2024 Wally Awards: Worst Living President

Out of left field [read: the Democratic Party. Ed.] comes a complete surprise! We thought we'd finished handing out the prestigious Wally Awards for 2024, but the events of the weekend allow us to add a new one -- the Wally Award for Worst Living President. There were two nominees...

And the winner, as selected by the totally impartial judges at the Babylon Bee, is... well, here are the first two paragraphs from their article, posted yesterday. 

What had already been a relaxing family vacation to usher in the coming new year became the site of an even greater celebration, as news of the death of former President Jimmy Carter made it official that Joe Biden had finally claimed the title of Worst Living President. 

Administration officials admitted behind the scenes that it was an achievement that Biden had worked long and hard to secure, with one insider disclosing that the president had begun to lose hope that he would finally attain it due to Carter's shocking longevity. Biden gave brief remarks to reporters upon cementing his claim to the title.

Click on the link above to read the quote from Senile Joe and the rest of the article. Walt won't even attempt to gild the lily.

Waiting for the Kamala Coronation to begin

Walt is waiting with `bated breath [not "baited"; look it up. Ed.] for the beginning of the Cackler Coronation ceremonies in Chicago. I have opened a book on the number of casualties -- literally, meaning dead and wounded. You can bet day-by-day or total. Contact Dino or Mario at the barbershop.

I understand that today's opening act will include a Parade of Hasbeens, including every living Dimocrat President except Jimmy Carter. (The letter of July 23rd announcing his long-awaited passing has been denounced by Reuters as a fake. But how would we know the difference?)

 

Included in the list of participants is the one who should have been (the way she tells it) America's first female President. I refer of course to Mrs William Jefferson Clinton, who got pipped at the post by a black(ish) man and then the Orange Man.

Hellery's husband, we are told, will also deliver a few remarks. Have you seen him lately? We have a recent picture, which Ed. says was the inspiration for a beloved character who has disappeared from Family Guy. Walt wishes Slick Willy would also disappear (along with the haridan he's married to), but from the look of this picture, I'd bet on the peanut farmer to outlast him.

Death watch 2016 and other stuff

It's been a quiet weekend here in Lake Wo... [Hold it right there; that line's been taken. Ed.] [No! Garrison Keillor's line was "It's been a quiet WEEK (etc)."] What I mean to say is that I didn't do much, read much or think much, therefore have not much about which to write. However, I did ruminate [Not on the carpet, I hope! Ed.] about how old everyone is getting, except myself of course.

The cause of my rumination was my discover, in Jeremy Paxman's highly recommendable book On Royalty (Penguin 2006, Public Affairs 2007), that Eliabeth II, Queen of Great Britain, Northern Ireland, yada yada yada, will turn 90 in April. 90! Imagine that! She doesn't look a day over 80, does she. What, I thought, are the odds that she won't live to see her 90th birthday? Pretty long, I should think, given that her mother lived to 101. I expect Prince Charles will have to wait until 2017 at the very earliest.

But there are other octogenarians and nonagenarians who might not make it through 2016. Some bookie in England probably takes bets. Wonder what odds they're giving on the Queen's consort, Phil the Greek (as Private Eye calls him). Probably long odds as well, given Prince Philips damn-them-all outlook on life.

How about Pope Francis? Only in his 80s, but rumoured almost since his election to be in failing health. Perhaps for some Traditional Catholics the wish is father to the thought.

If not the Pope, then how about a President, or, I should say, former President, thinking of poor old Jimmy Carter. He thinks he may be free of cancer, but then he also thinks a little more goodwill will bring peace to the world. He should live so long!

The President almost everyone would like to see them close the lid on would certainly be Comrade Robert Gabriel Mugabe, President for Life of Zimbabwe. For the last couple of years he's been grooming his second wife, Grace, to be his successor. She seems to think she's ready for the job, and I wouldn't be surprised if she's prepared to wait another year. Perhaps she would go so far as to hasten the Old Man's demise. Hey, it's Africa!

Well, that's enough death watch. Let me close by giving out this week's Walt Award for Super-DUH! Headlines. No, it's not "China may be using sea to hide its submarines", rightly ridiculed here on Friday. That beauty was pipped at the post by a late entry from the Globe and Mail. Over a story from Reuters about an entirely predictable disaster in Mumbai, the Groan and Wail ran the headline "Huge fire engulfs venue at ‘Make in India’ event". Not stupid, really, just funny. Congratulations.

If you're not sure why Walt would find that headline and story funny, consider what Prince Philip had to say on the subject of Indian wiring. See "Prince apologises as latest gaffe offends Indians", in the Grauniad, 11/8/99.

Further reading: Jeremy Paxman, mentioned above, is a British journalist, best known for his work presenting BBC's Newsnight and University Challenge, the latter on my must-watch list when I lived in Olde Blighty. He has also written some eminently readable books, including On Royalty, and The English: A Portrait of a People (Penguin 1999). It is, of course, impossible to understand the English, but Mr. Paxman makes a very good attempt to explain the unexplainable.

