Whined and Dined

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Joe Blow

It's official! "Groping Joe" Biden is now in the 2020 Presidential race, ratcheting up the excitement and interest in the Democrat field of contestants to the place that we still don't give a single damn.

Seriously, are the foam-at-the-mouth young radicals really going to get excited for another old white man (indeed, possibly the whitest man on Earth) with a long documented history of grabbing and nuzzling women and children, plagiarizing speeches, and making gaffes every time he opens his mouth? A man who has a long and easily-checked record of bad policy calls - like opposing integration efforts for schools, being wrong about every foreign policy pronouncement he's ever made, and announcing on live TV that Obamacare was a "big fucking deal" (although in fairness he was right, and we were the ones getting f*cked).

Biden made his announcement via a slickly-produced video in which he solemnly read meaningless platitudes off a teleprompter: "Folks, America is an idea. An idea that's stronger than any army, bigger than any ocean, more powerful than any dictator or tyrant (wink-wink, nudge-nudge). It gives hope to the most desperate people on Earth. It guarantees that everyone is treated with dignity. And gives hate no safe harbor."

While this droning monologue might make Biden (or more likely, his speechwriter) a reasonable candidate for Poet Laureate, it does nothing but confirm that the one-time Veep is an empty suit whose sole purpose is to give a pleasant face to the ugly, dangerous, and anti-American plans of the Deep State swamp dwellers.

But rather than put us all into a coma by continuing to talk about such a dull man, let's revisit a few cartoons from the vault which will help remind us of just what a nimrod we're dealing with...

I Shrink to Forget

We won't lie to you: today's cartoon and commentary aren't really clever insights and perspectives, but rather a laundry list (and a highly shortened one, at that) of the stuff that is driving us out of our ever-loving minds today.

And there's a wee bit of personal experience woven into this. For several months, we've been seeing a psychotherapist to help us develop better coping skills to reduce the levels of stress which may (or may not) be causing "Stilton's Palsy," our self-named affliction that interrupts both sleeping and waking life with occasional involuntary modern dance routines, complete with "spaz hands."

We're glad to say we've been making nice progress, doing our meditation exercises, breathing deeply, and picturing ourselves in the safe interior of a magic subterranean cave which has soft shafts of sunlight and a glowing pool of gently lapping water. And, importantly, our peaceful place has no freaking sources of news whatsoever. But eventually we have to return to reality, where we're again assaulted by political and media lunacy - causing a tsunami of stress hormones to pressure-wash the insides of our rapidly-aging veins.

What's most frustrating is that we're not nuts - there really is stark raving, mouth-breathing, utter insanity loose in the world and it's only spreading and growing in popularity.

Seriously, if Democrats would just look at all these crazy news stories, it might suddenly dawn on them why so many sane people have chosen to support a President who is at least a bit less nuts than anyone in the Democrat party.

We'd say more, but the session time is up.

The Heller Report

"It's the best there is," Doc Daneeka agreed.

The "lightly redacted" Mueller Report has been made public and, predictably, it's not changing a single mind regarding President Trump's guilt or innocence. Not that the anti-Trump forces are exactly sure what Trump is guilty of other than his repeatedly pointing out that a two-year phony investigation was, indeed, a phony investigation.

An attempted political coup, in fact, which we're certainly hoping Attorney General Barr will be pursuing thoroughly, relentlessly, and hopefully mercilessly.

The Mueller Report clearly establishes that neither Trump nor anyone in his circle had anything to do with Russian collusion, and that sufficient evidence to cause Obama's justice department to spy on Trump's campaign never actually existed - everything was based on a fabricated (and transparently ridiculous) dossier which was paid for by Trump's opposition in the 2016 election: Hillary Clinton and the DNC.

Failing to find evidence of, well, anything truly damaging to Trump, Robert Mueller packed his report with snarky anecdotes about Trump being a volatile and chaotic personality surrounded by staffers who keep him from making big mistakes.

Well, duh - that's exactly what we voted for! The system is working!

