Televangelists Want People To Die Of Covid-19 So They Can Get Richer

Scamevangelist says if your church is taking coronavirus precautions, that
church is not really a religion. Obviously, if your church suggests
precautions, God would probably want you to go along with them. 

Everybody is an understandable, correct tizzy over the dangerous conornavirus, as I'm sure you're all experiencing.

One of many patterns I'm noticing is how evil televangelists and conspiracy theorists are through this whole thing.

I've always known most of these types are scum of the Earth, but to use a pandemic to get rich using scams, no matter how many people die as a result, is just....just.....I can't even come up with the word.

We give life prison sentences or the death penalty to mass murderers. Aren't these people doing exactly the same. Except not with a gun, but with words aimed at the gullible.

I've got just a few examples. Let's start with one dude named Jonathan Shuttlesworth.

Here's what he said about churches that close down and/or limit services.

"Shame on every European full gospel church, bunch of sissies, that shut down during this thing. Catholic Church not having holy water in the lobby - how holy is the water then?  That should be a sign to you that your whole religion's a fraud.  Any faith that doesn't work in real life is a fake faith. Totally fake.

If you're putting out pamphlets and telling everybody to use Purell before they come into the sanctuary and don't greet anyone, you should just turn in your ministry credentials and burn your church down -- turn it into a casino or something. You're a loser. Bunch of pansies. No balls."

Shuttlesworth has a solution to this though. Join his church!

If you join Shuttlesworth's ministry, he says. Just join up and send him all your cash, you will be given a supernatural protection from the coronavirus. So that's the scam.  So people will give this idiot donations, think they're protected, get infected and spread the virus to anyone who unwittingly comes in close contact with them.

Nice, huh?

Scammer Jim Bakker tried to sell a fake "cure" for Covid-19.
There's lots of cease and desist letters over this out there 

Same is true with Jim Bakker. You probably remember him, or his wife. He's been scamming for a long, long time.  Here's a recap, put succinctly by NPR:

"Bakker gained fame in the 1970s and '80s as the host of The PTL Club, a Christian television program he hosted with his then-wife, Tammy Faye. He stepped down from PTL after a sex scandal and later spent several years in prison after a jury found that he had defrauded his viewers out of millions of dollars."

Bakker's out of prison now for that.  So he's scamming people in a much more deadly way than his crimes earlier.

He's hawking a product called Silver Solution.  As NPR reports, Bakker had a guest on his show back on February 12 named Sherrill Sellman and implied it can cure illnesses associated with this virus.  "Well, let's say it hasn't been tested on this strain of the cornavirus, but it has been tested on other strains fothe coronavirus and has been able to eliminated it within 12 hours....Totally eliminate it. Kills it. Deactivates it."

Missouri filed a lawsuit against Bakker and his production compant to stop them from advertising and selling Silver Solution.  New York State issued a cease and desist against Bakker for this item.  Also, the Food and Drug Administration and the Federal Trade Commission warned Bakker that he and his cohorts were selling unapproved new drugs in violation of the law, reports NPR.

Bakker has since taken down advertisements for Silver Solution, but Missouri is still pursuing the case because they worry Bakker might quietly start selling the stuff once attention to it starts to die down.

Creepy scamevangelist Kenneth Copeland says he can protect you from
the virus if you let him bless you by putting your hand on your TV
screen when hes on. 

Then we have the oh so creepy looking "televangelist" Kenneth Copeland, who told his viewers to put their hands on their TV screens in order to get God's protection from this virus.

Once people did that, Copeland instructed them to say "I take it, I have it. It's mine. I thank you and praise you for it."  Then I'm sure Copeland did his usual money beg for his grateful, but still very unsafe viewers.

But, according to Copeland, his viewers shouldn't be afraid because Jesus. Or Copeland. I don't know. Anyway, he said this weirdness:  "Fear is not OK. It is sin. It is a magnet for sickness and disease. The moment you begin to fear about anything, the devil goes to work on you. You are giving the devil a pathway to your body."

Got that? Coronovirus isn't a virus. It's the devil.  So an eventual vaccine won't help?

You might remember Copeland from early 2018 when he bought a private Gulfstream jet for $5.8 million.  He did so because he once called flying in a commercial airplane as "getting in a long tube with a bunch of demons." 

Anyway, I'm being Captain Obvious here. If you really want advice about coronovirus, televangelists won't help you.  Go to the CDC or better yet, the World Health Organization (WHO) if you want to learn ways to protect yourself.

If God were really speaking through these scamevangelists, I'm betting he'd be telling you to go to WHO, too.

Anti-Milk Protesters Were (Briefly) Scary, Still Dumb, Still Ineffectual

Jill Biden wrestling an anti-dairy protester away from her
husband, Joe Biden

A little highlight of the Super Tuesday primary last week was the noisy but very dumb anti-dairy direct action protesters that scared Joe Biden and the people surrounding him during a rally Tuesday evening.

A couple of idiots, identified as Sarah Segal and Ashley Froud from some outfit called Direct Action Everywhere yelling "Let Dairy Die!" ran toward Biden.  His wife, Jill Biden, demonstrating that she is a Philadelphia badass, physically blocked one of them.

