tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-51794766719288087682024-03-11T21:37:48.028-05:00friar's firesFriarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.comBlogger4745125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-43638408028845098462024-03-11T10:29:00.008-05:002024-03-11T21:37:16.884-05:00No, Really, I Come to Bury OscarExcitement over the <i>Killers of the Flower Moon</i> movie made in my community translated in me being interested in the Academy Awards for the first time in many a day. I was especially interested in Lily Gladstone, nominated for best actress, and Scott George, nominated for the best original song.<div><br /></div><div>Gladstone was nominated for her portrayal of Mollie Burkhart, the woman whose bravery and determination eventually helped expose the murder of Osage people by white men trying to secure the wealth of their oil. George's song "Wahzhazhe (A Song for My People)” was featured in the movie in a scene showing modern Osage dancing.</div><div><br /></div><div>George and several Osage singers and dancers performed the song onstage, a historic moment in itself. "Wahzhazhe" is the name of the Osage people in their own language before it was Franco-fied by the French-speaking traders who met them, and Osage people shot off fireworks near town when the performance aired.</div><div><br /></div><div>He lost to "What Was I Made For?" from <i>Barbie. </i>Academy members often pride themselves on their liberal or even progressive attitudes about most social issues, but they have always been gun-shy about going all the way to elevate something entirely from another culture and in another language. The first movie not shot in English to win a statue was the Korean horror move <i>Parasite</i> in 2019.<br /><br />While "Jai Ho" won best song from 2008's <i>Slumdog Millionaire</i>, it was an English translation of the song in the soundtrack. "Naatu Naatu" from the 2022 Telugu-language action movie <i>RRR </i>was the first and only non-English song to have won an Oscar. The vaunted progressivism goes out the door when given a chance to reward music from Native Americans -- and correct the gross caricatures of "Indian music" from movies of years past. The Academy's songwriting members went with a hit song from a hit movie about one of the most ubiquitous toys in America.</div><div><br /></div><div>Gladstone, along with Annette Bening (<i>Nyad) </i>and Carrie Mulligan (<i>Maestro</i>), played a historical character. Diana Nyad is an out LGBT journalist who, after several tries, swam from Cuba to Key West in 2013 at the age of 64. Mulligan played Costa Rican actress and activist Felicia Montealegre Bernstein, the wife of composer Leonard Bernstein, the maestro of the title. Winner Emma Stone of <i>Poor Things</i> and Sandra Hüller of <i>Anatomy of a Fall</i> played fictional characters.</div><div><br /></div><div>Despite my antipathy towards the awards, I've always believed that the nominees for different acting categories are generally good performances from talented people. Yes, Whoopi Goldberg won the Best Supporting Actress category in <i>Ghost</i>, but every theory has holes.</div><div><br /></div><div>But when given the chance to make history and buttress its progressive bona fides by rewarding Gladstone's performance, or to honor actresses who brought two other extraordinary women's lives to the screen, the Academy's acting members thought it best to laud an actress who plays a woman given the brain of her unborn child who then indulges in lots of sex and socialism.</div><div><br /></div><div>Over the last 25 years or so, women playing characters in normal situations or playing historical characters have occasionally won Oscars, but it's not the way to bet. When there's weirdness or excessive sexuality (or both), lay your money on the actress playing that character. Because the Academy voters probably will.</div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-90077833276977357092024-02-16T10:49:00.005-06:002024-02-16T10:49:51.404-06:00Prodigal Returns?<p>An update on my wandering package: At 10:32 AM today it made it back to Tulsa and now has a reasonable chance of reaching my mailbox. Of course, Tulsa is where it went awry before, so who knows?</p><p>In any event, I’m looking forward to hearing about what the New Orleans suburbs are like.</p>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-85528844533404231402024-02-14T21:38:00.005-06:002024-02-15T09:33:13.572-06:00Neither Snow nor Rain nor Sleet...<p>So on February 8 I ordered a book. It was in a store near Houston. ABEbooks sent me the tracking number, so I could see what our mighty Postal Service was doing with the book. I've looked things up before like this, because sometimes it's interesting to watch them come from distant places.</p><p>This time it was very interesting. The book made it's way up through Texas to reach Oklahoma City by February 10. Later that day, it went to Tulsa, and the expected delivery date showed Feb. 11, which was early. The next day it was still in Tulsa and showed a delivery date of Feb 12. Instead, on February 12, my book from near Houston arrived at the United States Postal Service Shipping Center in New Orleans, and the due date disappeared, replaced by a message that my package was "moving through the system" and would be delivered late. All through today it showed "In transit to the next station." It arrived at the next station -- Saint Rose, LA, at 8:58 PM local time. Saint Rose is a suburb a short way west from New Orleans.</p><p>So I tried to figured out why my package started heading towards Louisiana, and your guess is as good as mine. The city of Roseland, Louisiana, has a ZIP Code that has the same digits as mine except the second and third digits are switched, which right now is my best guess. Fortunately my exact street address does not exist in Roseland, so there is a chance someone will wake up and send it back to Pawhuska.</p><p>There are days when I neither want to send anything through the United States Postal Service nor order from anyone who ships with them. So far, all of the days since the original expected delivery have been those days. And counting.</p>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-29607405021750892632024-02-10T12:21:00.001-06:002024-02-10T12:21:21.227-06:00An Interesting Idea<p>Writer Leah Libresco Sargent <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2024/03/escaping-the-rule-of-algorithms/">reviews</a> a book in the latest edition of <i>National Review</i> on how the efforts to use social media algorithms to keep users scrolling have “flattened culture.” I haven’t read the book, by Kyle Chayka, but Sargent’s opinions on the same issues are interesting in themselves.