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I’m sure that many of you have been involved in a family pool or a work pool where everyone puts in a buck to pick the date that Marylou will deliver her baby. In addition, will it be a boy or a girl? What will his/her name be? Etc. Unfortunately Marylou is not pregnant or at least we do not think she is pregnant and we are all looking for something else to occupy our time . . .  I propose a new two part pool that will be open to the entire country. It won’t even matter whether or not you know Marylou!

Part 1:

On what day and at what time will Joe Biden officially drop out (“chicken out”) of the first presidential debate. For those of you who might not be aware, this first debate is scheduled for September 29. (At present the Trump team is trying to schedule a fourth earlier debate because in some states the absentee  voting is opening well before September 29. The Biden team is not going along with this attempt to schedule another debate . . . no surprise here!) Anyway I propose that entries be accepted in this “Biden Cancellation Date” pool through midnight Labor Day, Sept. 7th. 

I further propose that half of the entry fee money be donated to a charity, and when Sleepy Joe cancels, Mr. Trump will then be able to pick the charity . . . after all he has much more experience in donating to charities as he has donated all of his salary to a good cause for the last almost four years. I realize that there are those who will argue Biden should choose where the money should go as his plans include giving away a lot of our money if he is elected.

Part 2:

The second part of this “when will Marylou deliver” type of pool will be much more difficult  as it will involve predicting the reason that Biden will cancel. So far the leading entries in this category include the mundane, such as laryngitis, in quarantine because of possible Covid, the New YorkTimes said so ( there have already been pleas from the NYT for Joe to not debate Trump!)

Personally, I think that his excuse will involve something much more creative . . .  perhaps it will be somehow tied in to children not being in school, or the wearing of masks indoors.

FYI: At this point the Vegas odds of Biden backing out of the first debate of the first debate are 3:1 against, but the recent influx of betting money has lowered these odds from 4:1. My advise is to get your money down now before the big money from California, New York, and Illinois comes pouring into Vegas. . . rumor is that these bettors expect and fervently hope that he cancels.

Hopefully as time goes on more and more people are becoming aware that BLM is against the traditional family as it is stated in its manifesto. A few questions here:

Is the dissolution of the traditional two parent family happening? 

Is it a good thing?

Is BLM actually on to something?

First; Is there an ongoing dissolution of the traditional two parent American family. Stats from a recent piece by Star Parker answers that question…”Yes.”

In the 1960s, less than 1% of couples living together were not married. Today, it is over 12%.

And the percentage of births to unmarried women has risen from 5% in 1960 to 40% in 2018.

In 1970, 85% of children lived with two parents. By 2019, this was down to 70%.

In order to have a typical traditional family there has to be both a man and a woman. (Note that I did say traditional.) Therefore it stands to reason that if women are not getting married in the same numbers that the number of marriages will go down. Is this happening?

Again these stats are from Star Parker:

In 1962, 71% of women ages 15-44 were married. By 2019, this was down to 42%.

In 1962, 5% of women ages 30-34 had never been married. By 2019, this was up to 35%.

The reasons for this are multifactorial (less religion, easy welfare, better job opportunities, etc.), but it is a fact that less women are marrying.

Is the decreasing number of two parent families a good thing or a bad thing? To me the simple answer is that it depends . . . It depends on whether or not children are involved.

The percentage of births to unmarried women has risen from 5% in 1960 to 40% in 2018.

In 1970, 85% of children lived with two parents. By 2019, this was down to 70%.

Yeah! So what? Does having one or two parents make any real difference?

For those whose concerns are more secular, the collapse of marriage is of concern because its practical results are negative. The statistics comparing how children do from a single parent family compared to those from a two parent family are dramatic . . . err, better said “DRAMATIC!!” … those from a two parent family are impressively better in a number of categories – less drug addiction, less likely to go to prison, more likely to be able to earn a decent living, etc.