The whole thing led to a now-iconic photograph of Jill Biden, teeth clenched, grabbing the protester's arms and wrestling her away from her husband.  Jill Biden, and Biden aide Symone Sanders, who forcefully and physically drove the anti-diary nuts away,  were the only ones who came out looking good from this.

According to Time Magazine:

"'The protest was intended to draw attention to the inherent violence of the dairy industry,' a spokesperson for Direct Action Everywhere tells Time over Twitter DM. 'We targeted Biden's rally because the Biden campaign has prominently featured appearances by former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, who now receives a million-dollar salary as CEO and President of the U.S Dairy Export Council.'"

It seems like Direct Action Everywhere is into these dumb stunts.  The anti-dairy protesters have interrupted  Elizabeth Warren events in the past.  And they made a splash at a Bernie Sanders rally earlier this year.

According to The Hill,  three topless women crashed the stage in February at a Nevada Bernie Sanders rally with the words, "let dairy die" painted on their chest. Another (clothed) protester, wrestled the mic from Sanders and declared, "Bernie, I'm your biggest supporter and I'm here to ask you to stop propping up the dairy industry and stop propping up animal agriculture,"

I really can't stand Direct Action Everywhere for lots of reasons, as you've probably figured out by now.  They emphasize they are nonviolent and I'm certain the demonstrators had no intention of harming Biden, Sanders and Warren.

But their protests come perilously close to violence, which paints Direct Action Everywhere as hypocrites.  Forcefully grabbing a mic from Sanders was vaguely violent, as was charging toward Biden on Super Tuesday. With all the nutcases running around out there, I'm sure Sanders, Biden and the people around them were briefly scared.

The Biden incident looked especially frightening to me.  Meanwhile, Direct Action Everywhere's Facebook states that they ".....ask folks who come into our spaces to be nonviolent in not only action, but tone and word."

They didn't make it to that standard at the Biden rally, did they?

One of the Biden protesters, Ashley Froud, told the Los Angeles Times she heard Jill Biden scream during the incident. (Who can blame her?)

"When you're so passionate and driven to do something, you don't even think about it. You just do it," Froud said.

By that logic, when somebody says, "I'm so mad at Bill I could kill him," they should just go ahead and kill Bill?

Froud told the Los Angeles Times how full of herself she is that everybody is talking about her message. "Looking at that photograph, I feel proud that I was able to deliver that message....If I could have done it another way that would have gained this much attraction, I would have, because I don't want to make people feel like they're in any fear. But it's hard to make people listen to these issues that matter."

It's hard to get the message out so you did this stupid stunt. Yes, a lot more people are now aware of your cause, but now, at least as many people won't take you seriously.

I'm pretty sure there are serious abuses in the dairy industry, at least in the big factory farm type operations. (I'm more familiar with the small farm operations here in Vermont, and it doesn't seem like there's a lot of animal abuse on those little dairy farms).

What Froud and her cohorts are failing to do is telling us why we should care, which is how you get people on board with your cause. People don't like animal abuse.  They don't like agribusiness cutting corners on safety. They want to know that what they're eating and drinking comes from good, ethical sources.

Instead, these demonstrators were just acting stupid. That doesn't inspire me to take their argument seriously, that's for sure.

The Perfect Valentine's Day Gift For Your Ex

The San Antonio Zoo has a perfect antidote to Valentine's Day,
especially you have a particularly loathesome ex.

There's two holidays on the yearly calendar that I'm so, SO not into.

One of them is Christmas, the other is Valentine's Day.

Since Valentine's Day is coming up tomorrow we'll focus on that.

It's a stupid holiday.  If you love somebody, you don't need a specific date on the calendar to tell somebody that fact.

I tell my husband every day that I love him. And I will inform him on Valentine's Day that I love him, but I'm sure he won't be especially surprised by that news.

Valentine's Day also sucks for people who are unlucky in love.  It's the marketing, advertising campaigns again that is really meant to make you feel terrible, and thus buy something to soothe your sad soul.

At Christmas, you're supposed to be insanely cheerful, according to society, even though societal pressure also makes you miserable during that holiday.

On Valentine's Day, you're supposed to be in a perfect relationship, and if you're not, you're a scumbag. Obviously, if you are not in a big romantic relationship at the moment, there are tons of likely reasons why.  Probably none of those reasons are your fault.

But  the evil perveyors of Valentine's Day struggle mightily to guilt you because you don't happen to be in a blissful romance on a random date, namely February 14.  But there's one lovely antidote for people who hate Valentine's Day and hate a particular ex.

According to People magazine and numerous other media outlets, the San Antonio, Texas zoo is doing this:

"For those interested in embracing the less romantic side of the holiday, the zoo is hosting a special event in which spurned lovers can name cockroaches or rats after their exes, and watch them get fed to zoo animals."

The San Antonio Zoo event is called "Cry Me A Cockroach" and will be livestreamed for all to watch on Valentine's Day.  In that livestream, we can watch cockroaches and pre-frozen rats get fed to the zoo's reptiles.

