Random Notes from a Crank

As I get older, I worry about how my brain is working. 

So when I got onto The Washington Post during our vacation here in Fort Morgan, Alabama, a couple of articles jumped out to me.

The first one is "Want to Keep Your Brain Sharp as You Age? Science May Have a Recipe." 

It's pretty clear that the Mediterranean diet is something to aspire to. I get regular exercise walking the dog weather permitting, but I could also go back to using dumbbells. 

And in this dark time during the administration of President Adolf, "7 Short, Simple Science-based Ways to Add Joy to Your Life" is worth a read. 

The phrase "little earthquakes in the mind" reminded me of this song by Tori Amos. 

Being down here in the Deep South has reminded me about how so many southerners drive way too damn slowly.

Way too many drivers are camped out in the left lane and driving slowly and clogging up traffic. 

Musing of the Moment: Ineptitude at Tottenham

It's June 3rd, and over ten days after Tottenham won the Europa League, fans like me are not sure if Ange is still the manager, and there appears to be a shakeup with the board. 

It's ridiculous. 

After winning the Europa League and then finishing the season with an unfortunate loss, the chairman of the ENIC board Daniel Levy went on vacation. 

He went on vacation during a time when other clubs are taking advantage of this new mini-transfer window. 

Other clubs are signing players while there's silence in N17. 

Ineptitude. 

Ange In. 

Levy out.

Why did I have to choose a Premier League club that is so poorly run? 

Random Notes from a Crank

Lots of things are going to get more expensive. 

A bunch of idiots are counting on Moscow Don to make some deals that help the U.S. and bring business and industry back to the United States. The New York Times has a good article on this nonsense: "A Flashing Economic Warning and a Sharp Political Jolt." 

The Canadian Prime Minister, who has a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Oxford, has a more realistic view of what's happening: "Our old relationship with the United States, a relationship based on steadily increasing integration, is over. The system of open global trade anchored but the United States, a system that Canada has relied on since the Second World War, a system that, while not perfect, has helped deliver prosperity for a country for decades, is over."

What's more menacing is how President Adolf tariff nonsense has strengthened China's position in the world economy. China is now importing soybeans from South American and getting its beef and pork from other countries. 

I woke up in a pissed-off mood this morning because I was thinking about how the head coach of high school basketball team basically wasted my son's junior year. And to a certain extent, the head coach of the high school baseball team is doing something similar. 

As I was driving to a baseball game yesterday, I caught the broadcast of the Barcelona-Inter Milan Champions League match, the first tie of two matches. It sounded like it was bananas. 

Based on the highlights, it was. 

I don't have a team I'm rooting for in that competition, but I certainly want PSG to beat Arsenal. 

Random Notes from a Crank

In the wake of all kinds of deregulation from the Adolf administration, the U.S. is set be a hell of a lot less safe and more polluted: "Inside Trump's Plan to Halt Hundreds of Regulations." 

I saw a clip from The Daily Show with Jon Stewart talking to Rahm Emanuel about who will become the next leader of the Democratic Party, who will become the next presidential candidate. 

Emanuel seemed to think that the next leader will be a governor, which got me contemplating which governors would be good choices: 

• Gretchen Whitmer (Michigan)
• Josh Shapiro (Pennsylvania)
• J.B. Pritzker (Illinois)
• Andy Beshear (Kentucky)
• Tim Walz (Minnesota)

I'd be fine with any of those people. Beshear is the only person from a traditionally red state.

The notion that other countries "stole" American jobs is asinine. The ultra wealthy and greedy corporations moved those jobs to other countries because they didn't want to pay U.S. workers what they deserved and didn't want to follow sensible environmental regulations. Instead, they wanted to employ sweatshop cheap workers in foreign countries. 

Moscow Don and his cronies are defying court orders. We are in a constitutional crisis. 

President Adolf has bankrupt this country morally and ethically. And don't forget money. The guy who somehow got a casino to go bankrupt is fleecing Americans because of his stupid tariffs and his dumb economic policies like tax cuts for the wealthy. 

Random Notes from a Crank

I've been an avid viewer of Saturday Night Live since I was a kid. 

The sketch about Zelensky's visit to trap in the White House was spot on. And the new agency DOUCHE is strikingly accurate. That's what they're setting out to do: Department of Unmaking Child Healthcare and Education. 

Mike Myers had to have a lot of fun imitating Musk's strange mannerisms. 