</p><p>Other books and articles have shown us that social media algorithms are designed to keep our eyes on the app, and that they exploit some of humanity’s most atavistic traits to do so. We evolved to keep an eye out for danger, so we are drawn to bad news. It’s more informative than good news in terms of identifying threats. That’s why many of the articles we read have clickbait ads at the bottom such as one that tells us sugar doesn’t cause diabetes - this does! Or that doctors beg Americans not to eat this food. Often accompanied by grotesque pictures that have little to do with the subject at hand but which activate the part of the brain that wants to slow down and see the wreck, they are junk science at best. But the advertiser doesn’t care if these ads are true - only that you click on it.</p><p>Chayka says that social media as it currently exists is just a more genteel version of the same thing, designed to grab eyeballs with less grotesque but equally intriguing lures. Sargent says both hide an identical hook, and neither proprietor gives a durn about the impact of their offerings. Her suggestion that we think of Big Tech offerings as another so-called sin industry - like alcohol, tobacco or pornography - probably goes a little too far. But creating the idea that social media is best used, if at all, in sparing doses by grown-ups would probably make a bunch of things better.</p>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-83768410458969421852024-02-09T09:59:00.006-06:002024-02-09T09:59:59.226-06:00All Warm and Fuzzy<p>That feeling you get when you see your preferred football team’s logo painted for the Super Bowl…on the home field of your longtime hated rival.</p>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-61672788786968369112024-01-20T11:34:00.007-06:002024-01-20T11:42:03.381-06:00The Sophie’s Choice Election<p>In the Norman Styron novel and Meryl Streep movie of the name <i>Sophie’s Choice</i>, the title character carries with her a dark secret. On being sent to the Auschwitz death camp, she was told she could keep one of her children and she sent her daughter Eva to the gas chambers.</p><p>I can’t be the first person to compare an election to the horrible choice forced on the fictional Sophie Zawistokawa. But I think this election merits it. We seem overwhelmingly likely to be forced into a 2020 sequel in the presidential election, and we will probably have to experience January 2025 through January 2029 with either a sack of raging overbronzed suet behind the Resolute desk or a President who gets told “Good boy” when he finishes signing a bill without a nap.</p><p>Much is made of how the primary voting system allows the people to speak on their candidates, taking the choice out of the proverbial smoke-filled rooms of the days of undemocratic (small D) party bosses selecting the “right person” (non-political use of the term ‘right’). But no smoke-filled room <i>ever</i> produced two men so completely unsuitable for the office of President or so uniquely incapable of doing the job.</p><p>Recently, Republican candidate Nikki Haley was asked if she would accept a vice-presidential spot on a ticket with Mr. Trump. She said she wasn’t running for second place (a significant overestimation of the vice-presidential role). That was smart, because saying, “My body couldn’t stand the weight loss of all of the barfing I’d do whenever I was on stage with this offal” might have looked bad. Yes, she worked in his administration, but as the Ambassador to the United Nations in New York. Not Washington. </p><p>Even though he’s likely to win the nomination, Mr. Trump couldn’t let Ms. Haley say she wouldn’t take the job - he had to say it wouldn’t be offered. At a rally in New Hampshire, he said she wasn’t “presidential timber.” Sticking with that metaphor, Mr. Trump isn’t either. Unless “presidential timber” describes an empty shell of bark on the forest floor that crumbles when touched.</p><p>President Biden is simply a different kind of awful. His reversal of what he believed to be Mr. Trump’s unfair border policies has resulted in a deluge of people crossing the border unprocessed - in numbers large enough that Senator John Fetterman equated them to “essentially Pittsburgh showing up at the border.” Pres. Biden, in a brief Q & A with reporters, said there is indeed a problem at the border, and he’s been saying so “for the past ten years.” He said - ostensibly to Congress, otherwise that reporter’s on the hook for a lot of dough - “Give me the money.” But there isn’t any money, Mr. President. You gave it away at the beginning of your term in a <i>third</i> Covid-relief package that brought us <i>Saturday</i> <i>Night</i> <i>Fever-</i>era inflation rates.</p><p>President Biden could truly serve the country by selecting a running mate that could be President, since he’s almost certain to become unable to perform his duties should he win in November. But acknowledging that Vice President Kamala Harris couldn’t do the job would require him to admit to a mistake and to piss off most of his base. No modern politician has that kind of courage, so it won’t happen. It would get him my vote, though, because I could claim I did <i>not </i>vote for a senescent grifter, I voted for the competent understudy. </p><p>If Mr. Trump truly loved the country he wants to make great, he’d step aside for either Ms. Haley or Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. Either of them would build on his seemingly unintentional first-term victories and have the advantage of 1) Not mounting a batshit insane revenge party and 2) Not being batshit insane. But again, he’d have to admit mistakes, see reality and act for the greater good of someone other than himself - courage and vision impossible for a modern politician.</p><p>The choice in my headline is this lousy pun: Vote for awful? Or vote for offal? On the page, the words sound the same but mean different things. The horrid reality of November 5, 2024 is the reverse: They sound different but mean the same thing: Four years of dreary rage.</p>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-21387872937063602072023-12-25T23:29:00.004-06:002023-12-26T21:20:35.519-06:00Cooties!<p>So my preferred football team, the Kansas City Chiefs, did not beat the Oakland, um, LA, um, Oakland, um, Las Vegas Raiders in a Christmas Day football game. On the one hand, this is depressing. On the other hand, even when the Raiders win they lose, because they still have to be the Raiders.</p><p>But in the wake of the loss, we have opinions from two men I usually enjoy ignoring: Sports trolls Clay Travis and Skip Bayless. Both suggest the blossoming romance between star Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce and singer/songwriter Taylor Swift had become a “distraction.” See, when guys turn their minds from pure football to things like girls, they stop thinking straight or being able to play well. Or so this thinking says. You may remember it from when you were six and did your best to exclude the opposite sex from anything you could because they were icky. But then you grew up.