To expand further on this point (and make it simple enough for even our liberal friends to understand), let's travel back to a post we made last year which explains why we don't give a rat's rear end about anything in the Mueller Report...

SEPT 7, 2018 - FLIGHT RISK

Yes, we know that Trump doesn't drink, for which we give thanks daily. This is a metaphor.

According to Bob Woodward's new tell-all book "Fear" and a recent New York Times op-ed which was allegedly written by "an anonymous White House official who we are totally not making up," President Donald Trump is an egotistical, mercurial boob who requires constant supervision by others to stave off disaster.

Yawn.

The accounts may or may not be 100% accurate, but we don't care - other than having a constant undercurrent of mild terror. Because many of us who voted for Trump, however reluctantly, knew all of this about him going in. We weren't really happy about giving the country's reins to a man whose thought process can be likened to a pinball machine, but the only other choice was inconceivably worse.

Going back to our cartoon metaphor, our plane was already in serious trouble and going down fast. Hillary Clinton would put us into a nose dive at maximum throttle, then cackle hysterically (when not coughing) all the way down to our fiery doom.

Trump, on the other hand, might seem to have a screw loose - but he had a record of somehow getting things accomplished and seemed sincere in his desire to save the day. And unlike Hillary's kamikaze scenario, Trump wouldn't be alone in the cockpit - he'd actually have a trained co-pilot, flight engineer, navigator, and others to help compensate for his inexperience and eccentricities.

Which brings us to the present. Woodward and the New York Times are reporting that dedicated White House staffers are working constantly to defuse Trump's bad ideas and help enable his good ideas - which is why this amateur President keeps racking up success after success.

In other words, we're seeing a scary process that produces good results rather than what, under Hillary, would have been a nightmarishly efficient process producing devastating results.

That doesn't strike us as being an entirely bad thing. Especially if the in-flight turbulence doesn't get bad enough to keep the flight attendant from rolling that drink cart our way on a regular basis.

Cheeky Excuse

Now THAT'S what we call a Buttigieg!

We're taking the day off to attend to some non-emergency family business, but wanted there to be at least a minor visual reward for those who showed up here today. Which is why we're sharing this picture of an absolutely spectacular straw hat.

Durable, inexpensive, made from renewable materials, and offering great protection against the sun's damaging rays, we can't recommend straw fedoras highly enough. Whether you get an ornate hat woven from pampas grass, or a much humbler hat woven from not-so-pampas grass, you'll be sporting a style which we can all enthusiastically get behind, without the cost putting you in arrears!

We'd say more, but oddly we keep losing our train of thought. Or, to get to the bottom of things, we keep thinking about cabooses...

Have a great weekend and see you back here on Monday!

Torch Bearer

When an important icon of western civilization goes up in flames, as the Notre Dame cathedral in Paris did on Monday, experts tell us that the best way to cope with our collective grief is to make tasteless jokes about it. And by "experts," we mean the craftsmen who distill Clan MacGregor scotch.

We don't, of course, find anything remotely funny about the Notre Dame blaze...although we do find it "funny" that French authorities issued a report saying that the inferno couldn't possibly have been caused by arson or, God forbid, terrorism...even before launching a real investigation. Presumably, that report must have been authored by the French equivalent of James Comey, who is unclear about the proper sequencing of investigations, conclusions, and exonerations (at least, when there's a political agenda involved).

Fortunately, a lot of the great cathedral survived the flames, and donations are pouring in to rebuild the structure, perhaps with some important updated features which better reflect modern France, like state-of-the-art fire extinguishing systems, broadband wi-fi, and minarets.

BONUS: SOMETHING'S BERNING...

In a special Fox News town hall meeting, Democrat front runner (and yes, we're stunned to be writing those words) Bernie Sanders got a chance to air his bombastic socialist talking points. Oddly, the event was treated seriously by Fox News, who are said to be trying to arrange another town hall with Democrat wunderkind "Mayor Pete" Buttigieg, whose name we can neither pronounce nor say with a straight face. It is unknown if similar events will be planned for the other 93 currently named Democrat candidates for president.