Gosh, watching that livestream sounds like such a romantic way to spend Valentine's Day with your honey, doesn't it?

People magazine tells us that cockroaches would cost you $5 to name, and the rats, $25.   You must really hate your ex if you're willing to spend $25 on a rat named after said ex so it can be fed to another animal.  In that case, you really need to get over it.

By the way, only first names are allowed. You can't fully identify your bad ex with first and last names in this "Cry Me A Cockroach" promotion.

If you're interested, click on this link to get more info and sign up for Cry Me A Cockroach.

Somewhat unrelated, but if you were just dumped by your honey, you feel crappy.  But to me, the folowing song and video is a salve you can tune into any time you feel especially bad about the breakup.  Guaranteed you'll feel better:

How Not To Advocate For Pot Legalization

Booking photo for Spencer Alan Boston, who lit up a joint in
a Tennessee courtroom. The judge was not amused.

A lot of people are pushing for the legalization of pot, and those efforts are gaining some successes.

That's fine.  I'm so not into pot, but then again, I'm really into beer. Some people hate beer, but they don't want to outlaw it.

Similarly, I see no point in opposing pot. If you like it, and you're responsible with it, hey, light up a joint.

However, there are right ways to advocate for changes in the law, and there are wrong ways.

Meet the Goofus who did it the wrong way.

As Newschannel5 in Nashville, Tennessee reports:

"The inmate, Spencer Alan Boston, appeared in court on a marijuana possession charge. He appeared in court Monday, and the sheriff says Boston approached the bench to discuss his sentence and that's when Boston pulled the marijuana from his pocket in front of the general sessions judge."

From there, Boston started discussing his support for pot legalization. Maybe not the right format, but OK. But then, he lit his joint and started smoking in front of the judge.  Actually, I'm a little impressed the guy got the pot into the courthouse in the first place, but nevermind.

Next, said Newschannel5:

"The sheriff said Boston was led out of the courtoom through a small cloud of smoke. He was booked on a second charge of simple possession and received ten days for contempt of court."

No word yet if legislators in Tennessee take up any pot legalization bills.

If you don't believe all this, here's the video:

"Can Opener" Bridge Keeps Claiming Dumb People, Despite It Being Raised

A classic "Penske Peel" at the infamous 11 foot 8 bridge in Durham,
North Carolina. They recently raised the bridge by eight inches, so now
it's the 11 foot 8+8 bridge. Still, dumb people are still crashing into it. 

There's a train tressle in Durham,  North Carolina with a street going under it.  I'm an absolutely huge fan of it.

The span was always known as the 11 foot 8 bridge, as that was the distance between the pavement on the street and the bottom of the bridge.

The bridge became an internet celebrity over the past decade or so due to the extremely high number of trucks that got their tops ripped off because truck drivers insisted on trying to make it under the span, despite the fact they couldn't fit.

This, despite all kinds of signs and sensor-triggered flashing lights and "Overheight Must Turn" signage that told truck drivers they won't fit under the bridge so stop. They'd keep going anyway, with disastrous results.

People in a nearby building have dutifully documented the carnage over the years with a surveillance camera.  It's turned into an extremely popular YouTube site.

I confess I was a little crushed, pardon the pun, when the fine people of Durham decided to raise the bridge by eight inches in the hopes of stopping this stupidity.   I get it that the overheight crashes were a pain in the ass for Durham police, public works and all that.

But I figured the idiot truck drivers deserved the public shame of crashing into this bridge an I hoped it would continue.

I, and many other people thought it was the end of the fun videos associated with the 11 foot 8 bridge.

But nope! It's now the 11 foot 8+8 bridge and people are still, gloriously crashing into it. Granted, the raised height of the bridge means the crashes aren't quite as dramatic as they used to be. But happily, they continue.

So here's to the stupid truck drivers everywhere who insist on crashing into things they need not crash into!

Videos of recent crashes of the 11 foot 8+8 bridge here:

First one is a piece of furniture being knocked off a truck on December 19. It features the walk of shame of the driver who had to retrieve it:



Then, we have the ever-popular "Penske Peel" with the top of a Penske rental truck being damaged. Penske peels have always been popular here:

Mean Spirited Toilet Design Has People Talking Shit About It

There are always ways for bad bosses to make life for employees worse.

There are also always people willing to aid and abet these horrible bosses.

Add toilet designer Mohabir Gill to the list. He's designed and patented a toilet that slopes forward by 13 degrees.  Gill says it's medical a medical device, sort of.

I'd say it's a medical device in that it gives cruel employers peace of mind - mental health of a sort - assuring them that they are being as mean to employees as possible.

The toilet is uncomfortable to sit on, so that would theoretically mean people would spend less time in the loo with this thing.  Gill says spending too much time on the toilet can lead to medical problems, supposedly.

Everybody knows the real reason for this toilet design, though.  Employers don't want their workers being unproductive by sitting on a toilet too long when they should be working, dammit! And why didn't they go to the damn bathroom before work.  They have a job to do!

Here's the BBC's take on it, which I totally agree with:

"If it is real I think it's a perfect representation of the disdain capitaism has for workers and for human beings," Hilary Gardner, who uses the Twitter username @plume_ told the BBC.

