The wisdom of the ages

We ignore folk wisdom at our peril.

For instance: I've always remembered Pop as saying that you shouldn't plant your garden until May 20th because of the danger of frost. Sam, on the other hand, has always claimed that Pop's edict was that you can plant anytime after Mother's Day. We've gone around about this for years; and for years Sam has maintained that I've been planting too late.

Like the slow drip. . . drip. . . drip of Chinese Water Torture, uh, Chinese Intensive Interrogation, Sam's constant negative feedback and Al Gore's incessant harping about global warming have weakened my allegiance to my own remembrance. So here I am on May 18th with all my carefully nurtured tomato and swiss chard and zucchini and cucumber plants already set out in the garden; and Linda mentioned this morning that they're predicting possible frost tonight.

Now, in a proper world, a mob of us peasants would rise up and go on a rampage with our shovels and rakes and hoes. We would put a dunce cap on Sam and equip him with a set of flimsy wings with which to stir the air over the tender tomato plants. And we would then storm off to capture Al Gore, the false Shaman, so as to render him down for fat to fuel smudge pots. The renderings from Al would fuel a lot of smudge pots and thus save a lot of crops.

But. . but. . . unfortunately we can't do those things, just yet. . . because the folly of the whole global warming hysteria has not yet become clear to enough of the population.

So instead we are reduced to reliance on our own singular efforts. In my own case I'm okay; because it happens that yesterday Linda replaced the living room drapes. The lining of the old drapes is a very thin material which will make perfect plant caps. You can bet that I'll be cursing later today as I go about tenting all the plants.

Meanwhile: in other news, Alec Baldwin has the Filipino segment of the great global multicultural community a tad upset. Alec was joking the other day about importing a Filipino mail order bride for breeding purposes; and it seems that Ramon Revilla, a senator in the Phillippines, was not amused. He threatened to open a big can of whup-ass on Alec.

For myself, I wasn't terribly offended by Alec's remarks about mail order brides because I'm not Filipino. But I was wondering how it is that Alec didn't get some negative feedback from the Gaia community for wanting more children, they being bad for the environment and all. And that got me to wondering how it is that Baldwin is still here in the United States. As I recall Alec was one of the lefty idiots who threatened to leave the country in the event George W. Bush was re-elected back in 2004. Why is Alec Baldwin still here in the U.S. spouting his racial hatred? Shouldn't he be, like overseas somewhere, like maybe in The Phillippines?

And another thing. How is it that President Barack Obama's continuance of George W. Bush's evil war in Iraq has not caused lefties like Alec Baldwin to go ballistic? Back before the recent election I distinctly recall being reminded that the war in Iraq was evil and that it was moreover causing terrible problems because it was costing $8 Billion per month.

Well, here we are, well into President Barack Obama's new Hope and Change regime, and Barry has found time to spend like many trillions of dollars on Hopey Changey stuff; but somehow he hasn't found time to end the war in Iraq, which was just funded by Obama's Democratic Party controlled congress for another eight months at the rate of, uh, $8 Billion per month. Surely the left still cares about that $8 Billion per month.

And surely President Obama wasn't lying back during the campaign when he constantly promised to end the war in Iraq and do a whole bunch of other Hopey Changey stuff like close the evil and illegal prison down in Guantanamo Bay where President Bush put all those misunderstood sons of liberty who our military captured in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Thinking about President Obama has me remembering some old wisdom of Aunt Mary R's. During virtually any discussion of politicians she would remind you that "they're all whoremasters." She couldn't get away with saying that today of course because calling Barack Obama a whoremaster, or criticizing him in any way, would quickly be denounced as racism by the baying leftist pack, he being half Kenyan and all.

If President Obama was half Filipino, apparently, anybody could go on national TV like Alec Baldwin and joke about buying one of his daughters with a credit card on EBay and having her shipped to his home for breeding, and none of the politically correct crowd of race hustlers would turn a hair.

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D988KQ001&show_article=1

Update: In other news, our pal Alec Baldwin has suddenly discovered that he hates Detroit cars and wants to see U.S. auto workers out of work after shilling for Chevy Tahoes for years. And he goes on and on about global warming despite the fact that he wants to wants to buy and import a Filipino to make another carbon spewing offspring. Do the United Auto Workers Union and the National Organization for Women know about this guy?

http://planetgore.nationalreview.com/post/?q=MmU4YzVlYWExNzMxOTU2NDlhMDA2MjgyM2FjMTg5ZGM=

Hat Tip to Greg Pollowitz, of National Review's blog Planet Gore, who evidently has a strong enough stomach to keep a closer eye on Alec Baldwin than I do.

And now for a little political incorrectness

Commenter Diane at Commentary Magazine's blog just did the best job I've seen of capturing the reason behind a phenomenon that outrages me - namely the blithe way the news media has attacked Sarah Palin in a way it would never attack a member of any other racial or ethnic group.

Here's a thought to enrage you Barack Obama fans. Sarah Palin is more qualified than Barrack Obama to be President of the United States, at least by demonstrated experience. Barry is better educated, and he's probably smarter; but Sarah has at least done something that looks like governing for a few years. Going by actual experience governing, Barry is a smooth mouth, a talking head. He's all hat and no cattle. He's an empty suit. Even he puts forward nothing but his running of his own campaign as his main executive qualification to run the country. And if you believe he runs his own campaign in detail, or even on an executive level, you must also believe that Kermit the Frog has a third arm and hand tucked up his own back passage to make him move.

But enough of me - here is Diane, the commenter who so aptly captured the reason so many so called elite folks feel free to trash Sarah Palin while they act like Barack Obama is the second coming of Franklin D. Roosevelt - who was a not too bright governor like Palin when he was elected president, by the way.

Diane Says: October 22nd, 2008 at 3:36 PM
I’d like to get something off my chest re: the hypocrisy of the Left’s attacks of Sarah Palin. I contend that it is a stunning piece of overt reverse racism.
We’re told she isn’t smart enough. Doesn’t have the right college degree. Imagine for a moment if Sarah Palin were a Native American. Everything else about her is the same — hunting, snowmobiling, religious, self-made freshman governor. Would we be hearing the liberal establishment deriding her non-Ivy education, her funny accent, her folksy word-choices? Her family’s size or her children’s morals? Her parenting skills? No, we wouldn’t. Because as a Native American, she would be the long-suffering victim of oppression. Her having risen above it would be a tale of triumph. Her hunting and religious views (let’s say she was an animist who prayed to ancient spirits in a sweat lodge) would be accorded the dignity of a fine and noble cultural heritage.
Cast her in any other ehtnic minority — Hispanic, black –– and the test yields the same results.
We don’t scoff at Thurgood Marshall attending Howard University law school. It was a miracle, we are told, given the advanced state of white oppression, that he attended law school at all. Look at Bolivian president Evo Morales, the high-school drop out, former bricklayer, baker and llama sherpherd whose peculiar Catholic faith included making alcohol and coca offerings to the earth goddess, Pachamama. But because he is a full-blooded indigenous Amerind, none of this disqualifies him in any way from political leadership.
This amounts to a form of political affirmative action. White politicians who aren’t elites are subject to vicious stereotyping and condescension. Non-whites who aren’t elite get a pass, indeed a pat on the back for not kowtowing to “the man.” And minorities who are elites — like Obama — get the double-advantage of full acceptance by elites and massive affirmative-action bonus points for their so-called disadvantaged origins.

Me again - Diane's comment was in response to a post by Abe Greenwald about Christopher Hitchen's blind spot re religion. An interesting post and comment thread if you're into such things.

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/blogs/index.php/greenwald/39671