Thoughts On A Sunday

Winter has returned with a vengeance, with below zero temperatures and plenty of snow.

The January thaw is now just a memory. The open waters of Lake Winnipesaukee seen at the beginning of the week are now bearing a skim of ice from shore to shore. The roof rake has been used twice over the past three days to pull the snow off the roof of The Gulch. The snow shovel has seen more than its share of use as well.

Basically, we’re back to normal for winter.

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I cannot believe I am writing this, but we have lost yet another member of the feline contingent here at The Gulch.

Some time between 7 and 10PM last night our little three-legged cat, Miley, passed away. She had been to the vet earlier that day as she’d been having some health problems and the vet extended the duration of her medication we’d been giving her. She seemed to be on the mend.

It was as I was going to give her her evening dose of her medicine that I found she had passed away.

She was a sweet, affectionate lap cat. She loved to cuddle and everyone who met her fell in love with her. She had a beautiful continence.

Henry, another of our cats, passed away from lymphoma two weeks ago. Hilda, one of our Maine Coon cats, passed away unexpectedly last May.

The past nine months have not been good in regard to the feline members of the WP family.

This sucks.

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As much as many people have been worrying about the depressed birth rate in the US, it’s a bigger problem in China. They’ll see the same problems seen in Japan and soon to be seen here in the US.

Making matters worse, the slowing birthrate has meant that China’s main state pension fund, which relies on tax revenues from its work force, risks running out of money by 2035 because of a decline in the number of workers, according to research commissioned by the government-backed Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

Sound familiar?

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Call it yet another example of the Law of Unintended Consequences coming back to bite Progressives in the butt.

New York reformed its bail law, believing bail was a burden for poorer alleged perpetrators. So they did away with bail for a lengthy list of crimes. The result?

Crime committed by repeat offenders has skyrocketed, including one fellow who had committed four bank robberies and, after being released without bail, went on to commit a fifth bank heist.

How is it possible that the proponents of bail reform missed these possible consequences?

Another unintended consequence: The ill-conceived bail reform law has become an election issue.

That issue is the controversial bail reform law pushed through the New York State legislature by Governor Andrew Cuomo late last year. The law eliminates cash bail on the argument that cash bail discriminates against poorer defendants.

But critics of the law have been warning for months that eliminating bail was sure to put too many criminals with violent tendencies back on streets, even if they weren’t currently under arrest for very violent crimes.

Less than three weeks after the law went into effect, it sure looks like the naysayers were right.

In what’s becoming an almost hourly stream of depressing updates, New York’s newspapers, local TV news shows, and news sites are posting story after story about violent crimes being committed by people instantly released after arrests because of bail reform.

I expect this will be a big election issue in New York come November.

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While the Democrats are focusing all of their attention on the impending impeachment trial, John Durham, the US Attorney from Connecticut, has been digging deeper into paper trail highlighting misconduct by federal law enforcement and intelligence officials that dogged the Trump campaign prior to the 2016 election and his administration after he took office.

I have a feeling a lot of Deep State officials and Democrats (but I repeat myself) will be facing a judge and jury sometime in the near future.

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Seeing how snowy it’s been since last night, this post and link by Eric the Viking is timely.

As Eric writes about a piece in MacWorld covering the topic of being without power for 72 hours:

Yes, it's awful to be off the internet for a couple hours. As somebody who has lived through several New England snowpocalypses, I would also recommend appliances that run off of camp propane canisters like a camp light, camp heater, and a camp stove. Personally, I also have a cord of hardwood to burn if things get a little rough. Think Frontierland.

While the MacWorld article deals with the loss of power and Internet due to the wildfires in California, it applies equally to winter blackouts.

At our former Manse, we had a woodstove, four cords of wood, a generator, and 500 gallons of propane to run it. With judicious use of electricity and using the woodstove for heat, we could easily go almost 6 weeks before running out of fuel. Not that I would expect we’d ever have to do so for that long, but knowing we could was comforting. While The Gulch isn’t nearly as well appointed (no woodstove, cordwood, or 500 gallon propane tank), it does have a generator to keep the lights and heat on and the refrigerator running, with enough left over to power a microwave, TV, and to charge our cellphones/tablets/laptops. There may not be any Internet, but that is really a “nice to have” and not a “need to have”. We’d “rough it” and make do without.

