Allah Provides

In a shocking example of nobilis oblige, Gisele Bundchen, the world's top supermodel and wife of football star Tom Brady, has used a full-body and face burqa to enter and leave France unrecognized in order to get a little nip and tuck on her chi-chi persona. And France is not happy about this deception ... see: New York Post Page Six Story ... since such full-body and face cover-ups are now illegal in France.

It takes a certain type of cynical haughtiness for this multi-millionaire twit to hide behind such a Muslim costume ... one often used by suicide bombers ... to stay incognito in Paris, a city where such drastic dress now produces much public angst.

Feet of Clay

John Hinderaker of the Powerline blog points out that in a recent CNN interview, Donald Trump's thoughts on immigration have gone through a bit of a metamorphosis and that he is now sounding very much like the Democrat that he has been most of his life ... see: Trump Goes Soft on Immigration. Has the stalwart Trump suddenly gotten feet of clay? In particular please, dear reader, explain how Trump's following stream-of-conscious quotes from this interview sound any different from what Senator Chuck Schumer or Jeb Bush might spout:

Then we have a law, right? You’re supposed to come in legally. I would get people out, and I would have an expedited way of getting them back into the country so they can be legal ... We have to bring great people into this country, okay? And I want to bring — I love the idea of immigration, but it’s got to be legal immigration. Now, a lot of these people are helping us, whether it’s the grapes, or whether it’s jobs, and sometimes it’s jobs, in all fairness, I love our country, but sometimes it’s jobs that a citizen of the United States doesn’t want to do. I mean, there are jobs that a lot of people don’t want to do ... We’re going to something. I’ve been giving it so much thought, you know you have a — on a humanitarian basis, you have a lot of deep thought going into this, believe me. I actually have a big heart. … I mean, a lot of people don’t understand that, but the DREAMers, it’s a tough situation, we’re going to do something, and one of the things we’re going to do is expedite — when somebody’s terrific, we want them back here, but they have to be legally –.

Is Trump getting squishy and back-peddling on his previous diatribe against illegal Mexican criminal immigrants? Perhaps as with most controversies, The Donald likes to stake claims on both sides of the issue. And he says he is not a politician ...

reddit Gallery CCCXVI -- NSFW

Not suitable for work. Another excursion into the world of reddit Pictures. See: reddit Pics for sources.  Do yourself a favor and click on pictures to enlarge them.  Enjoy!

Sensuality in Clay - Benjamin Victor

Patriot

Boys Will Be Boys

Tron

Liz Olsen in Paris

Income Inequality

In what industry do women earn much more money than men? Not surprisingly, it is the pornography industry ... see: Daily Mail Story. I suppose this has something to do with naked women having more commercial appeal than naked men. This article also points out that many of the actors in this medium, who perform as male homosexuals, are surprisingly heterosexuals. I have never ventured into this male-only cinema genre, but I have suspected that this is indeed the case with "gay" females ... not that there is anything wrong with that.

Can we also extrapolate this income differential into the high-fashion modeling business?  I suspect that this is also true. The top female model, Gisele Bundchen, certainly makes a pile more lucre than even her famous sports-star husband, Tom Brady ... see: ESPN Story. So, can we then say that income inequality is "relative?"

And there are at least 15 other industry sectors where women out-earn men ... see: Forbes Article. Can we now expect Mika Brzezinski to modify her periodic Morning Joe mouth-foaming rants against income inequality? I kinda doubt it ... for I suspect this has more to do with what Joe Scarborough earns next to what she makes.

Topsy-Turvy

I am once again befuddled by our topsy-turvy popular culture. Jimmy Kimmel sheds an on-air tear because a lion I never heard of was shot and killed by a bow and arrow and the nimrod who took this hunting trophy is now receiving death threats ... see: Hollywood Reporter Story. Yet ISIS, Boko Haram and other radicalized Muslim organizations are enslaving and brutally murdering thousands of innocent humans each week and the national media (including Jimmy Kimmel) has devolved into a ho-hum mindset ... see: Question.

Not that I don't care about this particular lord of the jungle's demise ... but, come on people, there are clearly priorities in how seriously we should lament over world events ... and, as noble Cecil the Lion was, his death is still way down my list of caring priorities.

Afterward: I have also noticed that other bloggers and talk show hosts are contrasting this lion's killing with the main-stream media indifference shown to the numerous murders inside the United States committed by illegal immigrants ... or any of the myriad of innocent lives terminated by Planned Parenthood in the process of harvesting their tiny organs.

