drawing: Faces # 1419

By Jack Brummet

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The Assfish

By Jack Brummet

The species Acanthonus armatus appeared only 10 years ago off the coast of Vancouver, British Columbia.  Its arrival generated a lot of excitement—mainly because it is commonly known as the assfish. The Royal BC Museum in Victoria, British Columbia, put one on display this January.  I can't find any information on whether or not the fish has appeared in Washington's Pacific coast or in Puget Sound. 

With its bulbous head and flabby skin, a curator said it resembled a “glorified tadpole,” but declined to guess at the origin of its name.  "As might be expected from its common name, the bony-eared assfish, which is a member of the cusk-eel family, will never win an ichthyological beauty contest."  For more information, read the original article in  Canada's National Post.



As Liz Langley wrote in National Geographic "With a name like assfish, you're probably used to being the butt of jokes."

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Newt Gingrich Vice-President trial balloon?

By Jack Brummet, National Affairs Ed.

It looks like someone in the Trump "organization" leaked—or maybe threw up a trial balloon—that Newt Gingrich is on the short list for Donald Trump's VPOTUS slot.  Of course the leak may well have come from that self-aggrandizing blow hard, The Newt himself. Holy S***!

I knew they were looking for a congressional insider; a Speaker [1] fits the bill.  This race just keeps getting stranger and juicier.  I just saw a clip on Fox where Gingrich [2] said he'd be glad to take the job... with a few (unstated) conditions.

               

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[1]  Even a disgraced Speaker of the House who was ridden out of town on a rail

[2]  Illustration of Newt is by me, from an All This Is That post during the 2012 primaries)

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Megumi Igarashi being prosecuted for vagina kayak

By Jack Brummet, Asian Arts Ed.

Do you remember the story about the Japanese artist—Megumi Igarashi—being prosecuted for making a kayak molded into what authorities (and she) said was a depiction of her female parts? She recently wrote a book about the experience. Japan Times noted that "If convicted, Igarashi could face up to two years behind bars and a fine of [$20,755]."

Curiously, not being prosecuted for many years is the annual "Festival of the Steel Phallus," in Kawasaki, which includes a parade with models and sculptures of male genitalia.

Images from the apparently perfectly legal phallus fest:

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Mark Cersosimo's short film about Stephen Wright's *House Of Dreams*

By Jack Brummet, Outsider Art Ed.

Mark Cersosimo recently made a short about Stephen Wright, who turned his London home into an artwork, “The House Of Dreams."

I would love to make a US house of dreams. If anyone has a spare house I could use, let me know!

/jack

The House Of Dreams from Mark on Vimeo.

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Faces 1398 - faces on conduit found in Baja

by Jack Brummet

click to enlarge

Detail: 

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Escape training video: how to escape if you are a prisoner of war

Escape Training - Captive Escape Training Through Identifying Opportunities. This 1950s military training film shows studies of how you might escape if taken captive as a prisoner of war.

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Rape and Brigham Young University's "honor code"

"Madi Barney, 20, courageously publicly reported her own rape accusation recently in Provo, Utah, and as a result has been disciplined as a student at Brigham Young University for allegedly violating the school’s 'honor code.' (She is barred from withdrawing from courses or re-registering.) Whether the sex was consensual must be investigated by Provo police, but BYU officials said they had heard enough to charge Barney with the no-no of premarital sex." [Washington Post, 4-20-2016]

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Daily Banter: "You're Rewarding 25 Years of GOP Smears"

The Daily Banter has an interesting piece on how the rage against Hillary from the left is the result of a quarter century of GOP attacks against HRC. Excerpt:

"With the exception of maybe Barack Obama, whom they've irrationally loathed with the fire of a thousands suns, it's tough to name anyone conservatives have more vigorously derided throughout the years than Hillary Clinton. Even her husband, as much as they tried to take him down at every turn, earned a begrudging respect from many in the Republican party. Beating him up for, say, his sexual proclivities was the height of Beltway hypocrisy and they knew it, but politics demanded they grab onto any potential scandal they could with both hands and ride it as far as it would take them. While it's true many were bitterly jealous of Clinton's seemingly depthless charisma and sorcerer's way with voters, for the GOP leadership at the time it wasn't personal -- just really dirty business. Hillary on the other hand has always been cast as an arrogant bitch, a soulless bête noire, an irredeemably corrupt and fundamentally dishonest political hustler. From the very beginning of her time in the national political limelight, she was vilified for refusing to simply sit back and be an ornament on the White House Christmas tree, as she was apparently supposed to. And when she ventured out into her own separate political career, what was considered calculating but somehow forgivable from her husband became merely calculating -- and nefariously so -- from her. Bill was allowed to be Slick Willy. Hillary was just a rotten to the core."

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Drawing: Faces 1417 - the advance man

By Jack Brummet

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Drawing: Faces 1416 - Uncommitted

By Jack Brummet

[Sharpie®, Sharpie Industrial®, Marks-a-lot®, acrylic paint, and #5B pencil on 4' x 1' 4" concrete panel]

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Things fall apart: The state of the Democratic Presidential Primary

By Jack Brummet, National Affairs Desk

It could all fall apart, but the Trump-Ryan meeting fallout (and a lot of happy talk from both sides) today makes me nervous that the GOP-TEA PARTY is coalescing, while the Dems are embroiled in factionalism, mud-slinging, pointless churning, and back-biting.

The Dems, people seem to believe, were handed a gift horse candidate by the GOP-TP, and now they (we) are on the verge of blowing it by not capitalizing on our position. This needs to happen right here, right now...not 33 days from now when primary voting is over, and not on July 29th after the convention.

It's a very strange year where much of the conventional wisdom and laws of gravity have been swept out the door.  We need to act accordingly.

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