I recently watched the Netflix movies about the start of SNL, Saturday Night. If the depiction is true, I never knew Chevy Chase and John Belushi disliked each other so much. 

It's now once again what I call the dead season of sports. I neither watch the NBA nor the NHL. And March Madness hasn't started. Since I quit playing fantasy baseball, I don't watch much MLB. And because Hulu doesn't have the Marquee Network, I don't watch the Cubs. 

Democrats are inviting federal workers who were fired because of the draconian efforts of DOGE to Moscow Don's Congressional address on Tuesday. Many of them are veterans. 

I like this move because it shows how Trump, Musk, and their goons are just indiscriminately firing people. And I like how pissed-off constituents are showing up at town halls. 

Of course, craven Republicans will just stop having town halls if I had to guess. 

Random Notes from a Crank

The image below has to be one of the best covers on magazine I've seen in a while. 

It's not a coincidence that I'm currently reading a biography of Napoleon and Prequel by Rachel Maddow.

The present is currently rhyming with the past.  

Speaking of Maddow, she shared an article on Bluesky about a town hall in which many residents were loudly pissed off at a Congressman: "Jay Obernolte Preaches Deficit Reduction, Support Musk in Raucous Town Hall." 

I hope more citizens show their anger and opposition to what's happening at the hands of President Adolf and the complicit GOP. 

The U.S. is currently living in a kakistocracy. 

Here's an advert (as the English say) at a London bus stop. The Swasticar...

In the German election, the party that the above dipshit supported didn't do as well as they wanted thankfully. Merkel's party, the Christian Democratic Union, won, and the incoming Chancellor has vowed not to work with the far-right Alternative for Germany party. 

Mother Jones has a good article up about the election. Check out "Eighty Percent of Germans Voted Against the Far Right. Can That Happen Here?"

Random Notes from a Crank

A video project at UNC-Chapel Hill is brilliant to me. It's discussed in this article from The Washington Post: "A Campus Sign Said: 'Tell Us Something Good.' Students Delivered." 

What the US is currently experiencing is a Trumpdemic, a pandemic of stupidity, spite, graft, and unconstitutionality caused by the executive orders of President Adolf. And it's all aided and abetted by Congressional Republicans who have no spines. 

I started reading Rachel Maddow's Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism. It's topical. 

I will make sure to read this book during the warm-ups and halftimes of my son's high school basketball games in front of dipshits who voted for Racist Tariff Man. 

And this basketball season has been a repetitive exercise in frustration. My son is a junior who is a very good player. He was told that he was going to play both JV and varsity. However, he rarely gets to play varsity games because the coach is playing seniors and one junior who are clearly not as good as him. 

In addiition, our offensive set-up sucks. They don't even hint at trying to do anything inside, and the system they use to press could be described as "next level bad." 

I look forward to basketball season being over and moving onto baseball season. 

Random Notes from a Crank

A while back one of the words of the day was "kakistocracy," which means "government by the worst people."

With Adolf's number of executive orders and with the GOP having majorities in the House and Senate, that is the country the U.S. is living in, unfortunately, 

It's all very depressing. The Late Show with Stephen Colbert helped get me through his first administration, but I haven't girded up my emotional loins to watch the program since Adolf took office. 

But what can we expect with 54% of Americans reading below a sixth-grade level?

One of the better editorials I've read is from Bernie Sanders in The Guardian: "What Trump Didn't Say in His Inauguration Speech." 

Here are the last two ¶s of the opinion piece, but I recommend reading it all. 

Bottom line: as we enter the new Trump presidency, we have got to remain focused. We can’t panic. No matter how many executive orders he signs and statements he issues, our goal remains the same. We have got to educate. We have got to organize. We have got to bring people together around an agenda that works for all, not just the few.

Now more than ever, we have to fight to create an America based on economic, social and environmental justice. Let’s get to work.

He's right. 

But what's happening is damn depressing. 

Nothing like "backing the blue" when you release the Jan. 5 insurrectionists.

And repealing civil rights protections. 

Music Friday: "Until the Day Is Done"

After the results of this Tuesday, this song seems appropriate. 

"The battle's been lost. The war is not won./ An addled republic, a bitter refund." 

Keep fighting for what's right and all people's rights. 

Random Notes from a Crank

On a mainly weekday basis, I've been posting definitions from the Dictionary of American Slang, which was published in 1967, in alpha order on my FB feed. 

