Time to Reset the DUMBCON

The way things have been going lately, it's hard to keep track of the prevailing level of stupidity. I've done my part to help with that problem, starting with my creation back in 2009 (14 years ago, can you believe it?) of the original five-level National Stupidity Condition, or DUMBCON, based on the military's defense condition, or "DEFCON" plan.

I tweaked that scale numerous times over the years, adding additional levels until it reached a high of ten levels - one more than the number of levels in Dante's Hell - in July of 2018 ...

In March of 2020 I decided that the system was unwieldy and that it had become too difficult to discriminate among so many levels of stupidity, and so I returned to the original five-level structure, with a modification of colors and an update of the definitions of the individual levels ... only to go back to the ten-level version in January, 2021 - less than a year later - thanks in large part to Der Furor's incitement of a violent mob to storm the Capitol in an attempt to stay in power.

By January of 2022, I had reconsidered yet again and decided to go back to the structure I'd implemented in 2013, which added DUMBCON 0 to create a six-, rather than five-level system. I reset the DUMBCON Level to 2, where it has remained ever since.

But the DUMBCON Index, no matter how I often I tweaked it, wasn't sufficient to fully describe the level of utter stupidity represented by the likes of Empty G, Der Furor, Ted Cruz, Lauren Boebert, and Ron DeSantis, and so I created, in June of 2021, the Gohmert Stupidity Scale. Named for the proudly ignorant former Texas representative, it established the Gohmert (abbreviated ghm) as the basic unit of stupidity, and created a logarithmic scale based on the Richter Scale (used to assess the power of earthquakes) and the Scoville Scale (used to describe the heat of various peppers). The main use of the Gohmert Scale has been to quantify the stupidity of winners of my biweekly Ass Clown Awards.

But such is our brave new world of stupidity that I have decided it's time to reset the DUMBCON level and rethink the fundamentals of the Gohmert Stupidity Scale.

Effective today, February 28th, 2023,

I am increasing the DUMBCON level from 2 to 1.

Further, I am announcing a modification of the Gohmert Stupidity Scale which will attempt to better calibrate its accuracy by adding, in addition to the fundamental factors of ignorance and willingness to adapt to new knowledge, allowances for the role played in modern social-political-religious stupidity by such factors as greed, malice, and hatred. I am putting the final touches on the new scale, and will publish it in this space this coming Thursday, March 2nd*.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Dear Readers, it seems as if the defining characteristic of our time is proudly arrogant stupidity. If we can't fight it effectively, let's at least measure and characterize it. I'm doing my part to help.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

* Unlike the wonderful new GOP health care plan, better than anything else out there, which was always going to be released in two weeks.

Musical Sunday

Earlier this month it was announced that Gustavo Dudamel, the charismatic and popular conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, would be leaving to take a new position as the conductor and musical director of the New York Philharmonic. Dudamel, equally famous for his energetic and personable style of conducting and his bouncing head of Harpo Marx-style curly hair, is a popular figure with his musicians and does a marvelous job of coaxing magnificent performances from them. I discovered Dudamel some years ago, and get real pleasure out of watching his conducting ... today for Musical Sunday, I offer up his conduct of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra playing Maurice Ravel's classic composition, Boléro.

For me, much of the joy of watching Dudamel conduct an orchestra is admiration of the sheer joy the man obviously feels at what he's doing, and how the orchestra responds to his enthusiasm. 

This is musical art at its finest.

Have a good day and enjoy the rest of your weekend. More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

Cartoon Saturday

This is why you need Cartoon Saturday ...

Friday marked the first anniversary of the brutal invasion of Ukraine by Russia; a huge winter storm dumped snow in the northern and western United States, as far south as Southern California; Alabama Republican Representative Barry Moore has introduced legislation to name the AR-15 as the "National Gun of America"; according to various reports, Der Furor has had discussions with his advisers about fighting crime by implementing group executions by firing squad and bringing back the guillotine; and in Romania, a council meeting was disrupted when councilor Alberto-Iosif Caraian - “working” from home - responded to a roll call by turning his camera on while he was in the shower.

With the so-called "religious right" gaining more and more noisy prominence and power, I guess I should use my collection of cartoons about sex before they become illegal ...

You've got to take advantage of the moment ...  

Sauce for the goose, too ...

The kids probably already know at least as much as their parents ...

