Many Are Cold, But Few Are Frozen

Considering the arctic weather conditions in much of the country, we thought it appropriate today to pull some climate-related cartoons out of the "Hope n' Change" deep freeze. Enjoy!















Stay warm, everyone!

Underground Railroaded

Okay, before anyone gets too wildly bent out of shape by the cartoon above, let us admit that we're only reporting on appearances here - and in the Wild World O' Trump, appearances can be deceiving. We honestly don't know if Donald Trump's temporary end of the government shutdown is a cave or a Burmese tiger trap with sharpened punji sticks waiting to impale overly cocky Democrats (and yes, we're looking at you, Chuck Schumer).

When the impasse had been broken (for a 3 week financial extension), Schumer crowed that he'd "taught Trump a lesson." Those words may well come back to bite him - and soon. Because the lesson Trump should have learned is to never expect the Dems to relent for the good of the country or the benefit of the citizenry. So if deadlock turns to shutdown, Mr. President, keep things shut down until you get your damn wall, fence, or alligator-filled moat.

Of course, Trump probably felt some sympathy for the temporarily out of work federal employees who, we're told, are starving to death in droves and being bulldozed into mass graves because they're frankly too stupid to know how to manage their money or shop.

Seriously, we just received a notification from the North Texas Food Bank (to whom we voluntarily give regularly and generously) asking for additional donations owing to all of the federal employees who are elbowing aside the poor to get their hands on free food.

To which we'd like to offer, in complete sincerity, this little tidbit of potentially life-saving wisdom:

That's right, hungry non-essential federal workers! For less than 10 bucks at Costco, you can get 48 hot, delicious meals of the same type enjoyed by actual college graduates who are in much, much deeper debt than you are! That's 3 meals a day for 16 days! Toss in another $10 and you can buy a mega-jar of gummi multi-vitamins to stay in optimal health! Another $10 will get you two jars of protein-rich peanut butter, each of which is roughly the size of your head. Want more choices? Add some frozen peas, a raw egg, or some sriracha sauce to your delicious, inexpensive noodle feast! Like your noodles crushed first? Hand the package to a hungry TSA Agent and ask him/her to imagine it's someone's crotch!

And we're strongly recommending that you get your bureaucratic butts in gear and stock up now, because thanks to the arrogance and intransigence of Democratic "leadership," the next shutdown - which starts in under three weeks - will probably last until 2020.

Speaking of which...

BONUS: BERNIE THE DINOSAUR

In fairness, he might ACTUALLY run if he hears Hillary pumping a shotgun behind him...

With both socialism and insanity reaching new heights of popularity, Bernie "Why Did I Come Into This Room?" Sanders has made it clear that he's launching a brand new campaign for the presidency. Presumably, his main platform will again be ending income inequality by "cutting up the financial pie like the Manson family going after Sharon Tate."

Truth be told, we're very excited about seeing the various Dems queue up to get into the race, for the same reason that we loved attending the glorious "10-in-1" carnival Freak Shows of our youth. Entertainment just doesn't get any better, assuming you can keep from upchucking your corndogs.

SOTU, Nancy?

President Trump has agreed, for now, to postpone his State of the Union address after Speaker of the House Nancy "They're Not Wrinkles, They're Laugh Lines" Pelosi forbade use of the House chamber (where the speech is traditionally given) because of inadequate security personnel during the government shutdown, as well as the fact that on the speech's assigned date, Ms. Pelosi is throwing an "impossible-to-reschedule" Matlock viewing party in her heavily-fortified (by taxpayers) mansion.

There are also unsubstantiated reports which, if true, would be highly disturbing, that Nancy cancelled the speech rather than risking another rebuttal afterwards standing side-by-side with Chuck Schumer, who reportedly takes Viagra to keep from blinking during television appearances.

Nancy additionally brushed off the State of the Union address as "so unimportant" for Americans, who would only be confused by hearing about the myriad successes of the Trump administration, and the highly questionable accomplishments of Democrats.

