A Good Night

Well, yes.  Or better: YES!

And then there's this:

That's GOP spam I found in my in-box this morning.  MY vote didn't have a gotdamned thing to do with the results, coz my guy, Allen Weh, lost to the Democrat incumbent senator Tom Udall by 55-45 percent.  OTOH, my county (Roosevelt) is deep, deep red.  Note:

NM is generally red, with the exception of a few poor counties and the urban areas of ABQ and Santa Fe, not unlike a lot of other states.  To quote that dumb-ass dating site... "City folks just don't get it."

AAR*

I'm just back from the polling place and it was a walk-up proposition, no waiting at all.  That said, there were about 25 ~ 30 people casting their votes while I was there and two or three more walked in as I was leaving.  All geezers, too, but I suppose all the young'uns are at work and either already voted or will do so after work.

Anyhoo: Mission Accomplished and civic duty fulfilled.

*AAR = After Action Report.  Not everyone knows that. 

Election Day

Go vote!  Mr. Gorrell, from the Usual Source of these things, has sumthin' to say about that:

I agree with him.

And then there's this, from the Usual USAF Source:

Airmen Up For Re-election

—Autumn A. Arnett

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a colonel in the Air Force Reserve, is one of several lawmakers up for re-election on Tuesday who serve the nation not only on Capitol Hill, but also in the Air Force. Polls have shown Graham well ahead in his quest to retain his Senate seat. Over on the House side, Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.), a chaplain in the Reserve, and Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), an Air National Guard pilot, are seeking to remain in office. Both Collins and Kinzinger are combat veterans. Also looking to return to the House in January for the 114th Congress are Rep. Bill Johnson (R-Ohio), a retired lieutenant colonel, and Rep. Sam Johnson (R-Texas), a retired colonel who spent nearly seven years in captivity during the Vietnam War. Two Democrats who are former airmen are seeking re-election: Rep. Peter DeFazio (Ore.) and Rep. Bill Enyart (Ill.). There are also nine Republicans who are former airmen who are running to keep their seats: Rep. Vern Buchanan (Fla.), Rep. Jeff Denham (Calif.), Rep. Rich Nugent (Fla.), Rep. Steve Pearce (N.M.), Rep. Joe Pitts (Pa.), Rep. Ted Poe (Texas), Rep. Dave Reichert (Wash.), Rep. Mark Sanford (S.C.), and Rep. Chris Stewart (Utah).

Only two Democrats in the whole damned bunch.

Off-topic, but...  I've been spending quite a bit o' time at that car brochure site, more time than I prolly should.  To say "times have changed" is a massive understatement.  Case in point, from the 1963 Corvair brochure:

I'm thinkin' the safety wonks' heads would explode if Chevy... or ANY car company... ran ad copy like that today.

And now it's time for a refill and answer the overnight mail.

History

First, a couple o' 'toons from the Usual Source o' these things:

And then there's this, from a daily newsletter I get from the PBS Newshour:

Hardly an historical aberration: So what’s going on here? Is President Obama so toxic that he is unlike past presidents? Not quite. First, like we noted above, there are the fundamentals of this election. Despite being reelected in 2012, he lost the most competitive states where the hottest Senate races are being run by double-digits to Mitt Romney. Plus, there is truth to the so called six-year itch. Seven presidents have been reelected since the Great Depression, and in those second terms, a president’s party has lost an average of 26 House seats and seven Senate seats. The worst second midterm for any president since WWII was Dwight Eisenhower’s. And it’s a reminder that, even then, “small-ball” issues dominated news of the day and drove politics. Eisenhower’s “problems included influence-pedaling charges against his White House chief of staff, national frustration over Soviet gains in space and missile technology and a bitter economic recession,” notes the Senate Historical Office. The 13 seats gained by Democrats was and still is the single-largest gain by one party of Senate seats. That election gave Democrats a 64-36 majority and laid the foundation for the Great Society measures of the 1960s.