</p><p>Unless, apparently, you think like Messrs. Bayless and Travis. Travis, in fact, goes on to dredge up the Yoko Ono comparison. But Ms. Ono did not break up the Beatles - their own egos did a much more thorough job than she ever could have. And Ms. Swift has not jinxed the Chiefs. A less gifted offensive coordinator, an iffy receiving corps that has a bad case of the yips, defenses that are collapsing on Kelce because one defender apiece can handle the other guys? Yeah, those things have jinxed the Chiefs.</p><p>Sports reporters will explore some of those issues in upcoming stories. But not Mr. Bayless and Mr. Travis, who are too busy proving to the world they don’t have girl germs like Travis Kelce does.</p>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-91300112580467426432023-12-06T16:54:00.001-06:002023-12-06T16:54:03.647-06:00InternalizeI have done internships as a part of the educational requirements for both of my professions and degrees. At one, I had a bed in the corner of the rec room in my uncle and aunt's house -- which was great, because that internship paid squat. In another, I rented a "studio" that had started life as parts of several rooms in a bungalow and had a heating system that excited no atoms or molecules into heat-energy producing motion <i>ever</i>.<div><br /></div><div>Interning is about gaining job experience in a situation where you can fly or fall with people around you who will guide you about the falling. Political internships involve even less actual work within the field, although statements made by legislators and politicians frequently share similarities with the work of untrained 19-year-olds. They are dodgy, incomplete, marginally accurate and largely defensive about the inadequacy of the work itself.</div><div><br /></div><div>Earlier today I read a news item that some 40 White House interns wrote a letter -- unsigned, natch -- taking the President of the United States to task for not demanding Israel stop trying to kill Hamas terrorists. Now, they didn't phrase it that way, but that's because they're young and don't know very much.</div><div><br /></div><div>I got into a nice late middle-aged rage about the gall of young people who know so many things and who have yet to let time and experience help them unlearn them so they can know stuff that's real and true.</div><div><br /></div><div>I wondered about the proper response to the interns, but turns out Noah Rothman at <i>National Review</i> has the right <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/fire-the-insurrectionary-interns/?utm_source=recirc-desktop&utm_medium=homepage&utm_campaign=hero&utm_content=related&utm_term=second">idea</a>: Fire the lot of them. Yes, the letter is anonymous, so some interns who held back might be let go and it's not particularly fair they get sent packing along with their willfully blind co-workers. But it's just an internship, they're very young and have the time to get over this, and maybe it can show the folly of knowing your co-workers are about to do something stupid and not standing up to call them out on it.</div><div><br /></div><div>One of the funniest things about these silly people is that they are writing this letter as "the fall 2023" interns. Meaning their service is about up anyway. So rather than speaking truth to power, they are more like leaving power a note to find after the custodian cleans out their desks.</div><div><br /></div><div>Every now and again society shows us how dumb an idea it is to listen to people without experience. They may be the brightest human beings in many a moon, but without experience they, as former President Reagan said, "know so many things that aren't so."</div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-65366872745038934382023-11-19T13:12:00.003-06:002023-11-20T23:33:00.409-06:00Cureth post-Thanksgiving!One of the time-honored traditions of Thanksgiving is the "food coma." People eat enough to get sleepy and then doze away the afternoon watching football or placeholder soap opera episodes. Or, of late, they prepare to talk with their family members who think differently about how wrong those members are, knowing that the ties of blood will prevent their being sat outside on the porch with the smallest possible slice of pumpkin pie.<div><br /></div><div>Nicholas Culpeper offers a solution for the former; the solution for the latter is better candidates so we can discuss them instead of howling about them. <i><a href="https://askthepast.net/how-to-cure-lethargy-1655/">Ask the Past</a></i> brings us his <i>Culpeper's Last Legacy</i> from1655, where he writes that there are various cures for this "lethargie." Among them are burning brimstone under the nose, frequent provocations to sneeze with "white Helleborne," shaving the head and pouring "Vinegar of Roses" upon it, preferably letting it "drop down from some high place upon the crown of his Head." Ladies either never suffered from lethargie, or had different cures such as shaving their husbands' heads while they slept and pouring rose vinegar on it from the balcony.</div><div><br /></div><div>For my money, the most likely method to work is "burning <i>assa foetida </i>to wake him." The name alone awakens my inner middle schooler to tell me a thousand jokes and explain the origin of the phrase, "that smells like ass." Given that it's nicknamed "devil's dung," I can't imagine anyone could sleep through the stench.</div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-83932067599975205682023-11-17T13:21:00.004-06:002024-02-17T10:36:09.277-06:00A Voice About Nothing<p>I’m somewhat concerned to still be posting about one of my favorite football players and the world’s biggest pop star, but interesting things still crop up. For example, on <a href="https://ew.com/joy-behar-does-not-want-taylor-swift-stuck-with-idiot-travis-kelce-the-view-8403519">Thursday</a> <i>The</i> <i>View</i>’s resident sage, Joy Behar, opined that she doesn’t want to see Taylor Swift end up with Travis Kelce. The reason? Some tweets Kelce made in his early 20’s, back when Twitter was just a place people sometimes tossed out random thoughts.</p><p>It seems the young Kelce spelt not well, and, moreover, made judgmental statements about women’s appearance. Such tweets offend the author of <i>SheetzuCacaPoopoo: My Kind of Dog </i>and <i>SheetzuCacaPoopoo: Max Goes to the Dogs. </i>Said she, “He’s illiterate is more to the point. He’s obsessed with the girls looking good, that was his thing.”</p><p>Now, evidence suggests Ms. Behar was never a young man. Her only child is a daughter, but she does have a grandson nearing the teenage years. The number of young men “obsessed with the girls looking good” is sizable, and if she was previously unaware of that he may demonstrate it to her soon.</p><p>But all of this is moot, because these are the tweets from a <i>dozen</i> <i>years ago</i>. Had <i>that</i> young man come calling at a concert a dozen years ago, I suspect Scott and Andrea Swift might have shown him the door too. In Joy Behar’s world, though, dozen-year-old tweets define who you are forever. Even if you learn to spell.