The company that would make this thing, inaccurately called StandardToilet, claims the toilets we are used to leads to  this result: "A user may spend longer than necessary sitting on the toilet without short-term discomfort. Sitting on a toilet for longer than is necessary is generally undesirable... The sloping design could save industry billions in wasted hours."

People on social media and elsewhere also suggested that these toilets could hurt people with back and knee problems, or conditions like Irritable Bowl Syndrome or Crohn's Disease.

This toilet is just part of the mindset of many corporate bosses to squeeze

According to HuffPost:

"Employees already feel pressure to take shorter bathroom breaks. Seventy-four percent of Amazon warehouse workers avoid using the toilet out of fear of beingwarned about missing their target numbers."

The toilet could backfire on employers who would install them.  Employees would feel the distain their bosses feel for them and quit.  That would force the employer to hire and train a replacement for what had already been a good reliable employee.

"The toilet seems just as likely to make people quit their jobs as it does to make them leave the bathroom sooner than planned," wrote Joe Pinsker in The Atlantic. 

Other people have already found ways to circumvent the goal of the toilet. @HondaDriver8000 on Twitter suggested, "Just sit on the 13 degree slope toilet backwards for the opposite of the intended effect."

I guess the battle between employee and employer rages on.

Everybody Is Flushing Trump's Toilet Talk Down The Um, Toilet

I'm going to go against my better judgement here and talk about toilets.

Donald Trump made the same mistake when he discussed this plumbing feature last week.  It's old news now, but worth revisiting.

To wit, he said as Vox and just about everybody else reported:

"'People are flushing toilets 10 times, 15 times as opposed to once. They end up using more water,' Trump said, complaining that water flow in other fixtures has slowed to a trickle. 'You can't wash your hands practically, there's so little water comes out of the faucet, and the end result is you leave the faucet on and it takes you much longer to wash your hands, you end up using the same amount of water.'"

Let's set aside for a moment that you'd think the president has bigger things to worry about than low-flow toilets.  I guess he's against regulations that make toilets use less water.  Maybe he poops a lot more than you and me.  Some people call him a shithead, so there's that.

Although early models of low flow toilets did seem problematic to us non-shitheads, as far as I'm concerned they fixed the problem.

So if I, and I presume most people need just one flush per poop, what is Trump pooping that requires 15 flushes to go away?  I really don't want to think about it, but still.

As usual, Twitter came to the rescue with this crisis.

One of my favorite tweets in response to all this was the following:

Susan Stone @SusanStone12

Replying to @chrislhayes

To be fair to the POTUS, it's hard to get the whole Constitution and Bill of Rights down in one flush.

 Referencing Trump's recent mysterious Saturday trip to the Walter Reed Medical Center: 

Anthony Chergosky@achergosky

Replying to @atrupar

Now we know why he went to Walter Reed

Maybe some corruption is involved? 

Eric Ranschau @eranschau

Replying to @chrislhayes

Christ… Was he trying to flush his tax returns?

And finally, here's a good diagnosis: 

The Artful Roger. Diamond of many Facets.@Rojodi

Replying to @chrislhayes

Wow! Proof he's full of sh*t!

German Town Goes On Beer Buying Spree To Annoy Neo-Nazis

Residents of Ostritz, Germany are seen here buying up all the beer
at the town's supermarket so an influx of Nazis at a right-wing
festival wouldn't be able to buy any. 

The area around Ostritz in the Saxony area of Germany is dealing with the Shield and Sword rock music festival, a favored gathering for neo-Nazis and other like-minded creeps.

The only thing worse than a Nazi is a drunk Nazi, so people in Ostritz had that in mind when they came up with an "evil" plan.

A court had earlier ruled that booze would be banned inside the event, so Ostritz residents figured the Nazis would buy their beer in town on the way to the festival.

So, residents raided the local supermarket and bought every last bit of beer in there before the festival-going right wing assholes couldn't get any.

Double bonus: Townspeople could down a nice cold one or two while holding their own peaceful demonstration agains the Neo-Nazis. It's a win-win.

No word from the Nazi creeps if they were unduly thirsty during the festival. Poor babies.

Bad Spring For Vermont Covered Bridges And Stupid Truck Drivers

The extensively damaged covered bridge in Lyndon, Vermont.
An oversized truck barreled through the bridge in May. 

This spring was not good for Vermont's famed covered bridges. Two idiotic truckers made sure that was the case.

Back on May 16, a moronic truck driver blasted through the Millers Run bridge, built in 1878 in Lyndonville, breaking angled roof supports, damaging two main vertical beams and shattering parts of the bridge's north side.  

Police said the driver told them she was making a delivery and GPS directions said to go across the covered bridge.

As if GPS were God and she couldn't tell the truck was bigger than the bridge.

As a side note, I guess that's why truckers continually get stuck on the narrow winding Smugglers Notch pass on Route 108 in Vermont. Numerous signs tell trucks not to go up, but GPS says go, so they go. Human-created warnings be damned.

Engineering studies are going on now to figure out how to fix the bridge. The trucking company whose driver is responsible for the damage looks like they will pay for the damage.

