Life

Lefty and Shorty Talk Fauci

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

Last evening Lefty and Shorty were all but ready to close the Gulf Station.   Rain was falling from the heavens at an accelerating pace, mosquitoes were rolling in and cars were not.  Shorty- Why do we stay open until midnight?  Lefty- So that you and I can discuss one of the most influential people of the 21st century, Dr. Anthony “Tony” Fauci, who announced that he was retiring before the November midterms.

Lefty sat to the left of Shorty.  Imagine that.  Shorty sat on the shorter of the two “halves” of the 55-gallon drum about six feet apart.  Imagine that.  Each was cut down to size and retrofitted with a soft cushion top.

Lefty-  Can you believe what world influence he wielded? Shorty-  Meh. He was a not-so-great actor on a big stage with a constantly changing script. Lefty- Umm.  An actor?  Shorty-  Yes, actor.  But, he was not close to the best “Tony” actor of the last 22 years.   Lefty- I can’t believe you think…  Shorty- The best “Tony” actor had the last name of Soprano, Tony Soprano.

Lefty- What in the world does Tony Soprano have to do with Fauci.?  Shorty- They were similar.  Lefty- Wow! Go on.  Shorty- Well, one was tall and fat, the other short and thin, but.. Lefty- But what?  Shorty- Tony hired men to take a shot at hundreds.  Fauci hired Pfizer to give a shot to millions.

Lefty- Please.  Shorty- Tony was a habtual liar.  Fauci was too.  Lefty- Come on.  Fauci was following the science.  Shorty-  No, Fauci was following the money, same as Tony.  Both had huge egos.  Fauci wanted you to follow the scientist, not the science.  His act is now all played out.

Lefty- I can’t believe…Shorty- There’s more.  Lefty- God forbid!  Shorty- They both had women costars that acted subserviently.  Tony had Carmela, and Fauci had Dr. Birx.  Lefty- This should be interesting.  Shorty- Camela lied for Tony.  Birx lied for Fauci.  Lefty- I see.  Shorty- And, they both liked scarves.  Birx wore one every day.  Lefty- I’ll bite, what about Carmela?  Shorty- Once Tony had to buy back her loyalty after another dalliance and got her a Hermes scarf. She showed it off to all of her friends mispronouncing it as “her me’s. Lefty- So?  Shorty-  Unknowingly, pronoun identity may have begun right then and there.

Lefty- One of us could use a mafia necktie right about now.  Shorty- Fauci said that he wasn’t retiring, he was just going to the next chapter of his life. Lefty- Here’s a softball.  What do you think that might be?  Shorty- The N95 Masked Singer, what else?  But, he might also get to work with Rand Paul soon.

Lefty- What else?  Fifteen minutes of my life, I’ll never get back.  Lock the place up, I’m out.  Shorty-  Well, at least we socially distanced tonight.

 

How Far?

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

How far down the rabbit hole are you willing to go?

