- How will we ever survive without our precious national raisin reserve?
- And from the same government that confiscates farmers’ raisins, we now have the mad attempt to force rich suburbs to accommodate poor minorities. Your neighborhood is racist if it doesn’t comply.
- No wonder more states are quietly rebelling against the federal control of all things. Here’s one more small rebellion. (H/T L.A.)
- How one criminal with an obsession discovered and revealed the obnoxious, illegal Stingray program. (Yes, “they” really were “beaming rays” into his house.)
- “Same sex marriage, Tolerance, MYOB, Get Off My Lawn & the Constitution.”
- Seventeen years ago, a hacker collective tried to warn us. Nobody listened.
- Even those guys probably couldn’t have predicted the NSA targeting our anti-virus software.
- Oh well. Have some funny dog fails.
It’s a very good thing that I have ironclad control of my internet use… otherwise I’d probably spend the rest of the day watching funny dog and cat videos… and I don’t even care much about cats. As it is, I kept it down to half an hour…
The corgi in the sand was the best. LOL But then, I am prejudiced.
I do wonder if some dogs can’t focus or judge distance clearly when they run straight ahead, or when something is thrown straight toward them. Even known intelligent dogs (e.g. the German Shepherd) missed a couple of times.
RE: national raisin reserve
I just finished reading Charles Murray’s new book, By the People: Rebuilding Liberty Without Permission. Maybe this 8-1 SCOTUS decision is a very small step in loosening the grip of the odious regulatory regime plaguing this country for the last seventy years.
But, I’m afraid fedgov agencies can roll out new rules and actions much faster than SCOTUS can strike them down.
[HUD’s plan is frightening. Phase one will collect data on poverty, school-testing scores and public-transit sites from every Census division to spot towns that have too few poor residents.
If a town’s guilty, HUD will charge racism and demand more public housing.]
No, it’s not frightening. What is frightening is the tendency of people to submit to this crap. Some laws and rules just beg to be ignored or flouted.
“Oh, no, we might lose our federal highway funding!” Well then be a slave, that’s all you’re good for…
One effect not noted would be to salt the targeted communities with Democrat voters. Combine this with the hordes of barefoot diseased illiterates inundating our borders and you have a political weaponized demographic which can be moved around to yield the few percentage points needed to carry an election in a strategic race. They can be deposited where needed because they have no jobs to worry about and with same day registration no barrier to voting in their new place of “residence.” Obviously, anybody who objects to their neighborhoods being overrun by legions of illegal aliens, winos, and bums is a despicable racist to be publicly assailed with the usual calumnies.
The one with the frisbee at 1:27 has clearly been taking lessons from my dog Ghost. “Why’d you do that? Do I throw things at you?”
We’ve had COAH, the Council on Affordable Housing in NJ since the 80s. It stems from a court decision that basically states anyone can live anywhere they want, no matter how poor, and the towns have to make an affordable place for them.
Each town in NJ is supposed to have X number of “affordable” units for every X number of “market rate” units (maybe 1:8). Originally, rural towns could buy COAH credits from inner city areas, and they were supposed to use the money to rehab and modernize older apartment units. When that ran out, it opened the floodgates for new building in previously non-buildable areas. It was like a giant Xmas gift that just kept on giving for builders. Rural towns that had large lot zoning (3+ ac per lot) were forced to rezone certain parcels, sometimes preserved lands, into high density, low income housing “to meet their COAH obligations”. If a town was deficient in the numbers, there was “builder’s remedy lawsuit”, in which the state stepped in and rezoned for the town in favor of the builder.
All in all, what they’ve accomplished is building future slums in otherwise bucolic places. Its brought crime to the country. There’s gang presence in super affluent towns.
And now they want to do it nationwide? Woo freakin hoo.
Wow. Even without knowing those gory details, the tagline “New Jersey: Coming soon to a town near you” never had any appeal. Now even less so.
