DON’T ASK

You Asked For It (according to my previous post) — but this post is a different story, so….

 

By a weird coincidence, ASK ME NO QUESTIONS AND I’LL TELL YOU NO LIES (a quote attributed to 18th century Irish novelist, playwright and poet Oliver Goldsmith) is my springboard for this post of “Don’t Ask” quotes — thus sparing you the fate of my last post, which subjected you to some questionable poems.

Let’s plunge right in with perhaps the most famous DON’T ASK quote (at least in America):

“Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.” –John F. Kennedy

Here’s another famous one (in jazz circles), leveled at squares:

“If you have to ask what jazz is, you’ll never know.” –Louis Armstrong

If you have a humorous bone in your body, the next three should bring a smile to your face:

“Sometimes I lie awake at night and ask, Why me? Then a voice answers, Nothing personal, your name just happened to come up.” –Charles M. Schulz

“Some people see things that are and ask, Why? Some people see things that never were and ask, Why not? Some people have to go to work and don’t have time for all that.” –George Carlin

“When your mother asks, “Do you want a piece of advice?’, it is a mere formality. It doesn’t matter if you answer yes or no. You’re going to get it anyway.” –Erma Bombeck

Now for some serious stuff:

“What then is time? If no one asks me, I know what it is. If I wish to explain it to him who asks, I do not know.” –Saint Augustine

“If you ask me whether the election of Barack Obama is the fulfillment of Dr. King’s dream, I say, ‘No, it’s just a down payment.” –John Lewis

To close, here’s a quote I like which is a stretch to fit the category, but since it’s the birthday of the author, don’t ask me to re-think its inclusion here:

“Thinkers think and doers do. But until the thinkers do and the doers think, progress will be just another word in the already overburdened vocabulary.” –Francois de La Rochefoucauld (9/15/1613–3/17/1680)

I think that does it for now. How’s that for progress?

 

 

THE FLOCKS AND THE CROW, a play on Aesop’s fable THE FOX AND THE CROW

crow, v. To exult, esp. over another’s misfortune; to boast exultantly. –Webster’s New College Dictionary

You have no doubt heard many devotees of Donald Trump defend their support for America’s Crowmmander-In-Chief because “he says what he thinks” — as if such a character trait trumps all else as a Presidential prerequisite. Trust me: by that standard, a few of my in-laws are characters of sufficient grandiosity and shortness of breadth to be Prez. I declare, even Adolph Hitler (had he been born/raised here) might have ridden megalomania and bombastic B.S. to the White House. If drunk with power, no less a windbag than yours truly might rise to the occasion — Lord nose it’snot unthinkable.

My problem, however, is that I’m apt to think and think again before I crow what I think to my flock (otherwise, the by-line on my posts may as well be “by misterspews” instead of “by mistermuse“). Some might call this tendency over-thinking. Some might assert that was President Obama’s hangup. If so, then this guy certainly couldn’t cut it as President:

The Thinker by Rodin

Well, then, shouldn’t we be seeking the fabled middle ground between extremes: under-thinking and over-thinking? But that smacks of compromise, and we certainly can’t have that.

What to do, what to do. Surely there must be a way to get ALL of what we want, if we’re foxy enough:

Any questions?

Any doubts?

Any rags?

PROMISES PROMISES

If you’re like me, you’ve about had your fill of Donald Trump, so I promise this will be my last post to mention his name (until next time)….and this post will do so only to bring us to the title subject. For as much as Pied Piper Trump has lured his infatuated followers with the siren song of an outsider/non-politician, he has one thing in common with typical politicians: they promise what they (should) well know they can’t deliver….but The Donald does it as shamelessly as, and more brazenly than, “real” politicians.

Idealistic politicians like 2008 Obama made unkeepable promises, but I think more out of näiveté than hubris or delusions of self-grandeur; he overestimated his powers of persuasion and underestimated the GOP’s resolve to repel him at every turn. Would the 2016 Obama make the same promises, knowing what he knows now, if he could do 2008 over again? Who knows? This post doesn’t promise answers, it promises promises.

One hardly knows where to begin when it comes to wading through the swamp of unbelievable promises made by politicians over the past millendium, so here’s someone else’s compendium, which I recommendium by extending ’em here:

http://www.viralnova.com/insane-political-promises/

For the geographically-challenged, if you didn’t “get” promise #12, Libya is IN Africa. As for me, having more or less winged my way to getting to this point in my post, I at least know how I’m going to bring it to a merciful end: with these promisory quotes….