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Elizabeth Warren’s economic policy proposal can be described with four words:

A Total Effin’ Disaster.

It would take us back to the bad old days of the Obama Recession, in spades.

How is it she can possibly sell this as a good thing?

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And that’s the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where everything is snow-covered as it should be, the ice has returned to the lake, and the local ski slopes are busy with holiday skiers.

Climate Change Isn't The Fault Of The Evil Humans

I must confess that this post was prompted by an e-mail I received from one of the WP nieces today. We correspond on an irregular basis, debating a number topics that she sees me cover here. I her latest missive (prompted by this post), she asked if I believe in climate change.

I have not yet answered her e-mail, something to which I will attend after finishing this post, because I want to post two videos that explain my viewpoint on the matter. I will be answering her question in the affirmative, at least when it comes to whether or not the climate is changing. However, I do not believe that humans are the cause, at least not to the level so many of the alarmists have claimed to be the case.

Climate change has been with us since Earth came into being. During this inter-glacial period (which started about 12,000 years ago), it has been far warmer than it is now. Two more ‘recent’ warmer periods – the Medieval and Roman Warm Periods – were warmer than it is now. No one, with the exception of Michael Mann, disputes that. So what is driving the claim that climate change is bad and that it’s all our fault?

Here are a couple of videos that might help explain that, the first being that of physicist William van Wijngaarden delving into the complexity of the physics behind global warming models, and the errors that abound about the “simple physics” of climate change claimed by proponents.



The second video is a PBS interview of meteorologist Andrew Watt, he of the Watts Up With That climate blog.

Andrew explains the problems with the much of the data used to prove anthropogenic global warming and how those problems are being ignored.



And so the debate continues.

Quote Of The Year...So Far

“Rule .308….Even when tyranny rules all, the Rifleman still gets a vote.” - Mike Vanderbaugh

As seen at Day By Day. Thanks to John Block.

Is There Anything That Isn't Racist?

It seems that to the SJWs everything is racist…except their own racism.

What’s the latest racist activity being blamed on white folks?

Hiking.

That’s right. Hiking. Walking outdoors. Walking on trails. Walking through forests. Walking up and down hills and mountains. Walking along ponds and lakes.

It’s all racist.

Yeah. Right.

These idiots need to be institutionalized.

Thoughts On A Sunday

We are in the midst of the January thaw here in New Hampshire, with the temperature here at The Gulch reaching the mid 50’s yesterday and the upper 50’s today. Some have said it’s global warming causing these warm temps in January, but it is an annual event that has been taking place since before the first Europeans came here. Sometimes the thaw has warmer temperatures and sometimes cooler. (About 14 years ago we had a January thaw that saw temperatures in the mid-60’s for almost a week that caused the postponement of the annual Lake Winnipesaukee Ice Fishing Derby for almost a month.)

It rained most of the night and early morning, melting away the last of any ice and packed snow on the roads around here, making room for any future snowfall.

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At least once city in Washington State is going stupid, at least when it comes to energy. (Seattle has already gone very stupid in another fashion, between killing jobs with a very high minimum wage, banning business and homeowners from cleaning their sidewalks with garden hoses, and refusing to deal with the homeless by allowing them to camp anywhere they want.)

The latest stupid city? Bellingham, Washington.

Their ‘stupid’ move? Trying to ban the use of natural gas for heating homes.

What makes this even stupider? The ban would also affect homes already using natural gas, meaning they would have to tear out their heating systems and replace them with something else.

Who would pay for all of this? So far the Bellingham city council hasn’t said, but I have a feeling they’ll burden the homeowners with ripping out their existing heating systems and replacing them with an electric-based system like electric baseboards or heat pumps. If I were there, I would accede to their demands, but replace my system with a woodstove, something that should put their knickers in a twist.

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A lengthy debate with the youngest WP Sister proved to me that Democrats like Steyer, Bloomberg, Sanders, Warren, Biden, etc., have no issues with selling the lie that only the upper echelons have seen any gains in the way of wages over the past three years. It seems that this particular trope is being used to justify the Democrat presidential hopefuls’ calls to damage the economy “on the behalf of working-class Americans”.

