Jan 012012
 

 

It’s here! 

Well, by the time you read this it will be 2012 and if you believe the Mayans, 2012 is all they wrote. I remain skeptical. After all, if the Mayans knew so much, why aren’t they still around? Still, lots of people like doomsday threats and we still have almost a year until 12/21/12 when it is all supposed to end.  So expect to hear a lot more about the end of the world.

Of course, like all predictions, there are plenty of ambiguities and weaseling when you actually get into what those Mayans really intended to say. It seems that they might have been saying that 2012 marked the end of an era which began long before Mayan civilization arose and ends long after it disappeared. It is hard to believe that they put much faith in either the beginning or the end.  They couldn’t even handle the middle.

Coots are skeptics!

The Coot’s don’t hold much for doomsday scenarios. We don’t hold much stock in Global Warming and if we remember right there was some kind of Raelian end of the world predicted a year or so ago that fell through. We don’t expect the Mayans to do much better. None-the-less we know that our readers are thirsty for more information and so as we begin what may be the last year ever we provide our readers with some links to help  sort it all out.

First, what are the End of the world Predictions for 2012

Second, what are believers and skeptics saying

 And finally, if you just want it all to go away National Geographic debunks it all.

It’s all up to you from this point. The Coots wash their hands of 2012 doomsday predictions. If 2012 is like 2011 it will be bad enough. And if 2012 goes any worse than 2011 we might just welcome doomsday as an improvement.

All things considered, we recommend that you party hearty. It might be your last chance.


Ralph

Ralph is the inspiration for Cantankerous Old Coots and is our Grand Duke of Cantankerousness

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Dec 252011
 

Maybe you don’t need to know this story

English: As happy as a cow in clover Couple of...

Image via Wikipedia

But, after all, today is Christmas. After you discover how misguided and stupid your friends and family are when you open your Christmas gifts and while you wait to stuff you gut with calorie laden Christmas treats that will only add more yardage to your waistline and make your New Years resolve to loose weight even more difficult, here is a heartwarming story about a cow who yearned for freedom.

 Yvonne the Cow to Become Hollywood Star

Alas for Yvonne, the dream of freedom was short-lived. The idea that a cow should be free was just too much for the public. Unable to stand the idea that a cow should be free while humans have to put up with government tyranny, Yvonne had to be locked up.  In liberty challenged Germany, the public just couldn’t allow a cow doing what she liked. It was setting a bad precedent.

But she did avoid execution.  Finally captured and subdued, Yvonne’s dreams of freedom were dashed. She now lives in a gilded cage like the rest of the German public and her story will become an animated movie.  What more could she ask?

It’s a wonderful life.

Ralph

Ralph is the inspiration for Cantankerous Old Coots and is our Grand Duke of Cantankerousness

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Dec 182011
 

Image by KeiBi via Flickr

It’s almost here!

Don’t tell me that the Coot’s are out of touch. Just a week ago I recounted my own personal dilemma about Christmas cards, Merry Christmas sentiments and the whole idea that Christmas is a religious holiday central to European heritage and Western Civilization.

Maybe I didn’t say all that but down underneath my words, those deep undercurrents of thought were swirling violently as I described my journey from simple country boy to nuanced, sophisticated and effete college grad. Now, in my dotage, I am learning that the nuance and sophistication don’t wear well and erode the spirit. I am drawn more and more back to the simple world of my youth where faith, trust and belief brought people together in a common cause and patriotism wasn’t embarrassing.

We can’t teach them to read but we must send them to college.

One of the casualties of today’s mission to inflict a college education on everyone is the adoption of this nuanced sophistication as SOP. Faith is stupid is today’s mantra. Religion therefore must be tempered with nuance and sophistication. No eternal damnation for the unbeliever! No absolute right or wrong. But still some intransigent people cling to faith and hold our society back from moving to the next level of transcendence where all is relative and nothing has meaning.  This can’t be tolerated!

Lib Radio Host Bill Press Tells Tebow: ‘S-T-F-U’ (Shut the F**k Up) About Jesus

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Guys like Tim Tebow with their simple humility and faith just can’t be allowed to express their conflicting world view these days because kids might hear him and notice that there isn’t much meaning in the nuanced and sophisticated world they live in. He must be mocked and ridiculed into submission no matter what the Bill of Rights says.

 Congressmen can’t say ‘Merry Christmas’ in mail

Well today, nuance and sophistication hits the Congress. Congressmen can’t wish their constituents Merry Christmas unless they want to pay the postage out of their own pockets. Now that the nuanced and sophisticated have nearly completed their takeover of government, it is time to ‘Tim Tebow ‘ the members of Congress. No matter that most of their constituents would welcome a Christmas greeting from Congress. It might help them feel better about being raped and pillaged the rest of the year.

