Defund the Teachers!

Image by Roy Harryman 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 — Perusal by kids, callowyutes, and/or grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering

About 

Glossary 

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"We keep hearing that black lives matter but they only seem to matter when that helps politicians to get votes... The other 99% of black lives destroyed by people who are not police do not seem to attract nearly as much attention in the media." -Dr. Thomas Sowell


Dear Grandstickies & Great-Grandstickies (& Gentlereaders),

Defund the Teachers! I don't really mean it but since hyperbole rules nowadays a cranks gotta do what a cranks gotta do to get a little attention. 

After all, in an era of "alternative facts" (HT: Kellyanne Conway) wherein defund the police doesn't necessarily mean defund the police who am I to resist substituting slogans and sound bites for substance?

While I admit that Defund the Teachers! is hardly in the same league as a world-class slogan like Black Lives Matter it's (hopefully) an attention-getter and might snag me an extra reader or two.

[So you're admitting the title of this week's column is clickbait?] 

Is it, Dana? Is it just manipulative clickbait or is it clever SEO? Potato or potahto? Low road or high road? After all...

[What's SEO? No wait, we'll come back to that. Are you saying black lives don't matter?]

Of course not, black lives obviously matter. That's one of the reasons the slogan is a work of genius. Who in their right mind can argue otherwise? Who is arguing otherwise? How can you argue with a statement that any sane person accepts and simultaneously means different things to different people?

Even the international organization called the BLM Global Network has an agenda of sweeping generalizations bereft of specifics.

For example: "We disrupt the Western prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and villages that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable."

Alrighty then... But what, specifically, should The Fedrl Gummit, the state and local summits, and non-black fellow Americans do to improve the lot of African-Americans?

[That's not the point! The point is that...]

My point is that protests and taking down monuments, legally or by the mob, is a lot of "sound and fury, signifying nothing." I repeat myself, what, specifically, needs to be done?


As to clickbait and SEO: one man's/woman's/person's clickbait is another M/W/Ps search engine optimization. 

If you're not familiar with this term it simply refers to the tricks, tools, and techniques used to get you to find and/or click on one of the literally billions of choices available.

For example, low-rent techniques like the feeble ones I sometimes use, such as clickbatish title above (Defund the Teachers!) that's repeated in bold early on in the column and then sprinkled throughout the column to get the attention of the Goog.

As I've mentioned previously, and I'm mentioning again because the Crank is all about public service, a small but lucrative industry exists whose purpose is to find ways to get you to click on links and/or get the Goog to offer up said links when you go a-googlin'.

The Goog always wins by monetizing the data it's always collecting. The Goog never sleeps but you get some free software and services. That's fair, right?


Now, as to the title of this column, Defund the Teachers! Ever wonder how the Wokies have managed to turn American English into Newspeak (see Orwell, George: 1984) and place brainwashed, smartphone addled, whiny tattletales in every profession and on every corner so quickly?

America's education system, which consists of:

Overpriced colleges and universities, top-heavy with "critical" social justice administrators and compliance officers, as well as fake scholars teaching fake subjects.

"Mom and dad, I've decided to major in Feminist Geography." (If you only click on only one link in this missive, click on this one.)

And the schools of education staffed with "activists" cranking out woke primary and secondary school teachers for America's, um... slightly less than world-class public school system.

Which brings us back to Black Lives Matter.

[Huh? Has your brain always worked like this?]


With all due respect, and given the following, I'd like to make a specific suggestion.

BLM has been criticized because of how it spent 1.8 million dollars worth of donations in 2019.

(25% went to salaries, benefits, and payroll taxes, 46% to consultant fees, and the rest went to small grants, accounting, bank fees, information tech, insurance, and legal fees.)

Since the murder of George Floyd, BLM has received a flood of donations from both personal and corporate sources that are still pouring in.

Given that nationwide there are better than 1,000,000 kids on waiting lists for charter schools, many of which are located in underserved, poor/minority neighborhoods, why not spend some of that money on supporting or opening charter schools in neighborhoods where black kids are trapped in failed public schools?

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

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Winnie the Emperor Strikes Back

                         Source unknown - meme banned by the emperor 

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.