</p><p>It’s in memes all over social media, but it’s true: Thank goodness I didn’t have an online youth.</p>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-36574095295228034842023-11-08T15:01:00.001-06:002023-11-08T15:01:41.856-06:00Rider on the StormSeveral science-related websites noted the long, fast and high flight of a male shearwater bird caught up in Typhoon Faxai back in 2019. Shearwaters generally fly just over 300 feet around the ocean, while during this particular daredevil made it up to around 16,000 feet higher than usual. And it traded in its usual speed of between 3 and 37 miles per hour to almost 125 miles per hour as it made five circles with the typhoon. During the period the eye of the storm was over ocean, the bird landed and rested on the waves.<div><br /></div><div>And stoners with their gummies think they get high...</div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-32378011940703372832023-10-31T09:21:00.006-05:002023-10-31T09:21:51.165-05:00All Hallows' EveAs we come to Halloween, I rejoice in the end of the foul slurry of the entertainment industry, horror movies, shall slow for a few blessed months. But Friar, you say, is not slurry merely a mixture of water and particulate matter that accumulates when the unwanted material is cleaned away from the desired material? And I say it is, and you have spoken wisely. Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-86728805440986098262023-10-23T15:19:00.005-05:002023-10-23T15:19:24.384-05:00Collateral DamageI've seen some posts about one of the many stories that explain why we shouldn't make fun of or annoy old people. As this is a status I shall attain sooner rather than later, I'm interested in the subject matter. But this story is basically ugly through and through.<div><br /></div><div>As it goes, the elderly person is in the drive-through line at McDonald's. The person in the next vehicle behind starts laying on the horn when the older person isn't as quick through the line as she wishes (the story is almost always told with the rude youngster being female). The old person then pays for his order at the payment window and for the rude woman in the following car. The clerk tells her that the older person has paid for her order, which is said to motivate her with gratitude, which she attempts to show. And then the punchline is that the older person shows both receipts, takes both orders, and leaves the woman with nothing when she gets to the food window. Now -- chuckle -- she'll be forced to go to the back of the line and start all over again! Kneeslap, kneeslap, what a witty response!<br /></div><div><br /></div><div>My gut says the story's not true, but it either event it sucks. If it is real, think about it. This is a woman who honked to get someone to move faster in the <i>drive-thru</i> line. Does that action suggests she would be the kind of person to accept the prank with a self-deprecating chuckle and a good natured, "Got me! Guess I'll go around again!" Of course not! She's going to berate the clerk and the manager she'll ask to see. She'll hold up the line for everyone else and not really care about people behind her. She'll wind up with her food and she'll probably bully them into giving it to her free even if only to get rid of her.</div><div><br /></div><div>Paying for her food would have done exactly what needed to be done. Show kindness in the face of rudeness and maybe change some of her habits. Who knows why she's honking? Long day at the office? Dinner's late for the kids and this is all she can pick up? Going back into the office and this is her only chance to grab food? I don't know, and neither does the story. She's just a tool to help all of the snowtops and those of us not far away show how we're still clever! And we're sure smarter than all of those brash, rude young people who honk the horn!</div><div><br /></div><div>So I guess there is a moral to the story. Some old folks will demonstrate their cleverness instead of the courtesy they say ran rampant back in their day. And they're sure they'll get one over on that rude whipper-snapper, no matter who else has to have a lousy day because of it. Just collateral damage , an unavoidable consequence of us getting what we want.</div><div><br /></div><div>Why am I thinking of November 2024 all of a sudden?</div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-6244874517635456782023-10-15T22:43:00.005-05:002023-10-15T22:43:41.887-05:00Cool…if You’re Not the OwnerFor the first time in the history of spacecraft, a satellite owner has gotten a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/technology/space/dish-gets-first-ever-space-debris-fine-over-echostar-7-2023-10-02/">fine</a> for “failure to de-orbit.” as David Shepardson writes at the link, the Dish network had a satellite that was no longer useful. They’re supposed to put it into a certain disposal orbit by using the satellite’s onboard motors, Dish claimed that because of the limited fuel, they couldn’t reach the disposal orbit and their Echo-7 satellite is considerably lower than it should be.<div><br /></div><div>In the lower orbit, the satellite could become an obstacle to satellites that still work or other space missions. So the FCC, which covers this matter because the satellites involved are communications tools, fined Dish $150,000.</div><div><br /></div><div>When space travel has gotten to the point that we’re writing tickets, it has become a truly mature industry.</div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-47585648964461995602023-10-09T22:38:00.002-05:002023-10-09T22:38:30.397-05:00Biiiiig Show<p>There’s not much of Las Vegas’ usual entertainment that interests me, so I don’t know that I’ll ever visit. But I’ve been watching videos of U2’s show at The Sphere, a Vegas domed venue covered with video screens inside and out, and if I had the bucks…</p>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-72920892813891144752023-10-05T19:04:00.002-05:002023-10-07T19:26:53.476-05:00Questions and Answers<p>Question: Would Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz be any different if he were a talentless clone of Jack Nicholson portraying a skeevy preacher who gets elected to the United States House of Representatives?</p><p>Answer: Pick a fictional Gaetz every time -- confine the damage to lousy movies.</p><p>Question: Would you shake hands with New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez?</p><p>Answer: Yes! Maybe some of the cash hidden in his <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/bob-menendezs-indictment-highlights-gold-bars-wads-cash-rcna116935">suits</a> would stick to your hand.</p><p>Question: Is there any reason in the world to vote for the nominee from either major party if they wind up being the senescent grifters currently leading the polls?