For us, the highlight of the town hall came when it was pointed out that his bestselling book has made Bernie a multi-millionaire (presumably an evil one, since there's no other kind) who could voluntarily pay the higher taxes he deems a "fair share" versus the far lower taxes established by Donald Trump. So has he done that?

Bernie hemmed and hawed, but eventually admitted he hasn't voluntarily paid an extra cent in taxes in the name of fairness or eliminating income inequality. After which he started babbling about why the American Dream isn't about the freedom to make great wealth, but is rather about getting free healthcare, a free education, and "when (people) turn on the water, have drinkable water and not toxic water."

Presumably, Mr. Sanders' next bestselling book will be about hydration and hypocrisy.

Tick Talk

We're just going to let the cartoon do all our talking today. Unlike Omar and her freshman Congressional colleagues, we know when to shut up.

The Cart Before The Hearse

On Wednesday, we saw the first image of an actual black hole and, despite a bit of kidding from us, it was astounding and important. And not solely because it provides a perfect metaphor for a big, developing news story: the arrest of Wikileaks' Julian Assange.

Regarding the black hole picture, it's impossible to see the black hole itself because of the mind-blowing forces which the core exerts to keep anything from escaping. But we can infer a lot by the accumulation of seethingly hot material circulating around that mysterious center and defining its edges.

And so it is with the case of Julian Assange's sudden arrest and forcible removal from the Ecuadoran embassy within 24 hours of Attorney General William Barr's announcement that he's actively investigating the circumstances behind the attempted coup (our words, not his) of President Donald Trump via falsified charges of Russian collusion...and subsequent spying on Trump's campaign by intelligence agencies closely aligned with Barack "Gotta Protect My Legacy" Obama, and Hillary "I Sold My Soul For The Presidency" Clinton.

We don't yet know what's at the impenetrably black center of all this, but it's certainly interesting to look at the white hot material that's now circulating around this nexus.

Key to the Russian collusion case is the idea that the Russians hacked DNC computers (for Trump's alleged benefit) and gave the embarrassing information to Wikileaks to hurt Hillary. But Assange knows where that information really came from...and he hasn't been shy about saying that it wasn't Russia. Rather, he's hinted that the DNC materials may have come from someone within the party itself. Perhaps someone like young DNC staffer Seth Rich, who was upset that Hillary essentially bought the entire DNC for the express purpose of taking Bernie Sanders (at the height of his popularity) out of the presidential race, and who may have shared information with Assange. Seth was subsequently shot to death on the street...with no signs of an altercation or robbery.

If Assange names Seth Rich as his source and provides evidence to prove it, all Hell is likely to break loose (which we're enthusiastically in favor of). Moreover, if it can be clearly shown that our intelligence agencies knew that the Russians weren't the source of the leaks, they'll have a pretty hard time explaining why they subsequently began spying on a presidential candidate (based on a clearly fictitious dossier funded by - surprise! - Hillary Clinton), as well as employing high-ranking agents who vowed that they'd make sure Trump either never won, or would never serve.

It's a very high-stakes game, and at the moment we don't know which team just grabbed Assange. Did Trump order a preemptive arrest to keep Assange safe and get his testimony? Or did the Deep State/Obama/Hillary cabal snatch Assange to silence him permanently (be watching for telltale press stories reporting Assange to be suffering from "serious health problems," so snuffing him will seem at least slightly less obvious to those who've never heard of Arkancide).

Like that Black Hole, we can't see what's at the center of all this yet. But our gut tells us that it's absolutely massive...and that a lot of political hacks are about to be sucked inexorably into a crushing maw of unimaginable force.

BONUS: STARR LITE...

Speaking of people whose unlikely and untimely deaths benefitted Hillary Clinton's political ambitions, we're now hearing that Independent Counsel Ken Starr, in his final report about the Clintons' Whitewater scandal, tastefully omitted his conclusion that Hillary Clinton drove her "friend," attorney Vince Foster, to suicide by ripping him to shreds in front of White House staff.