High on that latter list (and likely high on some kind of illegal drugs) would be the Democrats' abortion-related pieces of legislation in New York. These ghouls have declared that there is a Constitutional right to abortion, that abortions should be freely available up to (and presumably including) a baby's due date, that abortions will not be required to be performed by doctors (no doubt putting some extra cash in the pockets of Benihana chefs), and the removal of all protections previously offered to a baby who survives an abortion attempt. Meaning that a living newborn child who has somehow managed to dodge toxic injections, serrated knives, industrial shop-vacs, and spinning saw blades can still be given the Gallagher watermelon treatment using a giant wooden mallet with no criminal repercussions for the raincoat-wearing "technician."

Ironically, one of the reasons that Democrats like Pelosi are so Hell-bent on flooding our nation with illegal aliens is that they can't figure out why there aren't enough Americans being born to fill all the jobs. Yeah, that's a head-scratcher, alright, albeit one that the Pro-Life kids from Covington High School seem to have unraveled without Andy Griffith's help.

And speaking of Covington High School...

Confrontation with Naive Americans

We're going to let the visuals carry most of the load today, owing to the extraordinarily stupid nature of this whole darn story. It begins with some Catholic kids visiting Washington DC to learn how our national capital works. And boy, did they!

The most credible of the many versions floating around is that a group of kids from Covington Catholic High School suffered extensive verbal abuse from protesters in Washington (including from some black protesters calling a black Covington student a "nigger" and screaming that his white friends would someday "steal your organs") then, as long as everyone else was making noise, they asked their school chaperone if they could shout out a few innocent school cheers.

Into this mess steps a tom-tom thumping Native American (and  long-term liberal activist) who marches up into the face of a MAGA-hat wearing kid who...(trigger warning: this gets pretty damn graphic!)...smiles back at the man. Oh, the humanity!

Seriously, that's all that happened. But it was plenty enough to send the news services and social media (but we repeat ourselves) into paroxysms of outrage. Theoretically, the "smirking" young Trump lover somehow dissed the Native American Drummer Boy...causing the world to go nuts.

Some social media loudmouths called for a school shooter to massacre the students at Covington Catholic High School (and indeed, the school had to be closed yesterday as police encircled the building). But there were also some milder threats...

A Saturday Night Live writer offered to fellate anyone who punched the innocent Catholic kid in the face. We're pretty sure that making such an offer is an overt criminal act (maybe two or three of them), but does give us a pretty good idea of the skill set that (ahem) "writers" bring to SNL auditions, resulting in absolutely humorless shows.

And because the drum-thumping Native American claims that some kids were chanting "build the wall" (which, in hindsight, a lot of Native Americans probably wish they'd done around 1491), the news incorporated that angle into the story too...

It's true! A Republican legislator from Arizona came up with the idea of charging people $20 each to unlock porn filters on their phones, and then using the money to build the wall. And frankly, it's not the worst idea that we've heard. No, that would have to be this one...

See what we did there?

Wading face-first into this sticky controversy, Stormy "For Two Bucks I'll Throw in a Handi-Wipe" Daniels said that an electrified wall should be built around the Covington Catholic school to keep "disgusting punks" who believe in making America great again and the sanctity of life from interacting with decent people like lying, contract-breaking, dollar bill-grabbing, sperm bank "night deposit" sluts and their crooked sleaze-ball attorneys.

And because Stormy is still considered a Progressive feminist heroine by women whose highest aspiration is apparently to somehow become a sex object used for the sick pleasure of anyone with a sawbuck (ie, a writer for "Saturday Night Live"), her opinion would have carried a lot of weight...had the dimwitted "flavor of the month" not also had something apocalyptic to say:

In the distinctive words of Ms. Dysplasia-Vortex, "Millenials and people in Gen Z and all these folks that come after us are looking up and we're, like, the world is gonna end in 12 years if don't address climate change! Your biggest issue [editor's note - she's referring to actual grown-ups], your biggest issue is how are (we) going to pay for it? - and, like, this is the war! This is our World War II! And I think younger people looking at this are more, like, how are we saying let's take it easy when the end person died from our cruel and unjust criminal justice system?!"