Too bad for all of us that it’s a total fabrication because too many of the Democrats’ useful idiots believe it and are trying to sell the same trope. These are the same folks that have tried to sell the same kind of BS that we were entering a recession, not because we were entering a recession but because they desperately need a recession in order to use it against Trump.

That shows you just how low they are willing to go to regain the White House.

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There’s nothing I can add to this that would make it any better.

How many Democrat presidential candidates tweeted in support of Iranian protesters?

Here’s a hint: None.

That makes Trump one up on them.

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How bad is the poop problem in San Francisco?

This bad.

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If Virginia Governor Ralph Northam goes through with his promises to all but eliminate the Second Amendment Rights of the citizens of Virginia, many of those same citizens said they are willing to go to war against the state government to protect those rights.

At heated public meetings across the state and in long social media comment threads, some gun rights supporters are openly discussing the possibility of civil war. Many have warned of the need to fight back against “tyranny” or have compared Democratic lawmakers to the British forces during the revolutionary war. “I really do think we may be on the brink of another war,” one speaker told a crowd of at least 800 people in Pulaski county, the Roanoke Times reported.

Here’s the thing, though. This talk of a civil war isn’t new. We’ve been talking about this for years as a warning that if anti-gun zealots come after our guns, they’re going to have a bad time of it.

However, it’s also important to note that we’ve also been pretty clear that there’s a line in the sand and, thus far, no one has crossed it. Right now, bills have only been proposed. Nothing’s passed and nothin’s signed. It’s just a lot of rhetoric. As long as Northam and company bear in mind that this is a topic that yes, a lot of people will go to war over, we shouldn’t have a problem.

I have a feeling Northam and his anti-gun buddies like Michael Bloomberg are finding out that their plans to strip Americans of the Second Amendment Rights isn’t going to be easy, period.

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The so-called ‘Blue State exodus’ certainly is signaling the failure of Blue State tax-and-spend economics and ‘woke’ policies and laws. Many are fleeing for Red States, seeking a relief from overbearing and overreaching Blue State taxes, laws, and regulations. But there’s a downside to this exodus that more of us are seeing every day.

But that good news may be relatively short-lived. In a depressing example of irony, the influx of new voters from blue states into red ones has been bringing with it a surge of liberal, Democratic voters. This has led to some traditionally red states becoming increasingly competitive for the Democrats. (Texas is probably the best example, though the tide there hasn’t fully turned yet.)

The grim humor in this is that these migrants seem to fail to realize that the conditions they were fleeing in those blue states were a direct result of the policies put in place by liberals. Higher taxes, more oppressive governmental regulations and “woke” policies that are more tolerant of crime and damaging to traditional values made many of those places basically unlivable. But by coming into red states, where lower costs of living, more freedom, and better security were waiting, and voting the way they always have, they’re basically bringing their own poison with them into their new pool.

We’ve certainly seen that here in New Hampshire.

Our present legislature is heavily tax-and-spend Democrat. They tried to ramrod through a budget that overspent by almost a billion dollars, tried to slip in a stealth income tax (New Hampshire has neither an income or sales tax), and tried to repeal a number of business taxes. The governor vetoed both the budget and tax increases. Without the budget-busting spending increases, existing tax revenues came in with an approximate $140 million surplus. Even with the expected budget compromise between the legislature and governor, there will be a budget surplus. Yet the Democrats want to spend it, and more.

They tried to implement new laws that serve no purpose other than stripping New Hampshire residents of their constitutional rights, that address solutions for ‘problems’ our state doesn’t have, to make state government even more intrusive for no other reason than they thing we cannot run our own lives.thta government has to do so “for our own good”. In other words, they are trying to spread the very Blue State virus that infected the state(s) they came from.

They haven’t learned the lesson.

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And that’s the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where we’re going through the January Thaw, the lake is still not frozen over, and a return to normal seasonal temperatures is in the offing.

Gervais Nails It

While I am a bit late in commenting on Ricky Gervais’ slapdown of Hollywood know-nothing leftists at the Golden Globes, I am going to state that it was something that was long overdue. Seeing just how ‘woke’ (and woefully/willfully ignorant) most of the Hollywood elite have become, the slapdown was well deserved and timely.

