Executive Penmanship

Owing to an absolutely unavoidable scheduling conflict involving a critical tee time, Barack Obama has decided to skip Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's funeral on Saturday, but will "pay his respects" on Friday.

According to a highly-placed White House source who may or may not be imaginary, the president was reported to have said "I would have gone, but it's not like we're running out of Supreme Court Justices. Hell, we've still got eight of 'em! Moreover, if I go to the funeral of one, then they'll all expect me to come to their funerals. That's a dangerous precedent I'm not willing to set."

In fairness, Mr. Obama does have a lot on his plate, what with planning for next month's visit to Cuba. While there, the president is expected to tender official apologies to the Castro brothers for our nation's disgracefully aggressive conduct during the Cuban Missile Crisis and, by way of reparations, offer to help foot the bill to bring Russian missile batteries back to Havana.

Mr. Obama will also visit the grave of Che Guevara as part of a solemn ceremony which involves leaving a large briefcase of cash behind the headstone, feeling that "somehow I owe it" to the revolutionary's sole surviving granddaughter, Texas judge Cinderela Guevera.

Still, Barry isn't completely stiffing Scalia's funeral (so to speak). No, he's sending...

OLD BLACK OPS JOE...

BONUS: WALLY WORLD

His Holiness makes a good point.

We don't really have much to say about the dust-up between the Pope and the man who builds his towering hats, Donald Trump - but the subject was just too ripe for us to ignore entirely.

Hope n' Change doesn't actually care if Trump is a Christian or not (although we would care if he's lying about it). Additionally, if Pope Francis wants to declare that certain forms of architecture are more sinful than others, we're fine with it.

Even if it ironically means a lot of undocumented Mexican bricklayers will be going to Hell.

Wednesday Wildcard

With so much attention being paid to the presidential campaign circus, it's easy - but dangerous - to forget how many genuinely awful things are going on in the world, unimpeded by the current president.

As a case in point, it has now been revealed that ISIS is using chemical weapons on our allies and has the capability of producing more. Chemical weapons, as you may recall, are generally considered to be in violation of Obama's "red line" - if you use them anywhere in the world, he will come sweeping down on you with his mighty sword of vengeance.

Just kidding! He actually won't do squat unless it's an actual chemical attack on the United States which renders every golf course unplayable.

And speaking of good reasons to carry a set of clubs...

Operating under what we assume is advice from Bill Clinton, Hillary is now campaigning doggy-style. No, really.

At a recent speech, she started barking like a dog to prove that Republicans are liars. No, we don't get the connection, either - but then again, we haven't had as many concussions or drunken blackouts as Mrs. Clinton.

BONUS: SOCIALISM MEDIA

Thanks to Bernie Sanders and rampant national ignorance, socialism is enjoying newfound popularity amongst those who can never imagine themselves working hard enough to pay taxes. And according to Bernie and alleged-filmmaker Michael Moore, life in socialist countries is pure paradise!

But here's an interesting reality check from a (non-political) friend's Facebook post:

Actual conversation today...
Us: "So how do you like living in Brussels?
Her: Well, you know, it's a socialist country so they're always on strike. The last time we flew in we couldn't get home from the airport due to the transportation strike.
Us: Why are they striking?
Her: For higher wages; with the 40% tax it's hard for people to make a living. A US couple started a coffee shop to create jobs helping women out of the sex trafficking industry, but the government requires all businesses for the first year to hire people released from prison. Yeah, and they're just all very laid back. When we first moved there the movers tried 3 times to get my armoire up the stairs and then just said, 'You'll just have to find some other way, we can't do it.' Customer service is practically non-existent."

This is the same Brussels, by the way, which just busted another terror cell of radical Islamists several days ago. Apparently socialism makes it easy for people to live comfortably without actually working, leaving more time for hobbies like waging jihad.

And while we're on the topic of socialist enterprises with non-existent customer service...

BONUS 2: TURN YOUR HEAD AND KAFKA

As you may recall (assuming you drink less than we do), as of our last Obamacare update daughter Jarlsberg's insurance had been cancelled without explanation, leaving her without coverage for her critically important epilepsy medications and neurologist appointments. But at least her new policy was going into effect February 1st, so new bills would be taken care of while we tried to clear up the old mess.

And for the senior Jarlsbergs, Healthcare.gov was sending threatening letters about canceling our insurance unless we sent them further proof of income. Which we did. Multiple times.

So you can imagine our delight when daughter Jarlsberg called several days ago, trying to hold back tears, when she went to pick up this month's medications and found out that now her new, fully paid up policy, has also been cancelled without warning or reason by Blue Cross Blue Shield.