Today I was on the letter M in the alphabet, so I posted this definition from the dictionary:

"meatball meat ball n. 1. A dull, boring person; an obnoxious person; anyone regarded with disfavor, esp. one of flat or uninteresting character; a creep, a drip, a square, a wet blanket. 2. A tactical signal flag bearing a black dot on a yellow field; also, the Japanese national flag. #. A swelling of or on the face, cause by a blow in fighting. 4. In baseball, any pitched ball that can be hit readily by a given batter. v.t. 1. To strike someone with a fist. --ism n. 1. Anti-intellectualism; the state of willing ignorance or mediocrity. 2. A state of, or instance demonstrating, decreasing standards of integrity, ethics, intelligence, and individualism in culture, politics, education, and the like; democratic rule by an uneducated, non-thinking majority."

I'm particularly fond of the term "meatballism" because I think it properly describes the U.S. for quite some time. It's an anti-intellectual country, and it's been like that for centuries. 

The amount of willful ignorance is astounding, and the if you follow politics for any amount of time, the "decreasing standards" will make you depressed. 

I think the U.S. is currently engaged in "democratic rule by an uneducated, non-thinking majority." 

I guess there are glimmers of hope though with the Labour Party coming back into majority power in the U.K.: "How Ken Starmer Overwhelmed Britain's Conservatives."

And over in France, Macron's gamble to call an election turned out better than expected since left-leaning folks flocked to the polls and put down the right-wing idiots trying to take power: "France Electioin Results: Far Right's Rise Suffers Unexpected Blow as Left Surges." 

But what does this mean for November? 

At least if you're going by a flash poll by YouGov that I took today Trump hopefully is in trouble. At the time I'm writing this post, 36% of people polled think Moscow Don is mentally fit to be President, 5% think he was mentally fit to be president in 2020 but is no longer mentally fit to be president, and 54% believe he was not mentally fit to be president in 2020 and is not mentally fit today. 

At least on that last answer, Biden only clocks in at 31%. 

In better news, the people polled were asked about their opinion of the GOP's "Project 2025," and 53% have a very unfavorable opinion of it. 

The biggest challenge before Biden is that he has to hit the swing states hard since we still live under a system that relies on the idiocy that is the Electoral College.

Musing of the Moment: The Danger and Stupidity of Bottled Water

The Washington Post has a great article out today about the danger of not just microplastics but also nanoplastics in bottled water: "Here's What You're Really Swallowing When Your Drink Bottled Water."  

Bottled water is one of the biggest scams out there because a lot of bottled water simply comes from municipal sources. 

And then there's an old Penn and Teller bit on bottled water that you can watch below.

So people are buying water they can get from their faucet or filtered from a refrigerator. 

They are voluntarily ingesting microplastics and nanoplastics, which I would assume it bad for one's body. They are paying an exorbitant fee for the water they could get from their municipality. And because so few people actually recycle the bottles, the world is awash in plastic polluting the very water they want to drink. 

The stupidity of humans.

Random Notes from a Crank

I doubt I'm the only person in the U.S. who does this, but when I change from one pair of shoes to another pair of shoes, I often have the Mister Rogers song in my head. 

"Won't you be my neighbor?"

Since Moscow Don is likely not immune to being sued for his critical part in the Jan. 6 insurrection as related by NPR ("Appeals Court Says Trump Isn't Immune for Jan. 6 Riot Lawsuits"), I wonder how may class-action lawsuits can be lodged against that fascist wannabe goon. 

I hope that white-supremacist grievance merchant is buried in even more lawsuits. The more the better. He's a serious threat to our country. 

And the people who support him are delusional morons. 

Even worse are the people who will vote for him who know he's a fascist-in-the-making, but they vote for him because of whatever issues he supposedly supports. In reality, he's a Republican in name only, a RINO. 

He's not really conservative except for the far-right social-issue dog whistling he does on a regular basis. 

Musing of the Moment: Harper's Indexes

Here are some interesting stats and numbers from the November and December Harper's Indexes:

• Percentage by which U.S. women are more likely than men to have a tattoo: 41
• Portion of U.S. adults with tattoos who regret getting at least one of them: 1/4
• Increase since 1984 in the median age of first-time U.S. home buyers: 7
• Portion of prospective U.S. home buyers who say they consider climate change when evaluating where to live: 4/5
• Percentage change this year in sales of Bud Light: -16
• In sales of Modelo Especial: +11
• Factor by which beer imports from Mexico have increased since 2013: 2
• Percentage by which beer imports from other countries have decreased: 29
• Percentage change in the divorce rate between 2008 and 2020: -31
• In the divorce rate between 2020 and 2022: +2
• Percentage of millennials who are not planning to get married: 21
• Of adult Gen-Z-ers who are not: 7
• Percentage of U.S. adults who say the political system is working "very" or "extremely" well: 4
• Who express little confidence in the future of the political system: 63
• Who say there is too little attention paid to the important issues facing the country: 78

I have noticed women tend to have more tattoos than men these days. I had a student write a paper years ago that went against the conventional wisdom that tattoos people get are there to show one's individuality. His take was that getting a tattoo was more of a herd mentality issue with many people getting the same kinds of tattoos (certain trends), especially women. 

