Category: Politics

“Batman, I think we’re boned…”

Ostensibly the first time in U.S. history that a Supreme Court draft opinion has been leaked. And what a doozy:

Supreme Court set to overturn Roe v. Wade, leaked draft opinion shows: report

For the record, I agree in principle with the purported draft opinion: the Constitution does not provide for a legal right to an abortion. Roe v. Wade was wrong because it allowed rights to be created from whole cloth, ignoring that any such rights derived from the 14th amendment must be “…deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition.” It was a poor decision from the start. Can you imagine what an activist court could do with the power to create rights out of thin air, as they saw fit, with no foundation in our Constitution, history or laws?

That does not mean, however, that I am anti-abortion. I agree that a woman should have the ability to terminate an unwanted pregnancy within a reasonable time for any cause, and later with reasonable cause (rape, incest, health, and severe disability for example).  And there is nothing to stop this from becoming a reality outside of the Supreme Court. Only now it will require a tough political decision by weak politicians (who should have made the decision in the first place).

The ability to pass a law legalizing abortion is squarely within the realm (and responsibility!) of Congress. The political decision of Roe v. Wade was required solely because Congress was too afraid to perform its duty. Congress skirted its responsibility, living for another day (pronounced “election”) by leaning on the Supreme Court to make the decision for them. But now the chickens have come home to roost, and Congress finally needs to do its job.

But, alas, the Democrats they won’t get party support for a bill that doesn’t irritate Republicans, and Republicans are just too stupid to know that all they have to do to sweep the House and Senate in November is to pass a bill legalizing a woman’s right to an abortion.

Really – just too f**king stupid…

Buying votes with your money, episode #232

RUFKM?!?

The latest from liberal fantasy-land, where money grows on trees fertilized by congressional bullshit:

Democrats propose bills to send gas payments to Americans, some funded by taxing oil companies

Are people really so stupid that they believe having the government interfere with a free market won’t have catastrophic effects? Or is it simply that they don’t care as long as they get theirs?

Excerpts from the article:

Democrat Reps. Mike Thompson, John Larson, and Lauren Underwood are proposing a plan similar to the COVID relief payments sent to Americans during the pandemic that would send $100 per month to individuals each month the national gas price exceeds $4 per gallon. In the bill, couples would receive $200 plus $100 for each dependent.

Uhh…and how do we pay for this? Oh – by taxing the oil companies. Yeah, that makes sense… they’d never pass on these tax cost to their consumers, would they?

“The Big Oil Windfall Profits Tax would provide consumers guaranteed relief while maintaining American competitiveness and reducing pressure on inflation by attacking corporate profiteering,” the press release for the bill reads. “Under the Khanna/Whitehouse bill, large oil companies that produce or import at least 300,000 barrels of oil per day (or did so in 2019) will owe a per-barrel tax equal to 50 percent of the difference between the current price of a barrel of oil and the pre-pandemic average price per barrel between 2015 and 2019…”

I get it… they’re going to tax the oil companies based on how much more the oil costs them. Yeah, that’s fair… no way that will come back to bite us in the ass, not with the government involved and all…

The sad thing is that at least one of these proposed laws will likely pass. People are simply too stupid (thank you, American education system and the teacher’s unions) to realize that the math simply doesn’t work. I guess it’s handy that Americans rank 30th out of the 35 OECD member nations in math; it allows politicians to use the people’s own money to buy their votes.

On a side note, I think it’s hilarious that Republicans are considered less educated than Democrats today. Given the state of the American educations system I’d consider it a compliment. Clearly “educated” no longer means “intelligent”.

Buying votes with your money, episode #231

Yeah, this can’t be good…

Newsom’s plan for free gas cards will drive prices, inflation even higher, expert warns

I love this quote:

Newsom said in a statement that his administration is “taking immediate action to get money directly into the pockets of Californians who are facing higher gas prices as a direct result of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.”