Six-Year Itch? Results for a president’s party since the Great Depression in a second midterm
1938 FDR -55 House, -6 Senate
1950 Truman -29 House, -6 Senate
1958 Eisenhower -48 House, -13 Senate
1986 Reagan -5 House, -8 Senate
1998 Clinton +5 House, No change in Senate
2006 Bush -30 House, -6 Senate

AVG: -26 House, -6.5 Senate

Let us hope history repeats itself this time around.

On the Early Bus Again

I suppose an early rise is to be expected when one goes to bed around 2230 hrs.  I find it middling-strange that I only need about six hours o' sleep every night, and eight at the very most.  I don't count the two-hour nap I take every afternoon, though, and that has to figure in there somewhere.

So, all of the overnight mail has yet to hit the in-box but most of it has.  This was a piece-part of it...

I'm thinking Mr. Ramirez is the best of the current crop o' political cartoonists.  He ALWAYS gets it right.  Apropos o' not much... I was never Peter-Principled.  I came close a couple o' times, but never really got there.

Update, 0940 hrs:  On further thought about that Peter Principle thing... I think I've reached my level of incompetence in retirement, in that I don't seem to be doing it too very well.  Some folks, like President George H. W. Bush, jump out of airplanes in retirement, others take off on exotic travel binges, still others go back to school just for the fun that's in it.  Me?  I sit on the verandah and drink beer; an exotic travel binge for me means driving over to The Big(ger) City^TM every other month or so.  Incompetence.

You Can't Fix Stupid

But you CAN fire it/them.

Rats Leaving the Sinking Ship

Leon Panetta's memoir ("Worthy Fights") is out and it's causing something of a firestorm due to his criticism of Obama's "leadership."  Here are a few such items from the firestorm...

The Usual Source of political 'toons has a lot o' stuff like this:

Here's Panetta on last night's PBS Newshour...



Panetta throws a few sops towards Obama but his criticism is still pointed.  I never thought I'd be in agreement with a senior Democrat leader but I certainly am, in this case.  I suppose it's an example of the "stopped clock" phenomenon... you know, "right twice a day." 

Panetta was on Charlie Rose... for the full hour... a couple o' few nights ago.  I watched this show in real time and the interview is interesting, believe it or don't.  I realize prolly no one is gonna sit in front of their computer for nearly an hour to watch some political wonk pontificate, but the vid is here if you want it.

These events... three books from former cabinet members pointedly criticizing a sitting president... are absolutely unprecedented in my lifetime.  The bottom line: Obama might actually be WORSE than we think.  That's pretty hard for me to believe given my already low opinion of the man.

More Bits and Bytes

There was a lot of interesting stuff in the overnight mail today.  Herewith three of those items...

First... a political 'toon.

Heh.  I'll spare you the double-entendres that immediately came to my mind.

No dysfunction HERE:

Air Frame: A B-1B Lancer flies over northern Iraq after conducting air strikes in Syria against ISIS targets, Sept. 27, 2014. The strikes were conducted as part of the President's comprehensive strategy to degrade and ultimately destroy the terrorist organization. (Air Force photo by SrA. Matthew Bruch) (click to embiggen)

Bad to the BONE... make sure you embiggen this pic.

An altogether different flying experience... which would be a suite at 30K feet.  A couple o' screen caps from a VERY interesting article:

This piece might be the most extensively-documented photographic essay I've ever seen, on any subject.  See "What It's Like to Fly the $23,000 Singapore Airlines Suites Class" here.  It's simply freaking amazing; the food alone might be worth the ticket price.

In other news... we got our inter-tubes connection upgraded from 5 Mbps to 100 Mbps this morning.  The difference is astounding... web pages don't load on the screen now, they POP.  I think this is pretty amazing for a dusty lil rural town of only 12 and a half thousand people.

Good News!