The so-called conservative war against Bud Light because of a transgender spokesperson is so stupid. Apparently many of these Bud Light drinkers are switching to Modelo, which is humorous because during the Trump administration that company ran TV ads that were clearly trolling Moscow Don and his hateful speech about Mexicans and immigrants. That's some serious irony. 

The rise in the divorce rate obviously has a number of factors, but it's possible the pandemic was a significant cause--and possibly the support of a certain presidential candidate. But then again, that increase should have happened in 2016. Maybe it was because certain people voted for that charlatan a second time?

With the GOP having an advantage with having two Senators for dinky population states and the stupidity of not giving Puerto Rico and D.C. statehood and an uninformed citizenry voting for candidates for stupid reasons, it's no surprise 78% think the political system is not paying attention to climate change, economic inequality, pollution, the wage gap, educational issues, good jobs in the U.S., and other concerns. 

The House, for example, has done next to nothing for years under GOP leadership. Many members of Congress are more concerned about winning elections and raising campaign funds than actually doing something to make the country better. They just want to do some political hokum to get votes. 

The GOP asserts that the "government" doesn't work. Then they get control of a significant branch of it and show everyone that it doesn't work because of their leadership. A dog chasing its own tail. 

Random Notes from a Crank

I don't know why all these razor blade companies are making razors with five blades. The cartridge is just too large to get around the small spaces on one's face, such as around the nostrils. I had to use my son's razor a while back when I forgot mine when we rented a lake house when visiting my daughter in Southern Illinois, and I much prefer my Mach 3 razor. 

I can't find the article because the whole GOP fiasco to nominate a new speaker has taken so many twists and turns, but one of the reasons Moscow Don and other GOP clowns opposed his nomination to be the next Speaker of the House is because Emmer apparently supports the movement to move to a majority vote for the President of the U.S. and eliminating the arcane and stupid Electoral College. 

I'm a huge proponent of moving to a majority vote for President. 

If you're voting for a Republican candidate for President, say, in Illinois, your vote doesn't count. If you're voting for a Democratic candidate for President, say, in Alabama, your vote doesn't count. 

Those votes don't really count because of the outdated Electoral College, which should have been thrown in the dustbin of history, screws the minority voters in certain states. They should have moved to the majority vote for President sometime in the early 20th century. 

It's ridiculous. 

Sure it's our tradition. But it's, as Thoreau wrote, a "foolish consistency." 

As traditions go, it's DUMB. 

Unfortunately, going to a majority vote for President doesn't address the other problem in our country: two parties don't really represent the political leanings of most voters. 

For someone like me who is strongly liberal on a number of social, educational, and environmental issues but is kind of middle of the road or somewhat fiscally conservative, I almost always side with the Democrats because the views of GOP candidates on various aforementioned issues are abhorrent. 

I'd like most Democratic candidates to be more frugal about some economic issues even though there are some lines I won't cross for GOP talking points about publicly funding private education and their "voodoo" economic theories that make no flippin' sense, among other legitimate concerns about their asinine trust in the so-called free market. 

For example, even though a number of people were taken with the ideas of Bernie Sanders, I backed Hillary Clinton because she was actually asking, "How are you going to pay for that?" Grandpa wanted to let the kids eat whatever they want, but Mom wanted the kids to eat a nutritional meal and then have dessert. 

My work this semester has made me become quite jaded about students' willingness to do the work that's necessary to improve. As much as some people have grading contracts or labor-based grading (based on Marxist principles, which is problematic), it's hard to give people grades on work when they turn in their work. 

Musing of the Moment: A Rant & a Plea for Sanity for the Strike Zone and for Me

I will preface this musing (or rant) with the fact that I have umpired and probably will continue to umpire. I have simply umpired for our local rec league baseball either behind the plate or as a base umpire. 