Okay, we're not positive her statement categorically proves that the world is coming to an end in 12 years, but it sure as hell suggests that the electoral system which put her in Congress is officially on life support.

Taken together, there's a lot to think about when connecting all of the stories above. And since those on the Left aren't particularly gifted when it comes to "thinking," we're going to helpfully boil all of this down to a simple truism:

You progressives have no chance of beating President Donald Trump in 2020 until you can demonstrate that your whole damn party isn't at least marginally more sane than he is. At the moment, that's not looking likely to happen.

Noose Reports

Today's commentary is simply a slice of life observation, to which we'll add the observation that "slice" and "life" are usually only mentioned together in crime reports.

When perusing the news for anything that was actually interesting, we couldn't find squat - but were stopped in our tracks when we encountered the online headline "World's Cutest Dog Dies of Heartbreak." And no, we didn't read the story nor are we providing a link (though it's easy enough to find) because we're aghast - albeit sardonically amused - that such a story is even out there for people to willingly click on. Presumably for those folks who weren't already feeling suicidal enough.

Granted, we shouldn't be hypocritical enough to suggest that this story doesn't speak to our own decidedly sick sense of humor. For instance, we couldn't help but think of how this situation would be handled in our other strip, Johnny Optimism...

Not that there was NO weekend news worth making fun of. There were multiple Women's March events around the country, with pussy hat-wearing femmes carrying consciousness-raising signs like "Welcome to the Bitchdom," "Tits Over Toupees," "Pussy is God," "Women Don't Owe You Shit," "Sex Work is Work," and the wordy but highly provocative "More people died from lettuce last year than immigrants!"

And by highly provocative, we of course mean "jaw-droppingly stupid." Because our research indicates that about a dozen people died from eating E. coli tainted lettuce, while about 5400 Americans were murdered by illegal aliens. There were also about 12,000 sex crimes committed by illegal aliens, compared to none for any salad components. Although a cucumber or two might have been unwillingly victimized.

Fortunately for the marching women, the editorial staff of Buzzfeed kept them from looking like the biggest nincompoops of the weekend by running a wholly unsubstantiated "inside story from the Mueller investigation" attacking Trump (surprise!) which fueled heated impeachment talk from ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, and MSNBC until Mueller himself stepped forward to say that the story was complete and utter "fake news."
A statement which cheered us up, but was presumably too late to save the grief-stricken cutest dog in the world. Nice going, Buzzfeed.

Free Association Friday

Today we introduce a special feature called "Free Association Friday," in which we comment on whatever the heck is tumbling around inside our noggin. This will provide us the opportunity to examine stories which may not be in the mainstream, as well as to fill space on slow news days without resorting to posting bikini babes twice within a week.

• In looking at the BRIGHT RED HEADLINES on Drudge asking "Did Trump Bribe Drudge Poll?" we find ourselves shaking our heads for the umpteenth time about what passes for news these days. In the story, sleazeball attorney Michael Cohen is accused of paying a firm to skew the results of a CNBC poll and a Drudge poll to make Trump look better- but the firm wasn't able to do it, and Cohen subsequently gave the PR flacks only a small amount of the money they were promised, plus (inexplicably) a boxing glove.

As nearly as we can tell, no one was "bribed," the polls weren't swayed, and who the Hell cares about (or believes in) the accuracy of online polls anyway? Besides being an entirely non-criminal act, it's also unforgivably boring.

• We are currently reviewing an updated version of our Last Will and Testament, and it's even less fun than doing taxes. The legal language is just as convoluted and baffling, plus every sentence is describing some horrible scenario we'd rather not think about. "In the event that you have died horribly and your rotting corpse is being nibbled on by maggots and your spouse has descended into drooling incompetency with a life consisting of alternately screaming and having spectacular bathroom accidents, how many years should your drug-dependent descendant be deemed "clean" by a certified drug rehab program before receiving any of the money you were too dumb to enjoy before kicking the bucket?"

Even worse, it's important to only review important legal documents while cold sober. Not that we believe Nancy Pelosi ever has.