This precipitated a one hour phone call over the weekend in which we tried to get things straightened out, only to find out that only "level one" employees staff the phones on the weekend, and they aren't technically empowered to do any damn thing at all. In fact, we suspect that they're only on staff to be used as meat in case their superiors go cannibalistic during a national emergency.

So yesterday we called again, this time a 90-minute call. The first 45 minutes was a woman breathing heavily and mumbling to herself in confusion while looking at her computer screen. She then put us on a "brief hold" which stretched into a full half-hour. She eventually returned to say that the problem was all in our imagination, and daughter Jarlsberg has always been insured.

It was at this point that heated words were exchanged and it was decided (unilaterally) that the whole fustercluck needed to get expedited to someone with both authority and, just maybe, a triple digit IQ.  "I'm turning it over to Finance," clucked the customer service person, as if this would fill us with ineffable joy. But we effed anyway - and demanded that "Finance" not only fix this problem but call us to explain everything in detail or we'd file a complaint with the Oklahoma Insurance Commission.

But...we were lying. We'd already filed the complaint online during that half-hour of nerve-shredding muzak on hold. And we're ready to go to war.

For now, the situation remains hopelessly unresolved - but we've floated daughter Jarlsberg over $1000 to make sure she can buy the medications that Blue Cross, Healthcare.gov, and B. Hussein want to deny her.

As far as the senior Jarlsberg's health insurance plan goes, well, Healthcare.gov just sent a forbidding collection agency-style "second notice" that our insurance will soon be terminated for failure to provide proof of income.

Speaking to a functionary who can only dream of someday becoming a "level one" employee, we were told that if we've submitted all of our documentation (which we have, four times), then "you should be fine."

"Then why are we still getting threatening letters?"
"Because they haven't looked at what you sent in."
"Why not?"
"They got millions of files to look at. They way behind."
"So what's going to keep them from cancelling my insurance if they never look at my records?"
"If they do, you can call up again and say that you sent your records."
"And will anyone look at them then?!"
"Maybe. They got millions of files to look at."

Now, imagine these kinds of interactions for every aspect of your life - and you've got the Socialist utopia that Hillary, Bernie, and millions of brain-dead millenials are hoping to foist off on our nation. Your every hope, dream, and aspiration would depend on the approval of some anonymous, non-accountable dolt who would see you only as a file. Or would if you weren't eternally at the bottom of a metastasizing stack of "millions of files."

Rough Weekend

Following the tragic and untimely death of conservative Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, speculation is running wild about who Barack Obama will nominate as a replacement to best assure that our country and Constitution can never recover. We don't know for a fact that it will be one of the idiots above, but we do know that any nominee Barry actually recommends is worth blocking.

And Scalia's death, still due to unknown causes at the time (although he was found in the "El Presidente" room with a pillow on his head, after which local Presidio County Judge Cinderela Guevara pronounced Scalia dead of natural causes without seeing the body and without ordering an autopsy) comes at a very convenient time for liberals...

No, we don't think Hillary had Scalia killed.  But we certainly expect her to seek political benefit from his death by pushing the importance of her election for the purpose of picking a possible successor (if Obama's nominees are blocked). Additionally, some of the issues under review by the Court (with Scalia expected to be the deciding vote) could have been damaging to the Left - and those running on the Left - if the decisions had been finalized before election day.

But there's no need to look for conspiracies to acknowledge the great loss we've suffered with Scalia's death. Hope n' Change didn't agree with him on everything (including the issue of Gay rights), but he was a great thinker, a Constitutionalist, and a man who made a positive difference for our nation.

Unlike some people who spring to mind...

Saturday's GOP debate featured name-calling, booing and jeers from the audience, and probably Donald Trump's most offensive appearance yet (and that's saying something).

Trump sneered that George W. Bush should have been impeached, that he failed to protect our nation from the 9/11 attacks (the implication being that The Donald would have done better) and he called Bush a liar who knew Saddam Hussein had no WMDs - a notion which contradicts all of the contemporaneous Intelligence assessments, domestic and international, at the time.

Cruz, Rubio, and Jeb all performed better than Trump in the debate, perhaps because their answers were specific and detailed, while his answers always came down to his questionable claim that he can make "great deals" with anyone: Russia, China, Mexico, Republicans, Democrats, Isis, Cancer, incoming asteroids, or whatever.

Hope n' Change is currently maintaining our intent to vote for Trump if he's the eventual Republican nominee...but we can't promise that we won't change our minds if this bombastic, bloviating boob doesn't learn to STFU, especially on the topic of 9/11.

Still, we could do worse...



BONUS: PRESIDENTS DAY CARTOONS FROM THE VAULT!