</p><p>Answer: Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has been in <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/could-rfk-jr-become-the-libertarian-partys-presidential-nominee/">touch</a> with the Libertarian Party.</p><p>Question: Should the Writers Guild of America union have gone on strike in May of 2023?</p><p>Answer: No. Two men "wrote" <i>Saw X </i>during 2021. The strike should have happened before then to strangle this example of the ordure oeuvre in its fetid crib.</p><p>Question: Should Donald Trump become the Speaker of the House of Representatives?</p><p>Answer: Well, they deserve it.</p>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-30407492236641875212023-09-30T11:29:00.001-05:002023-09-30T11:29:58.331-05:00Whaa?Once upon a time, the <i>Daily Caller </i>was<i> </i>a slightly above-average culture-warrior web publication of the right. Since about, oh, 2016, they have been a sold-out Trump populism dumping ground, so it's not surprising that <i>Daily Caller </i>Chief National Correspondent Henry Rodgers would, on a flight to a speech in Detroit, ask Donald Trump his opinion on the Taylor Swift-Travis Kelce situation.<div><br /></div><div>The man who cheated on his first wife with the mother of his next child -- before his last child with his first wife was born -- and who dumped said second wife when <i>her</i> child with him was four and is credibly accused with an affair with a porn star while his third wife was still nursing his youngest child said, he wished them both happiness, together or not, then said, "probably not."</div><div><br /></div><div>Now, stuff like this is what I (don't) go to the <i>Daily Caller</i> to (not) read. So normally, I'd never know about it. Except...</div><div><br /></div><div>The <i>Today Show</i> sight featured the <i>DC </i>story. As did <i>AOL's </i>entertainment section<i>, Sports Illustrated, The Daily Mail, Yahoo's</i> "Lifestyle" section, <i>The Hindustan Times </i>(?!), <i>MSN</i>, and so on. Once again, the people who will say they want Donald Trump gone will follow the Les Moonves model, summed up in this quote from February 2016 when he was the CEO of CBS: "It may not be good for America, but it's damn good for CBS."</div><div><br /></div><div>Moonves referred to the way the Trump's shameless charlatanism always draws eyeballs, whether from haters or supporters.</div><div><br /></div><div>We're past talking about the few ideas he brings to the table. For one, there's every reason to believe a Trump second term would focus on revenge for everyone he things wronged him and his modest adherence to actual conservative thought would wither away. For another, few if any Republican figures will work for him this time in key policy positions and the practice squad players he taps for the roles will struggle in meeting his mercurial demands.</div><div><br /></div><div>I'm not a very good predictor. But I, along with quite a few others, think Donald Trump will probably win the Republican nomination. He will almost certainly not be president. He is a singularly unlikeable person of no character unfit for the office of President of the United States. Had he not faced <i>another</i> singularly unlikeable person of no character in 2016 he would have never been the President of the United States. He commands the loyalty of a large enough portion of GOP voters to surge past a crowded field. But nobody else likes him (maybe some of those followers don't either). </div><div><br /></div><div>And if we all -- including the outlets listed above -- stop paying attention to him, he might just disappear.</div><div><br /></div><div>PS -- Both Kelce and Swift have been relatively apolitical but when their leanings have become visible they seem center-left. Perhaps Trump's prediction of relationship failure will spur them to try harder and, united, they can buy Mar-a-Largo and raze it.</div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-23290725065985138402023-09-26T16:54:00.004-05:002023-09-26T16:57:01.563-05:00Fun News?Of course, the biggest news of the Kansas City Chiefs' dominating win over Chicago was a 33-year-old spectator sitting in the club level. Watching the game alongside Donna Kelce, whom we Chiefs fans refer to as Mama Kelce, was one Taylor Alison Swift, who may very well be the biggest music star on the planet.<div><br /></div><div>If you live under a rock, you might not know that Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce -- who is clearly one of the top players at the position and one of the key reasons the Chiefs play at the elite level they do -- has expressed a crush on Swift, and they have been what every news story I've read has called "hanging out."</div><div><br /></div><div>Lots of 33-year-olds hang out. But when one of them is NFL royalty and the other is music and cultural royalty, then it becomes something people talk about. And do more than talk, for that matter -- sales of Kelce's jersey rose <i>four hundred percent</i> since Swift was spotted in her club box seat with Mama Kelce. For KC folks, Mama Kelce is perhaps even more beloved than her yardage-generating son. When she wanted to see son Jason play for the Philadelphia Eagles as well as Travis play in KC on the same day, the mayor of Kansas City offered a police escort from the airport so she could arrive in time. For Taylor to <i>sit with Mama Kelce</i> is a kind of seal of approval all of its own.</div><div><br /></div><div>Writing for <i>Poynter</i>, Tom Jones also <a href="https://www.poynter.org/commentary/2023/taylor-swift-travis-kelce-kansas-city-chiefs-arrowhead-bigger-than-nfl/">suggests</a> that a big chunk of the interest stems from the meeting of the two biggest shows on Earth. He also asks this important question.</div><blockquote><div style="background-color: white; box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 1.6; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; margin-top: 0px; outline: none; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Whatever the case, doesn’t this beat some of the depressing news we hear on a daily basis?</span></div></blockquote><p>And yes, it does. Two relatively nice people meet, get intrigued by each other and hang out a bit to see where it goes. Only difference is they're famous. On the other hand, all I have to do is list names: Trump, Biden, Harris, Menendez, Biden H, and so on.</p><p>I'll pick "Traylor," "Tayvis" or "Swelce" any day of the week.</p>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-72671669000559523172023-09-25T12:15:00.004-05:002023-09-25T12:15:19.607-05:00Agree to AgreeIn the course of trying to slodge through a new <i>Quanta</i> article about the importance of modular forms (what are they? Hey, I said "slodge" for a reason), I ran across a different article by about how mathematical proofs have a social <a href="https://www.quantamagazine.org/why-mathematical-proof-is-a-social-compact-20230831/">dimension</a>.