Surrounded by the stupid.

And that's not just gratuitous snark -- it's the truth.

WASHINGTON — It’s long been known that America’s school kids haven’t measured well compared with international peers. Now, there’s a new twist: Adults don’t either.

In math, reading and problem-solving using technology – all skills considered critical for global competitiveness and economic strength – American adults scored below the international average on a global test, according to results released Tuesday.

Adults in Japan, Canada, Australia, Finland and multiple other countries scored significantly higher than the United States in all three areas on the test. Beyond basic reading and math, respondents were tested on activities such as calculating mileage reimbursement due to a salesman, sorting email and comparing food expiration dates on grocery store tags.

Is this really a surprise to anyone? When you can confuse a store clerk virtually to the point of tears by handing her a quarter to accompany the $5.00 bill you had already given her after she'd wrung up up the sale for $4.25, you know you are deep into stupid territory. This actually happened. A sales clerk had taken my $5.00 for a $4.25 purchase and entered the amount into her cash register. When I belatedly fished out my quarter from the depths of my Mary Poppins bag and handed it to her, she froze. A confused look came over her. She bit her lip, staring at the five dollar bill and the quarter.

"You gave me too much money."

"No, I gave you the quarter so you could give me back a dollar bill."

"But I only owe you 75 cents."

"Not if you add the quarter to it."

"But I don't need the quarter! That's too much."

I took back the quarter. I then took the additional three quarters she handed me. I paused for effect and to give her brain a chance to have closure on that transaction. Then I put all four quarters in one hand and asked, "Can I have a dollar for these four quarters?"

That's when she almost started crying.

And I almost started laughing.

But I'm not that mean. Almost. Not quite.

Americans are stupid. We are stupid and we are uninformed. But thankfully we score high marks on self-esteem. Yes, that means we are arrogant. This is important because if you aren't arrogant when you're stupid, you might just learn something. Like how to make change.

But wait. All this stupidity is easily explained. It is not, in fact, a result of lowering standards and expectations of performance; nor is it the result of the increasing political power of the teachers' union and the federalization of education through the Department of Education. No. That's just silly talk.

It is all about the inequality.

Simple.

However, my retarded reptilian brain remembers this little video from 2008, and I wonder whether it can be reconciled with the pronouncement that stupidity is simply an expression of inequality.

It would appear from this video, that at the very least, some of our fellow citizens' stupidity results from listening to NPR and reading the NY Times.

Say, "AAAAAAAHHH!"

Hoping this doesn't apply to one of my BFF's. Sorry, kitten, dental work is never fun.

My week.

Our office manager is on vacation (either that or she sneaked in that nail file again!) and so I have to work -- the entire week! On top of that, no one is here, which means that I don't even have to pretend that I'm doing anything. So this is the utterly retarded stuff I watch to keep myself busy.

They say necessity is the mother of invention. I say, WRONG! Boredom is the mother of invention. These guys prove it. You have to be pretty effing bored to do this.

The fact that my boredom results in a complete lack of accomplishments only makes me an outlier. Or, perhaps, I could point to this blog as an accomplishment.

HAHAHAHAHAHA!  Okay, that IS funny!

Oh, thank GOD we got that contract through before the shutdown!

I'll toast to that!

Honestly, the little people with their little problems like cancelled vacations and barricaded businesses and evictions from private residences in national parks, can not even hold a candle to the horror that would ensue if a $5 million contract for custom crystal glassware hadn't made it under the wire before this hideous government shutdown.

Really. There is only so much sacrifice those who have no intention of sacrificing can be expected to make.

Just a week before the government shutdown kicked in on October 1, the State Department awarded a five-year, maximum $5 million contract for custom handcrafted crystal stem and barware, according to a report in the Valley News, an online news site in Vermont (via Charlie Perkins).  Valley News reporter Warren Johnston reports:

On eve of last week’s government shutdown, Simon Pearce won a potential five-year competitive contract for $5 million to provide 20 different styles of custom handcrafted stem and barware to the State Department for use in American embassies around the world. 

The contract stipulates that the items be made in the United States, Clay Adams, chief executive officer at Simon Pearce, said in an email. 

“Simon Pearce is a natural fit for this given its production in Vermont and Maryland. Simon Pearce received its first purchase order … for more than 12,000 pieces, most of which will be produced here in Vermont later this year,” Adams said...

I am entirely sympathetic. It would be outrageous if the diplomats in the State Department had to make do with last year's stemware. The ability to set a fine table by our lords and ladies of the new aristocracy is of paramount importance.

