"SORRY LOSERS AND HATERS"

“Sorry losers and haters, but my I.Q.

       is one of the highest -and you all 

    know it! Please don't feel so stupid or 

       insecure, it's not your fault,” 

    Donald Trump tweeted in 2013.

      Alex Wong/Getty Images

The very interesting article “Trump fixates on IQ as a measure of self-worth,”

by Andrew Restuccia, was featured in yesterday’s Politico.com begins with “People who know Trump suspect his IQ obsession stems in part from a desire to project an image of success, despite scattered business failings and allegations of incompetence.” 

If he truly revered people with high IQs, he’d listen to and respect the research of scientists world wide who have the proof that we are suffering from man-made global warming. He’d listen to those who have studied world politics, world trade, education, and many other fields. He'd use those experts, not business friends, to man (or woman) the appropriate government departments.

To me, the man has the vocabulary of a child, and the temperament of a child bully. I really question why he thinks he has such a high IQ. I’ve seen the figure at 158, but no one can substantiate that. I’ve seen the figure at 73 – that’s more like it, but again, it’s unsubstantiated, and probably bogus. Based on his actions and speeches, and possibly even his Tweets, experts have rated him as having below average intelligence. What he is rated high at is manipulating, threatening, and changing his (alleged) mind. The truly gifted and brilliant don’t ever refer to their own IQs or denigrate those with lower scores.

I wish he’d change his (alleged) mind and not run next year.  Dream on.

CHASING A PANDA

No, not this kind of panda...

I’ve been stopped once or twice by a cop - never got a ticket though – and I’ve never, ever been chased by one. Good grief! But this past Sunday, I turned the tables on the normal way of things, and I chased a cop.

Long story short. Frank was coughing heavily and breathing poorly, so we took a trip to the nearby emergency room. They didn’t like what they were finding, so they sent him to the hospital. We are accustomed to going to the hospital that’s about fourteen miles away, but there was no room there. We got sent to another hospital about twenty-three miles away. Driving to the closer one means driving in a lot of heavy traffic. Driving to the farther one means relatively rural driving, and almost the same time to get there. Nice.

The ambulance driver, who later told Frank to apologize to me, said it was a straight shot down to Rt.75 then east. The hospital is right on Rt.75. Ah, yes it is, but he forgot to tell me about the detour around that huge hole in the road near the end of the trip - the detour that has no signs to tell a driver how to get around it and get to the hospital.

Well, I drove around and around, seeing the some of the gorgeous homes in the town, seeing the municipal buildings and the main streets, but I couldn’t locate the hospital. Then, you guessed it, I saw a policeman in a nice panda car. I latched on and followed him around through several streets and turns. Finally, he thought something was off, and pulled into a parking lot, and then round a big dumpster, checking to see if I’d followed. I did. I met him on the far side.

...this kind of panda!

He was really good about it. He gave me simple directions - just about two miles with two turns. I got to the hospital in no time at all after that, but I was really frazzled by the whole excursion. I can look back now and smile, but until I saw that police car, I thought I was doomed to drive the streets of Monroe, North Carolina, until the cows came home or I ran out of gas.

And, to bring you up to date. It turns out that Frank’s COPD has come back to haunt him after ten or twelve years. Whatever triggered off the change, the strong symptoms, and the seemingly over-reactions of the medicos, he’s doing just fine. He’ll be back on one of the meds he used to take, just to be sure, and we’ll go on from there.

UNDER THE TABLE

I've got a stash of ideas for blog posting. They're just thoughts I've had in passing and remembered to enter into the stash. It's been a busy but nondescript week here, so I thought to take a look. One line says "me and Joy under the table."  That would be my cousin Joy, and the table would be our grandmother's dining room table. It was a massive thing on two slab-like pedestals. We could sit there, each leaning on a pedestal, and converse to our hearts content. We weren't hiding - everyone knew where were were, and they could hear us from the kitchen. We couldn't have been more than four or five or so, because after that we'd never have fit.

I went googling for a suitable picture, and I found this one. Hoo-boy, wouldn't it have been fun for us two to have had iPads then. We'd have been there to this day.

There's something to be said about snug places under dining room tables, in window seats, or in a grownup's big, comfy chair.  The world is reduced to an area as small as we are, a space we can handle. The world is reduced to the equivalent of the womb, to the equivalent of a a hug. We all need that.

WHAT'S IN A TITLE?

I've no title for today's posting. I almost didn't have a subject, but my regular routine stop at the Politico website gave me my subject. I love political cartoons, and each Friday I check the lineup at Politico. This morning's look gave me this:

Bee-u-tee-ful! It's right in line with what I've been thinking: let's get back to the younger generation of lawmakers. If he's re-elected - fate forbid - our current president will be 79 when he leaves office.
Biden would be 83, and much as I do admire a lot of what she's accomplished, Elizabeth Warren will be 76. (I hope I did that math correctly.)

I am now 76, and knowing my own capabilities, I believe Warren could do the job, but, Democrat or Republican, we've got to get some younger, more flexible politicians running our government. I'm going to learn as much as I can about the more prominent of those nineteen dwarfs. If nothing else, the political scene will be very interesting in the months ahead.

HORSE HOCKEY

     Yes, Horse Hockey! This news was in this morning's New York Times:

U.S. passes first big global warming legislation in 10 years

House lawmakers voted to block President Trump from abandoning the Paris Agreement on climate change and to require his administration to devise a plan to cut America’s greenhouse gas emissions.

The measure, which passed 231 to 190, stands virtually no chance of approval in the Republican-controlled Senate. What is so unbelievable about the news is that it "stands virtually no chance of approval in the Republican-controlled Senate." Do you mean to tell me that he majority of Republican senators agree with the president that global warming is a hoax? And I see that 190 Representatives - are they all Republicans? - agreed with him too. We're going to hell, degree by degree. Our legislators are fiddling while the world burns.