Everyone has their own prayers ...

Inappropriate public display of lepidopteral (?) affection ...

Oxygen gets lucky ...

Everything starts somewhere ...

I have a really terrible pun on this topic, but I don't think it's suitable for this space ...

Well, yes ...

Money well spent ...

And that's it for today's NSFW edition of Cartoon Saturday, because nothing's better to take your mind off the news than good old-fashioned sex.

Have a good day and a great weekend. More thoughts tomorrow, when Musical Sunday returns. See you then!

Bilbo

The Left-Cheek Ass Clown for February, 2023

Well, it's been quite a month, hasn't it? There's been so much world-class ass clownery going on that even a hysterical, ranting speech from Vladimir Putin to mark the first anniversary of his brutal invasion of Ukraine doesn't rise to the level of an award ... and that's saying something.

I believe this is also the first month in which I've given two consecutive awards - a Right-Cheek and a Special - to the same person, Georgia Reprehensive Marjorie Taylor Greene, a true paragon of cringeworthy ass clownery.

But we need to recognize a Left-Cheek Ass Clown for the month, and I felt like the answer was obvious. Ladies and Gentlemen, Dear Readers, the award for 

The Left-Cheek Ass Clown for February, 2023

is presented to

Fox "News" Corporation

and

Its On-Air Commentators

Fox News, which once used the tag line "fair and balanced," has long since proved itself to be neither fair  nor balanced, reflecting a dichotomy between a news reporting operation that at least made a meagre effort to effectively report the news, and an on-air entertainment operation whose commentary has become the reliable mouthpiece of the Republican Party and hard-right conservative voices. "Fair and Balanced" was replaced as a slogan later by "We Report, You Decide" ... which would have been a better slogan had it read, "We Lie and Distort, You Rage at Imaginary Horrors." 

Fox News' complete lack of truth and accuracy in reporting to avoid angering Der Furor and losing its audience to more extreme networks was laid open for all to see this month when e-mails and other internal documents from various Fox managers and on-air personalities were made public as part of a defamation lawsuit filed by Dominion Voting Systems.

You will recall that Fox News has consistently and steadily given air time to Republican charges that the 2020 election was rigged to ensure the loss of Der Furor and that, in particular, voting machines manufactured by Dominion Voting Systems had been manipulated to change votes for Der Furor to votes for Joe Biden. No evidence of this was ever supplied, but that did not slow down Fox's allegations of fraud and vote manipulation by Dominion, even though its opinion stars knew that accusers like lawyers Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani were peddling evidence-free nonsense.

For example, Fox commentator Tucker Carlson* wrote to fellow Fox commentator Laura Ingraham that, 

“Sidney Powell is lying by the way. I caught her. It’s insane.” 

Ms Ingraham wrote back, 

“Sidney [Powell] is a complete nut. No one will work with her. Ditto with Rudy [Giuliani].”

But wait - there's more!

Earlier this week, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy** turned over exclusive access to 44,000 hours of security videos from January 6th, 2021, to Tucker Carlson in order to fulfill a promise made to his hard-right supporters to gain their votes for his speakership ... but without Congressional Republicans having to put their fingerprints on the action. This will, of course, allow Fox to continue to pander to its extreme right, election-denying base, helping to protect its share of the increasingly crowded tinfoil hat market while stoking rage and political turmoil. Mr McCarthy, by the way, is already fundraising on the action - 

Ladies and Gentlemen, Dear Readers, Fox "News" Corporation is awarded the tinfoil and toilet paper crown in recognition of its utterly amoral, completely untruthful, and profit-driven disregard for truth and accuracy, which has led to the unwarranted loss of America's confidence in its elections and deliberately driven wedges between progressive and conservative Americans ... all to keep from losing customers to even more extreme media companies. They deserve the contempt and opprobrium of all good citizens.

Have a good day and come back tomorrow for Cartoon Saturday. More thoughts then.

Bilbo

* Carlson is himself a three-time Ass Clown Award winner: March 2019 Left-Cheek, March 2021 Right-Cheek, and 2021 Ass Clown of the Year.