Umpires have a difficult job. Lots of fans bitch and moan about calls. Coaches are sometimes dicks to them. Players have terrible body language after they don't get the calls they want. I've seen some terrible fan behavior to umpires. 

Some fans are just deplorable. 

For the past four years, I've been on the coaching staff of travel baseball team. And I don't understand what the hell has happened to the strike zone. 

The official definition of the strike zone from Major League Baseball is as follows: "...the area over home plate from the midpoint between the batter's shoulders and the top of the uniform pants ... and a point just below the kneecap." 

You can see for yourself by hitting the hyperlink above. 

So why in the hell are home plate umpires not calling strikes at the belt or above the belt to batters who are nine, eleven, fourteen, and sixteen years old? 

What are we trying to accomplish by not calling high strikes? 

I've seen strike zones called that are basically from the players crotch to his knees--balls to kneecaps. I'm in the dugout and can see quite plainly the vertical range of the strike zone. 

If a home plate ump calls high strikes, the game moves more briskly and the batters are more likely to put the ball in play. In addition, those strikes at the belt and above the belt are great pitches to hit. More balls in play equals more action and entertainment. 

There were umps out there this season calling a smaller vertical strike zone in 15u travel games than when you watch MLB baseball games. 

The common counterargument is, "Well, as long as the strike zone is consistent for both teams, that's fine." 

I disagree. A strike zone that small is shitty, dumb, and annoying. 

Having a consistently shitty strike zone is no way to play baseball. Go by the strike zone laid out by Major League Baseball. 

For me, I'm calling the zone from the midpoint to the bottom of the knees with a ball inside the plate and one or two balls outside the plate. And if a batter has two strikes on him and there's a borderline pitch thrown, the only walking he's doing is back to the dugout. 

I hope more home plate umps do the same. 

Random Notes from a Crank

I recently resubscribed to Mother Jones after not having a subscription for a couple of years. In the first issue I received this year, there's an excellent recount about how the GOP, from a historical perspective, has aided and abetted extremism and white supremacy for decades. 

It didn't start with Moscow Don. The Republican Party has been pandering to racists and nativists and angry white people for decades in order to get votes. 

The article is by David Corn and is titled "The Elephant in the Room" in the physical magazine but has a much longer title on the website: "It Didn't Start with Trump: The Decades-Long Saga of How the GOP Went Crazy." 

The article appears to be a précis of Corn's book American Psychosis: A Historical Investigation of How the Republican Party Went Crazy. I'm thinking of buying it, but I'm concerned it will just make me more angry than I already am. 

Regardless, as Corn relates in the next to last ¶ of his article, "But since at least the 1950s, the party has consistently boosted extremism, prejudice, paranoia, and rage. Sometimes this has led to the GOP prevailing in political battles. In other instances, voters have beaten back the cynical gambit." 

As someone who has strong opinions about football uniforms since I watch a lot of American football, I have to say that the orange helmets and uniforms that the Chicago Bears wore last week were terrible. 

Those helmets made me call the Bears team the "Great Pumpkins." And like the Great Pumpkin of Peanuts fame, they didn't show up at the end of the game in that snooze-fest that saw the Commanders beat the Pumpkins 12 to 7. 

I am rewatching the HBO series Deadwood, and I got to episode 7 of season 2 and was reminded of this great scene, which has Swearengen giving advice to Merrick about stopping moping around and feeling bad for himself.

I deal with so many people who make excuses when times get rough. They need to listen to Al. 

Here are some interesting factoids and stats from this month's "Harper's Index""

• Percentage change since 2019 in the portion of Americans who believe environmental laws are worth the cost: -23
• Percentage of U.S. voters who view climate change as the most important problem facing the country: 1
• Of U.S. voters under thirty who do: 3
• Portion of American young adults who have considered enlisting in the military: 1/10
• Portion of those who are ineligible to enlist: 3/4
• Percentage increase since 2019 in the number of independent bookstores in the United States: 34
• Percentage of undergraduates who say they encounter at least moderate difficulty with online learning: 94
• Percentage of Democrats that Republicans believe are atheist or agnostic: 36
• Percentage that are: 9

I guess I'm part of that 9 percent. 

Random Notes from a Crank

I'd venture to guess that the people who say "America is the greatest country in the world" haven't been to many other countries. And if they've been to other countries, it's not been for a long while, possibly only on a vacation. 

