When The Hatred Surges

Not talking about our local Commies and their HitlerTrump bullshit here.  Nope, we have to go Over There to see a bunch of gummint types having their asses handed to them by the voters, for once.

The Labour government’s decision to scrap its blanket 20mph speed limits in Wales just a year after they were introduced has sparked hope for the rest of the UK. 

Wales’ Transport Secretary Ken Skates admitted the policy was so unpopular even his own family had signed the petition against it.

This despite all the assurances that a 20mph (!!!!) speed limit would do so much to combat Global Cooling Climate Warming Change©.  Of course it wouldn’t (and won’t), just as our own imposition of a 55mph highway speed limit did nothing of the sort either.

I suppose retraction is better than a public hanging, after all — although that may be a contentious issue all by itself, especially among Stout Bulldogs of my acquaintance Over There.  (The Englishman, for one, is especially fond of the “heads on pikes” approach to curbing government excess.)

Now we’ll see if the Welsh example spreads to other Brit municipalities of similar stupidity.  But I wouldn’t count on it.

Monday Funnies

So let’s spice up the dreadful morning with a few items of (predictably) questionable taste.

And on a similar topic:

Okay, that’s enough political stuff.  Let’s go deeper:

Some things that do have periods:

And on that bloody note, I’ll send you off into the week.

Just One Winner

Of all the headlines you’d like to read in whatever media tomorrow, what would you most like to see?  (No, not “AIDS Cure Found In Dolphin Livers” — go bigger.)

Mine?

I’ll leave the sub-head / followup article to you, in Comments.

And by the way, I have a sneaking suspicion that more than a few Democrats wouldn’t mind seeing it either.  But think of all the wasted paper involved in their pre-printed fake ballots…

Stupid Is (Part Deux)

Okay, there’s stupid (voting for a Democrat Socialist), very stupid (waterbombing Danny Trejo)… and then there’s ultra-stupid:

A Spanish tourist reportedly has been “trampled to death” by elephants in South Africa after he tried to get close to them to take pictures. 

If you look up the word “pendejo”  in the dictionary, that’ll be his pic you see, right above that of the Trejo Waterbomber.

I remember one time I was driving friends around the Kruger Park when we suddenly came upon a solitary elephant.  I stopped, of course, at a distance of about thirty yards.

“Get a little closer!” urged one friend (American, first time in Africa, in fact I think it was the first time she’d ever left New England).
Of course, I refused.
“He’s just standing there,” she said.
“See how his ears are flapping?”
“I know, it’s so cute!”
“He’s warning us off,” I said, and put the minibus into reverse.

Then the elephant took three giant steps towards us, whereupon I tried my very best to break the world speed record for reversing a VW minibus down a dirt road.  Even so, he got to within about ten yards of the bus before our acceleration took us clear.  Fortunately, the road was straight and after a minute or so the elephant stopped, flapped his ears at us one more time, and exited stage right.

I took the opportunity to turn the bus around, and got the hell out of the area.

One of the others managed to get a single pic of Dumbo, right before he got on the road and decided to shoo us off.


(in the very left-hand bottom of the pic you can see the car windowsill, to give an idea of how close he was, no zoom lens)

Get out of the car? Close to a herd with calves?

I guess the Spanish guy felt that he knew all about elephants, having done the African River ride at DisneyWorld where the elephants frolic charmingly along the river banks, rather than trampling people to death.


Afterthought:  phew, if the whole herd got in on the act as the report says, all that remained must have been some bloody mud with bone splinters, with pieces of El Stupido’s iPhone mixed in.

 

Stupid Is

…and you know the rest.

I have to tell y’all, I am generally not a fearful man.  That’s not a boast, that’s a summary of my reaction to several (very) scary incidents that have tested me over my six-score years or so of adult life.

That said, if you told me that my next dare was to throw a water balloon at Danny Trejo, I’d back away whimpering and head to the bar.

I don’t care if he’s 80 years old.  I wouldn’t care if the lion you wanted me to tease with a stick was that old in lion-years, or assured me that the black mamba I’d have to kiss had been de-fanged.

Ain’t no way.   NFW.  Not Danny Trejo, no water bomb.

Yet some pendejo  did just that and gave Trejo the goods.

And was surprised when ol’ man Danny laid a big can of whup-ass on him.

Vote Of Confidence

…or not.  No sooner have the Commies won the UK election when we see articles like this one appearing:

Escape from Keir’s Britain with the experts’ definitive emigration guide: The best places for sunshine, big houses, high wages, no crime and top-notch healthcare – plus the hotspot with NO income tax

Of course, the smart money has already made that plan and the moolah has long ago flown over the white cliffs of Dover.  But on to the list.  Some of the countries are a lot more difficult to gain entry to, especially for permanent residence so getting there requires a lot of wishful thinking.  I’m also assuming that the target market folks are either well-off retirees or else have remote-friendly work-from-home jobs where location is irrelevant.

European countries:  Spain (a favorite already), Portugal (close second), France and Italy.  Never been to Spain, don’t care much for Italy (except in the north, which is spendy) but I could certainly do southern France.  Which is Mediterranean, as are Greece and Cyprus.  I would have a serious problem with either, because I have a problem with non-Western European alphabets, and unlike many others, I would never insist that the host people have to learn my language.  My problem, not theirs.  (I should point out that this is not the typical attitude of most Brit expats.)

Sweden:  what?  I mean, winters, dude.  Not to mention taxes (from the article:  “Income tax varies depending on the local authority, ranging from 29-35 per cent. Earners above a certain income pay an additional 20 per cent.”

Canada:  see Scandi countries above.  And speaking of socialist countries…

Oz/New Zealand:  no language barrier (more or less), but fleeing Starmer’s nascent socialist regime for the established (and venal) ones in the Antipodes doesn’t seem like a decent exchange.  (Hello, Covid lockdowns.)

South Africa:  someone has a sense of humor.  Except that South Africa is way beyond a joke. There’s a reason that Zimbabwe, Malawi and other African paradises aren’t on the list, and putting Seffrica on the list is simply a stupid nod to what the country used to be, and not what it is.  A really smart guy once said to me, many years ago, “If I went to my CEO and suggested investing in South Africa, he’d fire me.”

Texas and Florida:  leaving aside the almost impossible-to-crack legal difficulties of establishing U.S. residence, I am amused that only two states made the “cut”.  (No Tennessee?)  Whatever, I think the author has woefully underestimated the cost of living in both states.  Then again, of aaaaaaallllll the countries on the list, once you’ve established residence in either TX or FL, you can buy a gun and protect you and yours without any problems at all.  Which has to count for something.

So much for the Mail’s list.

Conspicuous by their absence from the list are some other countries.

Of course, one would think that Switzerland and Monaco would be obvious options, but they aren’t:  cost of entry, cost of living, and some really high barriers to residence take them right out of the running. Basically, the guys who could afford to move there already have.

When it comes to bang for the buck, so to speak, the Caribbean or Central American countries like Domenica, Belize and the Virgin Islands stand out way ahead of, for example, Sweden.  I’m amazed they weren’t on the list.

Your thoughts in Comments.