As you can see by the video at the bottom of this post, the truck driver cruised on through, wrecking the bridge and then kept right on going, as if that was the normal thing to do.  The truck driver, Jolene Godfrey, 43, of White River Junction, was on a delivery run for Upper Valley Produce.

Just a day or two after the bridge in Lyndon was trashed another truck driver trashed another Vermont covered bridge, this one in West Woodstock. 

The truck, with a trailer carrying equipment exceed the bridge's height limit and damaged the interior of it. At least this time, the truck driver owned up to it, stopped immediately and cooperated with police.

All this is nothing new.

Last summer, another trucker damaged the Cornish-Windsor Covered Bridge over the Connecticut River on the Vermont-New Hampshire border.

Once again, it was GPS. Nizeyimana Silas, 31 at the time of Nashua, New Hampshire, drove through the bridge, which has a posted nine foot, two inch clearance, according to the Valley News. The truck is three feet taller than that.

Cornish Police Chief Doug Hackett had to tell the Valley News the obvious: "Following your GPS doesn't mean you don't have to follow posted signs. You can't use the GPS as an excuse.... At some point, you have to look at the road, look at the signs, look at what's going on around you."

Please, folks. Stop relying on your GPS. It lies to you.

Here's the video of the Lyndon bridge being damaged by the oblivious trucker:

Another Sign Of The Apocalypse: Super-Crazy QAnon Conspiracy Book Selling Like Hotcakes

The idiots of Qanon prove that there are zillions of suckers
born every minute. 

These are the kinds of stories that just make me want to give up.

A book called, "QAnon: An Invitation to the Great Awakening" was a big boffo seller on Amazon, at least earlier in March.  

QAnon, for those who mercifully haven't heard about it yet, is probably the most bonkers conspiracy theory in history.

The basics of the conspiracy are that the world is run by a Satanic cabal headed by Hillary Clinton. She and other prominent Democrats also supposedly run a child sex ring in the nonexistent basement of a Washington DC pizzeria.

Moreover, according to this wild and stupid conspiracy, Donald Trump and Special Counsel Robert Mueller are secretly working together to destroy this evil cabal.

As NBC reported in March , the book was at No. 9 in all books about politics and No. 1 in all books about "Censorship."

Apparently, "QAnon: An Invitation to the Great Awakening" is full of garbage that comes at you willy-nilly.

NBC describes it thusly:

"On one page, the book baselessly claims that the United States created AIDS, polio, Lyme disease, some natural disasters, two Indiana Jones movies and the Pixar movie Monsters Inc."

Wow, that's some busy government we have doing all that! I wonder why this secret cabal took the time to make these movies?

NBC's report goes on helpfully:

"The book posits that Monsters Inc shows off a government plan to collect children's blood 'that gives (government figures) some form of high or youthful look."

Oh. But then why doesn't Hillary Clinton not exactly look like a spring chicken? Oh, sorry, we're not supposed to question the logic of these insane conspiracies, are we?

The reason that this weirdness is doing well on Amazon has to do with the old, sad fact in America: There is a sucker born every minute.

Social media has been playing wack-a-mole with these whackadoodle conspiracies. NBC quotes conspiracy theory research Mike Rothschild saying YouTube recently changed its algoritms to make it more difficult for the grifters pushing Qanon to make monetize their video creations.

So, Rothschild said, these grifters are no dummies: "They absolutely exploited flaws in Amazon's algorithms." The book, Rothschild said is "a bold new step in the endless grift at the heart of Q."

In an earlier article from last August NBC tried to explain why people fall for conspiracy nonsense that is batshit crazy.

People have always thought that many things don't happen by chance. There's an underlying reason. That's how conspiracy theories are born.

I get the NBC story on why people believe conspiracy theories, but I'm still struggling with how people get to that state of mind.  According to this article, people who are generally anxious and feel like their life is not fully in their control anymore, gravitate to conspiracy theories.

Alright, so I get it how people believe in things like a conspiracy over the assassination of JFK, even if the theories are pretty off. But how do people get to insane things like Qanon?

What's really dangerous is the people like Alex Jones who peddle conspiracy theories to the masses.  I'm sure he doesn't believe the crap he spouts. He knows he can make money off it because of all the gullible people out there.

As thoughtcatalog.com points out, these gullible people are willing to believe the global elite are planning to murder 80% of the world's population, that children killed in the Newtown, Connecticut massacre were just crisis actors that were part of a "false flag." Jones had a guy on his show and demonstrated support for the dude who was claiming that the 2,000 children that go missing everyday are being sold to Mars as sex slaves.

There we go again. The strangest conspiracy theories involve sexual crimes against children. I'm glad people are fighting back. Jones is being sued for his terribly harmful antics, and it's not going well for Jones at all. 

The best explanation for Qanan and its popularity that I've seen came from columnist Clarence Page.

He writes:

"The Qanon theory, whatever its origins, sounds tailor-made for core Trump supporters who need supporting arguments for the alternative scenarios spun by the White House, conservative media and other Trump allies.