<div><br /></div><div><i>Quanta</i> writer Jordana Cepelewicz interviews mathematician Andrew Granville of the University of Montreal about this in an August Q&A. The jumping off point is the claim by reclusive Japanese mathematician Shinichi Mochizuki to have created a proof solving something called the "ABC Conjecture" that has do to with a relationship between addition and multiplication. Mochizuki's 2012 proof was 500 pages long and pretty dense, even for a mathematical proof. After two other mathematics professors visited Mochizuki in 2018 and found out what seemed to be fatally flawed gaps in the proof, Mochizuki dismissed their claims by saying they did not understand his work.<br /><br />While "I'm right and you're too dumb to know it" might work in conversations with politicians and many celebrity figures, it's not an acceptable way of discussing mathematical proofs. In order to be useful, they must be held to be valid by a large group of mathematically knowledgeable people, so that when those people rely on the proof in their own work it won't fall apart.</div><div><br /></div><div>According to Granville, Mochizuki's response hit on a key feature of mathematics and proof writing. The only way a math person may prove a proof is by convincing other math people their answer is accurate and not missing anything. Now, the other math people obviously have knowledge everyday folks lack. Ask me to evaluate a complex proof and my answer will be a single word: Hellifino.</div><div><br /></div><div>But even the math people start with understandings that might be different from the proof writer. They are the people who can say, "You cannot use that squiggly line in this spot! It must go here instead, and if you don't see that you breathe through your mouth and your knuckles drag the ground when you walk." They may say that because they know better. Granville points out that they may also say that because that's how they learned or because that's how their equations work properly.<br /><br />The upshot of his understanding is that a social factor among mathematicians plays a much larger role than anyone might have thought it would in this discipline seen as the realm of cold logic. Perhaps it once was, but work in the first part of the 20th century opened the door to letting the community of mathematicians put their thumbs on the scale. It could have been a detriment to their work, but Granville sees it as a way to build closer ties among different mathematical disciplines and ideas. </div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-83612353227870810342023-09-19T15:24:00.004-05:002023-09-19T15:24:56.926-05:00I Hate When Things Are Over<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1kkPXS7_bekI6RCWNMtCG68CRusODiurchW01pEQ4HuAg8fC8ksj97Jdg48Al3G_8IcQrYCt11UnnEUkradAULP2vQGa90wM_PiQ7ZUjSvqGme-zFPYuR4CVK52mKRqsVcHzt_oMsqVMUDsAf-Rc87TR9TxfwHb0a7T5obZGZZUGEaRU6trVAafZpvchZ/s2392/IMG_3405.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1506" data-original-width="2392" height="251" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1kkPXS7_bekI6RCWNMtCG68CRusODiurchW01pEQ4HuAg8fC8ksj97Jdg48Al3G_8IcQrYCt11UnnEUkradAULP2vQGa90wM_PiQ7ZUjSvqGme-zFPYuR4CVK52mKRqsVcHzt_oMsqVMUDsAf-Rc87TR9TxfwHb0a7T5obZGZZUGEaRU6trVAafZpvchZ/w400-h251/IMG_3405.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p><br /></p>The above picture is from the last song ever to be played at Oklahoma Scotfest by the North Texas band the Selkie Girls. Band members will still make music (singer Alli Johnson already has a solo <a href="https://www.allijohnsonmusic.com/music">album</a>), but the sextet will disband in a few months. I first caught on to the Selkie Girls at a Scottish festival in Sherman, Texas, a few years after they had begun to play. The jazz-influence percussion, dual vocalists and harp were an instant draw that set them a bit apart from a lot of Celtic bands, and their live performances were worth catching whenever possible.<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXqSBR27ZJWk7HCXEkYjb9amQH_q9umNNruHMfnYxf38GNLRxcdmxX3yW-llI3RLzKsH0hlJddUUa3QIF12rDPH6hQC0METhvt-EVuJf0mqh4O6SZYFWMBvDG735F5zs0An_jIhSzgdjRNwqic12NLqkqzZ9dDneZ0DxoBGy1wtt5l0JBsKKPjaxjXLl_0/s3109/IMG_3410.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1826" data-original-width="3109" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXqSBR27ZJWk7HCXEkYjb9amQH_q9umNNruHMfnYxf38GNLRxcdmxX3yW-llI3RLzKsH0hlJddUUa3QIF12rDPH6hQC0METhvt-EVuJf0mqh4O6SZYFWMBvDG735F5zs0An_jIhSzgdjRNwqic12NLqkqzZ9dDneZ0DxoBGy1wtt5l0JBsKKPjaxjXLl_0/w400-h235/IMG_3410.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p>This photo is not from the last <i>song </i>the Tullamore trio played at Scotfest, but it is from their last set. My journey with them, as friends and as a fan, has lasted almost 26 years since I first saw them play at the Medieval Fair in Norman, OK in 1997. The band will call it a career after a Celtic Cruise in 2024, making this their last Scotfest also. Tullamore has morphed several times over its career, but the mainstays have been Mary the hammered dulcimer player and Mark the guitarist, and they are good friends. Between shows of theirs I have caught in Norman, Edmond, Arlington, TX and Tulsa, I've literally <i>never</i> been disappointed with a performance. I've also always been happy to see my friends Mark and Mary (I liked the other band members too, by the way, but they were as I said the constants).</p><p>The post title comes from the early '90s one-hit wonder Deep Blue Something. Their song, "Breakfast at Tiffany's" includes the line. Despite the fluff that was Deep Blue Something, the song's always stuck with me and the line sums up my reaction to endings of good and pleasant things.</p><p><i>Sláinte </i>to both bands, and thanks for all the music.</p>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-29457180654047106722023-09-09T17:16:00.010-05:002024-02-17T10:37:02.858-06:00Fight, the PowerI come now to address a pet peeve I have when watching political commercials or hearing political claims and endorsements.<div><br /></div><div>Of course this is rich ground for plowing, as the next political commercial I see that is of any value beyond helping one spell a candidate's last name will be the first. But I come not to disdain their dishonesty, trickery or complete lack of substance. No, my problem today is with one word: fight.</div><div><br /></div><div>Candidates for every office in the land promise that they will fight for their constituents. They will fight for the middle class, they will fight injustice, they will fight the forces trying to destroy the country or those who are blocking attempts to save it. <i>Everyone</i> fights. We, the listeners who have gone to get chips during the commercial, are meant to be impressed by the conviction and grit demonstrated by someone who will <i>fight</i>.