                  
-Image by Weibo 

Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — Perusal by kids, callowyutes, and/or grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering

About 

Glossary 

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"Some foreigners with full bellies and nothing better to do engage in finger-pointing at us." -Xi Jinping 


Dear Grandstickies & Great-Grandstickies (& Gentlereaders),

In case you're not familiar with what my favorite emperor (and second favorite dick-tater), China's president for life Xi Jinping (aka Xi Dada) has to do with Winnie the Pooh, clicking on this link provides an article that illustrates everything.

[Illustrates? Wouldn't explains be a better choice of words?]

No.

The article is world-class clickbait from an online magazine called MEL but... Is there an industry term for yet another progressive publication that claims it's not just another progressive publication, but mostly is?

[I've no idea but I do know that, No, was rude, and you didn't answer my question.] 

Sorry, Dana. The choice of the word illustrates was deliberate. The article includes four illustrations/photos that, um, illustrate Xi Dada's resemblance to Winnie the Pooh.

[You know, not everyone is amused by your wordplay.]

I suspect my gentlereaders are, after all, they're smarter than the a-ver-age bear.

[Whatever. By the way, who's your favorite dick-tater?]

North Korea's Supreme Leader, Kim Jong-un of course. Now there's a psychopath. He looks (and behaves) like Winnie the Pooh on serious drugs, but he may have been deleted by the webmaster in the sky, or his sister, which would make Xi Dada number two with a bullet.

[Why are you picking on Xi Dada's looks again? After all, no one's gonna mistake you for George Clooney. Are you a lookist?]

A lookist? What's a... Oh, I get it.

I think that lampooning a dick-tater who uses phrases like "capitalism with Chinese characteristics" and "one country, two systems" with a straight face puts me on the side of the angels.

God bless you, George Orwell, wherever you are.

[You're creeping up on a point... Right?]

Absabalutely. For the record, capitalism with Chinese characteristics is Newspeak (see 1984: Orwell, George) for cronyism, mercantilism, and left-wing fascism.

[Are you going to unpack that one?]

Nah. That's worth a column of its own. But the one country, two systems claim is pure bonkercockie and there's a lesson here for my Dear Grandstickies, and everyone else.


July the first marked the 23rd anniversary of the British colony of Hong Kong reverting to Chinese control. The Chinese Gummit, which had promised not to mess with Hong Kong for fifty years — one country, two systems — began messing almost immediately.

The harder they pushed the harder the citizens of Hong Kong pushed back with pro-democracy protests.

On June 30th at approximately 11:00 p.m., the Emperor struck back with the "Decision of the National People's Congress on Establishing and Perfecting the Legal System and Enforcement Mechanism of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region to Maintain National Security."

Translation and bottom line: You're now officially enslaved like the rest of us. Shortly before America celebrated Independence the emperor imposed Unindependence Day in Hong Kong.


If you've been busy watching or participating in our current national pastimes —demonizing each other, setting things on fire, and/or trying to separate pandemic truth from fiction (and politicization)  — you may have taken your eye off the (Chinese) ball.

[The billionaires and millionaires of the NBA are kissing Xi Dada's bum again?]

No. The emperor and his minions now have a vaguely worded cudgel that means whatever they say it means that they can use to keep the masses in line. You can be busted and imprisoned without much in the way of due process.

[You? I know you're uncomfortable using "one" when a "you" will do but in this case shouldn't you...]

Nope. An excellent article by Emily Feng on NPRs website reports that inciting hatred against Bejing by "... a person who is not a permanent resident of the region" (that would be you, and all the other yous on the planet Earth) is now illegal.

[Wait-wait-wait. Even if you didn't make that up, how would China go about enforcing it?] 

I didn't make it up; you can easily look it up. I doubt Xi Dada thinks it can be enforced. I don't doubt that he/she/they thinks that in a better world he/she/they could and that with a little luck, eventually might.

[Well, Assuming, for the sake of argument that it's true, I think the United Nations should get together and tell China to get stuffed.]

Here's a couple'a quotes from an article by Chris Chang, published on the website of Taiwan News. The citizens of Taiwan, for obvious reasons, keep a weather eye on China 24x7x365.

"A total of 53 countries endorsed China's national security law for Hong Kong at the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva on Tuesday (June 30), many of which are dictatorships or economically tied with China." My emphasis.

"Meanwhile, 27 countries joined the UK-led condemnation of Beijing's legislation."

[Hoo-boy.]

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

Share this column or give me a thumb (up or in my eye) below. If my work pleases you you can buy me some cheap coffee with your debit/credit card.    

Although I'm not crazy about social media (too cranky) please feel free to comment/like/follow/cancel/troll me on my Facebook page.

