imaginary friend. Secular stagnation is a term used by economists that refers to little or no economic growth. Secular is short for saeculum, which is Latin for long term.

[You One can always count on economists for clarity.]

Anyways, the phrase in question was oft-bandied about during the Obama administration. It referenced the fact that the recovery from the Great Recession was, historically speaking, notoriously tepid and that it remained so for eight years.

Finger-pointing commenced, and continues. 

Interestingly, the Orange One was able to get things fired up simply by lowering taxes and regulations. 

If not for the fact he offended the Gods with his unrestrained hubris — who as usual wildly overreacted and struck down not only the Donald but also many a mere mortal with plague — the Tweeter-in-Chief might still be in charge.

[Oft-bandied? Notoriously tepid? Unrestrained hubris?]

Cool, huh? Well, Uncle Joe is putting the (economic) band back together and the Republic is about to be blessed once again with a group of administrators top-heavy with academic and gummit backgrounds, mostly unsullied by jobs in the real world. 

God bless us. Every-one.  

[Wait a sec', who's back?]

No drama Obama, of course. You should pay more attention. 

He recently released the first book of a two-volume memoir detailing his years in the White House — not to be confused with his memoir about his life prior to politics... or his book The Audacity of Hope, subtitled, The Teachings of St. Barrack. 

[You made that up!]

Just the last part.  

He and the Missus struck a deal for $65,000,000 that included her memoirs, a book released in 2018. 

Cafeteria ladies everywhere briefly basked in her warm glow.  

They needed the dough. Imagine the cost of the upkeep on two homes (imagine the size of his honey-do jar!). There's the modest mansion in D.C ($8,000,000) and a cute little beach house ($12,000,000) in Maatha's Vineyard.

Fortunately, they both also signed a deal to develop projects for Netflix, although its value is classified. Hopefully, if they budget, it'll be enough to get by on. His pension is only $219,000 a year, but it comes with a lot of bennies. 

[And he'll eventually get Social Security, that'll help.] 

Anyway, for some reason, he's been popping up here, there, and even over there. I was worried that the rumors he had contracted Covid-19 and was hanging on by a thread in a secret Bulgarian sanitarium were true. 

[Why on Earth would you think that he...]

I couldn't think of any other reason why he would deny us his wisdom and not barnstorm for Uncle Joe while he was self-quarantining in his basement for the better part of the recent campaign due to his unfortunate co-morbidity (Oldus Dudeous). 

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

Share this column, give me a thumb (up or in my eye), and/or access older columns below. If my work pleases you you can buy me some cheap coffee with PayPal or plastic.

If you do your Amazon shopping by using one of my Amazon ads as a portal to access Amazon, Lord Jeffrey will toss me a few pence if you buy anything.    

Feel free to comment/like/follow/cancel/troll me on Cranky's Facebook page.

Cranky don't tweet.