Starr says that he cut his conclusion from the report to spare Hillary the pain of having to deal with what her cruel actions had caused. And that's plausible, we guess.

Also plausible is that Ken Starr didn't want his own dead body found in the middle of a public park with no grass on the bottoms of his shoes, next to an empty briefcase which - after being searched multiple times - suddenly and spontaneously produced a typed suicide note, torn into easily reassembled pieces, but bearing no fingerprints. Nor would Starr want Hillary's staffers to duck under the police crime scene tape surrounding his office to steal boxes of files...all of which happened to Vince Foster.

Let's be really clear about something: Hillary Clinton never intended to win the 2016 presidential election fairly...and she sure as Shinola didn't intend to lose the election fairly. Her crimes are known, many, and so far unpunished. Here's hoping that changes soon.

AND FINALLY...

According to Representative Ilhan Omar, the ravingly anti-semitic Muslim congresswoman from Minnesota, the organization CAIR (the Council on American-Islamic Relations) "was founded after 9/11 because they recognized that some people did something and that all (Muslims) were starting to lose access to our civil liberties."

Some people did...something?!

Words fail us - and the most appropriate words aren't even fit to put on this page. Which is why we created the cartoon above to, hopefully, make our sentiments tastefully but abundantly clear.

Sucks to be Huge

Not that they'll be missed.

It is described as the ultimate void. A vast, dark vortex of emptiness with an unimaginably dense center from which nothing can escape.

We're talking, of course, about the mainstream news media - with whom we want nothing to do today. The Dems interrogating Barr, the Dems trying to get Trump's tax returns, top level turnover in various White House departments as our southern border fails, Alec Baldwin talking about running for President - oh, please!

But we do find it at least potentially interesting that a group of astronomers is promising today to reveal the first ever direct image of an actual black hole in space. Granted, we don't expect it to look like much of anything...but its shape could at least potentially change everything we think we know about physics and what we believe to be reality. Or...and we can't emphasize this strongly enough... it might just look like a boring hole.

Because seriously, how hard would it be to fake a photo of absolute nothingness in deep space? You could sneeze on the film of an old chest X-ray and probably pass off the results as the greatest astronomical discovery since the days of Copernicus (who invented the sneeze). Although actually, there could and should be some interesting stuff to see around the black hole, swirling down the ultimate drain and giving off wild bursts of light and energy as time, matter, and space are all condensed into infinitely hot meaninglessness.

Granted, Washington DC had already given us a pretty good idea of what a black hole looks like...

Nothing that goes in is ever seen again.

...but the image released today will probably be a lot less clear. In fact, we're expecting a fairly funky computerized image which will be accompanied by a much more detailed, colorful, and spectacular "artist's rendition" of the black hole. Something like this, perhaps...

True fact: the Event Horizon is defined by sparkling, iridescent drips of sugar glaze.

In the end, the "image reveal" may or may not prove to be interesting or educational. But we'll be tuning in anyway, because compared to everything else that's going on, #BlackHolesMatter.

PULSE-POUNDING UPDATE:

Tah-dah!!!! Okay, not that great a picture, but still genuinely interesting.

The Black New Deal

So, New York 14th District voters - how does it feel to pick a ninny?

Although we hate giving dimwits more time in the spotlight than they deserve, AOC has once again offered us too tempting a target to resist.

Specifically, she has entered the ranks of those political figures who suddenly lapse into a broad Amos & Andy dialect when talking to African-American audiences in order to seem more "black." Interestingly, this overtly racist affliction only seems to strike liberals, with notable victims including Hillary "Ain't No Ways Tarred" Clinton, Rachel "Of Course I'm Black, I Committed Welfare Fraud" Dolezal, and Barack "I Was Raised in a White Community by White Communists Who Fed Me Fluffernutter Sandwiches" Obama.