I’ve been hearing about various ways the fedgov has been pushing crime out into the suburbs (section 8 housing all by itself is a culprit), but this latest business is the sort of joke only a government could appreciate. All day I’ve been thinking about Harrison Bergeron.
http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/harrison.html
Currently there is a ridiculously popular(?) brouhaha on about the Confederate flag and all things Confederate in general. Here in South Carolina the Governor Nikki Haley and the local Republican establishment suddenly all for removing the Stars and Bars from the Confederate Memorial at the capitol in Columbia. Then we’re told we should also remove the words “confederate memorial” from the memorial. Whole thing is so juvenile it’s embarassing. Big question is, what is this whole production designed to distract us from?
What this all boils down to, is government not letting the market work. Well, guess what? That’s what they always do. And guess what else? Almost everybody is on board with that, including the folks in those “better” neighborhoods now being invaded. So cry me a river folks. Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind. Or whatever platitude you want to insert here.
I put the word “better” in quotes because I never cared much for snooty rich neighborhoods. Don’t like the attitude. But that’s just me. My standard for a good neighborhood is one with at least one or two dead cars on the street or in the weeds somewhere. When that happens you know the “improvers” have not gotten to it yet, and that there are no HOAs.
[which can be moved around to yield the few percentage points needed to carry an election in a strategic race]
As if it mattered who wins an election. One thing is for sure with elections: the peons always lose.
Now if we could just get rid of that fascist honey subsidy…
http://articles.latimes.com/1993-03-21/news/mn-13718_1_subsidy-programs
Paul, I noticed that honey subsidy article you linked is 23 years old, so I got curious about whether the subsidy had ever been ended.
Not that I can find in a quick search.
I did find a NEW subsidy program for beekeepers:
http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/usda/usdahome?contentid=2014/02/0028.xml
Given the dire state of honeybee populations in recent years, I can understand the motive, even if it’s still the wrong thing to do.
Regarding the Confederate Flag flap, Jim Goad in his book The Redneck Manifesto http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_c_0_12?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=redneck+manifesto&sprefix=redneck+manifesto%2Caps%2C188 wisely points out that society needs scapegoats; blacks used to fill that role and now rednecks do. And equating trashy or all (there’s a difference) rednecks with a flag that hundreds of thousands of honorable men served makes for useful political convenience.
Regarding immigration, I hadn’t thought of voter mobility as a weapon. It does sound like it could work for them. Beyond the analogy of G. Gordon Liddy of pouring dirty water into clean water, beyond the thousands of violent criminal illegals released by the feds, and beyond the Mexican illegals who want passionately to repay us for a war that occurred over 250 years ago, the massive influx of Muslims – some spirited off to secret destinations – creates an entirely new threat in addition to terrorism.
Totally at odds with our culture (and Living Freedom), they want Sharia law http://nalert.blogspot.com/2015/06/the-american-muslims-that-want-sharia.html Some of them already have a “voluntary” version http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2015/01/27/hold-islamic-tribunal-confirmed-in-texas-its-voluntary-says-attorney/
In his first presidential campaign, Obama promised to “fundamentally transform” America. He just might do it. https://shariaunveiled.wordpress.com/2013/02/10/obama-allows-80000-muslim-immigrants-into-the-united-states/
Well, any excuse to post a Rush tune. (Yes, it gets relevant.)
Nice Vonnegut story. I can visualize people wandering around trying to do things with various quantities of “handicapping” strapped to themselves.
I suppose I’m going to have to find a copy of the Battle Flag of the Army of Northern Virgina to buy, just to spite the latest round of idiocy. Banned by eBay, and Amazon too. Presumably, I can find a vendor in Mississippi or Georgia to sell me one. I believe it’s the Battle Flag, not the Stars and Bars, which is the target of all the hand-wringing. Just don’t look for me to be driving an orange Dodge Charger.
Saw something the other day about how city-folk moving out to the country aren’t aware of how their septic systems actually work, and attendant problems, which I mostly wouldn’t have thought worth mentioning, except one of the commenters mentioned Erma Bombeck. How long has it been since I’ve read her? Quite a while.
Oh, I see those cerebrally-challenged (I’m thinking fecal transplant here) Senators, Manchin and Toomey are lacing up their boots again. I suppose Gottlieb is all giddy now.
Big question is, what is this whole production designed to distract us from?