Comparing Notes

Bill Clinton and Bill Cosby

Then I told her, " You better put some ice on that ..."

Bold-Faced

In keeping with a trend of doctored government statistics, it seems no accident that most NOAA's climatologists are located in Boulder, CO ... for this U.S. government agency has perpetuated a gigantic bold-faced fraud on the American people ... adjusting down past temperature data to make it appear that the United States is warming up when, in fact, it is in a long-term cooling cycle. To understand the extent of this ruse, pay particular attention to the charts in this article: Real Science Story.

I have in the past written about this data slight-of-hand on the part of these NOAA scientists anxious to keep their lucrative sinecures ... even at the expense of the truth ... see: Global Smarming and The Heavy Hand of Government. But these latest revelations are far more extensive and damning than older discovered "adjustments."

I am truly aghast at how self-serving and mendacious these government scientists have become. Perhaps we might perform equivalent downward adjustments on their salaries, pensions and bonuses?

Afterward: See also Daily Mail article: 5,000 Hacked E-mails/

People I Could Do Without

Mitch McConnell

Flo

The Donald

Linda Dunham

Debbie Wasserman-Shultz

Vladimir Putin

Adam Sandler

Pope Francis

Ayatollah Khamenei

Rush Limbaugh

Question

The following headline is on the cover of this Sunday's New York Times Magazine: "Christians in the Middle East are being forced out of their homes, enslaved and killed. Why is no one coming to their aid?" (See: New York Times Story.)

Obvious answer: Because Pope Francis, President Obama, and much of the rest of the Christian world all seem to be preoccupied with global warming, income inequality, and the evils of war.

When They Were Young #8

The following early-life pictures come to you courtesy of reddit/Pics. Enjoy!

Rachel Maddow

Mel Brooks

Julie Andrews

Martha Stewart

Newt Gingrich

Obama

In Kenya ... are they trying to imply something?

reddit Gallery CCCXV

Another excursion into the world of reddit Pictures. See: reddit Pics for sources.  Do yourself a favor and click on pictures to enlarge them. Enjoy!

Carved Watermellon

Lapis Lazuli

Foggy Morning

American Agribusiness

Increasing the Minimum Wage

Price Controls

The Chinese government is effectively manipulating the Shanghai stock market (reducing supply and increasing demand). It has restricted trading in certain stocks (reducing supply), outlawed short selling (reducing supply), told certain large investors that they couldn't sell certain stocks for five years (reducing supply), encouraged government-owned banks and insurance companies to step into the market to bolster stocks (increasing demand), reduced margin interest rates (increasing demand), etc. The result is that the recent free-fall in the Shanghai market has been arrested ... see below:.

Is this a good thing? Somehow I doubt it, because history has repeatedly shown that government "price controls" never work. However this Chinese government market interference differs from past price controls in that it is encouraging price increases, not discouraging them. One might also point to our Federal Reserve Bank insofar as its actions over the last seven years have clearly done effectively the same thing ... flooding our economy with liquidity and holding interest rates at near zero. So maybe China is just learning from our experience ... only taking it four steps further.

My spider senses tell me that this type of inverted price controls by a government will also not work, but that they take a longer time to fail ... and the cathartic consequences may be far more devastating. 

New economic theory and history is now being written.

More Outrage

Cultivating outrage is likely another part of President Obama's cynical strategy to transform America ... so now we have been served up another packaged outrage ... the nuclear agreement that "Christmas in Cambodia" Kerry negotiated with the Iranians has a obscure clause that states that the United States will protect Iranian nuclear sites from sabotage or attack by any foreign power, e.g., Israel or even possibly Saudi Arabia (if it only had the guts) ... see: The Gateway Pundit Story.

In the past it was reported that Obama had stopped Israel from an attack against Iran ... see: The Daily Mail Article ... a revelation that was hotly denied by the administration. Now, it seems likely that, because of this obscure clause, this past outrage against Israel probably was true. How perfidious can Obama be?

This blog contains but a few weak words in an Internet full of trillions of bold news and opinion words ... so it is very unlikely that it's opinion will mean but a fart in a hurricane in the course of human events. But if and most likely when the real ramifications of this administration's Iranian subterfuge becomes clear as a result of future events ... I hope and pray that history gives our current mocking martinet in the White House his realistic due ... and remembers him as the traitor to American core values he most certainly is.

Where To Invest?