** McCarthy is a two-time Ass Clown Award winner: December 2022 Right-Cheek and January 2023 Right-Cheek.

Ass Clown Special Award

I've long known that I could probably present Ass Clown Awards weekly, rather than bi-monthly; indeed, in some years I could probably present them twice a week. However, I've tried to hold to the bi-monthly schedule so as not to diminish the value of the individual awards, resorting to the presentation of interim Special Awards when events and personalities warrant. This, sadly, is one of those times.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Dear Readers, today I present an 

Ass Clown Special Award

to an unquestionably deserving 

Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene

(R, GA-14)

This is a landmark award, being not only the fourth* presented to the political void I choose to call "Empty G," but the first time I've presented an award twice in a row to the same individual**.

Today's award is occasioned by an utterly amazing - even for her - tweet Empty G published yesterday:

Yes, you read that right ... a sitting member of Congress has just called for the breaking of the Union, the separation of red (conservative) states and blue (liberal/progressive) states into two nations. Leaving aside the occasional blathers of windbag Texans (including elected officials) who muse about how nice it would be if Texas were an independent nation, I believe this may be the first time since the Civil War that a sitting member of Congress has actually advocated secession.

Even considering her routine stupidity, buffoonish behavior, and ignorance of the Constitution, law, and common courtesy, Empty G has crossed a broad, bright-red line. She is clearly ignorant of the fact that the blue states she despises have long carried the water for the red states she champions ... overall, red states tend to rank far lower than blue states in such categories as economy, education, infrastructure, and health care.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Dear Readers, today we present a well-deserved Ass Clown Special Award to Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor-Greene - Empty G. As I wrote in summarizing her previous award, the citizens of Georgia who elected this classless miscreant*** deserve what they got. Sadly, the rest of us must live with their stupidity.

Have a good day. More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

* Third individual award, fourth when considering a joint award presented to her and to Colorado reprehensive Lauren Boebert. 

** She was the Right-Cheek Ass Clown this month, after her disgraceful performance at President Biden's State of the Union address.

*** Thanks to my dear friend Kathy for this wonderful expression!

Poetry Sunday

Back in January we celebrated the birthday of poet Robert W. Service, "The Bard of the Yukon," by running his famous poem "The Ballad of Blasphemous Bill." It's time to visit with Mr Service once again, as we consider this poem, which is appropriate to things like the National Debt, Climate Change, and the coming deadline to file your income tax returns ...

It Is Later Than You Think

by Robert W. Service

Lone amid the café’s cheer,

Sad of heart am I to-night;

Dolefully I drink my beer,

But no single line I write.

There’s the wretched rent to pay,

Yet I glower at pen and ink:

Oh, inspire me, Muse, I pray,

It is later than you think!

Hello! there’s a pregnant phrase.

Bravo! let me write it down;

Hold it with a hopeful gaze,

Gauge it with a fretful frown;

Tune it to my lyric lyre ...   

Ah! upon starvation’s brink,

How the words are dark and dire:

It is later than you think.

Weigh them well .... Behold yon band,

Students drinking by the door,

Madly merry, bock in hand,

Saucers stacked to mark their score.

Get you gone, you jolly scamps;

Let your parting glasses clink;

Seek your long neglected lamps:

It is later than you think.

Look again: yon dainty blonde,

All allure and golden grace,

Oh so willing to respond

Should you turn a smiling face.

Play your part, poor pretty doll;

Feast and frolic, pose and prink;

There’s the Morgue to end it all,

And it’s later than you think.

 

Yon’s a playwright — mark his face,

Puffed and purple, tense and tired;

Pasha-like he holds his place,

Hated, envied and admired.

How you gobble life, my friend;

Wine, and woman soft and pink!

Well, each tether has its end:

Sir, it’s later than you think.

See yon living scarecrow pass

With a wild and wolfish stare

At each empty absinthe glass,

As if he saw Heaven there.

Poor damned wretch, to end your pain

There is still the Greater Drink.

Yonder waits the sanguine Seine ...

It is later than you think.

Lastly, you who read; aye, you

Who this very line may scan:

Think of all you planned to do ...   

Have you done the best you can?

See! the tavern lights are low;

Black’s the night, and how you shrink!

God! and is it time to go?

Ah! the clock is always slow;

It is later than you think;

Sadly later than you think;

Far, far later than you think.

It is, indeed, later than we think ... but the road down which those cans can be kicked is long and invitingly broad and straight.

Have a good day and enjoy the rest of your weekend. More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

Cartoon Saturday

It's shaping up to be quite a year ...