• We are trying to make peace with our recently purchased "Smart TV," but it's an uphill battle. Because in our experience, "smart" devices seem intentionally designed to make us feel dumb. The 55" 4K television has an astoundingly sharp picture, fully capable of making epic films look like they're being played out on live security cameras. The sound is about what you'd expect from one-inch, bottom-firing speakers (or tin cans connected with a string), but you can easily upgrade the audio by adding an expensive sound bar which plays everything slightly out of synch, making an old episode of The Office seem like a poorly dubbed Godzilla movie. The Smart TV also has buttons which take you to hundreds of Internet channels which apparently originate in The Twilight Zone. Seriously, what the heck is this stuff, where is it coming from, and how can we make it go away?!

In our aforementioned Will, we plan to leave this TV to someone we don't like.

• In the Jarlsberg household, debate rages about whether it's more relaxing to watch cysts being drained on Youtube (yes, we subscribe to the Dr. Pimple Popper channel), or savoring some good ingrown toenail surgery (we also subscribe to the Toe Bro channel). In complete honesty, we find both to be relaxing (especially just before bed, viewed in our Oculus Go VR goggles) and less disgusting than the average news broadcast. Warning: the links above are real, and the one with the cyst should not be clicked while having any sort of gravy-based meal.

• And finally, we think it's freaking hilarious that President Trump cancelled Nancy Pelosi's overseas jaunt on a military aircraft at the last minute as an act of transparent payback for her attempts to force him to cancel the upcoming State of the Union address. What his move lacks in class, it more than makes up for in style points!

Taking Leave of Your Census

"This is our child unit, Pumpkin!"

There surely must be stories in which the phrase "a federal district judge has ruled" actually leads to something good, or at least vaguely like justice. But today's news item is decidely not one of those stories.

Specifically, Judge Jesse Furman has ruled that the Trump administration may not add an outrageously offensive question to the 2020 Census asking, "are you a citizen?" Which, in our opinion, would have saved a lot of time and money by keeping dogs and cats from being interviewed. But noOOooo.

The judge made this ruling because he "infers from the various ways Commerce Secretary Ross and his aides acted like people with something to hide that they did have something to hide." For instance, they might have been hiding a suspicious desire to know how many actual American citizens there are, or been attempting to get a better grip on the number of aliens who are illegally in the country.

Had the wildly unacceptable question been allowed (which will be reviewed by the Supreme Court once Ruth Bader Ginsburg is again able to cling to her perch and gnaw her cuttlebone) it would have had terrible effects, according to the director of the ACLU's Voting Rights Project (who is apparently unaware that illegals aren't supposed to be voting).

"The inevitable result," he said, "would have been to strip federal resources and political representation from those needing it most." In other words, the Left wants illegals to maintain the same access to taxpayer-funded benefits and political representation that citizens have...essentially making citizenship itself meaningless.

Whether or not that's the future we want for our country is worth discussing...but as usual, it's a discussion the Left wants to make sure has no reliable facts about which to argue.

BONUS: BULLY SHTICK

In an absolutely jaw-dropping advertising gaffe, Gillette razors has been running a spot in which they basically accuse all men (formerly their target market) of being ignorant, sexist, skirt-chasing thugs and bullies, guilty of "toxic masculinity" during this enlightened #MeToo era.

Really, Gillette?!

There's a message worth delivering about real men not being rapists, bullies, and all-around assholes, but like candidate Hillary Clinton, Gillette chose to call all men Deplorables. Except, of course, for those Gillette-approved pajama boy types who intercede to tell their neanderthal friends that it's "not cool" to show that you're attracted to a woman, and a bad idea to stand idly by as a gang of feral boys beat the living crap out of another kid who looks like a little boy, but whose gender we don't want to assume out of fear of traumatizing him/her/it.

The imagery in the commercial includes a "Stepford Husbands" row of toxic men in a suburban back yard, standing shoulder to shoulder behind their evil, smoke-emitting grills as animal meat sizzles menacingly...soon to become testosterone-fuel coursing through the veins (sometimes dangerously remaining in certain veins for four hours or longer) of a nation of grunting, hirsute, brutal man-beasts eternally cursed by their possession of a Y chromosome.