I'm thinkin' this one's been around the block a few times before it hit my in-box.  It's still good, though.

Why, yes.  Yes, it IS a slow day for blog fodder.

A Couple o' Things From Yesterday

Ramirez, first.

The man has a point.  And then there's this:

Hockey soda?  Really?  And what does "pro STYLE" really mean?... not to mention the eye-rolling "functional lifestyle beverage."  MY functional lifestyle beverage is whiskey, thankyaverymuch.

And finally... We're gratified to see the adults in the room prevailed in the Scottish independence referendum.  The United Kingdom is still united, thank The Deity At Hand.

Pro-union supporters celebrated in Glasgow as the result became clearer.  (photo from the Beeb, more here)

Semantics & Weather

I find this amusing... not funny, just amusing.  Given our gub'mint's track record on the various and sundry "wars" depicted in the 'toon, perhaps the Obama administration is right in labeling the current military adventure as it has.

This is just as amusing, if not more so:

Today is the sort o' day some folks would call "dreary."  Not me, however.  A nice, long, gentle rain is JUST what the doctor ordered for The High Plains o' New Mexico.

Jes a Couple o' Things

First...

Heh.  Hillary is such an EASY target yet I suspect we'll get awfully damned tired of her before 2016 is done and gone.

And then there's this...

Yup, two years ago today.  Robert, the salesman at Bender GM who sold me the car, called me up at precisely 0838 hrs yesterday morning to inquire about how things were between The Tart and myself, in addition to the above e-mail.  Both events were nice touches (and it's the first time I've experienced after-sales behavior like this, ever) but I wish Robert hadn't called at what passes for oh-dark-thirty these days.  We retirees need our beauty sleep, yanno?  That said, these past two years have flown right by.  I'm still in love with the oh-so-lovely, graceful, and speedy Dowager Tart... I think I'm gonna keep her.

We Feel Yore Pain, Hillary

Yep, life's a bitch sometimes.  I dunno if I'd want to trade spaces with Hill...

That looks like a lot o' work, which means I'd need a gardener, a maid or three, and a butler or two.  No chauffeur, though.

Heh

Mr. Kelley is on about this, just in case you've been out of touch for the past couple o' days.

And then there's this...

Everything old is new again.

Slow Day

We've read all of the overnight correspondence... from which we usually take at least one item and turn it into a blog post... and we found there wasn't a whole helluva lot there.  But we need sumthin'... and this will have to do:

That's from the Usual Source of these things, of course.

Saturday: Pooty-Poot and the Mama of All Bears

Pretty clever.

She's Baaaack

I don't think she ever left, really.



Right on point and as hot as ever.

In other news... I remained abed until shortly past noon, again.  (sigh)

I Didn't Watch It

That might have been my reaction.  That, or getting sick to my stomach.  I just can't take this guy any longer.

Added, somewhat later:  That other Old AF Sarge also posted about the SOTU today.  And I had to comment, of course, coz that's what we DO.  Here's what I said:

I think the SOTU would be a LOT better if it had a Benny Hill soundtrack... sotto voce... running for the entire time the president is in the House. By that I mean it would begin when the Sergeant At Arms announces "Mr. Speaker... the President of the United States!" and continue as he autographs his way out the door after he leaves the podium. Maybe we could get the networks to speed it up like a Benny Hill chase scene, too. A LOT more people would watch.

You don't know what I'm on about?  Well, lemmee fix that for ya.

Saturday: Springsteen?

Yup... TWO of 'em:



I gotta give props to both Fallon and Springsteen; that was pretty good.  And speakin' o' rock stars...



No!  Don't kill Ziggy!  Don't EVER kill Ziggy!

And Yet ANOTHER One

Yet another short political quiz... and this one considers libertarians (small "L," thankya).  My results:

We are NOT surprised.  At all.

h/t to Occasional Reader, Constant Correspondent, and Good Friend Lin, via e-mail.