After reading all of the above stats can anyone explain to me how BLM is supposed to help black people? To me it appears that the tenets of BLM are antithetical to the success of black youth. 

In that same Star Parker piece I read something that I had read before but is worth repeating again and again.

“There is the oft-quoted observation of Brookings Institution scholar Ron Haskins that American adults who follow three rules — finish high school, get a full-time job, and wait until at least age 21 to get married and have children —  have a 2% chance of being poor and a 75% chance of being a middle-class wage earner.”

This should be posted in every school throughout the nation.

Perhaps BLM should incorporate these three things into its manifesto … but only if it is really interested in making black lives matter.

BTW: Star Parker is black.

Somerville is a town in Massachusetts adjacent to Cambridge (Harvard) and very close to Watertown, where Tsarnaev, the Boston Marathon bomber, was captured in 2013. In Somerville, the fire department apparently had the audacity to place a thin blue line American flag on the back of a fire truck. Well, as would be expected  on 8/1/20, a Karen did not like it that the Fire Department was showing support for the Police Department. (Actually “Karen” was “becca defund the police@farm_witch” on Twitter . . . with no accompanying picture!) Predictably Karen tweeted the mayor of Somerville, Joseph A. Curtatone basically to let him know that she did not approve.

On 8/2/20 @JoeCurtatone  promptly acted like the gutless man that he apparently is, and responded:

“Flags are off the trucks. They were not authorized to be there. Looking in to how they got there. Sincerely hope the people who did this realize did not realize how hurtful it would be to people in our community.”

Perhaps, a more reasonable response from someone who is not a leftist weakling could have been  . . . “Will look into it.”

For those of us not familiar with the thin blue line, I googled it . . .

The thin blue line represents the thin line Police Officers walk daily between life and death. ~The thin blue linerepresents the police officer role of separating the good from the bad while creating order from chaos.

My question, “Who is the coward here?”

Certainly Joseph Curtatone is a coward and a lefty. Whether the thin blue line flag was authorized or not, his response to Karen showed that he was a “Mr. Karen.” My response to yellow Joe: 

“Put on your big-boys pants, Joe. Immediately caving to “becca defund the police” clearly demonstrates why you should not be in any position of authority.”

In addition, “becca defund the police” is also a coward. He/she apparently does not have the chutzpah to put her real name on the twitter account that also has no picture. 

It is interesting that apparently Somerville has a BLM flag flying above city hall.

I did not see a twitter complaint from anybody about that flag, which makes me wonder if anybody in Somerville has a backbone or a right hand . . clearly the mayor doesn’t!

I do not have a Twitter account, but if I did . . . !

BTW: Does anybody know the proper term for a “Mr. Karen?”

What goes into picking a VP running mate for a Presidential election? Obviously, multiple things – enough so that a candidate now apparently must have committee make the decision. While I am sure that Trump had a committee of sorts in 2016 before he chose Pence as his running mate,  no reasonable person could doubt that it was Donald Trump who made the final decision. This year with Joe Biden, who will make the final decision? On paper, the answer is Joe Biden, but everyone is aware that it is very unlikely that Sleepy Joe will actually make this decision . . . or for that matter will independently make any decision in the near future.

The fact that months ago Basement Joe said that he was going to choose a female as his running mate tells it all. To my way of thinking, this “my VP choice will be a woman” tells a lot about Biden’s campaign strategy . . . It’s dumb! If he had it set in his mind that he truly wanted a female running mate, why announce that months ago? The fact that he has announced that his choice will be a female means that he has already potentially eliminated about fifty percent of potential candidates(i.e. he has eliminated all males). It would seem to me that his choice would have more standing with the public, if in the end he could say that he chose the best candidate, and not merely the best woman.

Let’s be clear, for the good of the country, I want Joe to lose to Trump. However, just for the sake of discussion, from the viewpoint of the independent voter who would be Biden’s best choice.

Let’ first consider which state the VP choice is from. Should she be able to guarantee that her home state will turn out and vote for Biden?