Having had a long career in advertising, we find ourselves wondering how in Hell any overpaid ad exec (and teams of testers) thought the way to sell razors to men was by insulting them? Seriously, you don't see "Summer's Eve" running commercials telling women not to be vicious, overly-emotional harpies who should - oh yeah! - buy more lemon-zesty douche products.

Which is why the ad isn't really intended to rein in sexists and bullies at all, but is rather a crass and commercial appeal to neutered social justice warriors who enjoy seeing the unwarranted slander of one of nature's two favorite genders.

Our bottom line: toxic masculinity is a lot less of a threat to our culture than toxic emasculation. We don't need Gillette's razor to tell us that; Occam's will do nicely.

Top Billing

Today's post is a straight up bitch session, although it technically doesn't involve Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Maxine Waters, Kamala Harris, or Joy Behar. No, we mean "bitch" in the sense of a complaint...in this case related to our first round of paying bills for 2019.

Specifically, we discovered that the government, in its infinite wisdom, has tripled the cost of Medicare coverage for the reasonably healthy Mr and Mrs Jarlsberg, owing to the unforgivable sin of our lofty perch amongst the evil rich.

Only we aren't rich. And not really very evil. Rather, a couple of years ago we took some investment money out of our personal retirement account (rather than going on Social Security) and put it in the bank to pay our bills with. And it was admittedly a tidy amount, owing to the fact that it was intended to cover all of our expenses for a couple of years. And of course, we paid a massive amount of income tax on the withdrawal rather than subjecting ourselves to life on the run and/or repeated prison shower rapes.

But apparently, this still didn't fulfill our duty to the state. Which is why the Social Security Administration just gifted us with an IRMAA (Income Related Monthly Adjustment Amount) which triples our joint Medicare payments to approximately $1000 a month.

Granted, a lot of people are paying way more than that for insurance now that Obamacare has more than doubled prices while slashing benefits. But still, after paying into our Medicare policy for over 40 years (paying double, in fact, being self-employed) we're still a little nonplussed by this sudden uptick in charges. And we also find ourselves wondering how many of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's snot-nosed social media followers would be demanding "Medicare For All" if they knew their "free" health care was going to cost them a grand a month up front (not including skyrocketing taxes)?

Fortunately, our Medicare premiums should drop back down next year when the government looks at our actual somewhat pitiful income. Assuming that the government shutdown isn't still going on by then...

Tan O'Clock and All's Well

As promised, we've brought back this popular feature in which women of temporary color give their unique and valuable perspectives on breaking news stories. It is entirely coincidental that this feature will almost always appear on very slow news days...

Yes, that first model is a Democrat.

All of the headlines above are from the Drudge Report, but we haven't bothered to create links because - seriously - who wants to know more about this stuff?

We will say that the shutdown is getting interesting, and we find it amusing to hear the increasingly alarmed predictions of the end of our republic - usually without any mention of the fact that Chuck and Nancy could end the whole thing with a single phone call. But surely, they don't want nationwide chaos during the Trump administration, right? Right...?

And yes, Beto O'Rourke live-streamed his dental cleaning while interviewing the hygienist on her thoughts about living near the Texas/Mexico border. An action which frankly leaves us at a floss for words.

And the last story is about how the birth rates of white women have declined in virtually every state to the point that white populations will continue to decline as the birth rates of Hispanics and African-Americans increase. We are not reporting this as a good thing or a bad thing, but rather as a point of statistical interest and, most importantly, as an excuse to post pictures which might briefly inspire some white guys to show a little damn initiative in the fertilization department.

BONUS: IT'S BEEN BEATEN TO DEATH, BUT WE STILL HAD TO DO IT...

Spark of Genius

Okay, this isn't really what Donald Trump proposed in last night's 8-minute address to the nation about the need to fully and immediately fund security for our southern border, as well as the President's intent to continue the government shutdown as the only possible method of getting the Democrats to take part - however unwillingly - in our nation's defense.