Qanon is scary partly because its promoters want it to be. 'Triggering the libs' or 'owning the libs' - i.e doing things specifically to upset liberals - is its own reward to many on the right. But paranoid politics can pop up on all political sides - and often does."

Unfortunately, the game of "owning" the other side, the enemy, has become more important than facts in this world. The most dangerous part of all this is that when we ignore facts for fun and profit, those facts always come back to bite us on the ass. Often with tragic results.

Insurance Fraudster Won't Win An Oscar

Alexander Goldinsky seen here "falling" on spilled ice in a break room
is accused of insurance fraud. 

A gentleman in New Jersey put on an act to commit insurance fraud, authorities said. But judging from the surveillance video that caught him in the act, I doubt he's Oscar-winning material.

Numerous news outlets, like ABC News, said the following:

"Alexander Goldinsky, a 57-year-old independent contractor, was working for a company in Woodbridge, New Jersey, about 30 miles northwest of Newark, when he allegedly orchestrated the scam, according to the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Ofice.

The office released surveillance video Thursday from the company's empty break room, showing Goldinsky throwing the ice and strategically sprawling himself across the floor."

Thinking nobody was around and apparently not realizing there were security cameras, Goldinsky looks pretty obvious in the video as he sprinkles the ice cubes on the floor, and then almost gingerly falls to the floor to sustain his "injuries."

Authorities said Goldinsky filed a false insurance claim for ambulance services and the treatment he received for injuries he said got from the "fall."

Goldinsky is scheduled for an initial court appearance on Thursday.

I'm also guessing he won't be at the Oscars when they are presented on February 24.

Here's the video:

Now It's A Fight: Government Shutdown Blocks New Craft Beers

Vermont has a LOT of craft breweries, and the government shutdown
is preventing them all from rolling out new brews. This is
a problem nationwide because of the Washington stupidity. 

This week, I learned of a new, terrible effect of the long partial federal government shutdown.

Breweries, including all of Vermont's many craft breweries can't release new beers to the public.

There's an obscure federal agency called the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) that must approve all new beers and their labels before they can be sold.  It's an arm of Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

This agency is shut down. It's a bit of a crisis for breweries because now is the time of year they prepare to release their summer beers. That's a big marketing push, and if breweries can't release the summer stuff, they can't sell it, and we can't try it.

Yes, I know this is a much smaller crisis than the fact that hundreds of thousands of workers are not getting paid and face potential financial ruin. It's also not as important that public safety is compromised, and unsupervised national parks are being trashed by legions of idiots.

Brewers are saying if the government reopens this week, they might be able to get their summer products on store shelves in May. A little late, but still OK. If the government is shut down longer than that, it might be August before those new summer beers hit the shelves. At that point, why bother?

Even when or if the federal bureau opens, there's going to be a big backlog of new beer applications they're going to have to deal with.

This won't just hurt breweries, Rob Burns of Night Shift Brewing in Everett, Massachusetts told NBC  News. "Business is really so unpredictable and fragile and things that are completely out of control can have a big impact,"

The business model for most craft breweries is to constantly churn out new, innovative beers people love to try, notes Esquire. The government shutdown is, well, shutting down that tap. Craft Brewing in the United States is now a $76 billion industry. This will not be good.

This is particularly bad in Vermont, which is sort of the Napa Valley of craft beers. The Vermont Brewers Association says as of 2017, says the industry in the state has an overall economic impact of $378.2 million. Of that, $126.7 million is direct to tourism, and the industry accounts for $107.8 million in labor income.

Vermont has 11.49 breweries per capita, which is first in the nation.

A shorter government shutdown in 2013 had Vermont brewers pulling out their hair, VPR reported at the time. It has to be much worse now.

Florida Again: Woman Has Gross Way Of Ruining Kid's Birthday Party

Heather Carpenter of Florida, naturally, is accused of spreading
crap all over tables and grills at a park because a school principal
she hates planned a birthday party for her daughter at the
park later that day. 

A now presumably former substitute teacher in, yes, Florida apparently really hates the principal at the school where she worked. 

This idiot, Heather Carpenter showed up at Urfer Park in Sarasota County, Florida at 6:30 a.m. on December 1 and spread feces all over the wooden tables and grills at the pavilion in the park, says Fox 13 News in Tampa. 

The alleged reason: The principal at the school where she worked planned a birthday party for her daughter at the park. All the kids in the class were invited, including Carpenter's kid. But Carpenter was having some sort of dispute with the principal, so she decided to act like the shitty person she is.

The party had to be canceled, and the county had to replace all the tables and grills. They were too far gone to be cleaned. In all this cost the county $2,310, including labor costs. And the principal's poor kid didn't have her birthday party.

Lots of people use parks in a busy place like Sarasota County, and there's people milling about, even at 6:30 in the morning. One of them was a guy named Mike Hutchinson, who caught Carpenter doing this, spreading the crap around while wearing a surgical mask and blue rubber gloves.

She fled, but police later figured out who she, in part because of Hutchinson's description of her, and they arrested her. She faces felony criminal mischief and properth damage charges, Fox 13 says.