  1.   Spain’s government mandated a minimum 80-degree setting on all home air conditioning units as the transition to green power hasn’t kept up with demand.
  2.   Ukraine’s richer by $50 billion thanks to the generosity of America.  Zelenskyy is so appreciative of this gesture that he took time away from posing for the Vogue cover to reach out to China to have them bid on the rebuild after the war that is or isn’t a war.
  3. China is so concerned about the effect of burning fossil fuels that official plans call for boosting coal production capacity by 300 million tons this year. That is equal to 7% of last year’s output of 4.1 billion tons, which was an increase of 5.7% over 2020.  All of the windmills in the world matter not if China and India don’t comply.
  4.  It seems like they disagree with then-President Barack Obama who lectured us that “climate change was no longer a debate, it’s fact.”  He’s is right though.  The climate has been changing for hundreds of millions of years.
  5.  All of this paves the way for the Inflation Reduction Act, which gives away over a quarter of trillion dollars to green companies and green-leaning pet projects.  Never let capitalism get in the way of a government, er, political handout.
  6.  All of the green handouts, capitalism, and the Inflation Reduction Act collided yesterday.  The Inflation Reduction Act, the major climate bill, was signed this week, continuing the EV purchase $7500 tax credit but only those assembled in North America qualify.  Capitalism stepped in and GM and Ford raised the prices of certain electric models by $6,000 to $8,500, roughly matching the $7,500 tax credit introduced under the inflation bill.  We think that’s called a zero-sum game.
  7. Thirty-one models qualify, but the government’s process to qualify is tricky and the timing is trickier due to quotas.  The “must have” is that at a minimum “final assembly” must occur stateside.  Could this be as simple as screwing on the gas tank cap to qualify?  Wait.
  8. Actually the only thing this screws is the gas combustion car manufacturing business.  Oh, and the big, bad oil business as well.
  9. If you obsoleted much of the need for oil (good luck) you’d certainly harm the economy in Texas, Alaska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Louisiana, and Oklahoma to name a few.  What do all of these states have in common?  Hint- It’s not abortion rights, er, woman’s reproductive health.  Think red.
  10. Who wins when wind wins?  Hint-It’s not states that have or will abort abortions.  Think blue.
  11. At least we seem to be winning across the 50 united vs. that pesky pandemic.  Two vax’s and two boosters did the trick.  How?  We don’t need to revisit government political theater handouts and capitalism do we?
  12. Although the military is still requiring all of the jabs or you’re discharged from it for refusing.  Masking will be mandatory for Philadelphia students for the first 10 days of the upcoming school year that starts on Aug. 29, after which it will be “optional but strongly encouraged.”  We have to guess that the disease can only count to ten just like many students.  Make it make sense.
  13. Meanwhile, the CDC Director weighed in, “In our big moment, our performance did not reliably meet expectations.” Dr. Rochelle Walensky said this and more in a statement to the media yesterday that goes on to recommend CDC changes.

We’re so far down the rabbit hole that Bugs Bunny just asked Dr. Rochelle, “ah, what’s up doc?”

 

Ten Piece Nuggets- Random

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

It’s been a minute.

  1. Charles Barkley once said, “poor people have been voting Democrat for over 50 years and they’re still poor.”  Inflation hits all, but it hits the lower income tier hardest.  November midterms are about 100 days away.  It’s also said people vote with their wallets, or how they feel financially.   We will see.
  2. Speaking of the economy, some economists believe that we are already in a recession.   But what is a recession?  On WH.gov, the official White House website page it seems the traditional definition two consecutive quarters of falling real GDP) is getting a whitewash.  We quote, “That is neither the official definition nor the way economists evaluate the state of the business cycle.”  Changing times.  It goes on, “it is unlikely that the decline in the first quarter of 2022 if followed up by a second-quarter similar result indicates a recession.”  Is someone trying to move the goal posts?
  3. Dozens of incoming University of Michigan Medical School students walked out of a pro-life keynote speaker’s address, after a previous petition to get the speaker removed failed.  Students petitioned the school weeks prior to remove Dr. Kristin Collier as the keynote speaker over her support for the unborn.  Why did they show up to begin with?  Attention seekers?  How many want to become a Pediatrician?  Free speech anyone?
  4. If you travel to Mexico these days you need not wear a mask on the plane nor into the country throughout the airport including customs.  But when you depart when entering their version of TSA and until you board you do.  Makes sense?  But wait, there’s more.  Signs and announcements throughout the Aeropuerto remind you to socially distance by maintaining a space of five feet minimally.  We guess with inflation being so bad that five feet is the new six feet.
  5.  When you head through the security another difference or two becomes obvious.  The x-ray machines are the old ones, not the full-body scan ones.  Also, you need not remove your shoes.  Shoe bombs aren’t a threat exiting Mexico, just entering we guess.
  6.  Speaking of Covid, as you know fully vaxxed and fully boosted President Joe Biden tested positive late last week.  But, because tennis great Novak Djokovic isn’t vaccinated he cannot enter the US to defend his 2021 US Open title.  Last year no covid shot was necessary to compete.  This year it is.  Do the nuts have the keys to the insane asylum?
  7. Speaking of Covid, can we please, please, please stop calling the shots “vaccinations?”  Vaccinations provide immunity.  These shots that are making Pfizer and Moderna lots of money don’t provide immunity.  The only people that think that they do are the ones you see driving alone in their car with a mask on.
  8. The chief of the World Health Organization General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus isn’t monkeying around.  He said the expanding monkeypox outbreak in more than 70 countries is an “extraordinary” situation that now qualifies as a global emergency.  It’s a declaration that will spur further investment in treating the once-rare disease and worsen the scramble for scarce vaccines.   Pfizer’s ears just perked up.
  9.  Climate change became a national emergency last week Joe Biden told us.  Except, he didn’t officially declare it a national emergency.  Maybe someone can explain why.  NBC’s Meet the Depressed trotted out good old Al Gore yesterday to help the “climate activists” further scold the “climate deniers.”   Gore said that time is running out or may have already run out.  Which is it?  Hard to tell.  Of course, he said way back in the ’80s that the year 2000 was the turning point.  Is somebody trying to move the goalposts again?
  10. If you like baseball, you have to like the comeback from Tommy John surgery that Justin Verlander is having.  He’s 39 years old and hadn’t pitched in two full seasons.  He sports a gaudy 13-3 won/loss record with a razor-sharp 1.86 ERA this year.  In his last five starts, he’s 5-0 with a paltry 0.59 ERA.  And on Saturday in a high leverage seventh inning v the Mariners his 103rd and final pitch hit 100 mph to get out of a jam and secure the win.  He said that he wants to pitch until he’s 45.  Why not?