</div><div><br /></div><div>But I'm not -- although I might be if it meant any of these meatheads would <i>literally</i> fight each other in a ring with gloves, headgear and a hip replacement doctor on standby No, I think saying one will fight for something is just a way of trying to convince a voter that the candidate is <i>serious</i> about their attempts to help them.</div><div><br /></div><div>The problem of course, is that there is literally no way to measure the effectiveness of such a claim. a senator or representative will certainly claim they fought for or against something, depending on their party's preferred position about the something. They can fudge that. They fought, but the special interests of the other side were just too strong. Or dark money did them in. Or the deep state, the illuminati, Hollywood, the press collaborating with the other side or whatever else can be used as a scapegoat for the failure of their fight. They might even blame an <i>actual </i>goat. There is that diagram that shows how a goat's head fits into a demonic pentagram, after all.</div><div><br /></div><div>And fighting, of course, can be done by making sure the candidate or incumbent got a lot of TV hits -- you know the candidate is fighting because he or she said so frequently on camera.</div><div><br /></div><div>Lastly, fighting never gets anything done. Now, considering what Congress, say, has done may make people, including me, believe that's not always such a bad thing. But the truth is, there is legislation and work that a legislature is supposed to do. Also an executive. Also a city councilman or a county commissioner.</div><div><br /></div><div>But passing a complicated appropriations bill is not fighting, It's <i>work</i>. TV hits get nothing done in negotiating a budget agreement. Clever quips and putdowns against opponents get no work done. And in fact, the work is what you and I consent to let the IRS take our money to fund. Not fighting. Fighting is <i>against</i>. Working is <i>with</i>.</div><div><br /></div><div>We have to be careful -- a clever politician could <i>say</i> "work" but mean as little about it as they do when they say "fight." So I don't want a candidate to tell me he or she is working. I want them to tell me what they're working <i>on</i>. I want to hear what actual Article I work will be accomplished by them at the end of their term if they're running for Congress. I want to hear how they're going to update an antiquated city charter if they're running for city council (yes, that's an oddly specific request, and yes, it describes the community in which I live).</div><div><br /></div><div>Because if a "No Fighting Allowed" was a good sign to put on the school playground, it's probably a good one to put on every frickin' campaign in the country.</div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-17746858792649852652023-09-07T12:35:00.001-05:002023-09-07T12:51:51.306-05:00What's in a Name?<p><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I spent a big chunk of Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday morning talking to myself. OK, not really.</span></span></p><div class="x11i5rnm xat24cr x1mh8g0r x1vvkbs xtlvy1s x126k92a" style="animation-name: none; background-color: white; color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; overflow-wrap: break-word; transition-property: none; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><div dir="auto" style="animation-name: none; transition-property: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Many years ago, I searched for my name on Facebook and found a profile of a man in New Zealand who spelt his name exactly the same as I did, which happens to be an uncommon spelling. In those days, FB had some of your likes on your front profile page and I saw we'd read the same book. I messaged him to say so, he friended me and we've confused people ever since by wishing each other happy birthday and commenting on each other's posts.</span></div><div dir="auto" style="animation-name: none; transition-property: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="animation-name: none; transition-property: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Tuesday, during an </span><span style="animation-name: none; font-family: inherit; transition-property: none;"><a style="animation-name: none; color: #385898; cursor: pointer; transition-property: none;" tabindex="-1"></a></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">American road trip, he (or I) and his lovely wife (definitely him) dropped by the church and we tested the structural bonds of the universe by shaking hands. When it didn't blow up, we had a great chat. We both like bluegrass as well as a number of other things -- religion, antipathy for politicians and a belief that much of the time, the governments of both of our nations were far too invested in things they need not be.</span></div><div dir="auto" style="animation-name: none; transition-property: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="animation-name: none; transition-property: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">We sat at a table in a local restaurant for about two hours Wednesday morning </span>(tipped accordingly) <span style="font-family: inherit;">chatting before they were to be off and traveling again. I got to hear how he and his wife met. how beef-raising is done in New Zealand, what it's like in a country where 5.1 million people spread out over 104,000 miles and 2 million of them live in three cities</span>, and so on.</div><div dir="auto" style="animation-name: none; transition-property: none;"><br /></div><div dir="auto" style="animation-name: none; transition-property: none;">Thus one of the original (and long lost) principles of the internet was fulfilled, as it brought people from distant lands together and showed we are more alike than we thought.</div><div dir="auto" style="animation-name: none; transition-property: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="animation-name: none; transition-property: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Of course, he and I had a head start.</span></div></div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-60612267375251675462023-08-31T22:12:00.002-05:002023-09-10T12:06:39.276-05:00When, and How Large?A couple of articles in the magazine <i>Astronomy</i> highlight that science is about changing and reacting when researchers encounter new data.<div><br /></div><div>In its September issue. Richard Turcott wrote an article about how the galaxies visible to the James Webb Space Telescope were among some of the oldest in our universe. But they were quite a bit larger than they should be. Modern cosmology's most widely accepted theories suggest that old galaxies would have been small. This was a tough piece of info that doesn't match most accepted theories of the creation and development of the universe. Were they wrong? Should they be re-thought?