But, wait… whose money are you giving to Californians, Gov. Newsom? Oh, that’s right – their own! You’ll send the state further into debt – a debt to eventually be born by the taxpayers at an inflated cost (interest, government overhead, etc.) – to provide temporary “relief” for high gas prices (and pushing them higher in the process). Smart move, Ex-lax.

This is like telling people, “Don’t worry! We’ll charge some money to your credit card and send it to you (with a fee, of course) to help in these times of need!”  But why would Californian’s accept such a useless solution? It’s because they’ve been taught by California’s “progressive” politics (Really? Can we still call it “progressive” when California has the highest poverty rate among U.S. states?) that it’s only a game of musical chairs and that someone else will always get stuck with the bill. Each Californian demands their unearned payday believing that someone else (the mysterious “rich”) will end up paying their share of the bill. In short, progressive Californians are too excited about “free” money (pronounced “stupid”) to realize that they will always pay in the end.

Good luck, California. You’ll need it when you finally realize that there is no such thing as “free” money.

It’s a MAD world…

We’ve been operating on the theory for years that “Mutually Assured Destruction”, or MAD, would prevent the use of nuclear warheads. After all, what kind of psycho would launch a nuclear attack knowing that the only significant outcome would be their own destruction?

Whoops! We forgot that one day it might be an actual madman whose hand is on the button…

Biden calls Putin a ‘war criminal’ after saying Russia is inflicting ‘appalling devastation’ on Ukraine

If this helps…

… then why limit it to health care workers?

Bill makes it felony to threaten, attack health care workers

What’s the purpose of these laws, and their “hate crime” analogues? Is it to exact revenge for their victims? Or is it to deter such attacks by making them painful for the criminals? Either way, why am I – an ordinary citizen not part of some special interest group (pronounced “voting block”) – not offered the same opportunity for revenge and/or crime deterrence? And if these enhanced penalties work, thereby reducing crime against the selected group, why don’t we increase the penalties for attacking all residents?

Oh… because that would make sense. It would also decimate the soft-on-crime policies of liberal DA’s.

If we want a return to law and order, then we need to lock up the criminals – and punish them equally for each crime irrespective of the class/group status of the victim (or the class/group status of the perpetrator!).

Someone’s been taking lessons from Hillary

This news article contains perfect example of a politician utilizing the “three D’s” – Deny,  Deflect and Diffuse:

Democrat US House candidate under fire for alleged boozy, profanity-laced tirade at pre-teen slumber party

Deny (It didn’t happen):
“I saw the tweets. I have been out of town on a fundraising trip, and they are awful and offensive and false,” Broyles said to the news outlet. “I mean, I get trolled on Twitter all the time, but I don’t know these women and I don’t know what is behind this, but it’s just not true.”

Deflect (It’s a political attack):
Broyles added that the allegations could have been “cooked up,” and suggested that the 12 and 13-year-old girl’s mothers were using the allegations as a political attack against her … “I’m running for office. You don’t think this is a political attack? You don’t think this is something they cooked up?” Broyles said.

Diffuse (It’s not my fault):
However, in an interview with KFOR, Broyles admitted to going to the house where the sleepover took place. She said that her friend handed her a medication which gave her an “adverse reaction” causing her to hallucinate … “She asked me to come over.  She asked me to bring some wine. We had wine and sushi and a couple of hours later, we were upstairs in their theater room watching a movie,” Broyles said. “For years I have struggled with stress and anxiety and insomnia. I took the bar exam on 2 hours of sleep.  I mean, this is how far this goes back for me. And she knows that. And she gave me a medication I had never taken before. And I had an adverse reaction. Instead of helping me sleep, I hallucinated. And I don’t remember anything until I woke up or came to, and I was throwing up in a hamper.”

I’d like to point out that – even if her final statement is true – this candidate, by their own admission, took a medication “…that her friend handed her…“, one that she “…had never taken before” (and yet she took it, anyway; bright girl, eh?). I wonder if it was a prescription medication (possibly a crime)? But wait; there’s more. She also admitted in the interview with KOFR of “…struggled with stress and anxiety and insomnia.”

Is that the kind of responsible, stable adult you want to see as your Congressional representative? Is this who you want to determine how your hard-earned tax dollars are spent? Really?

Maybe she should instead apply for a job at the Clinton Foundation. At least she’s got Hillary’s shtick down pat…

Flip sides of the same coin

I keep saying that abortion and gun control are flip sides of the same coin (here and here, for example). Now along comes Gov. Newsom to prove my point. His new law is effectively designed to “get even” with Texas for their recent abortion law, which is still winding its way through the Texas state court system.

California bill to allow citizens to enforce gun ban modeled after Texas heartbeat bill draws Newsom’s support

General gibberish and hyperbole (via Newsom) from the article:

If the conservative-controlled court upholds the Texas law and not California’s, it would show “hypocrisy,” he argued. 

“Or it’ll get them to reconsider the absurdity of their previous decision,” Newsom said, adding: “There is no principled way the U.S. Supreme Court cannot uphold this California law. None. Period full stop. It is quite literally modeled after the law they just upheld in Texas.”

Only the Supreme Court has NOT upheld the Texas law; so far they have only ruled on technical issues involving the case as it works its way through the lower court system (which should be allowed to run its course). In the end, when the right argument makes its way to the Supreme Court, I’m sure that the Texas law will be struck down (as will Newsom’s gun law).

I think the real reason for this law is stated by others cited in the article:

To Gallagher, California’s Republican Assembly leader, Newsom’s move is an attempt to appease a disapproving public sick of rising crime.

“He knows that he’s in trouble, and he’s using this as a sideshow distraction to introduce another gun law, so hopefully people will not see and pay attention to his terrible record on their quality of life,” he said. “The governor needs to focus his efforts on things that will lower the cost of living for Californians, actually solve homelessness, instead of one-off gestures that aren’t going to do anything to stop gun violence.”

 Agreed. But who cares; I don’t have to live in California…

Even SF has “woken” up to the woke

Who knew this was possible in Krazy Kalifornia?

San Francisco voters recall 3 school board members

Recalled San Francisco School Board Commissioner Alison Collins isn’t accepting lightly that maybe voters are just tired of her racist politics:

“We now know what it costs to buy an election in San Francisco,” she said…

Yeah – that explains why almost 78% of voters tossed Ms. Collins to the curb. In addition, almost 74% voted for the recall of board president Gabriela Lopez and almost 71% for the recall of board vice president Faauuga Moliga (results as of 2/17/22 16:01:22).

When you lose by these margins in a liberal city like San Fransisco, it’s hard to blame the opposition party. But that didn’t stop local politicians, who blamed the losses on “closet Republicans”. But I’ve got to ask: is it really wise – in a liberal, progressive, LGBTQ stronghold like San Francisco – to refer to your opposition as being in the “closet”?

Really?

 

 

“…a few people…waving swastikas…”

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is cited as having expressed the following sentiment regarding the “Freedom Convoy” truckers overtaking Ottawa:

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau derided the thousands of citizens protesting lockdowns and mask mandates as “a few people shouting and waving swastikas.”

The implication, of course, is that the truckers somehow support the ideals and symbolism of the swastika.

I was shocked! Canadian freedom truckers supporting the ideals of Hitler’s Nazi regime? How could they! I scoured the Internet to find photographic evidence of this transgression, only to find that the truth had been stretched far beyond reason by a government in the name of fighting its opposition.

Each and every photo I could find (try searching yourself; lots of stories but few pictures) showed that the use of the swastika by protestors was meant to call out the government as fascist – not the truckers. It was used to describe the government, not to describe the beliefs of the protestors. And yet – as presented by the liberal press and the government itself (via Trudeau’s statement) – the government would have you believe that it was the intent of the protestors to describe their support for the ideals associated with the Nazi use of the symbol. Little could be further from the truth.

Well, at least it shows that the use of manufactured propaganda as a political tool (a Nazi tactic?) isn’t restricted to only American left-wing political groups…