Forgot Mother’s Day (animated .gif cartoon)

Blissfully unaware that he’d forgotten Mother’s Day, Bob gets an email. No, Bob! Don’t cli….

Click image for the rest of the story.

“Worry ‘Bout Yourself!”

I love this kid’s attitude. Hope it’s contagious … then there might be hope yet for this world!

Is “a boot in your ass” the American Way?

Rhetorical question, of course. I just happened to hear for the mmmmmmth time the opening to Sean Hannity’s radio program, which contains “‘we’ll put a boot in your ass / it’s the American way” from Toby Keith‘s “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American)” — something that gripes me every time I hear it.

And every time I hear it I can’t help but think of how Ron Paul pointed out so consistently during the 2008 and 2012 presidential campaigns that such an attitude underlying American foreign policy is largely responsible for our woes around the world.

Why can’t we just lead by example rather than by throwing our weight around?

 

Rambino?

Last week’s news included one of those things that just leaves your mouth hanging open. “If babies had guns they wouldn’t be aborted,” reads the bumper sticker for Republican Rep. Steve Stockman’s re-election campaign. Even in the world of cartoons (arguably saner than that of Capitol Hill), no self-defense scenario imaginable comes out well. Shooting yourself out of the womb just doesn’t compute.

Trust it to politicians to screw up two perfectly reasonable messages by scrambling them together.

Yeah, it’s always best if an individual can protect herself from violence. After all, wherever you go then, there’s your bodyguard.

I’ve long been critical of the liberal propensity to dismiss conservative views by belittling their proponents as idiots. Oh, well … here’s a freebie. Go for it.

Lovely Arizona Scenery!

Tyger Gilbert was best man at my wedding. At that time, if I recall correctly, he was just starting his hobby of digital photography, though he’d been a hiker off an on all his life. In the last decade or so he has combined photography and hiking as his favorite pastime, and the images he produces are often breathtaking. I just wanted to take this opportunity to recommend to everyone a visit to his website, http://www.tygergilbert.com for a look at his wares. It just so happens he’s celebrating the launch of his first “coffee table” book of photos, which I think deserves to be a big hit. Enjoy!

Whose Kids Are They, Anyway?

MSNBC host Melissa Harris-Perry caused a ruckus the other day with her assertion that Americans should move from a “parents own their kids” to a “communities own their kids” way of thinking. Right wing voices in the talkosphere have since been vociferously defending parental ownership of their children. Tristan Shoubt, as usual, offers a different take in his latest political cartoon.

If you want to share it, just link to this page or write for permission to tristan.shoubt@comcast.net.

The good, the bad, and the ugly witches

Our philofficer returns from vacation with this tidbit that appears to have emanated from George Takei’s Facebook page. The Star Trek icon posted this image of Glenda, the good witch from the Land of Oz.

http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/46628_640116679351122_650702339_n.jpg

Now, it takes someone like our philofficer to notice that the captions conceal a logical trap. People tend to think that “Only bad witches are ugly” means that you won’t find any pretty bad witches, when it really means you won’t find any ugly good witches — and there can be any number of pretty bad lovely bad ones.

Think about it this way: If it was your job to make sure the rule “Only bad witches are ugly” is being followed, you’d sort witches into “ugly” and “not ugly” groups and make sure no good witches make it into the “ugly” group. For your immediate purposes, it doesn’t matter how the witches in the “not ugly” group behave.

To get this right quickly, it helps to translate the original statement in the form “Only X’s are Y” into its logical equivalent, “No Y is not X” — that is, “No ugly witch isn’t bad.”

And, of course, if what you really meant to say was, “All bad witches are ugly” — well, just say so!