Where does someone stash one's investment funds these days? The choices are becoming very meager for the ordinary investor. Consider the following:

Income Stocks: The prospect of increased interest rates being pushed by the Federal Reserve Bank for this Fall has cast a pall over most income stocks ... particularly utilities. However, seeing that interest rate increases are likely to be small and stretched out, this might suggest that the weakness in these income stocks just might be overdone.

Growth Stocks: Growth stocks have been hot of late as money has been leaving income stocks ... that is until the latest slips by Apple and Microsoft. The stratospheric price-earnings ratios of many of these tech and bio-science companies offer considerable risk for the casual investor.

Government Bonds: Theoretically U.S. Government bonds are a safe investment ... however to earn 2.3% per year on you money for ten years is a pretty meager return ... particularly if one may not get a full return of one's capital if one has the sell this investment before its maturity date.

Municipal Bonds: Federal and often state and local tax free, these securities might be interesting under a Democrat presidential win ... since taxes are likely to go up. However, this may be more than offset by the dangers associated with increasing municipal bankruptcies.

Corporate Bonds: High-yield corporate bonds have been suffering the same fate as high-yield equities ... however, the time may be right for certain convertible debt securities ... but do your research!

Fine Art and Antiques: I believe that the only people who make money in these markets are well-connected dealers.

Gold (and Other Commodities): Gold and most other commodities are now at or near their five-year lows. The excuse given is the strength of the dollar. However I believe other forces are also at work ... including possible hedge fund manipulations of these markets ... and, as they say, you can't eat gold.

Developing Nations: A few years ago developing nations' markets were the place to be. Now, Russia and Brazil ... and more recently China have greatly disappointed.

Savings Accounts: Paying usually well less than 1%, savings accounts should only be used for ready liquidity ... certainly not for income.

Real Estate: The median price of homes in the United States just hit an all-time high  ... primarily due to lack of inventory ... and such prices, insiders say, are not sustainable ... particularly if mortgage rates climb back to more normal levels.

Your Mattress: Gets kinda lumpy.

So, in conclusion, there are not a lot of viable choices ... and I am as befuddled as the next investor ...

A Headache or an Upset Stomach

If Donald Trump becomes president does anyone not believe that he will engage in self dealing on a massive scale? And the same can be said for Hillary Clinton ... with all those greedy mouths to feed at the Clinton Foundation. So, if these two poll leaders are their party's nominees next year, the American voters will have to choose between a headache and an upset stomach.

Choice Cuts

Planned Parenthood is showing itself to be a despicable organization ... claiming that they are in the business of providing "women's health" when it really is primarily in the abortion business ... providing over 300,000 of these taxpayer-funded "procedures" a year ... see: Whipping Our Teens into Shape. Not only does it kill these often fully-formed fetuses, but it also now sells the body parts of these fresh corpses for big money.... an illegal business. This is gut-churning reprehensible behavior  ... see: CNN Appology Video and Breitbart Video.

The abortion trade has hidden behind the euphemism of a "choice" for women ... a choice between being "punished with a baby" (President Obama's words) and fulfilling what women's bodies where designed by evolution to accomplish. Now, due to Margaret Sanger's vision for a purer race ... combined with the insidious loopiness of the 1960's radical feminist movement ... vowing to deny a woman's biology, we now have an epidemic of infanticide ... which has further devolved into cutting up the fetal-tissue results of this grisly process in order to sell these tiny organs to get enough pelf to buy an abortion doctor her new Lamborghini.

How very like what we fought against in World War II.

The Grasshoppers

I know that John Hinderaker is generally my go-to guy at the Powerline blog, but Paul Mirengoff has a very pity entry on the debt debacle in Greece ... see: Greek Farce Explained. In this posting, Paul quotes a lot of the inside skinny about how the Greek poobahs misplayed their hands at the financing negotiations with the rest of the European Economic Community (EEC). Talk about the JV playing against the L.A. Lakers. This arrogant bunch of lefties from Athens carried with them there the grasshopper's attitude that the world owed them a living. They may have learned a very hard lesson ... which I don't think is over yet.

I myself have a few comments on these Mirengoff revelations:

- How can Finland be made to adsorb such of heavy burden of this Greek indebtedness? This posting reveals that this country is being asked to pay out 10% of its annual budget and 2.5% of its GDP to hold Greece's head above water. This can't be fair. If the rest of the EEC ponied up the same relative amounts, I suspect that this would cover Greece's shortfall many times over.