Kamala Harris and Karen Bass are both from California and California will vote for Biden even if Minnie Mouse were his BP choice. So no added benefit here. Susan Rice teaches at American University and so probably lives in D.C. No added benefit here. Elizabeth Warren is from Massachusetts, no again no added benefit here.

Baggage? Which VP candidate has the most baggage? 

Rice: Benghazi

Bass: Castro, Cuba

Warren: Pocahontas! Need I say more?

Harris: no real baggage except perhaps her past life as a ? mistress ofWillie  Brown (hearsay, innuendo!); however, she was a prosecutor, and this is  not a  good thing from the perspective of the Democrat’s base.

I could go on here, but truthfully I am getting exhausted trying to find good things to say about his potential pick. The fact that this is about a bunch of second-stringers tells it all! I believe that none of them have the cojones or the qualifications to be President, and since the present Las Vegas odds on Biden completing one full term are presently 3:2 . . . HELP!

The best I can hope for now is that the three also-rans VP contenders will get p.o.-ed when Miss Summer-Fall-Winer-Spring has finally been chosen.

In a weak attempt to expand the language capability of my readers, “Hur mår du” is Swedish for “how are you” and in order to see how Sweden is doing, it is time for my monthly Swedish coronavirus update.

To review:

Instead of tight lockdowns, Swedish officials encouraged citizens to use common sense, work from home if possible, and not gather in crowds over 50. Primary schools … open!  bars and restaurants … open!  with people enjoying drinks and crowding streets. Their aim is to slow the pace of the virus, so as not to overwhelm the health care system.

At this point I want to emphasize that they did not close primary schools. I guess Sweden does not have a power-hungry political teachers union, and perhaps Sweden just cares more about educating its young students.

Here are a few of the latest stats from Sweden:

Total cases – 80442

Total deaths – 5743

In June when there was a significant increase in testing, there was a sharp rise in the number of cases to greater than 1000 per day on more than half of the June days. However, in July the number of new cases dropped to <500 (still increased testing) in the second half of the month, and in July the number of ICU admits and the number of deaths are way down. This seems like there could be a glitch somewhere. Why are the number of cases going up, while the deaths and ICU admits are impressively lower? 

To me there can be only two possible answers. Either the increased testing is now picking up a lot of asymptomatic individuals, or the increased testing is identifying a greater number of individuals that are in an age range that does quite well with Covid.

The  age group of 70 and above had 89% of all of the deaths in Sweden. (Yes, you heard me right!) The age group 50-70 had 9.6% of all of the deaths in Sweden. Moreover, one of the reasons for the relatively high percentage of the deaths in the 70+age group is the extremely low numbers of deaths in the <50 age group. In this younger and younger-middle age group there were only 71 deaths (1.24% of all coronavirus deaths in Sweden). Of course, all deaths are tragic, but the bottom line is that very few young people (<50 y/o) died from Covid in Sweden.

From Reuters (7/15/20):

A recent report showed that severe cases of COVID-19 were very rare among both Swedish and Finnish children aged 1 to 19, with no deaths reported. A comparison of the incidence of COVID-19 in different professions suggested no increased risk for teachers.

As other countries face renewed outbreaks, Sweden’s latest Covid-19 figures suggest it’s rapidly bringing the virus under control.

“That Sweden has come down to these levels is very promising,” state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell told reporters in Stockholm on 7/28/20.

He also broached the subject of face masks, which the World Health Organization recommends people use when social distancing isn’t possible.

“With numbers diminishing very quickly in Sweden, we see no point in wearing a face mask in Sweden, not even on public transport,” he said.

So in conclusion like a football team, Sweden stuck to its original game plan even though early on it appeared that the game plan was not working. However like in a football game the final score is not the score at the end of the first quarter, but at the end of the fourth quarter. In summary, Sweden’s plan amounted to social distancing andcommon sense, which California does not seem to have, especially when it comes to school children and sending them back to school for in-person learning.