It must be remembered that Hollywood deals with fantasy, make-believe, and fiction and not the real world. So many of those elite are so disconnected from the real world and the effects of the various Progressive causes they support they should be considered ignorant children and their opinions ignored. (Wait...I already do that!)

Hollywood should stick to what it does best – make movies – and shut the hell up when it comes to anything outside of Hollywood. We’ll be happier. They’ll be happier (maybe). And we won’t have to listen to their bulls**t anymore.

Just Who Does Pelosi Think She Is?

I have to admit that the trauma of returning to work after a lengthy Christmas vacation distracted me from writing over the past few days, so I must apologize.

Now to the ‘good’ stuff.

I have to wonder just what the heck Nancy Pelosi is thinking, specifically in regard to impeachment. The urgency of getting through the inquiry and the vote made it seem that the Speaker of the House wanted to get the articles of impeachment to the Senate as quickly as possible. But once she got her impeachment vote, she locked them away in the safe under the carpet in her office as if putting them away so at some point in the future she could use them to bludgeon President Trump into doing something she wanted.

Her explanation: She wants to make sure the Senate is going to do things her way. There’s only one problem with that:

She has absolutely no say in how the Senate is going to run the impeachment trial. None.

She seems to think her control of the House automatically extends to the Senate. However, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has disabused her of that notion. He has reminded her from the floor of the Senate that she has already done her job and that it is now the Senate’s turn. He has told her that she has no power to demand anything from the Senate, that she cannot set the conditions of the trial, and that she should deliver the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate. That she has refused to do so and is still demanding that the Senate accede to her conditions makes me question he competence. Just who the hell does she think she is?

McConnell has already stated the Senate will employ the same rules used during the the impeachment trial of Bill Clinton. Those rules seemed to suit the Congressional Democrats just fine when it was their guy on trial. But now that it’s Trump on trial, they want to change the rules to make sure their joke of impeachment articles can be re-investigated and to call witnesses the House Judicial Committee didn’t call during their inquiry. Nancy wants the Senate to do the job the House failed to do. She knows the Articles of Impeachment are a big fat nothingburger and she wants a second bite at the apple. She wants her Senate colleague, Chuck “I Killed Indy Mac Bank By Opening My Big Mouth” Schumer, to direct the what goes on during the trial. McConnell has pretty much killed any chance of that happening despite what Pelosi thinks.

If Pelosi doesn’t deliver the articles soon, McConnell has threatened to hold the trial anyway and find Trump not guilty due to lack of any evidence. Pelosi may scream about it being improper procedure, but she can’t complain because she sure as hell didn’t follow procedure, letting Adam Schiff run roughshod over the inquiry before the inquiry officially existed, ran his Star Chamber questioning of potential witnesses in secret, which is not allowed under impeachment inquiry rules. (All testimony is supposed to be public.) No laws were broken by the President, though the Judicial Committee tried to twist the definitions of impeachable offenses into unrecognizable shapes just to get the President.

Nancy Pelosi seems to think she runs the country, runs the government, and can do anything she wants while “striding the halls of power with impunity”.

She needs to be shown she is wrong.

Thoughts On A Sunday

The weather in central New Hampshire couldn’t seem to make up its mind for the first weekend of 2020 – Is it going to rain or snow? How about both at the same time, or maybe some sleet?

Saturday was rain most of the day with a few attempts to change over to snow...for a minute or two here and there.

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It was certainly raining enough for the inaugural weekend of our little town’s updated transfer station. While there were a considerable number of folks trying out the new amenities, there weren’t nearly as many as we had expected. I figure the inclement weather had an effect on the number of people making use of the facilities.

With the new transfer station we no longer need to drive to the far side of a neighboring town to make use of their transfer station. That would take up to an hour to make the round trip there, wait in line to go through the scales, off load our trash, and then go through the scales again and pay for the amount of trash we dumped. Now it’s about a 15 minute round trip including dropping off the trash and recyclables. One of the best things about it: No scales to go through!

Welcome to small town America.