On the bright side, of sorts, she upheld Florida's reputation as a place where people go to commit weird, weird, crimes.

Apparently, Washington DC Marriage Bureau Is Bad At Geography

This man, Gavin Clarkson, is from New Mexico.
A depressingly large number of people
apparently don't know New Mexico is
part of the United States. 

You might not be surprised, but a lot of people who should know better are remarkably bad at geography.

This is a story that is more than a month old, but it's still worth looking at, because it's an illustration of how bad we are at it.

According to the Las Cruces (NM) Sun News, a guy named Gavin Clarkson of Las Cruces, New Mexico went with his then-finance to Washington DC, because they wanted to get married there.  On November 20 they went to the DC Courts Marriage Bureau to apply for a marriage license.

This is something that should have been a mere formality.

Clarkson was required to show his driver's license as proof of his identity. Here's where it gets weird: The clerk at the DC Courts Marriage Bureau said that Clarkson ws a foreign citizen and that he would need to provide an international passport to get his marriage license, reports the Sun News.

Last I checked, New Mexico was one of the 50 states. It is clearly part of the United States of America, right?  It's also not breaking news. New Mexico has been a state since 1912.

The DC Courts Marriage Bureau apparently does not know that. The clerk summoned her supervisor, who confirmed that yep, Clarkson is a foreign citizen who needed his passport. Nobody in this office seemed aware that New Mexico is part of the United States.

Says the Las Cruces Sun News:

"'She thought New Mexico was a foreign country,' he said of the clerk. 'All the couples behind us waiting in line were laughing.'"

I guess the fact that those couples were laughing reassures us that some people know New Mexico is part of the United States.

Clarkson has lived in the United States all is life and English has always been his language. The clerk at the marriage bureau still just had to remark about how well Clarkson spoke English, considering that he is from a "foreign country."

His now-wife, Marina was confused by that, as you might expect. She is a U.S. citizen, but is originally from Argentina and speaks English with a slight accent.

The couple tried going to the marriage bureau the next day and luckily, found a clerk that knew New Mexico was in the United States. The marriage was on!

Apparently, people not knowing New Mexico is a state is a thing. New Mexico magazine reports on many people who encounter New Mexicans in other states who think the state is part of a foreign nation.

New Mexicans bring up things and places like Alburquerque, Santa Fe, Roswell and Los Alamos to prove the New Mexico is in the United States.

But there's one reference that always seems to convince doubters that New Mexico is a state. Just mention either Walter White, who was the lead character in "Breaking Bad" or the show itself.

"Breaking Bad" was set in New Mexico.

There is a lot of confusion across America about all kinds of places. I live in Vermont. Once, when I was in South Carolina, somebody asked, "Where you from, boy?"

"Vermont," I replied.

"VER-mont!! Ain't that part of Killington?"

To make it easy on everyone, I just said, "Yes."  At least the guy had heard of Killington, the ski area.

A lot of people when I'm traveling ask if Vermont is part of Canada. No, but I'm so far north in Vermont that I can see Canada from my house (true!). Does that count?

When I visiting another state in July in August, people sometimes ask me how much snow is on the ground back home in Vermont. As if the Green Mountain State is at the North Pole or something.

Clearly, it's going to take more than a few episodes of "Breaking Bad" to get Americans caught up on their geography, though.

Christmas Gifts Only The Weirdest Could Love

I'm sure all of your friends would just LOVE a nose
warmer that looks like a spider! 

The Huffington Post recently put up an article that is sure to bring joy, or pain to every holiday shopper out there.

It's a comprehensive list of some of the more, um, novel Christmas gifts you can share this year.

I'll let you read the whole story, but I will cherry pick some of my favorites from this list.

One of these special Christmas gifts is a Trump bottle opener, which has the sound of Trump ranting. One of the messages spouts off about fake news when you use it. Frankly, I hope my nice cold bottle of beer is not fake news when I open it, so I'll pass on this one.

Ugly Christmas sweaters are all the rage in recent years, and I think I found the worst yet. It depicts Santa, sitting on a chimney, pants down, taking a dump down the chimney into somebody's fireplace. I think that qualifies as worse than getting a lump of coal in your stocking.

Here's the sales pitch from the company that sells this thing. "Ugly Christmas sweater has a whole new meaning when you rock up wearing something that literally takes a dump all over the Christmas season. He delivers to every boy and girl in one night, folks - when you gotta go, you gotta go."

I don't think this sweater is turning into a hit. At last check it was on sale - meaning they're trying to unload this, um, mess. The price keeps going down. It started at $84.95, went down to $78.95 and at last check was a low, low $59.95.

Still too pricy for me. Even so, you might want to continue on with this shitty Christmas idea. You can combine the above gift with the book "We Wish You A Poopy Christmas."

Honestly, the sales pitch for this book is even worse than the one for the poopy Christmas sweater:

The worst possible ugly
Christmas sweater.

"Curl up by the fire with some steaming hot chocolate and listen to Fudgy the Poopman offer his unique take on your favorite Christmas tales. You're probably familiar with Rudolph and his red nose, but in this book, you hear how Christmas was saved by Rupert, whose case of IBS has left him with shining red spot on the opposite end of the reindeer body."