The President spoke eloquently of the high costs of our current inadequate security. A flood of illegal drugs, weapons, and gang members bringing suffering and death to Americans, as well as devastating the job market for African-Americans and Hispanics, and costing taxpayers untold billions for support services for our uninvited guests.

But as frightening as the President's statistics were, they can't compare to the terror we experienced when our TV screen was suddenly filled with two soul-sucking faces that put the "butt" in rebuttal...

Schumer and Pelosi glowered into the unblinking camera and lied their shriveled rear ends off about what Trump had said only moments before. They characterized his statements as lies and hate, and claimed that Democrats are actually wildly enthusiastic about funding border security as long as Trump just ends the shutdown so the matter can be (ahem) "debated" separately until a bipartisan solution can be reached. Because the last 50 years or so of debate haven't quite been enough yet.

They claimed that Trump's wall - or any physical barrier - would be expensive and inefficient. Not terms we remember them bandying about in regards to other Democrat programs, let alone Obama's disastrous "shovel ready jobs" program which cost over 100 times what Trump is requesting for security measures. As a jobs program alone, this could be characterized as a success for Democrats if they'd just allow it to happen.

Interestingly, Schumer and Pelosi didn't bother to address how to stem the ongoing flood of illegals into our country, nor how to eliminate the direct threats to the lives and well-being of Americans. They stared into the camera like a nightmare version of the couple from Grant Wood's "American Gothic" painting, interested only in stoking fear and hatred.

Bottom line: the point-counterpoint speeches reaffirmed our belief that the wall needs to be built, and that a continuing government shutdown is the only way to get Democrats to do remotely the right thing.

Steady on, Mr. President.

First Day on Hijab

Rock on, Rashida.

Immediately following House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's straight-faced (or perhaps overly-Botoxed) pledge that her party would conduct all future political business with "respect" for the opposing side, a new Muslim Congresswoman from Michigan (we believe she represents Dearbornistan) jubilantly declared of President Trump, "We're going to impeach that motherf*cker!"

Rashida Tlaib has refused to apologize for her gutter language (seriously, does she pray to Allah with that mouth?!) and Nancy Pelosi finds no fault with the statement, categorizing it as a "generational" use of language - apparently under the belief that everyone in Tlaib's generation is a trash-talking shithead. Which, we'll concede, is a possibility.

We'll admit that we were particularly taken aback by Ms. Tlaib's language owing to her Muslim heritage (what kind of Mickey Mosque house of worship is she attending, anyway?), considering the highly kinetic ways in which that culture frequently disciplines women for public displays of obscenity. Or showing their faces.

Donald Trump tweeted that Representative Tlaib's comments had "dishonored her family," perhaps as a wink-wink, nudge-nudge reference to how that particular crime is sometimes handled by the Sharia branch of the religion of peace.

Clearly, though, only minutes after being sworn in, Tlaib has already dishonored the House of Representatives and the constituents who sent her to Washington. And we would say that she's dishonored the Democrat party if that were still even remotely possible.

But free speech, even when offensive, should remain free. Which is why we share this final thought from our good friend Johnny Optimism...

Hammer Time

They sound like bursting grapes!

Removing any lingering doubts that 2019 might not suck with the intensity of an immense black hole, yesterday Nancy Pelosi again wrapped her claw-like talons around a ceremonial gavel (which she refers to as "my precious") as she was restored to the lofty position of Speaker of the House of Representatives.

"Let each of us pledge that when we disagree, we will respect each other and we will respect the truth," said the aging harpy who recently showed her respect for the President of the United States by saying that listening to him was like being sprayed with skunk piss.

"Transparency will be the order of the day," she added - clearly not caring about the irony of her demands to turn off news cameras during her recent meeting with Trump, not to mention her famous quote about Obamacare that "we have to pass it so you can see what's in it." In other words, the only thing "transparent" about Nancy's tenure for the next two years will be the obviousness of her anti-American motives.