And if you question their need for the finer things in life, then you are simply a tea-bagging, knuckle-dragging, stooped-shouldered, slope-headed, mouth-breathing throwback and there's no point in even attempting to explain why government shutdowns must never be felt by those who wield the power in government.

Except that whole Benghazi thing. I wonder if Ambassador Stevens would have preferred long or short-stemmed wine glasses instead of security. Oh well...

Government shutdowns are for the little people.  They are the ones who need to learn a lesson.

What day is it?

President Peevish is Peevish

While the question of who is to blame for the catastrophic shutdown of a mere 16 or 17% of the federal government and the subsequent onslaught of zombies and cannibals unleashed on innocent civilians consumes most Americans, Charles C. W. Cooke points out that the effects of the shutdown are entirely within the power of our peevish president to decide.

Yes, government shutdowns have consequences — even shutdowns that leave 83 percent of the government operating as usual. But, consequences or not, there really is no good reason for the federal government to send barricades and wire-ties to unguarded open-air parks, to close off unmanned scenic overlooks, to evict homeowners from their private property on public land, or to threaten the livelihoods of hoteliers whose sole crime is to own a business on an unsecured public route.

There is no good reason, either, for the government to shut down the index pages of some, arbitrarily chosen, websites while leaving the rest of the pages running. No good reason for the federal government to try to close Mount Vernon and Claude Moore Colonial Farm, neither of which it owns or runs. No good reason for the federal government to threaten to cancel the Air Force–Navy football game when there were private donors waiting on the sidelines. And certainly no reason for armed rangers to hold senior-citizen tourists hostage inside their Yellowstone Park hotel for the high crime of stepping outside and taking photographs.

Who gets hurt and to what extent seems to be the president's prerogative. By any measurement, it appears that people who love this county, who fought for this country, and even those who died for this country --oh! and children -- are all crowded into the first place spot on the list of recipients for our Beloved Leader's malicious indulgences of spite.

As NR’s editors observed on Monday, there is a substantial difference between authorities’ barring access to sites that have gates and their barricading open spaces that do not. “It takes federal action to close the sites,” this website’s editorial noted, “and none to keep them open. This is not what an inactive government looks like, but a spiteful one.” An anonymous Park Service ranger confirmed that malice to the Washington Times last week: Staff, the employee said, had “been told to “make life as difficult for people as we can. It’s disgusting.”

But really, if you can't screw with people when you're annoyed with them, what good is power? This is something Democrats have always understood. Whenever there is even a whisper that government is taking too much money and wasting most of it, Democrats rush to the microphones to assure us that government is virtually cut to the bone and if you want your money back then they will sadly be compelled to cut teachers, firemen, and police. Every time. I have never once heard a Democrat concede that there might be some bureaucratic desk job somewhere that really doesn't need to be done. Not. Once.

Precious President Peevish is just decidedly more vicious about employing this tactic because, as we all know, any reaction to his nastiness is simply prompted by racism.

Obama probably ate his dog because it didn't love him.

But I know my dog loves me. And now SCIENCE! has proven that dogs feel the same emotions of affection for their owners as we do for each other.

Obama takes on the unions

 

The deep wisdom of this little tidbit from the scintillating intellect of our most intelligent president is that he secretly believes that the only power that should ultimately be allowed in our country is him.

Once you organize the entire "community", there's nothing left but the Chief Organizer. 

Hail to the Chief.

Fuck off.

How's that?

When no means no.

I've been in such situations, and let me assure you, the answer is NO! And it stays that way.

For the record: I officially HATE the fact that videos linked in posts don't stay put on YouTube and when I go back, which isn't often, to review, I find -- more often than I'd like -- that the video is GONE! So then I have to go find it again and redo the post. Oh well....I need to remember how very, very little this blog means to anyone.

Perspective, as they say.

When the stupid is stupdendous.

Apparently this is an actual sign taped to an actual printer in an actual military office.

Oh. Good. Lord.

 

My mood today.

This song is reverberating through the house. It is beautiful outside, but with a clean, crystalline hardness to the air that speaks of darker, colder times coming; the world is sweeping up all of summer's lushness in preparation for winter.

How to save a life.

This is a reasonable tactic when faced with the possibility of withstanding an assault of the stupid.

The life you save may be your own.

Political Theater in the Cornfields of America.

Political theater has always been a spectator sport in America. Watching politicians carry on, take up air time, posture and pose, or simply doze..has provided numerous humorists and comedians with ripe, almost fetid, fodder. Politics in America, while often hilariously stupid, always ineffective, and, at times, borderline retarded, have nevertheless been historically characterized by a certain benign incompetence that left the citizens of this great nation free to carry on, improving their lives, fixing government's mistakes, and generally remaining optimistic and generous.