Dambisa Moyo advocates end to foreign aid, makes Bill Gates angry

On Tuesday Walt reviewed Dead Aid, by Dr. Dambisa Moyo, an African economist. As noted, her book is a well-written, compelling argument for an end to foreign aid, which she says is a waste of money and actually works against the goals of development and poverty reduction. Here's a four-paragraph summary, taken from the final chapter.

What if, one by one, African countries each received a phone call...telling them that in exactly five years the aid taps would be shut off -- permanently?

What do you think Africans would do if aid were stopped, simply carry on as usual? Too many African countries have already hit rock bottom -- ungoverned, poverty-stricken, and lagging further and further behind the rest of the world each day; there is nowhere further down to go.

Isn't it more likely that in a world freed of aid, economic life for the majority of Africans might actualy improve, that corruption would fall, entrepreneurs would rise, and Africa's growth engine would start chugging? This is the most probably outcome -- that whewre the real chance exists to make a better life for themselves, their children and Africa's future generations, Africans would grab it and go.

Aid came from the West (and continues to do so), and it's up to the West to take it back. Why have people in the West not demanded that something be done? It is, after all, their money being poured down the drain.

Predictably, writing such politically incorrect heresy brought Dr. Moyo a lot of flak from "progressive thinkers" and aid advocates such as Jeffrey Sachs and Bill Gates. [Not to mention Al Gore and Jimmy Carter? Ed.] It will be noted that all of those named are rich American white guys -- the sort of Western liberals whose feelings of guilt are assuaged by persuading governments to throw their money -- and ours! -- down the toilets of the Third World.

Dambisa Moyo, on the other hand, is an African woman. (See picture.) Click here to read "Dambisa Moyo counter-attacks Bill Gates’ critique of her work as ‘evil’". Then read Dead Aid and figure out for yourself whose approach to helping Africa makes more sense.

Yesterday's man equates today's middle class with yesterday's poor

Have you read "American then (25 years ago) and now", posted here yesterday? Walt recommended that you read (or reread) The Great Divide: Second Thoughts on the American Dream, by the late Studs Terkel. The book tells, in their own words, the plight of America's poor.

The Great Divide was published in 1988. It is a compilation of interviews Mr. Terkel did earlier in the 1980s. Ronald Reagan was president of the US of A in those years. His immediate predecessor, whose Democratic maladministration was responsible for much of America's economic distress, was a former farmer from the Peach State, one James "Jimmy" Carter.

Ronald Reagan is no longer with us. Jimmy Carter, like the poor, still is. And yesterday, just by coincidence, he offered a waiting nation his views on America's "economic challenges".

During an interview with The Associated Press, he said that years of tax breaks for the wealthy, a minimum wage untethered from the inflation rate and electoral districts drawn to maximize political polarization have reduced the quality of life for all but the richest Americans.

Note from Ed.: There's a video clip embedded in the Washington Times report, which I've been trying for half an hour to copy and embed here, but thanks to Blogger's screwed-up GUI, you'll have to go to the newspaper account if you want to hear the words from the horses's mouth. Back to Walt...

In the video, President Carter said there was "a great deal of discouragement since 2008." Well DUH! But how can that be? When the affirmative action version of Jimmy Carter was sworn in, you'd have thought the Choir Invisible was going to descend from Heaven and make everything right -- as right as Carter himself would have made things if only he'd had a second term. What happened to "Yes we can" and all the hopey-changey stuff?

Seems to Walt that people who create messes should have some ideas about how to clean them up. If Mr. Carter has a magic wand which could be waved to end the present impasse in Washington, he would do well to hand it to the incumbent... immediately!

Insulting the President

In "Sticks 'n' stones" I asked you to believe that, if I chose to, I could find strong words with which to insult President Bush or any other president. A reader challenges me to give an example. I will give two.

I could have said that President Carter is so dumb that even the Peachtree Street dogs don't think it worth their while to growl at him.

But I didn't.

I could have called President Clinton a smug, ignorant, self-opinionated, addle-pated, spud-faced, snotty-nosed, mealy-mouthed, clap-ridden gobshite.

But I forebore.

So rather than be excoriated for referring to President Bush II as "Dubya" and "the Bushman", I feel I should be commended for my self-control. Three cheers and a tiger for me!

"The new sheriff is a nig...!"

Remember that line from the Mel Brooks classic, Blazing Saddles? The good townspeople of Rock Ridge are startled to discover that the governor has sent them a new sheriff who happens to be...ahem...of the coloured persuasion. So they embark on a campaign to get rid of him.

It is said that art mirrors life. Walt says that life imitates art as art imitates life. (Not as poetic. ed.) The good people of the US of A seem to have suddenly woken up to the fact that they have elected a "nig" as president. (Come to think of it, isn't there a bit of a resemblance between Obama and Cleavon Little?) So now, it seems, about 49% of them want to get rid of him!

This is not Walt's opinion. It is the analysis of former president Jimmy Carter. The peanut farmer says that the real reason Obama's approval ratings have plummeted is the racism of the American people.

Racism is still around, Carter says. So is liberal guilt, Walt says. C'mon folks, give the new nig a chance!