Hypocrisy can afford to be magnificent in its promises, for never intending to go beyond promise, it costs nothing. –Edmund Burke

It makes my heart sick when I remember all the good words and broken promises. –Chief Joseph

They made us many promises, more than I can remember, but they never kept but one; they promised to take our land, and they took it. –Red Cloud

What’s important is promising something to the people, not actually keeping those promises. The people have always lived on hope alone. –Hermann Broch

It’s easy enough to get into power. You can make promises and try to be all things to all people. But the moment you have to make decisions, you’re going to annoy at least half of them. Whatever you do, in the end you’re almost certain to be brought down by your own character traits. –Robert Harris 

Vote for the man who promises least; he’ll be the least disappointing. –Bernard Baruch

Or you can heed this bumper sticker: DON’T THINK – VOTE TRUMP

 

 

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER

What with one thing or another, almost the entire month of January has gone by, and I haven’t written a single post honoring any of the many august January holidays, such as:

Jan. 4  –  Trivia Day
Jan. 7  –  Old Rock Day
Jan. 9  –  Play God Day
Jan. 10 – Peculiar People Day
Jan. 16 – National Nothing Day
Jan. 21 – Squirrel Appreciation Day

So, in the spirit of BETTER LATE THAN NEVER, I will now try to make up for my oversight – at least in part – by assuring each holiday that being a part of one post beats being the whole of no posts. I’ll start with a trivia question in honor of Trivia Day:

Who originated the phrase, BETTER LATE THAN NEVER? (Hint: it wasn’t a, c, or d)

a. Barack Obama, in defending his late response to the spread of ISIL/ISIS
b. Geoffrey Chaucer, in The Canterbury Tales
c. Rip Van Winkle, in The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
d. Michael Bloomberg, in planning a possible run for President as an independent

Old Rock Day – I’m no geologist, but isn’t all rock old? For example, it’s possible there’s big rock in Little Rock, but new rock? Though everything may be relative, no matter how you roll it, any rock worth its salt has to be eons older than Einstein….at least, that’s my theory. In any case, a rolling stone gathers no muse, but a Rolling Rock definitely does:

Play God Day, in my judgment, is redundant, because many ideologues and religious Grand Poobahs play God every day. So let us move on to the next day, which includes ideologues and Grand Poobahs, but is more broad.

Peculiar People Day – Spotlight broad, Sarah Palin. All others pale-in comparison.

National Nothing Day –

Squirrel Appreciation Day – Here’s a squirrel I can not only appreciate, but appreciate even more the place where it makes its ending exit:

That does it for January make-up days, but the month isn’t over yet. We still have tomorrow to look forward to (or do we?):

Jan. 31 – YAD DRAWKCAB

 

 

IT’S A CONSPIRACY!

Conspiracy, n. An agreement between two or more persons to commit a crime or accomplish a legal purpose through illegal action. –Webster’s New College Dictionary

Last week at my house, a contractor friend was doing a few odd jobs, at the conclusion of which his helper and I were making small talk. I don’t even remember what we were talking about, when out of the blue, he asked me what I thought about “Jade Helm 15.” I, of course, being a man of no small knowledge of many things, promptly responded, “Huh?”

To make a long explanation short, it turns out that there’s a certitude among certain conspiracy believers on the far right that an upcoming U.S. military warfare training exercise is prelude to a federal takeover of the state of Texas. Moreover, this will be a pretext for Obama to declare martial law, provide the authority to cancel next year’s election, and serve a third term as President. At least, that’s how Billy Jim Bob (or whatever the helper’s name was) ‘splained it. Evidently he weren’t a 100% bona fide true believer, however, as he didn’t take me up on my offer of a $100 bet that it ain’t gonna happen.

Anyway, I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised by Jade Helm 15, because conspiracy theories are nothing new. It seems like they have been around since the beginning of creation, which may itself have been a conspiracy theory. Just in my lifetime, there have been such examples as the claim in the 1940s & 50s that fluoridation of drinking water was a communist conspiracy, up to recent claims that Obama is trying to bankrupt, corrupt, disrupt, erupt or inter-rupt America.

Now, far be it from me to deny that some conspiracy theories actually prove true. How do you separate the wheat from the laugh? And who has time to look into this stuff, even if you wanted to? Luckily, my good friend and fearless investigative reporter, Ricardo Cahill, has excessive amounts of time on his hands and the sources and resources to do the job. All you need do is go to his blog, where you will find any number of fearless revelations, many of which expose boobs (of the mentally-suspect or political  type, of course).

To close, I have conspired with myself to put forth the following: