Hipster Come Latelys: SF's Greta Mural is Nothing New

I started seeing all the hoopla around San Francisco painting a giant six story high mural of creepy climate girl, Greta Thunberg (IMDB 1036148), but it turns out it is not so nearly as novel as one might imagine. There all already murals of Greta in the US and around the world. San Francisco is merely 'catching up'.
 A small sampling...

Edmonton

Istanbul

U.K.

Rutland, VT

Bristol, U.K.

Find the Hidden Keyboard

There's a keyboard hidden in the zebra picture I used for this week's masthead. I've made it a little easier for you. The original picture, as you can see, was about twice as tall, plus to obtain the proper ratio for my purpose, I had to overlap it, so there's actually two keyboards for you to find in the logo above.

Happy hunting!

Pet Portraits: Artistic Airedales - Maltese Masterpieces - Weinerdog Watercolors

John Cox, my brother from another mother*, is all set to immortalize your pet. Well, he could, that is, if you want him to! You send him pictures of pets perfectly posed and he turns them into pristine, portraits of piquant personality.

Now, if there was only some way to illustrate exactly what he does...

*John got all the talent while I got the unbelievably good looks!

Woodcut - Election 1964

800 Pound Reagan Statue

You know the old joke, "Where does an 800 pound gorilla sit?" "Anywhere he wants!" Fittingly, there is an eight foot high, eight hundred pound bronze statue of Ronald Reagan that was unveiled at the California State Capitol recently.

In the basement.

In an odd little story in my local dead tree newspaper, there is an article that they attribute to the Sacramento Bee. Wishing to quote the article (without an undue amount of typing), I went to LDT's (local dead tree) website, where I could find no trace at all of this article from yesterday's newspaper. So I went to the Sacratomato Bee, and found an article about the unveiling, minus the snark and detail printed in the dead tree version. I even Googled the first ten words of the piece, "Ronald Reagan is the hero who ended the Cold War..." to see if it was anywhere online. No joy.

As a public service, I will now type my little fingers to the bone to give you some of the flavor of this article.

It stands in the "lower rotunda," also known as the basement... Two Reagan cabinet secretaries were on hand for the event, Energy Secretary John Herrington and Secretary of State George Schultz. Schultz, 94 spoke for nearly 12 minutes without notes, telling stories of the Reagan he saw...

Compare & contrast with the current resident of the White House who cannot speak for 12 minutes to a kindergarten class without a teleprompter, or the current and previous Secretaries of State who cannot keep their stories straight for 12 minutes!

...Most of the people who crowded into the basement were Republicans. Several had connections to the governor and president. Only three Democratic legislators showed up, a pathetic showing. No statewide office holders* could break away from their busy schedules, including Gov. Jerry Brown, though Brown did sign the sculpture legislation**,  and included a message that cited Reagan's "courage and unique leadership ability."

Can't you just hear the scare quotes from the author as he talks about their "busy" schedules? Way to stay classy, Democrats! You get the feeling that if these turkeys were ever memorialized in bronze, you could use them as garden gnomes?

I would love to link you to this story so that you could get the full flavor of it, but perhaps it was just a little too honest for the sensibilities of modern newsmen? Or maybe, Brian Williams wrote it??

Should you visit the State Capitol in Sacramento, be sure to go down to the "lower rotunda" and see the 800 pound, eight foot tall statue of Reagan, or as we conservatives call it: "life sized".


* Most of whom are Democrats

** back in 2012

The Best Portrait of JFK in the Last Fifty Years*

*Or possibly, ever. I may be biased. I may not know art, but I know what I like. This portrait is both poignant and compelling. I was blown away by it.

Editor's Note: John draws the pretty pictures, I write the headlines here. Just so you know John wasn't patting himself on the back. If I use his title for the headline, it will show up in quotes. Otherwise, assume I wrote it.


Original art by John Cox. More at John Cox Art

Art Appreciation Day

Just a shade over two weeks ago, we announced the arrival of John Cox, whose art graces the pages of my commentary.


Some of you have made comments, all favorable, and some of you have visited John's site. Today, take just a minute, if you don't mind, and tell John directly on this post what you think of how he's classed up the place, and then, click over to his site and see some of the other good stuff and 'toons he has over there.

Oh, and Andrew Roman has a new post up yesterday: Thou Shalt Not Offend: The Word "Redskin" . Stop by, enjoy the piece and let Andrew know how you liked it. For what I pay these guys, I want to make sure they know they're well loved...

We Welcome John Cox as a Contributor to Proof Positive!

What did I tell you? Too. Freaking. Cool!


Portrait of John Cox under the benevolent eye of his new editor.
Many of you are familiar with the very talented artist John Cox. And to think, I have to thank Harry Reid for the events leading up to John becoming a contributor here!

Last week, I started corresponding with John after seeing a portrait he'd done of Senate majority leader Harry Reid. After Reid repeatedly made the slanderous accusations about the tea party being anarchists, my blood started to boil, and I asked John if I could use his portrait of Reid to illustrate my post, Harry Reid is an Ignorant Fascist With Stinky Feet* .

Shortly after, John suggested a collaboration, where he might illustrate some of my future posts or do caricatures of obscure folk that I might have occasion to write about. I took a step beyond that and invited John to become a contributor to the blog and contribute whatever pieces past, present or future, that he would like to share with this audience.

Have I mentioned yet that this is Too. Freaking. Cool? I'm a big fan of John's and I think many of you will become fans, as well, if you aren't already. Be sure to visit John at his own blog, too, John Cox Art. Some of it's political, some of it's humorous. Some of it is just art for art's sake! (Yeah, I know. What a hippie!)

Welcome aboard, John! Make yourself at home! I am indeed looking forward to collaborating with you.

Note to my readers: I had originally scheduled this for 8AM Eastern, but, face it! It was just Too. Freaking. Cool. And some of you were losing patience (and you know who you are!)

"3 Reasons Why Tax Dollars Shouldn’t Fund Art"

Nick Gillespie said there at at least three good reasons not to fund art with tax dollars. A fourth might be that since "Art makes a statement", sometimes that statement is "Look how much money I took these rubes for, by giving them crap and calling it art!"

I like the "pennies per person" argument, too. Some years back, at an Oscar presentation, Martin Landau was wearing a pin crafted to look like two postage stamps. "Just the price of two postage stamps" was all he was asking for to fund the arts.

For just the price of two postage stamps, from every one of the 300,000,000 men, women and children in America, I promise I will produce a prestigious piece of art, sometime within my lifetime, possibly depicting my new waterfront property... or your newly acquired bridge?

More at Hot Air

"The Forgotten Man"

Moonbattery posted this about a week ago, but I think it's worth a look.

HOPE 1.0

You should go out and buy the October 4th issue of National Review for the cover art alone!


Update: Welcome visitors from the NYT!

Lady Political Figures Busted

Riehl World View compared the picture of Sarah to the infamous bust of Hillary.
I see your Hillary and raise you a Michelle!



Cross posted at Left Coast Rebel

More on the Arizona Mural Controversy: Proof That Arizonians Are Racist

by Chris W. My Thoughts on Freedom

You would have thought that Arizona raised the Confederate flag over the state capitol today.

In the biggest non-story of the day, the left is all aflutter with the news that in Prescott, AZ artists were asked to lighten the faces of children on a mural on the Miller Valley Elementary School. This story is such big news that it is at the top of Memeorandum. Actually it is a slow news day and this is really the best the left can muster to rant about.

Not ones to take the explanation by the school's principal, Jeff Lane that the committee who commissioned the mural wanted the artists to "make [the children] look happier and more excited, fix the scale of the faces and remove some shadowing that made the faces darker than they are." the nutroots on the left are crying racism even though the one of the artists even admitted that the requested changes would "make the mural more accurately depict the photos of the Miller Valley School models."

You see, the progressives are not happy with Arizona's stand on illegal immigration and are enraged that we will not back down to their rhetoric and lies. So what is a radical to do? Rule 5 says ridicule is man's most potent weapon and rule 13 says pick the target, freeze it, personalize it and polarize it and if you don't think this is what they are trying to do, read here and here and here and here.

It is much ado about nothing if you ask me.

Via Memeorandum

(Editor's Note) Chris W. is an Arizona resident and a level-headed libertarian concerned with the problem illegal immigration poses in his state. He blogs at My Thoughts on Freedom.

Pic O' the Day

Compliments of The Troglopundit

The raising of the flag at Iwo Jima

"Darth Monet Finds Your Lack of Artistic Appreciation Disturbing"

A detail from Darth Monet:



Art lovers everywhere are in mourning.

Iraqi Shoe Sculpture Tossed

Remember that giant shoe that used to be in Iraq?

The government ordered it gone.

A huge shoe sculpture honouring the Iraqi reporter who gained global fame by throwing his footwear at former US president George W. Bush has now been dismantled, an official told AFP.

"We have removed the shoe statue of Muntazer al-Zaidi, because we received an order to do so from the governor Salaheddin province," said Shaha al-Juburi, head of the children's foundation where the bronze sculpture had been erected.

The shoe - in which a bush was planted - stood three metres high and sat atop a white pedestal in Tikrit, the hometown of executed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

Gosh! If you can't diss George Bush in Uncle Saddam's hometown, where can you do it? The post will serve to let the Left hyperventilate at will... Apparently the entire country didn't feel this way!

Hat tip Jawa
Cross Posted at Say Anything