- How can the EEC or the International Monetary Fund (IMF) lend Greece any more money when they know that they are not going to repay what has already been lent? Yes I know that the formation of the Euro has benefited Northern Europe, mainly Germany, greatly ... GNP growth-wise. But nevertheless, if you have to lend someone money to buy your products ... and you know that this debt will never be repaid ... this seems a silly commercial strategy.

- The U.S. generally has assumed an attitude that all this European economic kerfuffle does not affect us. But we forget that we contribute something like 18% to the IMF funding ... so what the IMF loses, we also partly lose.

Isn't rather ironic that present-day Greeks seem to have forgotten Aesop's lesson from "The Grasshopper and the Ant?"

White Bread

I know that I have become white bread ... uninteresting squishy white bread. When I was younger I was more Bohemian ... willing to do more outrageous things just to get noticed. I let my emotions often control my actions ... for the high that comes from such daring-do. But now the burden of age has tempered these eccentricities ... and I am satisfied with doing a crossword puzzle or writing a blog.

And I often question the wisdom of our younger folk who let their hearts control their heads ... forgetting that I was once such. Yes, I know that oldsters who resist such constraints are often held out as not giving in to Father Time and rewarded with a puff piece in the local newspaper. But I don't care. I would rather now traverse a safer path to nirvana than to discover it after a trip on LSD or having survived an Andean avalanche. I now see the wonder in Wonder bread.

Please pass the peanut butter ...

Bomb Throwers

Twitter has turned the United States (and I expect much of the rest of the world) into a bunch of illiterate bomb throwers and insipid twits (remember #bringbackourgirls?) Anxious to get their tiniest thoughts out to their adoring public, users of this instant messaging service post comments on many news events without stopping to consider how their 140 characters of top-of-the-head diatribe or dribble will be viewed. In business we used to refer to this as "ready, fire, aim." As a consequence, clarifications or retractions are often required ... which do nothing but muddy the waters further.

I suspect that Ted Cruz, Hillary Clinton (or her Twitter surrogates) and many other presidential aspirants think that they are being hip to tweet out their bon mots at the drop of a news cycle ... to their adoring throngs of millennials and X-ers ... but, to me, using this technology too often appears non-presidential and demeaning. Reading tweets second-hand (I refuse to subscribe) is all too often a cringe-worthy experience. I would personally prefer that the eventual leader of the free world be a little more circumspect in his/her pronouncements.

Idiot glitterati can make asses out of themselves using this medium, but, please ... let's keep our important political leaders free from such pop-star pap.

Enigma

Just when I thought I could tell the opposing Muslim teams without a scorecard, I am thrown a curve ball. Saudi Arabia has just captured 400 ISIS militants who had already attacked and were planning further targets inside Saudi Arabia ... see: AP News Story? Now, as I understand it, Saudi Arabia is predominantly composed of Sunni Arabs ... as is ISIS ... so why would they be at each others' throats?

Sunni ISIS has generally been attacking the Shi'ite-dominated Iraqi government and Bashar al-Assad's Shi'ite government in Syria ... both Iran funded. Even though Iran is not an Arab state, it, as Persian, has been the prominent Shi'ite force and has, for over a thousand years, been a deadly foe of Sunni Arabs ... yet ISIS is now strangely acting as its proxy against Saudi Arabia ... while at the same time attacking the Syrian government. Weird!.

I guess I will never fully decipher the Middle East enigma (or, for that matter, our Shi'ite-tropic president and his Svengali adviser, Valarie Jarrett.)

Gravity

The force of gravity is agreed to by 98% of all scientists ... so it clearly must be true.  (However, Einstein did believe that it is just a warp in the space-time continuum.)

Gravity also exists in politics. So now we see how uber-liberal Bernie Sanders is the gravitational attraction pulling Hillary Clinton to the left ... and Donald Trump is a similar force pulling some of the Republican presidential contenders to the right. And, to my mind, this is a good thing for, of late, the Democrat and Republican parties have become two sides of the same coin.

This political gravity then might mean that, come the next presidential election whoever the candidates, the voters should be given a real choice for a change. How very special ...

reddit Gallery CCCXIV

Another excursion into the world of reddit Pictures. See: reddit Pics for sources.  Do yourself a favor and click on pictures to enlarge them. Enjoy!

Blue-streaked Lories

Canadian Spotted Lake

Meteor Flash

Matterhorn at Night

Aqueduct in Segovia, Spain