Adjö

Var försiktig

What exactly is history?

The first definition in the dictionary is “a branch of knowledge dealing with past events.” That seems pretty straightforward to me.

The second dictionary definition  is “a continuous, systematic narrative of past events as relating to a particular people, country, period, person, etc., usually written as a chronological account.” Again that seems pretty straightforward to me.

Both definitions include “past events.” This term seems self-explanatory . . . things that have occurred in the past.

However, apparently in Illinois, history can have a different meaning . . . a “woke” meaning. 

“Leaders“ in education, politics and other areas gathered in suburban Evanston Sunday, 8/2/20, to ask that the Illinois State Board of Education change the history curriculum at schools statewide, and temporarily halt instruction until an alternative is decided upon.

At a news conference, State Rep. LaShawn K. Ford said current history teachings lead to a racist society and overlook the contributions of women and minorities.

Another “woke” idea! . . . “change the history curriculum at schools statewide.” Why limit this to just one state? Perhaps if history is going to be rewritten, why restrict it? After all if someone were to relocate from one state to another while still in school, would he/she have to retake history in order to learn the “other history”?

This is undoubtedly not the last brilliant “woke” idea. Perhaps next we should consider changing Geography. After all if LaShawn junior can’t remember where France is . . . then let’s just change it’s location!

Or perhaps we should change Math. After all if LaShawn junior can’t seem to get that 6×4=24 . . .then let’s just change that answer!

The possibilities for changes in education are endless if we would all just “woke” up!

It’s Sunday night and it’s been another violent weekend in Chicago, and it’s not over yet. I’ve checked the Chicago stats multiple times during the day today, and each time I look the numbers are higher, and i kept reminding myself that “it’s not over yet!”

Thus far according to CBS Chicago the death toll is 17 with 32 wounded. 

Those killed included:

-a 9y/o boy who was playing outside his home

-a 10y/o girl who was hit by a stray bullet while sitting in her home. 

-a 1y/o who was riding in a car

Help me here! What we seem to have is chaos, and a mayor, Lori Lightfoot, who refuses outside help. The shooting victims this weekend in Chicago are black . . . not predominately black, but overwhelmingly, and perhaps 100% black. The mayor herself is black. What does she say to the mothers of the 9 year old, the 10 year old, and the 1 year old? Can Mayor Lightfoot say, “I did the best I could.”?

Obviously not, and it’s not over yet! 

8/2/20

10p.m in Chicago

Usually the front page of my local “newspaper” emphasizes only bad news For example, the latest Covid stats, with an emphasis on how many have died, or the bad unemployment numbers, etc.

However today there was a side column on the front page whose headline that brought a smile to my face not only when I first read it in the morning but also for the remainder of the day whenever I again thought about it.

First a little background:

From January, 1915 until January, 1917, Balboa Park in San Diego was the host for the Panama California Exposition, which basically was meant to celebrate the completion of the Panama Canal. A central exhibit of the exposition, “The Story of Man through the Ages”, was assembled under the direction of noted archaeologist Dr. Edgar Lee Hewett of the School of American Archaeology. After the Exposition closed a group of citizens led by George Marston formed the San Diego Museum Association to retain the collection and convert it into a permanent museum, with Dr. Hewett as the first director. The name was changed to “Museum of Man” in 1942 to emphasize the museum’s concentration on anthropology. Since I have lived here the Museum of Man has been a truly iconic museum in San Diego . . . until now … as the Museum of Man is now the “Museum of Us!”

Apparently for some “woke” reason, a group of goody-two-shoes has decided to put the kibosh not only on the history of the museum, and its focus on anthropology, but also on the meaning of the word “man.”

I suspect that the “board of trustees” of the now “Museum of Us” were educated in the now woke public school system, as apparently they are not aware that a single word, in this case “man,” can actually have more than one meaning. (I can almost hear the so called “board of trustees” responding, “Really? We didn’t know that!”)