Actress and 1960's sex symbol Racquel Welch passed away at age 82; former South Carolina governor and United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley announced her candidacy for president, becoming the first major challenger to Der Furor for the 2024 Republican nomination; in 2023's latest mass murders by gunfire, three students were murdered and five seriously injured at Michigan State University, one person was murdered and three others wounded the following day at a shopping mall in El Paso, Texas, and in Arktabula, Mississippi, a man murdered six persons in several locations before being arrested; a court filing in a lawsuit against Fox News shows the network panicking that it had alienated its viewers and damaged its brand by not sufficiently parroting Der Furor’s false claims of election fraud; and in Texas, a man who filmed himself fleeing from a police traffic stop and bragging about eluding the police was identified and has been arrested and charged with a felony after posting the video to YouTube.

Last week's collection of music-related cartoons went over so well that I decided to do a reprise this week. Here are more cartoons riffing on lyrics and band names ...

You probably need to be my age or older to really appreciate this one ...  

Doctor's orders ...

Sorry about this one ...

Don't you wonder sometimes where the inspiration for a song comes from? ..

I've often wondered about this, myself ...

Oy ...

One small step ..

Uh, oh ...

Yes, music can be colorful ...

No, this is not a crappy cartoon ...

And so ends another musical edition of Cartoon Saturday ... I hope it took your mind off all the yucky things going on in the world.

Have a good day and a great weekend. Come back tomorrow, when Poetry Sunday has a timely reminder for you. More thoughts then.

Bilbo

Great Moments in Editing and Signage

It's Friday again, we did the Ass Clown Award last week, and that means it's time once again for

GREAT MOMENTS IN

EDITING AND SIGNAGE!

Let's get it on, shall we?

It's so much easier to handle and transport in this state ...

It's very annoying to have to debone a watermelon before I can eat it ...

Very mixed, I'd say ...

I wonder who the worker is that sorts the legs ...

It would have to be long stay parking, wouldn't it? ...

I think I'm going to stock up ... if my garden doesn't grow as planned, I'll still have something to eat ...

Um ... no thanks ...

Truth in advertising ... and it's organic! ...

It must be embarrassing to be reated so poorly ...

I guess it will be a stag event ...

And there you have it - this week's edition of great moments! I hope you enjoyed them.

Don't forget to send in your submissions for future posts! Whip out those cell phones, take pictures of the signage ya-ha's you run across (or scan them, if they're printed), and e-mail them to ol' Bilbo ... I'll give you credit when I use them.

Have a good day and come back tomorrow for Cartoon Saturday - more thoughts then.

Bilbo

What Would Dante Do?

If you're reading my blog, chances are that you've had an education that includes at least passing mention of Dante's Divine Comedy ... in particular, his visit to the pits of Hell, guided by the Roman poet Virgil, described in Inferno. Dante described Hell as a descending series of nine circles, each one dedicated to the eternal punishment of a particular sort of sinner and each set of sinners more loathsome than the last. At the very bottom of the pit of Hell was, of course, Satan, frozen waist-deep in ice for all eternity in the company of those guilty of the general sin of treachery. Dante's Hell is depicted in this diagram (click to embiggen it for easier reading): 

For purposes of this post, I'd like to call your attention to the eighth circle, almost all the way to the bottom of Hell. It is dedicated to the general sin of Fraud, and is divided into ten bolge, or "ditches," into which those guilty of various types of fraud are divided for punishment, depending on the perceived heinousness of their behavior. The ten bolge and the applicable punishments are:

• Panderers and Seducers, who are whipped by demons as they march in circles;
• Flatterers, who swim in human excrement;
• Simoniacs (sellers of religious favors or offices), who are buried head-first in holes while their exposed feet are burned); 
• Sorcerers and False Prophets, whose heads are twisted around so that they must walk backwards, blinded by their tears; 
• Barrators (corrupt politicians), who swim in pools of boiling pitch;
• Hypocrites, who stagger along wearing robes of gold lined with lead;
• Thieves, who are chased and bitten by snakes and lizards; 
• Evil Counsellors (not those who gave false advice, but those who used their position to advise others to engage in various types of fraud), who are wrapped in individual pillars of fire;
• Sowers of Discord, who are split from chin to groin by sword-wielding demons; and,
• Falsifiers, who suffer various torments based on the nature of their falsification.