Nancy also promised that Democrats "will make America more American by protecting our patriotic, courageous Dreamers who aren't actually Americans and may, in a few cases, belong to violent gangs."

Okay, she didn't really finish the sentence like that, but we're sure she wouldn't mind us adding the additional facts for the sake of transparency.

And while she didn't specifically mention the controversial border wall which is currently the cause of a partial government shutdown, her inflexible position on the issue is already impacting a lot of lives...

The lack of a border wall tempts people to make a very dangerous journey...in hopes of eventually committing the crime of entering our country illegally, after which a huge percentage will survive on welfare.

But not everyone makes it. Many woman and children are routinely raped and abused during the journey, and still others simply die of various causes - nearly 400, just last year. We'd include the young girl and boy who recently died after being dragged over the border by neglectful parents. The United States tried to save the children's lives, but it was too late.

Refusing to build the wall is an open invitation to more suffering and death. But deaths - even those of women and children - are secondary to the political advantages Democrats intend to gain by flooding our country with government-dependent illegals.

So besides giving Nancy that gavel, maybe we should also give her a shovel with which to dig graves for those who she'll continue to sacrifice for her own ambitions.

2018 - The Year in Review (Part Two)

Happy New Year! Before resuming our autopsy of 2018, we pause for a moment of fresh news:

Democratic Socialist Elizabeth Warren has announced the formation of an exploratory committee to test the waters for a 2020 presidential run. In response, the ever-subtle Donald Trump tweeted that "you'd have to ask her psychiatrist" if she really thinks she could win. Which reminded us of an old joke...

Elizabeth Warren went to the psychiatrist and said, "Ever since I decided to run for president, I've been having weird dreams. One night I dream I'm a tepee, and the next night I dream I'm a wigwam! And that's how it goes, night after night - tepee, wigwam, tepee, wigwam..."
"The problem," the psychiatrist interrupts, "is that you're two tents."

And now, back to 2018 and...

JULY



Even when we created the cartoon above, we had no idea how low the Democrats would actually go in disparaging the character of Brett Kavanaugh. This distinguished jurist with a nearly saintly resume would eventually be accused of being a drug-dispensing mastermind of gang rapes.

Oddly (but not unsuccessfully), the Democrats took this appallingly low road in hopes of making themselves more appealing to Progressive midterm voters...



Democrats and media outlets (but we repeat ourselves) began predicting an enormous "blue wave" in the midterm elections owing to the fact that the United States had fallen under Russian control, Trump was emptying dump trucks of weeping immigrant children into concentration camps, rising employment numbers were declared to be a meaningless statistical trick, and Western civilization was on the verge of collapse owing to the President's suggestion that NATO members start paying their dues.

For Progressives, these were powerful messages. And all the more so when they were echoed by their living god in...

AUGUST



Barack Obama made a series of campaign appearances in which he didn't so much promise that Democrats would do a good job if elected, but rather spent most of his time trying to take credit for Donald Trump's long list of successes. Predictably, the self-absorbed sonofagun also worked "I," "me," and "mine" into his speeches so frequently that there was no time left for any other words.

Unsurprisingly, the majority of candidates Barry campaigned for got their rear ends handed to them. Proof that when it comes to political expertise, Democrats should stick with those who really know how to work the system...



Okay, the Clintons probably didn't really say that. Mostly because there's no need to say out loud that which is already tacitly understood.

Which is why they would never have faced what Trump did in...

SEPTEMBER



Porn princess Stormy "Campbell's Cream of Mens Room" Daniels recaptured the hearts and minds of feminists, First Amendment advocates, and liberal news outlets by describing the President's fiddly bits in graphic detail. This was a very important story because, frankly, any story that doesn't involve sex can't hold the attention of a Progressive for more than about 10 seconds.

A truism clearly illustrated by the ongoing torture of the yet-unconfirmed Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh...



Dr. Christine Blasey Ford became the primary witness against alleged serial rapist Brett Kavanaugh, tearfully testifying that at a time and place she couldn't actually remember (but was decades ago), the future jurist had drunkenly pushed her onto a bed and pawed briefly at her clothing. Ford named four witnesses, all of whom swore to the FBI (under penalty of law) that they had no idea what the hell Ford was talking about.