The following are the definitions for the word … man:

1. an adult male person, as distinguished from a boy or a woman. 

   2. a member of the species Homo sapiens or all the members of this species collectively, without regard to sex: prehistoric man.

   3. the human individual as representing the species, without reference to sex;  the human race; humankind: Man hopes for peace, but prepares for war.

   4. a human being; person: to give a man a chance; When the audience  smelled the smoke, it was every man for himself.

It appears to me that the “board of trustees” was convinced by the “we are sooo correct” group that there could only be one meaning for the word, “man.”

Perhaps the next time I am in Balboa Park, I will go over to the Museum of Us . . . No, not to go inside, but rather to give the “bored” a dictionary. I doubt that I will ever be going inside again!

BTW: The rumor is that next this group will next be arguing to change some of the wording in the Bible, such that “ the food miraculously supplied to the Israelites in the wilderness. Ex. 16:14–36 will henceforth be called . . . “Us-na!”

Yes, this is an Aretha Franklin song from the 1970s that I think has particular relevance today. To my way of thinking I think that this word is not in the vernacular of a lot of the youth of today. One might ask why? 

Could it be that this is the fault of the schools? Absolutely! In a lot of the public schools of today, ‘Respect’ is neither taught or learned, as teachers have little motivation to demand respect (actually, they cannot demand respect from the students in today’s world), and students have little incentive to show respect.for most teachers . . . Why should they?

Could it be that this is the fault of the parents? Again absolutely. For the most part, the parents of today do not demand respect from their kids. Why is that? To me the answer is multifactorial . . . too busy, demanding respect is not P.C., single parents are often afraid to demand respect as if they do, they risk losing any control over the child. 

However for whatever reason this lack of respect has filtered down into our society.

Them: “The hell with what you think. You must think my way. I have no respect whatsoever for your thoughts on the matter. It’s my way or the highway . . . actually that’s not true . . . there is no highway. It’s my way!”

For instance, one might think that a statue of Columbus is a reminder of an historical part of our culture. 

Them: “Too bad for you and those that think like you. You are old-fashioned, old man! I don’t like that statue of Columbus, and so it is coming down. I do not respect your opinion on this matter . . . F-you!” 

To that one might respond, “Perhaps we should talk this over, and allow the majority decide what to do, if anything,with that statue.”

Them: “No!”

I could go on with other examples . . . For instance, Confederate names on Army bases. Rather than allowing the woke crowd of the young disrespecters  to unilaterally decide, perhaps we as a country should discuss this issue.

Them: “No, we are right, and again there is no highway!”

Major League Baseball is apparently in discussions about whether to scrap the entire season. After a few pics of players kneeling during the National Anthem, my answer as to whether MLB is going to continue its season is . . . “I don’t care!” I was raised as a White Sox fan, but, even as I got older, I was only rarely able to go to the White Sox games because Comiskey Park, where the White Sox played, was on the South Side of Chicago, which was too dangerous even back then. However the final straw came when B.O. jumped on the White Sox bandwagon. At that point, I jumped off. I suppose that you could refer to me as a ‘fair-weather fan,’ but Chicago rarely has fair weather.

The NBA season? Don’t know, and don’t care. LeBron James can spread his liberal spiel, but not on my TV set. At the first NBA game on 7/30/20 everybody took a knee during the national anthem. Everybody included players, coaches, and refs! No, I did not watch that game . .. oops! Darn!

Which brings us to the NFL. Really, the only real question is whether to give the NFL a chance . . . either tune them in until the first National Anthem kneel-down, or just assume that the kneel-downs will be occurring right from the git-go, and never turn on the NFL games in the first place. As of now the oddsmaker’s line is 3:2 on favor of ‘never turning them on.

Personally, I hope that both MLB and the NFL cancel their seasons, and then my protest will be silent. However as a consequence of no pro-sports, ESPN might go belly-up. Unlikely . . . yes, but one can always hope.