The takeover isn’t quite complete, however. The article explains that for some strange reason, the Senate is still free to say Merry Christmas. I’m waiting for the cries of complaint. Shut the F*** up, Senators!

And while it is still allowed.  “Merry Christmas to you all”

Ralph

Ralph is the inspiration for Cantankerous Old Coots and is our Grand Duke of Cantankerousness

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Dec 042011
 
Saudi Women's Driving Team

Image by SoulRider.222 via Flickr

Think different!

Sometimes the news gives you a fresh insight about life and helps you see the world a whole new way like the featured news story this week for the Coots News Service. Sometimes when you find yourself in a hole it is hard to think differently until you get your head above ground. Well that’s how I feel about today’s story. Maybe we just need to think different.

We all know that our culture and morals are fading fast. It is such an ever present reality that it’s almost trite to talk about the decline of principles and integrity these days. The evidence is everywhere that today’s society glorifies immorality and smut, wallows in it to be frank. There are all kinds of explanations that blame everybody you can think of. Some say that we we are all spoiled. People on welfare live better than royalty 100 years ago so what’s the point of hard work and discipline. Schools reward students that do what they are supposed to because actually teaching kids to think is just too much to expect from government workers. Nobody is expected to actually deliver the goods. They all just sit like baby birds with their mouths open waiting to be fed. It’s a real problem.

What to do?

Nobody seems to really have an answer for what went wrong. It’s a big mystery how we have gone from a country that honors hard work and discipline, respects morals and integrity and crusades for liberty around the world into a nation of lazy wimps that live for pleasures of the moment and run from conflict and taking a stand.  Heck even the President thinks we’re lazy.

My theory

I’ve always had my own theory that it all started with women’s suffrage. Giving women the vote in my mind was the beginning of the end. That one stupid act destroyed the institution of the family. Instead of focusing on raising strong children, suffrage thrust women into the ugly world of commerce and politics. Our families suffered and the result is the moral decline we see today.

Like I say, that’s only my opinion and I don’t get much agreement with my theory these days. Even though I haven’t found anybody that has a better theory– until now. There is a new report out of Saudi Arabia with a fresh theory and I’m giving it serious study. I’m not big on cultural diversity, but sometimes you need to take a fresh look from a different perspective. Proud as we might be of our Judeo-Christian Western culture, maybe we need to think different once in a while and ask “What would Mohammed do?”.

Islamic Academics: Allowing Saudi Women to Drive Would Lead to ‘Surge in Prostitution…Homosexuality & Divorce’

The way these Saudi professors see it, the problem with the West is all due to letting women drive. Could it really be that simple? They insist that allowing women to drive is the cause of the moral corruption in the West and that Saudi Arabia is the beacon of reason in a crazy world.  How do we know this?  It is all because only Saudi Arabia refuses to allow women to drive. Those Saudis have it all solved. You don’t find any moral depravity in Saudi. Food for thought, isn’t it. When you look at it letting women drive is probably worse than letting them vote.

Can we still save our culture?

It’s probably too late to put the cat back in the bag here in the US. I think we are stuck with women voting and driving for the duration although perhaps we can keep them from doing both at the same time. Since there are more women than men and these days most men can’t manage to support a household without a working wife, it is hard to see a solution. These days, ii you expect to hold a job you pretty much need to drive. Good as that Saudi wisdom might be I don’t think we are likely to apply those Saudi principles in the US any time soon.

Still it’s a fascinating exercise to imagine how different life might be to day if the US were to ban women from driving. What do you think? How would your life be changed? Would it be for better or worse?

Ralph

Ralph is the inspiration for Cantankerous Old Coots and is our Grand Duke of Cantankerousness

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Nov 282011
 
European democracy

Image by Jonas Hannestad via Flickr

Today we’ll go across the pond and take a look at the European Union, a miniaturized test-prototype of a New World Order type of thing…coming soon to your neighborhood.  We’ll see just how well one large government does in administering it’s subjects using  common sense.

Hint:  It doesn’t do it well.

Then we’ll come back across the pond to that communist enclave in the United States commonly known as Massachusetts.  Something really fishy is going on in New Bedford.

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Bob@HayleStorm Interactive

Bob comes to us with a skeptical attitude and a full cup of Cantankerousness. He also writes about homesteading and yurts over at JuicyMaters.com and rants about politics at Common-Sense-Conversation.com Most of the time, though, you'll find him at HayleStorm.net, cranking out great websites for clients OR writing tutorials teaching them to build their own sites.

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