You’ve been served.

 

Boom Booms Life Lessons #4

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

When we checked in on Boom Booms Life Lessons #2 we learned of his early departures and late returns six days a week to and from his workplace.  We also mentioned the Saturday yard work after that, and house repair after that as needed.  Well, it didn’t stop there actually.

On a couple of weeknights each week he finished dinner and headed to our spare bedroom that housed his desk, his adding machine, my mother’s exercise bike, and most of all an undersized pool table.  Yes, it was crowded.  He needed to do some “book work” he said.  He struck the adding machine keys so quickly that it was not possible to follow.

His one and only son loved playing pool (competition and geometry combined is a tasty combo) and asked for him to”crack em” almost every night that his own homework didn’t get in the way.  Boom Boom would finish his book work first.  Always.  He expressed it as follows.  Always.

“Work before play son, work before play!“

Once the heat generated by his fast fingers on his adding machine cooled, and his pencil entered its last numbers in the ledger, it was time for a game or three of 8 ball, or 9 ball, or…

“Let’s play one more game Dad.”

“Sleep before school son.  Sleep before school!”

And with that, we would leave the spare room and turn out the lights.

If you tend to put the need last to enjoy the want first, try the reverse.  The satisfaction of a job well done first leads to greater joy in the leisurely pursuit of your choice later.

The sound of the crank on the adding machine still echoes.  So does “Work before…………”

 

 

Boom Boom’s Life Lessons #2

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

Born into a family with a strong work ethic, Boom Boom learned quickly that working hard didn’t guarantee success, but it went a long way towards providing warm meals and a roof over one’s head.   At 12 years of age The Great Depression brutally started.  At 22 years of age, The Great Depression mercifully ended.  It left a lasting, yet positive mark on him.

He worked for the same company for over 32 years.  His “white-collar” management job started early for him.  He was gone every morning by 6:30 AM for his 15-minute commute.  He rarely returned prior to 6:30 PM.  He worked every Saturday too.  He left by 7:00 AM and returned around noon.  He chose to work on Saturday.  It was far from mandatory.  Then, he worked in the yard meticulously trimming, mowing, or fixing what might be wrong with the house till near dark every Saturday evening.

Boom Boom said it often, “no one can outwork or outthink you.”   “You can work as hard as you want as long as you want.  And, you may not be smarter than some others, but you can think longer and harder if you choose.”

No one outworked or outthought Boom Boom.  Perhaps no one can outwork or out-think you.

A Country Divided….

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

In the divided country that we live in does anything divide us more than our stances on abortion?

National elections come close.  To go to or not go to war might come even closer.  Might.

But, reproductive rights, formerly known as women’s wellness, formerly known as women’s healthcare, formerly known as pro-choice, formerly known as abortion is the greatest divider of us all.