I'm not sure why our nation's recent infantile obsession with poop is so rampant, but this Christmas stuff proves it's jumped the shark and must end now.

Moving on, the Christmas season is often chilly, especially for us northerners. We wear coats, hats, mittens, and even ear muffs. But what if your nose gets cold?  Well, of course there's a Christmas gift solution!

Keep your schnoz warm with a Spider Nose Warmer. I just love how the marketers of this thing in their sales pitch have absolutely no command of the English language. I'll quote it verbatim, with no editorial corrections:

"Nose warmer pom pom Christmast gadget. Funny nose gift nose heath Vegan friendly, Nose cozy winter heater. Your noise never been worn, it's made just for you....A unique practical way to keep your nose warm. Sure to be a hit with all. Fun and useful, great for everyone. Loops on each side of the Nose Warmer hook behind the ears, stretchy easy and comfortable to wear. And feets all."

Feets all? I thought it was a nose warmer. No thanks, I'll pass. They say a cold nose is a sign your dog is healthy. I'll just assume that if my nose is cold, I'm healthy.

I haven't finished my holiday shopping yet. I'm a last-minute kinda guy. But rest assured, family and friends! You're not getting any of the items listed above. If that disappoints you, buy 'em yourself!

PETA's Animal Cliche Suggestions Are Basically Beating A Dead Horse

PETA doesn't want us to use cliches that seem mean to animals.
Their alternative suggestions need work, though. 

There's an amazing number of cliches out there that involve animals.

That's the elephant in the room. There's more than one way to skin a cat. That dog don't hunt. Don't let the cat out of the bag. One trick pony. The lion's share. Pig headed. The cat's meow. Dog days of summer.  

Well, PETA, the strident animal rights group, thinks we ought to change some of our animal cliches to not celebrate cruelty to animals. Never mind that people who use these cliches generally don't want to abuse animals.

But never mind.

PETA decrees that we must change the following cliches to the some non-cruel alternatives. So here we go:

"Kill two birds with one stone" must now be "Feed two birds with one scone." (I had no idea birds like scones. Go figure.)

"Be a guinea pig" should become "Be the test tube."

"Beat a dead horse." should turn into "Feed a fed horse."  If the horse has been fed, it's not hungry. Why would you want to force food this poor creature? That seems cruel, but whatever. Plus, the fed horse thing makes no sense.

"Bring home the bacon" needs to change to "Bring home the bagels."

"Take the bull by the horns" should  become "Take the flower by the thorns." Um, most flowers don't have thorns. And even if they do, why should anyone punish themselves by poking themselves wityh thorns. You CAN be careful.

Now, like most people, I'm really, really not into torturing animals. But as usual, don't you think PETA is taking things just a wee bit too far?

As you'd expect the Twttersphere is not having it.

@tryzick put in a dig in by saying: "Raising awareness and teaching us new phrases? That's killing two birds with one stone right there."

Another wag, Nick Wing, a reporter at Huffington Post, @nickpwing added this: "We should also addressthe 800-pound gorilla in the room who is the  perfect weight because we don't body shame here."

Wing also observed this truthism: "Few things unite the right and left like an opportunity to dunk on PETA." 

At least the organization is one of those great uniters, huh?

Worst Gender-Reveal Party Ever Caused $8 Million Brush Fire

Gender reveal: It's a boy! But the explosion set off all that tinder-dry
brush you see, causing an $8 million wildfire. 

Dennis Dickey wanted to throw a nice, explosive gender reveal party, as he and his wife were expecting a baby.

He had what he thought was a great plan.

As NPR and numerous other news outlets explained, Dickey placed Tannerite, a very explosive substance inside a target, which he would shoo with a high-velocity firearm bullet.

Tannerite makes an explosie powder that produces some water vapor and a thunderous boom. Not to mention flames and what not. You can get Tannerite powder that sprays in pink or blue for a gender reveal party.

I don't know what Dickey,  a Border Patrol agent, was thinking when he pulled this stunt for his friends. As you can see from the video, below, everything around on that hot Arizona April day looked super, super tinder dry. Just thinking about a lighted match would start a fire, you might imagine.

The big fire caused by a gender reveal party burns along an
Arizona ridgeline in 2017.

At the time, the area was under a Red Flag Warning, which means there's a high risk of wildfires. Winds at the time were gusting to 40 mph.

But Dickey fires his gun. A big spray of blue. It's a boy!! But immediate, the tinder dry vegetation goes up in flames. What else would you expect?

The resulting fire would soon consume 47,000 acres and cause $8 million in damage. I guess Dickey had an $8 million baby, huh?  

On the bright side, although residents of many homes were evacuated, firefighters prevented those homes from burning down.

To be fair, Dickey did report the fire right away, but it was still too late. The fire quickly spread out of control. He has agreed to pay restitution, but I don't know where he's going to come up with $8 million.

He's already ponied up $100,000 and will pay monthly installments of $500 over the next two decades, but that won't cover it. And so much for the baby boy's college fund.

He'll also be on five years of probation and appear in a public service announcement for the U.S. Forest Service.