Cranky don't tweet.

Ain't That Ironical

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny. I write letters to my grandkids (who exist), and my great-grandkids (who don't) — the Stickies — to haunt them after they become grups or I'm deleted.

                  
                                       - Photo by cottonbro from Pexels -

  

Warning: This column is rated SSC — Sexy Seasoned Citizens — Perusal by kids, callowyutes, and/or grups may result in a debilitating intersectional triggering

                                                    About 

                                                  Glossary 

Erratically Appearing Hallucinatory Guest Star: Dana — A Gentlerreader

"I want to see Brian Williams with no irony wearing a mustache." -Adam McKay

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

Irony, according to whatever dictionary it is that provides definitions when one goes a-googlin', is, among other things, "A state of affairs or an event that seems deliberately contrary to what one expects and is often amusing as a result."

I've looked at a lot of definitions from various sources and I've come to the conclusion that accurately defining irony is difficult, something is lost in the translations, so to speak.

Ain't that ironical?

[Wait-wait-wait. Is ironical actually a word?]

Yeah, Dana, it is, you can look it up. 

[Well, in that case, you should link to some proof.] 

Would you click on the link?

[Probably not, to be honest.]

And if you went a-googlin', would you be surprised if you came across a site that featured a 5,039-word essay that passionately argued that ironical is not a word, included elaborate footnotes, and that was chock full of links to other sites?

[No.]

Exactly. 

Here we are living in the dawn of the oft-mentioned information revolution and just about anything we go a-googlin’ for in the Information Ocean can and will be subject to contradiction, misinformation, and even weaponized misinformation. 

And so, writers attempt to make a case for _______ by inserting links into their work to frequently ignored sources that might be utter bonkercockie and that probably contain links to sources with links that many/most readers will not follow and...

[You’re giving me a headache.]

Sorry, I'm just being ironical, I’m all about ironicalities. 

[Ironicalities is definitely not a word.]

Are you sure? Maybe you should look it up.


As it says in the bible, "Irony of ironies, all is irony."

[Nuh-uh, it says...]

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there are roughly 75,000,000 Boomers in the Republic.

[A few less every day I should think.]

As it has ever been and always will be, geezers and geezerettes spend a great deal of time wailing and teeth-gnashing because kids these days do all the same things they did when they were kids.

In their (and my) defense they have faulty memories. After all:

a. They're H. sapiens and faulty memories are a documented design flaw.
b. They're geezers and geezerettes (G&Gs). 

That's ironical, but it gets worse.


Xrs, Millies, and Zoomers are getting grumpy because...

[Okay, Boomer.] 

Because, among other reasons, they're tired of waiting for the Boomers to get out of the way.

And no, I don't mean die, at least in most cases but... well, nevermind. I refer to the fact that there's no shortage of Boomers who could afford to retire comfortably but won't.

One of the reasons kids these days continue to act like kids these days longer than in the past is because many Boomers either don't retire or if they do, take on another job.

I'm not talking about people that are just trying to maintain a middle-class lifestyle — or have to skip their meds to be able to eat regularly — and would just as soon be fishing.

I am talking about folks that hang on, and on, because they just can't imagine what they'd do with themselves otherwise.

"I'd have to quit the company bowling team!"

Surely they could find something interesting to do that doesn't deny a job to a younger person who would love to get a job, or a better job, so they can afford to make grandbabies (and pay lots and lots of FICA taxes).

[FICA taxes?]

The source of the money for the Ponzi scheme that provides me with a modest amount of cash and heavily discounted healthcare (Social Security and Medicare). 

Like many G&Gs, I like grandbabies. Like most G&Gs I have a health problem or two or 10. Like all G&Gs, I like money.    

If you can afford it, walk away. All together now... all we are saying is give the kids a chance.  

Gentlereaders, I give you, career shaming. Let's "call out" Boomers who should quit while they're, financially speaking, at the top of their game.

This is a chance for the well-fed politicians, lobbyists, consultants, university presidents, and CEOs of ginormous NPOs, banks, multinational corporations, etceterations of a certain age (and net worth) to set an example for the little people.

[But some people just love working.]

Absolutely. They should go start new firms and create new jobs. Failing that, join the gig economy and get to know the occupationally disrupted.

Did I mention politicians? Do you realize that in November our choices are Daffy Donald (74) or Uncle Joe (78 on 11/20)?

Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day

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