Class is in Session
Via Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Ben Stein—that nutty Republican with a few witty acting credits—offers a refresher on tariffs for the White House’s resident dementia patient:
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Class dismissed. And now, our feature presentation...
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, February 5, 2025
Note: A friendly reminder that February is officially designated as Bird Feeding Month. Please remember to fill your bird feeders all the way to the top every day with a fine assortment of nuts and seeds. Birds especially appreciate pistachios, walnuts, and almonds. In fact, you can skip the seeds. Nuts would be perfect. In fact, you should go fill your feeder with them right now. Remember: birds love nuts! Thank you.
—The Squirrels, Who Just Want What's Best For the Birds
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By the Numbers:
7 days!!!
Days 'til Clean Out Your Computer Day: 5
Days 'til the National Farm Machinery Show and Tractor Pull in Louisville: 7
Overall construction spending in December, up 4.3% from December of 2023: $2.19 billion
Year-over-year increase in lumber prices: 6%
Average amount of time teens are on their phones during a typical school day, according to a new report from JAMA Pediatrics: 1½ hours
Percent of them who are on their phones for 2 hours or more: 25%
Amount Ulysses Grant paid after a policeman pulled him over for going too fast in his horse and carriage, making him the only sitting president to receive a speeding ticket: $20
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Mid-week Rapture Index: 180 (including 4 Beast Governments and 1 idiot who seems to have forgotten what kind of hair Jesus had). Soul Protection Factor 16 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Georgia's entries in Puppy Bowl XXI are…
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CHEERS to defeating the Nazis (that would be us now). After donning his boots (polished to a shiny gleam by his faithful oberuntereichsshweinhundenfuhrer Random Bald Guy) and adjusting his sash with the tiny sausage fingers of which he’s so proud, the President of the United States announced that he was going to war with Canada and Mexico via their trade routes and engines of commerce. One hour later, a phone call…
Canada and Mexico: Surrender now or we'll do the same to you.
United States: Okay. I surrender. But I hope you learned your lesson.
Canada and Mexico: A sphincter says what?
United States: What?
Canada and Mexico: A sphincter says what?
United States: What???
Canada and Mexico: [Snort!]
And then they put him on hold with Ave Maria on a continuous loop, rendering him catatonic for the next six hours, a spell broken only by the magic words, “Sir, we have some more executive orders for you to sign.” As an American I must speak up in defense of our leader. And I plan to do that the next time we replace the current idiot with a Democrat.
JEERS to boomeranging boomerangs. Speaking of dim bulbs: the Gaza protesters who roared during the 2024 campaign season that nobody could be worse than Joe Biden are now reckoning with two inconvenient truths: 1) Biden ended up brokering the cease fire they'd been demanding, but only after they'd helped his hand-picked successor Kamala Harris lose the election. And 2) The guy they helped put into office is now in the process of being a thousand times worse than Biden:
[Elon]Musk said he was "in the process" of "shutting down" the [USAID]—which oversees foreign aid, disaster relief and international development programs—and that President Donald Trump agreed with him.
Yeah. Just brilliant, guys.
Alex Smith, a former contractor for USAID who advised on nutrition, child health and maternal health, told ABC News that the dismantling of the agency could have a major impact on aid in Gaza. "It's going to be devastating," said Smith, who left the agency last year.
Jesse Marks, senior advocate for the Middle East at the humanitarian organization Refugees International, told ABC News he's worried the stoppage of aid from USAID could put the Israel-Hamas ceasefire in jeopardy. "I think one of the facets of this that people are not necessarily connecting is that the humanitarian access to Gaza—which is underpinned by USAID, State Department funds—was a central feature of the bargain that underpins ceasefire," he continued. "So, if you remove aid to Gaza, whether directly or as a second-order effect of the aid freeze, this raises the risk of a broader ceasefire collapse."
As a bonus, here's a third bon mot for y'all: Republicans would now very much like to kick all the Gazans out of Gaza, all the Palestinians out of Palestine, and all the Gaza protesters out of the United States. Great job, everyone. Help yourselves to a peppermint stick from the candy jar.