But no longer.

This is the Age of Obama. This is when we must finally learn our lesson, and Obama is going to teach it to us. This is when we must understand at long last that we didn't build that, and if we did, we've made enough money at some point anyway, so much money, in fact, that it is better for everyone if Obama is allowed to spread the wealth around and if we are uppity enough to disagree with this, Obama has instructed his followers to get in our faces or to bring a gun to our little knife fight. It is the Age of Obama, where laws are absolute to citizens, but amazingly fluid to our Beloved Leader and his friends; where belief in the Constitution is tantamount to terrorism and standing on principle is considered arson.

I've got a match and some lighter fluid right here.

Now we are threatened with what will most likely amount to the paid vacation of 800,000 federal employees. This is outrageous! How are we to cope? Our overlords have been released from their desks, dismissed from their endless and unproductive meetings, removed from the halls of power, sent home to put their feet up and have a little down time.

And we are supposed to feel the pain.

And Obama is determined to make sure we do. Like a good parent, he is willing to watch us suffer to help us learn this most valuable lesson.

OUR BETTERS ARE IN CHARGE AND WE DARE NOT QUESTION THEIR BENEVOLENCE. OTHERWISE BAD THINGS MIGHT HAPPEN.

Of course, the important thing to remember is that all the bad things that are happening are not Obama's fault. They are the fault of those who don't want to accept his benevolence. He wouldn't do these bad things if only Republicans would bow and scrape and accept whatever he wishes.

But the Bad Republicans are making Obama do bad things because the Bad Republicans are thinking bad thoughts about him. The Bad Republicans don't like his policies because they are racist and ungrateful and just plain stupid. The Bad Republicans are predicting that Obama's Most Awesome Affordable Care Act will not only be less than affordable, they are insisting that people don't even want it. Of course the Bad Republicans are lying. Everyone LOVES Obamacare. Why, there have only been a few...well...a couple...okay...thousands of waivers and exemptions allowed, but only to Obama's closest friends who said, "Thank you VERY much, really, honestly, but we'd prefer not to be covered by your most excellent law." And Obama said, "Sure. We're buds."

And then Congress, the ones who helped Obama write this most excellent law, said, "Oh, hey, yeah...we LOVE Obamacare...it's positively HISTORIC...but actually, we'd rather not have to participate either. Think you could fix that for us, big guy?"

And Obama said, "Sure. Why not?"

It's like listening to Kenny.

So now the Bad Republicans are saying that the American people Very Bad Teabaggers are simply asking the same favor, but Obama says the Bad Republicans and the Very Bad Teabaggers are in danger of destroying the entire country with a shutdown because they are willfully doing this just to be mean and because they are racist. So the Bad Republicans are listening to the Very Bad Teabaggers, although with their mouths full all the time, who can tell what they're saying? But even so, the Bad Republicans are willing to destroy the entire country on the crazed mumblings of a group of Very Bad Teabaggers extremist terrorists who should definitely be sent to the cornfield.

Fairey Dust.

Shepard Fairey, the artist who helped catapult our Dear Beloved Leader to POTUS (Piece of Total Utter Shit), has, surprisingly, reconsidered his slavish adoration.

Thanks, Fairey.  But your "awakening" is a little late for the country.



H/T: Moonbattery

Spanking the Bear.

Somehow I doubt Putin will shrug his shoulders and party on with celebrities while his country is under attack. 

While there is no doubt that Putin is a bad guy, he is also sane, stern, and loves his Mother Russia, which is a far cry from our nutty professor, President Prissy Pants, who imagines himself capable of causing oceans to recede, mesmerizing people to vote for him, and deems himself worthy of receiving the Nobel Peace Prize on the come.

Putin's embassies are apparently better protected than ours. The attack hurt no one.

Al Arabiya

Unknown gunmen attacked the Russian embassy in the Libyan capital Tripoli on Wednesday, Al Arabiya correspondent reported. The sound of gunfire and rocket-propelled grenades could be heard around the embassy,

Russian embassy in Tripoli, Libya

the correspondent added.

Russia's Foreign Ministry said confirmed the attack saying none of its staff was injured.

Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Ekho Moskvy radio the attackers fired at the embassy in the Libyan capital, Tripoli, and tried to break into its grounds, Associated Press (sic)

She said that according to preliminary information no one among the embassy personnel was wounded.

None of its staff was injured.

Get that?

No. One. Was. Injured.


"What difference, at this point, does it make?"

You know, Hillary old girl, it continues to make a great deal of difference.

H/T: Weasel Zippers