</div><div><br /></div><div>Then, in an August 31 <a href="https://www.astronomy.com/space-exploration/galaxies-in-jwsts-mirror-are-closer-than-they-appear/">article</a> on the website (which came out later than the issue because of print publication deadlines) Paul Sutter describes how astronomers may have been using an inaccurate measuring stick to determine distance. Rather than being far away, those galaxies were closer and thus of appropriate size.</div><div><br /></div><div>Now astronomers and cosmologists have to study the matter to see which is which. If the galaxies are old and far away, some theories need changing. If they are close and ordinary, then the measuring methods for a <i>lot</i> of galaxies might need to be changed. Either way, people who understood things one way had to change their ideas when new evidence cropped up.</div><div><br /></div><div>That's action that can be worthwhile in a lot of places.</div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-15576392321530411902023-08-28T21:32:00.009-05:002023-09-01T09:42:01.910-05:00Biiig MusicToday I received my gift for my investment in a Patreon project for a long-beloved but semi-defunct band named Caedmon's Call. They did write mostly for the Christian music market, but the primary songwriters had a telling gift for imagery and ideas that had wide appeal. Recently, for an anniversary of their initial album, they decided to reunite and re-record it. Through Patreon they offered several different gifts to help fund the project. My choice included, among other things, a vinyl double album of the release.<div><br /></div><div>I'm not the guy to tell you that vinyl is superior to a CD. For one, I'm not sure there's that much difference and for another, too many loud shows in too many small clubs make sure I'll never hear whatever difference there might be. There's also the way vinyl records were pressed as CD sales rose. The records themselves became thinner and thinner -- cut a hole in the middle of one and glue it to the bottom of a top hat and you could set yourself up as Oddjob forthwith. I sold my collection about 15 years ago because I move too often and I owned about 700 heavy albums. I just kept a few and have added the odd title here and there.</div><div><br /></div><div>The album I was sent today is a double album, gatefold cover. It's a big old chunk of memory. The ginormous photos, compared to a CD cover or worse, a digital music thumbnail. Checking out which disc is the first half and which is the second. Sliding it into place among some other remaining albums. All things that take me back to a world where cassettes were OK for cars and 8-tracks had their day, but if you wanted to listen to music the right way, you laid it on a spinning platter, cued up the needle and let it play.</div><div><br /></div><div>Here's hoping Caedmon's Call does their second album the same way -- the first one is good but the second was my favorite. Either way, this evening sounds real, real good.</div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5179476671928808768.post-33502303149053509452023-08-25T09:49:00.003-05:002023-08-25T09:49:57.084-05:00Bag of Grab<span style="font-family: inherit;">-- Ted Gioia <a href="https://www.honest-broker.com/p/ugly-numbers-from-microsoft-and-chatgpt?utm_source=profile&utm_medium=reader2">notes</a> that the commercial promise of artificial intelligence (AI) hasn't measured up to the hype surrounding the release. As with any number of internet advances, it has proven of most use in shady schemes to steal money from people.</span><div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;">-- My two favored presidential candidates right now are Tim Scott and Nikki Haley. Depending on which reaction story you may read, Scott did OK or poorly. I still like his optimistic vision for a presidency that suggests we have problems to solve, not existential crises to use as bludgeons against those with whom we disagree. I already liked Haley after her two years as ambassador to the UN, but I would like her even without that after opening up Vivek Ramaswamy's goofy, insubstantial marketing campaign and showing the box was empty.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;">At 37, Mr. Ramaswamy is the first millennial to campaign for a presidential nomination and his debate appearance ticked all the boxes of the stereotypes held of that generation. One of the primary and, for me, most fatal problems is the idea in this quote: <span style="background-color: white;"> "If you have a broken down car you don't turn over the keys to the people who broke it again, you hand it over to a </span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-alternates: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">new</span><span style="background-color: white;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-alternates: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">generation</span><span style="background-color: white;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-alternates: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">to</span><span style="background-color: white;"> actually fix the problem," First of all, "again" should appear before "turn" or after "keys." Second of all, it's hard to see the most prosperous nation on earth as a "broken down car." It's got plenty of issues, but it still seems to be running. And third of all, Mr. Ramaswamy has done zip-a-dee-doo-dah to suggest he knows how to fix a car, let alone a nation. In fact, his appearance full of snappy put-downs and radio show call-in policy positions suggest he is part of the problem and would make it worse.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white;">-- In surrendering to the charges brought against him in Georgia, former president Donald Trump decided his mug shot should be a ferocious scowl. It looks ridiculous. It looks like the kind of overdone response by a comedian playing a dad on a TV show when confronting his erring children, giving him the change to use his catchphrase as a non sequitur punchline. </span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white;">Dad: "Just what is the meaning of this, you two?"</span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiffany_Trump#Early_life_and_education">Daughter</a>: "Well I'm rebelling because you waited almost a year after knocking up my mom to marry her and then you left when I was four."</span></div><div><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Trump#Early_life">Son</a>: "And I'm rebelling because you were sleeping with her mom before I was in kindergarten!"</span></div><div><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white;">Dad: "Oh, you two! I was just trying to Make America Great Again!"</span></div><div><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white;">(Cue laugh track for audience. Add rifle-ratchet noise if audience not loud enough)</span></div>Friarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16907204457371629428noreply@blogger.com0