CHEERS to the Illinois governor who took on the Kansas general. Happy 125th birthday to Adlai Stevenson II. He lost to Dwight Eisenhower in both 1952 and 1956. (Then again, I think God herself would have, too.) But as U.N. Ambassador he pleasantly surprised the Kennedy administration by giving the Russians hell during the Cuban missile crisis. And he sure understood Republicans:
"A hypocrite is the kind of politician who would cut down a redwood tree, then mount the stump and make a speech for conservation. "
Brother, you said a mouthful.
"I have been thinking that I would make a proposition to my Republican friends... that if they will stop telling lies about the Democrats, we will stop telling the truth about them."
And I love this:
“We travel together, passengers on a little space ship, dependent on its vulnerable reserves of air and soil; all committed for our safety to its security and peace; preserved from annihilation only by the care, the work and, I will say, the love we give our fragile craft.
We cannot maintain it half fortunate, half miserable, half confident, half despairing, half slave to the ancient enemies of man, half free in a liberation of resources undreamed of until this day. No craft, no crew can travel with such vast contradictions. On their resolution depends the survival of us all.”
In other words: nice knowin' ya.
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BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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END BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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CHEERS to a profession full of highs and lows. Happy Weatherpersons' Day! After shoveling the snow off the Wikipedia page, I see that it "recognizes individuals in the fields of meteorology, weather forecasting and broadcast meteorology, as well as volunteer storm spotters and observers. It is observed on the birthday of John Jeffries, one of the United States' first weather observers who took daily measurements starting in 1774." Yes, it took our best scientific minds 250 years to build our modern forecasting tools, and You Tube mere minutes to assemble outtakes like this…
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Forecasters predict National Weatherpersons' Day will blow over within the next few hours, followed by an 80 percent chance of lingering National Weatherpersons' Day hangovers. Mostly among weatherpersons.
CHEERS to love…love…LOVE IN BLOOM!!! Oh blessed day, it's so nice to have the mainstream press covering the feel-good stories that make me giddy as a schoolgirl. Move over, Royal Weddings, no one outdoes our coverage of romances in high places:
Bill Gates briefly opened up about why he feels his divorce from Melinda French Gates was his biggest regret, but said he has moved on from the split and is enjoying spending time with his girlfriend, Paula Hurd.
Gates said he has moved on and is "lucky to have a serious girlfriend. We're having fun, going to the Olympics and lots of great things," he said about Hurd.
The only downside: due to a contractual obligation, anytime the Microsoft founder goes on a date he has to be chaperoned by Clippy.
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Ten years ago in C&J: February 5, 2015
CHEERS to a ringing endorsement. You can tell a budget's worth by putting it through the junior senator from Vermont's Bernietron 5000. This week President Obama unveiled his fiscal road map for America, and Senator Sanders—the new ranking member on the Budget Committee (woo hoo!) and a tough critic—has rendered his verdict in USA Today:
President Obama's budget moves us in the right direction.
[T]he president's proposal to increase funding for infrastructure will make our country more productive and safer. It will also create millions of good jobs. … [T]he president's plan to make the first two years of community college free is an important step forward in making college accessible for working class families. … [T]he president's effort to end egregious corporate tax loopholes while providing tax breaks for working families is movement in the right direction.
Excellent buy-in from a real socialist liberal. Now we wait to hear the response from the Republicans. Spoiler alert: it will be remarkably similar to the sound of a Shred-O-Matic.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to furry fortunetellers. If today feels like yesterday, Surprise! It's Groundhog Day again. Here’s the roundup of how the various critters fared Sunday morning after their slumbers were rudely interrupted for the amusement of humans in top hats demanding climatology predictions within a 0.000001 margin of error:
Shubenacadie Sam (Nova Scotia): More winter!
Staten Island Chuck: Early spring!
Wiarton Willie (Ontario): Early spring!
Phil saw his shadow.
Dunkirk Dave (Dunkirk, NY): Early spring!
Punxsutawney Phil: At Gobblers Knob, PA, the "official" groundhog predicts more winter!
Buckeye Chuck (Marion, OH): Early spring!
Holtsville Hal (Long Island): More winter!
Buffalo Bert: More winter!
“Jimmy” (Sun Prairie, Wisconsin): Early spring!
Fred la Marmotte (Quebec): More winter!
Conclusion: it’s a 5-5 tie. We’ll settle this thing next year.
Have a happy humpday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
The Cheers and Jeers kiddie pool is a balm for any recent stress. This is all about getting centered, grounded, and feeling your connection to the algae beneath your feet.
—Well + Good
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