A SCOTUS ruling in 1973 in Roe v. Wade effectively made abortions legal in all 50 states.  Almost 50 years later the SCOTUS majority opinion returned the decision on its legality to the individual states.

And the for abortion crowd roared its disapproval.  And, the for abortion crowd will continue to roar its collective throaty disapproval.

President Joe Biden said last week, “Roe is on the ballot come November.”  Unfortunately for Democrats, his job performance is also on the ballot come November.

The right to a peaceful protest is guaranteed by our First Amendment.  Protest away.  Elect who you want to help shape the future going forward.

What isn’t necessary are emotional train wreck-type people suggesting emotional train wrecks.

Take Maxine Waters, please.   We ask in our best Henny Youngman voice.

“You ain’t seen nothing yet. Women are going to control their bodies no matter how they try and stop [us]. The hell with the Supreme Court. We will defy them,” said the far-too-long in power Ms. Waters.  She continued, “Black women will be out in droves. We will be out by the thousands. We will be out by the millions. We’re going to make sure we fight for the right to control our own bodies.”

It took her about 20 seconds to suggest we ignore the Supreme Court and injected obvious racist overtones into the good fight.  She’s quite the leader.

A few pro-life centers got torched this weekend in the mostly peaceful protests.  A few more are sure to follow.

Former President (and some say current) Barrack Obama called the move an attack on “the essential freedoms of millions of Americans.”  He also famously said in 2008 that “elections have consequences.”  In 2016 America elected President Trump.  Trump nominated three new Justices.  You know the rest.

If you’re old enough or studied history before it was revised, you’ve seen a few laws and rulings fall in and out of favor.

Alcohol was once consumed freely until 1920, prohibited from then until 1933, and legal again thereafter.

The war on drugs has gone so well that we have hoisted the white flag and either legalized or decriminalized marijuana in most states.

Heck, if you read enough opinions you know that breast milk, raw eggs, mercury, and ivermectin are either good or bad for you depending on the decade the opinion is written and how the wind blows.

Oil and gas went from one of the main drivers of the industrialized and now advanced standard of living we have, to a nasty fossil fuel that’s going to end the world very soon.

Windmills are in.  Exxon is out.

Obama said climate change is a fact.  We cannot even debate its merits anymore.

The number of Justices on the Supreme Court changed six times before settling to the present total of nine in 1869.  Recently we wanted to stack it.  Now we want to abolish it.

Some women are so incensed that they are marching in Washington exclaiming that they are going to go on strike and abstain from sex because of this ruling.  Inadvertently, they brought logic into their emotional eruption.

Right about now we could use more logic in the country, inadvertent or not.

The only thing that is constant is change.

And, a lot can change in a quick 50 years.

 

 

 

 

 

Ten Piece Nuggets-Sports, Guns, Rants

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

Ready?  Set?  Chew!