In this case, Ms. Occasionally-Colored was addressing a predominantly black audience when she was suddenly overcome by the urge to speak in a southern drawl seasoned with just a soupcon of Ebonics. Reacting to President Trump's dismissal of her as a "bartender," she defended her former (and future) profession by declaring "Ain't nothin' wrong wid dat!" while waving jazz hands.

She then further demonstrated her deep understanding of black culture by assuring them - still in Stepin Fetchit mode -  that there was nothing wrong with their holding jobs like "folding clothes for other people to buy," or "preparing the food that your neighbors will eat," or "driving busses." In fact, it seems like there "ain't nothin' wrong wid dat" about any kind of manual labor for black Americans, as long as they leave all the fancy thinkin' jobs to the progressive massahs in charge of the new plantation state.

Of course, part of that fancy thinkin' by the Leftists is to flood our country with so many illegal aliens that the humble, but thoroughly respectable, jobs she listed will be out of reach to those in black communities who were hoping to enter the job market and start climbing the economic ladder.

Still, if they vote the right way, there will always be a trickle of cash heading their way from Washington.

But there ain't nothin' right about it.

Casualty Friday

After "The Shining," their attempt to do standup comedy pretty much went nowhere.

Some days, the muse doesn't pay us a visit. Unsurprisingly, this usually happens on days in which the "news" is full of the same, meaningless pap that we're already sick of talking about. Case in point: the NY Times just published a 1500 word story which says "unnamed sources" may have been in contact with "unnamed members" of the Mueller investigation team who may have said that the full report is considerably rougher on Trump than the Barr summary indicates.

If that story deserves any response other than "blow it out your ass," we certainly can't think of it.

And that's pretty much our attitude toward every story that's currently trending, tweeting, or tub-thumping to grab our attention. Which is why we're filling space with roller coaster jokes and knee-slappers like these...

The longer you think about it, the truer it is.

Okay, stick a fork in us - we're done. But we encourage any and all volunteers to raise salient points from the news (or at least share some better jokes) in the comments section in hopes of keeping today from being a total loss!

Beating About the Bush

As much as we hate to do so, we're actually coming to "Groping Joe" Biden's defense today. Not because he isn't "handsy" and apt to inappropriately touch women, children, and even men, but because we haven't heard any accusations yet that really say he's anything worse than being annoyingly physical in his interpersonal dealings.

After all, some people are huggers, others aren't. Some kiss spontaneously, and some don't. Some press a woman's nipple and say "ding dong!" because it's fun to make doorbell jokes, while others deny being able to tell the genders apart. Who are we to judge?

Granted, we enjoy watching the Left eat their own, but we think there are far, far better reasons for tossing Uncle Joe out of the Presidential race than his shnorfling the back of women's necks. For instance, he's been in Washington DC since the Pleistocene era and yet has never been right about a single issue or foreign policy decision.

This is a man who recently attacked white people for being white. A man who tells black Americans that Wall Street wants to "put you back in chains." A man who believes the proper exercise of 2nd Amendment rights consists of running out onto your balcony at night and firing a shotgun in the air if you were startled awake by a dog's fart.

So it's not Joe Biden's grasping of campaign supporters that bothers us so much as his inability to grasp reality.

As bad as this was, it could have been worse if they were in a bowling alley.

BONUS: AVOCADO'S NUMBER...

Terror, quite possibly tequila-related, swept our nation recently when it was announced that if President Trump seals our southern border to stem the rising flood of illegal invaders, we could run out of avocados within three weeks.

Oh sure, there are plenty of other delicious things to dunk chips in, but do we really want to increase our dependence on France just to maintain a critical flow of French Onion dip? Do we really want fey millennials wearing pouty faces because they can't get avocado toast? Do we really want to wait a few weeks to enjoy American-grown avocados that were still picked by Mexicans?

Well, yes - we do!

And if the Dems don't like it, we suggest that they dip their Doritos in another pasty substance which comes from South of the Border. So to speak.

April Fools' Day 2018

As has become April 1st tradition here at Stilton's Place, we're sharing our predictions for a number of news stories which we expect to break before day's end. Enjoy!