Still, Democrats on Kavanaugh's hearing committee praised the nearly-amnesiac Ford for her courageous testimony, which she made with no hope of personal gain beyond the $600,000 in GoFundMe donations she received for her histrionic performance. She presumably was also able to sell film rights to her dramatic story, "I Might Have Been Felt Up."

In order to give the FBI time to somehow investigate this story with no dates, places, or witnesses, voting on Kavanaugh's appointment was delayed until...

OCTOBER



Kavanaugh survived the nightmarish hearings, but every Democrat voted against him. Progressive voters were predictably (and deliberately) fired up to vote against the party of "Rapey McRapeface" in the midterms.

It was definitely time to take sex out of the news and get back to the discussion of important, substantive political issues...



A judge ruled against Stormy "Now Try to Clap" Daniels' anti-defamation suit against Donald Trump, and ordered her to pay him over $300,000 in restitution. Which is a lot of money, even for an experienced restitute.

And she wasn't the only one being featured in news stories about money...



Still working the campaign trail, Barack Obama's pants burst into Benghazi-level flames when, regarding Trump's astounding economic achievements, he said, "When you hear this talk about economic miracles, remember who started it!"

Well, it sure as Shinola wasn't Barry. Although maybe his claim caused some investors to have doubts about whether an "Obama recovery" would last. By pure coincidence, the stock market suddenly began a fourth quarter nosedive which would eventually make 2018 a disastrous year for investors. And not a great year for America, either, as we found out in...

NOVEMBER

The mid-term elections were finally held, and while the much-heralded "blue wave" didn't materialize, Democrats still won back the House of Representatives. This virtually assures gridlock, specious lawsuits and investigations, and garden variety nonsense for the next two years thanks to a fresh crop of idiots...



Democrat Socialist Representative-elect Alexandria "Way Too Much Caffeine" Ocasio-Cortez was dismayed during early orientation in Washington because people kept assuming that she was a young, clueless intern instead of a young, clueless member of Congress.

Cortez, a darling of the social media Left, proved to be an unending source of hilarious (albeit terrifying) quotes, declaring that she would be "inaugurated" into her new job, that she believed that she'd soon have the power to sign bills into law, and thought she could subpoena anyone who dared mock her on Twitter. All of which made her more "fascist" than "fast learner."

Not that fast learners were in abundance, even in university settings...



Detroit's Oakland University announced a new policy of passing out hockey pucks to faculty and student government leaders to throw at active shooters should such an event break out. This wouldn't prevent a tragedy, of course, but might at least provide a bit of comic relief during an otherwise grim situation.

And "grim situation" wasn't a bad descriptor of...

DECEMBER



The Wall Street debacle continued, powered by the Fed raising interest rates and ongoing media claims that the Mueller "investigation" would be dropping an impeachable bomb on Donald Trump at any moment.

Not that Trump cared. Rather, he was pressing ahead with the nation's business - including crucial budget negotiations which would provide for secure borders. Not that everyone saw eye to eye with him on this issue...



With the year drawing to a close, Trump and the Democrats agreed that they'd rather see a partial government shutdown than back down from their respective positions on funding a border wall. But fortunately, there was distraction from the existential nightmare of the government giving paid time off to "non-essential employees" thanks to a jolly old elf...



In a poll (not to be confused with a North Pole), 27% of respondents declared that they'd prefer Santa Claus to be female or gender neutral, rather than a despicable old white man. This despite the fact that the actual Saint Nicholas was an old white man who, presumably, believed that his generosity to others didn't have to go to extremes like submitting to castration. Because seriously, what fun is Christmas once you've lost your sugar plums?

Which thankfully brings us to the end of 2018, a year which richly deserves the shallow, unmarked, backwoods grave into which we've hastily lowered it, and brings us to 2019 - which stretches out before us like a vast, untrodden mine field.

We look forward to sharing and surviving it with you!