  1. When Seattle Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll spoke highly of quarterbacks Drew Lock and Geno Smith during this month’s mandatory minicamp, you knew it was on.  What’s that?  Let the Baker Mayfield to Seattle trade watch begin.
  2. Meanwhile, the speculation revolving around how long and when DeShaun Watson will be suspended intensifies.  Watson, through his attorney, has settled 20 of 24 civil suits.  Watson admits no wrongdoing.  He is shelling out about 100k per suit for each instance of doing nothing wrong.
  3. If, and it’s a big if, Watson got a year-long suspension it would be over two full years in 2023 since he put on pads for a real game.  Adam Schefter and Ian Rappoport both think the league will hit Watson with an all-of 2022 penalty.  Does Cleveland regret mortgaging their future for a guy without an immediate future?
  4.  Some years teams just have “it.”  The 2022 Yankees have “it.”  Sporting the best record by far in the major leagues, they overcame a 6-3 deficit last evening in the ninth to send the Houston Astros and their closer Ryan Pressley back to their Manhatten hotel as losers 7-6.  A late June game doesn’t mean much you say?  The Yankees thought otherwise.
  5. How hot are the Yankees?  They’re 52-18 for a 74.3 winning percentage.  That torrid pace extrapolates out to a 120-42 record.  What’s the record for the most regular-season wins in a year?  The 2001 Seattle Mariners won 116 and lost 46.
  6. Rob Gronkowski is retiring. Again.  “I will now be going back into my retirement home knowing I gave it everything I had, good or bad, every time I stepped out on the field,” Gronkowski wrote.  Tom Brady said the same about 6 months ago, then “unretired.”   “It would not surprise me if Tom Brady calls him during the season to come back and Rob answers the call,” Gronk’s agent Drew Rosenhaus told ESPN’s Adam Schefter.   Why sweat through training camp when the GOAT can drop a dime at any time during the cooler regular season?
  7.  There was a lot to keep up with on the gun ownership front yesterday.  The Senate passed a safety bill including red flag provisions and more extensive background checks.  Meanwhile, SCOTUS handed down a 6-3 opinion that New York’s regulations that made it difficult to obtain a license to carry a concealed handgun were unconstitutionally restrictive, and that it should be easier to obtain such a license.  So, it’s harder to get a gun, but it’s easier to open carry once you get one.
  8.  The SCOTUS ruling didn’t sit well with washed-up, bitter Keith Olbermann.  The far-left, ex-MSNBC host tweeted it has “become necessary to dissolve the Supreme Court of the United States. The first step is for a state the ‘court’ has now forced guns upon, to ignore this ruling. Great. You’re a court? Why and how do you think you can enforce your rulings? #IgnoreThe Court.”  Dissolve the Supreme Court?  Wasn’t the idea just months ago to pack it with more robes?
  9.  Once upon a time, the US was/is a rule of law country.  The rule of law is the political philosophy that all citizens and institutions within a country, state, or community are accountable to the same laws.  Olbermann’s immaturity at 63 years of age is not a good look.  If you don’t like stopping at stop signs, don’t.  Make sense?
  10.  Olbermann wasn’t flying solo. The ruling represents “a middle finger to New York,” Whoopi Goldberg said on ABC’s The View.  “Truly a disgraceful ruling,” Barbra Streisand tweeted.  Do you wonder if Whoppi and Barbara’s bodyguards are packing?  No need to wonder, you know they are.

Speaking of packing, get out of the heat and head north.  Bring your firearm if you wish.

Ten Piece Nuggets

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

Nuggets!  Git yer 10 Piece Nuggets right cheer!!  Hot off of the press or depressed if you prefer.

  1.  It’s important to be more open-minded these days than ever.  As you know with gender ID the country is struggling to define what a woman is.  It’s not having such problems with men though.  And, as you now know, men can get pregnant.  Keep up with the changing times, please.
  2. But, when it comes to proper identification, California, as always, is ahead of the pack.  In comes a fishy ruling from the Golden State.  A Cali court has ruled that bees can legally be considered fish.  The reversal of an earlier interpretation means bumblebees can now be eligible for listing under the California Endangered Species Act. The conservation win comes as bumblebees have faced a serious decline throughout the United States due to climate change.  How do we know that?  Well, we have heard of flying fish.
  3. Over the weekend a shootout in Tennessee and another in downtown Philadelphia left multiple people dead in both locations.  The two fracases involved multiple gunmen in each incident.  Are we as upset about this as we are when a lone deranged lunatic mows down folks in a supermarket or a movie theater?  We get the outrage in schools, but wonder why the indifference nationally on the other.
  4. Speaking of which, the Uvalde parents of the victims will apparently sue the gunmaker of the AR-15 used in the shooting.  The premise we presume is that the manufacturer puts out a product knowing it can cause death.  It seems like the landmark cases against tobacco companies in the seventies.  Can we also sue alcohol producers?  Car makers?  Plane manufacturers?
  5. We empathize with their grief certainly but wonder about this attempt.  While they have the lawyers’ attention they should sue the stand-down Uvalde police department.  We’re sure they will.  And, we’re sure that they’ll get a big settlement.
  6.  Does the country feel hopelessly split to you?  On migration, a May poll informed respondents, “By the year 2050, a majority of the population will be made up of people who are Black, Asian, Hispanic, and other racial minorities.”  Respondents were evenly split: 22% said the demographic change would be a “very” or a “somewhat” good thing,” while 20% said a “very” or a “somewhat” bad thing.
  7. How about along party lines?  Thirty percent of people who voted for Joe Biden in 2020 say it would be “a very good thing,”  Just 3% of President Trump’s voters said it would be a “very good thing.”  We ask again, does the country feel hopelessly split to you?
  8.  Do you know how lucky you are to have such low gas prices? Huh?   White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre responded to questions yesterday about high gas prices during the daily briefing by noting it was “really important” that people understood that prices were higher across the globe.  She noted that gas prices in the European Union were $8.15 a gallon, prices in Germany were $8.88 a gallon, and prices in Canada were $6.23 a gallon.  Lucky you.
  9. She repeated an earlier WH position that “everything was on the table” to deal with high gas prices but said that she did not have any information on actions the president would take to help lower gas prices.  “I don’t have anything to preview,” she said.  If we weren’t so dumb we’d be insulted.  It’s Putin’s fault anyway, isn’t it?
  10. As expected Phil Mickelson, he of foot in mouth disease, announced that he was joining the new LIV Golf series backed by the Saudi-Arabian government. It’s widely reported that Tiger Woods has turned down a low nine-figure offer to do the same.   Mickelson joins another big name, Dustin Johnson, in making the same move.  Will they still be big names in five years?  Apparently, they don’t care as big money talks and fame walks across the pond.