I think that Dante's Eighth Circle is of particular salience today, given our current political and social conditions. The only change I would make is to replace the sin of simony (probably less an issue today than it was in Dante's time) with sanctimony, the act of being hypocritically pious or devout. Hypocrisy in the realm of religion is, I think, worse than ordinary hypocrisy, being more morally reprehensible. I could argue that it rates a lower bolgia than hypocrisy. 

The Eighth Circle is clearly the destination of many of those who dominate our religion and politics today. I would suggest that the various bolge might be the ultimate destinations of the persons indicated:

• Panderers and Seducers: Jeffrey Epstein is already there, keeping the lights on for the folks in his still-secret client book;
• Flatterers: Mike Pence, whose obsequious worship of Der Furor was sickeningly embarrassing and shameful;
• The Sanctimonious: Joel Osteen and other megachurch leaders. Oh, and Ron DeSantis, too; 
• Sorcerers and False Prophets: economists who still parrot the concept of "trickle-down" economics, and those who run for-profit churches;
• Barrator: Der Furor for sure, although he's also got a strong claim on a lot of other bolges; 
• Hypocrites: how much time do you have? Jim Jordan, Mitch McConnell, Kevin McCarthy, etm, etm;
• Thieves: most of the Republicans in the House could end up here, as they've certainly stolen their salaries by virtue of not doing anything to earn them. In the larger sense, pretty much every elected official who owes their election to vast tsunamis of untraceable money probably belong here as well, regardless of party;
• Evil Counsellors: Stephen Miller, Roger Stone, Steve Bannon, etm;
• Sowers of Discord: pretty much the entire staff of Fox News, OANN, and the like, as well as those politicians for whom the concept of loyal opposition is totally unknown;
• Falsifiers: make yourself comfortable, it'll take a while to run down this list. We'll just start with George Santos, Empty G, Lauren Boebert, Louie Gohmert.

The application of Dante's classification of sins and punishments to today's miscreants would be a lot more fun if it weren't so sad. If you have any other ideas for updates to the list of sins, or the appropriate punishments for them*, leave a comment.

Have a good day. More thoughts coming.

Bilbo

* If you don't want to actually read Dante's Inferno, you can read a thorough overview here.

Musical Sunday

Yesterday I finally got around to watching a movie I'd long wanted to see: The Grand Budapest Hotel, starring Ralph Fiennes, Tony Revolori, Saoirse Ronan, and a host of other actors in bizarre and funny roles ...

I absolutely loved the movie and recommend it highly, and it also reminded me of one of my (many) favorite songs, this gem by the late Nanci Griffith ...

Have a good day and enjoy the rest of your weekend. And pick the right hotel for your vacation.

More thoughts coming. 

Bilbo

Cartoon Saturday

It just keeps getting "better" and "better" ...

On Friday, President Biden ordered US aircraft to shoot down an unknown object flying in US airspace off the coast of Alaska, following last weekend's downing of a huge Chinese surveillance balloon off the coast of South Carolina; a huge earthquake caused massive destruction and killed more than 20,000 people in Turkey and Northern Syria; according to satellite data, Russia appears to be draining an enormous reservoir in Ukraine, imperiling drinking water, agricultural production and the safety of Europe's largest nuclear power generation plant; during a five-hour search of former vice president Mike Pence’s Indiana home on Friday, the FBI found one additional document with classified markings; and in Arizona, a man interviewing for a job with a local police department was arrested after he admitted - during a polygraph test, no less - that he possessed and had participated in child pornography videos.

I noticed that there seem to have been a lot of cartoons lately that riffed on the lyrics to well-known songs (and I'm not even thinking of the incredibly complex and awful puns of Stephen Pastis in his "Pearls Before Swine" comic strip). This week: cartoons taking off on song lyrics ...

There's cool, and there's cool ...

And they're using real rocks, too! ...

Me, too ...

How about a little hard flock? ...

This one's a little older, but will resonate with folks my age ...

I wonder what else she gave him ...

CSI, music ...

Sometimes, that's when your muse drops in ...

In case you need help with your symptoms ...

No, it's not ...

And there you are - a collection of cartoons you can sing along with! Plus, as an added bonus, it's a great lead-in to tomorrow's Musical Sunday post! Have a great weekend, and be sure to come back tomorrow for more musical thoughts.

Bilbo