There’s a presidential election on the horizon. Democrats are walking wounded. Their only hope is to dangle every red-meat issue (traditional marriage, right-to-life, immigration, voter ID, etc.) they can think of, and hope the Rs will jump at the bait instead of running on the economy, ACA, government spying, and other D vulnerabilities.
IMHO the Confederate flag, abetted by the church attack, is the first cast.
I think blacks will succeed in getting the S&B banned, which will prove to be a pyrrhic victory.
Lots of Civil War flags, including the Confederate Battle Flag, at https://www.usflagsupply.com/historical-flags/#/category/1745 .
The article about HUD’s insistence on low-income housing in high-income housing developments complains about the lack of constitutional authority for that. I see no constitutional authority for the existence of HUD, nor for 98% of the alphabet soup of federal agencies.
Limbaugh on the flag flap. I think he has a point. http://www.newsmax.com/US/confederate-flag-controversy-south-carolina/2015/06/23/id/651867/?ns_mail_uid=8454689&ns_mail_job=1625466_06242015&s=al&dkt_nbr=67eg6yo6
The Battle Flag is going to come down. The state Republicans have already caved (not formally, but they’re all lining up behind Gov. Haley on this). So now the cockroaches are all coming out of the woodwork and raising the stakes. I saw an article this morning calling (seriously) for SC to expunge any references to John C. Calhoun (street names, statues, etc.). And it even suggested expunging references William Moultrie (a hero of the Revolutionary Way) because he owned slaves. https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/06/23/five-things-charleston-can-change-capitol-takes-confederate-flag/ You can’t give these people an inch.
[CNN smells blood in the water and is piling on, too, suggesting the removal of Jefferson memorials because he owned slaved. http://www.infowars.com/cnn-host-suggests-taking-down-racist-jefferson-statues/ Granted, no one watches CNN anyway, but still. These people have to be ignored.]
The thing is, the Battle Flag isn’t flying over the Capitol building, and hasn’t for 15 years; it’s flying on the far end of the capitol grounds, over the Confederate Memorial. Whatever the merits of the Civil War (let’s not go there right now, OK?), there’s nothing inappropriate about memorializing the dead. And the Battle Flag has a proper place there.
But, as I said, it’s as good as gone already. My proposal is to replace it with the Gadsden Flag (the “don’t tread on me” snake). It’s better than nothing.
If they’re going to shove Calhoun, Moultrie, and Jefferson down the Orwellian memory hole, what new name will we have for Washington, DC, and Washington state — Mr. Washington being yet another notorious slave owner?
At least it’ll be exciting watching the social justice warriors blasting the faces off Mt. Rushmore.
Oh. But wait. I expect all this applies only to those nasty, ignorant, racist, redneck, throwback millions in the South. If your blue state or blue city is named after a bigot, you’re good.
“Oh. But wait. I expect all this applies only to those nasty, ignorant, racist, redneck, throwback millions in the South. If your blue state or blue city is named after a bigot, you’re good.”
Oh, yeah – the typical hypocrisy.
There’s much to like and dislike about the South, but its refusal to let the rest of the country define it has been its most enduring quality. It’s that determination to live its own lifestyle, and refusal to feel guilty for what it was, or is today, that most galls the critics.
The desire to snuff out the South’s defiance is epitomized by the Confederate flag (just as the English thought they could kill the spirit of the Scots by banning the tartans and dstroying the clans). I truly hope the flag is NEVER taken down, though I fear it will be.
Some more for the history books:
The Johnny Horton version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jKUHzljiUVA
The same lyrics & a note that it’s the old Joe Bowers tune (a good Irish one) and was played in London http://civilwarhome.com/pooroldrebel.html
Other lyrics with the usually omitted last part: http://www.lyricsmode.com/lyrics/r/ry_cooder/im_a_good_old_rebel.html#!
Remove all Confederate symbols:
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/06/24/debate-over-rebel-flag-widens-to-include-all-symbols-confederacy/
OTOH:
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/06/24/banner-sales-confederate-controversy-has-flags-flying-off-shelves/
A sensible voice (at least I think): http://hotair.com/archives/2015/06/24/democratic-presidential-candidate-jim-webb-lets-settle-down-about-the-confederate-flag-okay/