Enjoy the heat.

The (Not) Great Reset

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

We believe for a fact that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in 1963 when he shot and killed President John F. Kennedy.  We believe this based on a mountain of evidence piled up over the years vs very little to the contrary.  Follow the forensic and ballistic science.

President Obama said in 2014,  “The shift to a cleaner energy economy won’t happen overnight, and it will require tough choices along the way.  But the debate is settled.  Climate change is a fact.”  Clearly, he believes it. Or, at the least, he’s a great pitchman for solar and electric companies.

We believe it too as the climate has always been changing.  It’s how the sun is constantly cooling for example. It’s how the lower half of Florida broke off from Louisiana and floated to its current Everglades location. Follow the science.

And clearly, the CDC, labeled yesterday on Twitter as the Center for Disinformation and Control, believes that yet another covid variant is amongst us and potentially so disruptive that they extended the airplane mask mandate another 15 days. It was supposed to fly away for good on Monday 4/18.  Science.

Dr. Fauci must feel like a kid in a candy store this morning, but we digress.

That the CDC extended this mandate is beyond laughable.   And, that’s the problem.  It’s beyond laughable because there has to be a method to their madness.  Is it another means to a bigger end?

If you believe in the “Great Reset” theory, it’s all a bit scary.  We’re not sure if we do.  But, clearly, something is afoot.  There are too many zealots, not experts, pulling from the same side of the rope.

Masks don’t work.  Doctors near and far will tell you this.  You can take them off while eating.  What a joke.

But don’t say that out loud.  Twitter might suspend or even ban you.

The FBI might investigate you.  Of course, that’s not something that you need to worry about apparently.

You don’t need a mask anywhere in the US worth talking about.  Philly government buildings and NY preschools aren’t worth it.

Neither is the White House where an “emotional” Kamala forgot hers after the Judge Jackson confirmation.  That’s excusable and understandable, isn’t it?

But, step on a plane and mask up or else.  Control.  Power.

The CEOs of the major airlines should refuse to enforce the mandate starting today.  Today.  It’s not legal.  It’s not a law passed by Congress.

At least racism is getting fixed.  Well, it’s not if you boarded a subway in Brooklyn Tuesday.

And, yesterday Janet Yellen, Secretary of the Treasury spoke out again against climate change and in support of a carbon tax.   “Climate change is a very critical problem that we need to address. The central problem is the damage caused by greenhouse gas emissions.”  Yellen, the bean counter, is now yelling as a climate change expert.

Meanwhile down at the border, no masks are needed.  Neither is a negative covid test.  Fences?  Nah.  Border patrol? But, why?

Do you want cheaper gas and oil?  Tough.  Buy a Tesla.

Ah, Tesla.  That brings us to Elon Musk.  This morning he announced plans to buy Twitter.  And, with the offer comes the promise that free speech on one big left-leaning social media tech platform might actually be freed.