I know of family who has had to have fundraisers to help pay off their debts because their father, who died recently, had cancer. The US has to be one of the few, if not the only, first-world industrialized countries in the world that doesn't have universal health care.  

We don't have one of the best health care systems in the world, but it's certainly one of the most expensive. 

I think there needs to be a Karen/Karin support group out there. Being a "Karen" has been a negative epithet for a few years now. I've never thought of the name Karen in a negative light. 

One of my former girlfriends in high school was named Karen. And she provided fabulous hand jobs. So when I hear something along the lines of "you're being a Karen," all I have is fond memories. I smile and have an overwhelming feeling of good. 

The past month or so when I wake up in the morning I have found one of my bird feeders and the hummingbird feeder knocked down. My bird feeders are "squirrel-proof" because they have a mechanism on them that shuts the feed holes if a rodent weighs down on the feeder. So I was nonplussed about how a squirrel cracked the code. 

I pulled into the drive the other night and discovered the perp who has been knocking down my feeders. It's a raccoon. 

When my son was young, I remember watching a PBS nature documentary on raccoons. The scientists were tracking their movements in the city of Toronto. It was amazing how active they are and how many they are. They're everywhere. 

Random Notes from a Crank

Here are some factoids from the most recent editions of "Harper's Index":

• Percentage of Afghans who are expected to be living in poverty in August: 97
• Percentage of Americans who approve of labor unions: 68
• Percentage change since 2019 in U.S. labor union membership: -4
• Portion of Americans who think Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech is no longer relevant: 1/4
• Percentage by which Republicans are more likely than Democrats to think so: 94
• Percentage of U.S. educators who plan to retire earlier than they had expected: 55
• Percentage of U.S. workers who received raises in the past year that kept pace with inflation: 17
• Percentage by which men with a dog in their dating-app profiles are more likely to want a long-term relationship: 90
• Increase, in years, of the average age of marriage for U.S. adults since 1970: 7

The Guardian has an interesting article that relates recent research by archeologists that goes against the traditional narratives about prehistoric men and women. The depictions follow gender-based cliches. Check out "Prehistoric Women Were Hunters and Artists as Well as Mothers, Book Reveals." 

Some of these organizers for travel baseball tournaments are sketchy as hell. My son's team had a tournament in Peoria this weekend. We were originally set to have our first pool-play game at 5pm on a Friday, which is a shitty draw. 

With all the rain, our pool-play games got switched to Sat morning, so my son and I drove in a steady drizzle and checked into the hotel and ordered pizza. Then a couple of hours later, our coach was notified that the tournament is cancelled because of rain. 

So by not telling us ahead of time that it's likely to be cancelled, they made many people pay for hotel rooms and also made money hand over fist for the sponsoring team. With a $75 admin fee multiplied by 19 teams, the sponsoring team made $1,425 with no games being played.

Thievery. 

A waste of my time. A waste of gas. A waste of my preparation. A waste of my money. 

A lot of frustration and anger. 

Musing of the Moment: Stop the Idiotic Parental Overreach

Leonard Pitts Jr., the renowned columnist for The Miami Herald, has a great opinion piece that everyone who cares about K-12 education should read: "Let's Respect Teachers as the Trained Professionals That They Are, Shall We?" 

As he states, "So here’s my modest proposal: How about we respect educators as the trained professionals they are? How about we trust their judgment? How about we stop requiring them to reach consensus with those who have not the first clue? If a parent feels their child can’t handle some challenging material, fine: empower that parent to opt the child out of the lesson — not to deny the lesson to everyone else."

I am so tired for ignoramus parents and dumb-ass school boards trying to dictate what is and what is not being taught in schools because of their snowflake sensibilities or idiocies. 

The extreme example of parental and politically motivated overreach is the idiotic proposal in Iowa that proposes to put video cameras in every public classroom. 

Big Brother wants to watch. 

If you think there's a teacher shortage now, if more of this nonsense about banning books and doing surveillance on teachers continues, the problem is only going to get worse. 

Music Friday: "Idiots Rule"

I'm a Vikings fan, and the low vaccination rate of the team is a major blemish on the NFL. And Kirk Cousins' comments about surrounding himself with plexiglass are astoundingly stupid. 

The fact that the delta variant is creating havoc because of morons who aren't getting vaccinated is really angering me. 

The whole situation reminds me of the this song. 

However, I will say the idea of them "ruling" is a bit nuanced. They rule in a sense that we smart people have to go back to wearing masks because of their idiocy that has prevented herd immunity. 

Ruling by dumbassery...