And, with that and the upcoming midterms comes something else that we believe in.  The pendulum.  And, the pendulum is moving even when you think it is not.

Maybe there is light at the end of that tunnel after all.

Let us hope it’s not a NY subway train light.

Was that offensive?  One can hope.

Ten Piece Nuggets-Random

Posted on by thependulumswings staff

Fresh and hot to hit the spot is a serving of Ten Piece Nuggets below.

  1.  Two old-school NCAA bluebloods duked (sorry Coach K) it out last night for the NCAA Basketball Championship.  Kansas overcame a 15 point halftime deficit to beat North Carolina and completed the biggest comeback in title-game history.  It was the fourth title for the storied Kansas team which is one less than the five Level I NCAA infraction allegations it is facing.
  2. Kansas isn’t too worried about them though as they gave Head Coach Bill Self a lifetime contract last April that pays him over $5 million per year.  LSU fired its head coach Will Wade last month for exactly the same- 5 Level I infraction allegations.
  3. The contract states Self cannot be fired with cause for violations that occurred before this new deal, meaning he can only be terminated without cause for whatever penalties are handed down to the program by the NCAA.  This makes us wonder.  If Kansas fires Self will the team then be considered selfless? Clearly, we’re asking for a friend.
  4. All of this brings us to a great quote about what the NCAA is and isn’t.  It was delivered many years ago but remains true to this day.  “The NCAA is so mad at Kentucky they’re going to give Cleveland State another year of probation,” said Jerry Tarkanian, then head coach of the Las Vegas Running Rebels.  Tark fought the law, and Tark won.  And it seems like Kansas, unlike LSU, is ready to do the same.
  5. This is the best time of the year for sports nuts and second isn’t close.  Last night was the NCAA basketball final.   Hockey and basketball are in the stretch run right before their playoffs begin.  MLB throws out its first pitch this week.  The Kentucky Derby is just around the far turn. The NFL Draft hype builds by the day.  This weekend in golf is the revered Masters.
  6. Will he or won’t he?  Fred Couples thinks he will.  Barring a setback over the next couple of days, Couples, one of Tiger Woods’ closest friends, believes Woods will play when the 86th Masters begins on Thursday.  “He’s kind of a tough guy,” Couples said.  They played a practice round together yesterday.  “He looked phenomenal,” Couples said. “What impressed me the most is he was bombing it.”  If Tiger tees it up The Masters will set a new viewership record for itself and second place won’t be close.
  7.  By now you’ve heard that Elon Musk owns 9.2% of Twitter.   The surge in its price since the announcement earned him a cool $386 million and counting.  That’s pocket change for Musk whose net worth is nearing $300 billion.  What’s the next shot in the billiard match?  Musk could a) ask for a seat or three on the Twitter Board of Directors, b) ask for policy changes (read as free speech), c) takeover the company altogether, or d) sell his shares and bank a tidy profit.
  8. Musk has 80 million-plus followers on Twitter.  Tesla spends nothing on advertising.  The Twitter platform would give the sly and wicked smart Musk a tremendous opportunity to tout whatever he chooses if he controlled its content, followers, and censorship.  Social media is maddening and fascinating at the same time.
  9.  U.S. Senator Mitt Romney should officially change parties.  Utah should vote to impeach him or vote him out of office this fall.  Why?  Because he’s a sheep in wolves’ clothing is why.
  10.  Real estate is expensive in Southern California. How expensive?  Black Lives Matter leadership allegedly purchased a $6 million luxury 6500 sq ft mansion with cash in SoCal using donation money, according to New York Magazine.  Why?  An April 1 internal BLM email states it is to “serve as housing and studio space for recipients of the Black Joy Creators Fellowship,” which “provides recording resources and dedicated space for Black creatives to launch content online and in real life focused on abolition, healing justice, urban agriculture and food justice, pop culture, activism, and politics.”  This makes the $30k per month that our government (you) is paying to rent a Malibu House to watch over Hunter Biden sound like a steal.  Could he find somewhere else to paint?  Could he find his laptop?

Remember to always keep your napkin in your lap!