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You know it’s getting weird when the Democrats are defending the Iranian regime’s terror tactics and the chief architect of those tactics and attacks .

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Another thing getting weird:Greens against solar power. (Paywalled. Sorry.)

The Bureau of Land Management this week released an environmental impact statement indicating its intent to approve the 7,100-acre Gemini solar farm east of Las Vegas. The project could power 130,000 homes and would include four-hour lithium ion batteries to store solar energy for use at night. Gemini is the type of renewable energy project that environmental groups claim will be needed to move from fossil fuels that, unlike solar and wind, can provide power on demand. Nevada also needs large-scale solar to meet its 50% renewable energy goal by 2030. It currently generates 20%.

Yet greens grouse that solar arrays would disturb habitat for Mojave Desert species such as the desert tortoise, kit fox and the Threecorner milkvetch, a rare plant. They also complain that solar projects in California’s desert have been linked to thousands of bird deaths.

Still, greens kvetch that the project will do permanent damage to the desert. “There is no justification for this project that outweighs the importance of the desert tortoise, its habitat and BLM’s obligations to use its full authority to take actions that will contribute to the recovery of this threatened species,” the Defenders of Wildlife declared.

It’s nice to see environmental groups finally realizing that renewable energy isn’t a free lunch. Even wind and solar energy can have baleful impacts on the land.

The only reliable non-CO2 generating power source I can think of that doesn’t have the environmental issues that wind and solar create is nuclear. Both Third and Fourth Generation nuclear reactors are far safer than the existing power plants. (The U.S. Navy has been using Third Generation reactors for years on their submarines and they have a long history of reliable and safe operation.) Some Greens are starting to see the promise of nuclear power as a viable alternative to either renewable or fossil-fueled power generation.

Maybe there’s hope yet.

As a side note, maybe if more of those Bureau of Land Management bureaucrats were already located out West, the outcome of the BLM’s decision would have been different. Trump was right in making the decision to move them away from Washington, DC and closer to the land they actually manage.

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The on-again/off-again New England Patriots ended their playoff hopes with a loss to the Tennessee Titans last night during the evening AFC Wild Card game. Frankly, I didn’t have a lot of hope that the Patriots were SuperBowl bound again. Between a number of first string players out for the season and a large number of rookies, the Patriots weren’t playing to their full potential. That the first half of their season was played against ‘softer’ teams didn’t help them either, particularly in light of the injuries that plagued them during that period.

Another thing working against them was Titans coach Mike Vrabel, a former Patriots player and someone well versed in the Belichick system. Vrabel did well against his former coach, exploiting the weaknesses in the both the Patriots offense and defense.

The Titans play the Baltimore Ravens next week and they’re going to need to use every trick in the book to beat them. Honestly, I think the Titans’ season will end next week with a drubbing by the Ravens. Only time will tell.

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The Second Amendment Sanctuary movement is spreading. The latest addition to this movement is Kentucky, where a number of counties have already declared they will not support either state or federal efforts to stifle their residents Second Amendment rights.

One has to wonder whether the various state legislators and Congresscritters are listening to their constituents or if they’re ignoring them because “they know better” what their constituents need.

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It seems a lot of Democrats are lamenting the long overdue death of Qassem Soleimani, the commander of Iran’s Al Quds force. They have chosen to ignore the fact that he is responsible for the deaths of over 600 U.S. troops and countless thousands of others. The question none of them ask was just what the hell was an enemy of the U.S. and Iraq doing in Baghdad? Did he think he could enter what is in effect a war zone and walk around unscathed? It’s obvious he did.

He was wrong.

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I have to wholeheartedly agree with Derek Hunter: There is something fundamentally wrong with the Democrats.

It’s odd how the political left cheers America’s shortcomings and mourns its victories.

The United States killed the top terrorist on the planet Thursday, and Democrats were…upset. Perhaps “upset” is too vague, they were a combination of angry and scared.

They were angry that President Trump ordered an air strike on Qassem Soleimani, a man responsible for the deaths of more than 600 American soldiers and thousands more wounded. They tried to pretend they were glad he was dead, that he deserved to die, but their quick condemnation of the action that took him out exposed what they were really thinking. Any statement on the death of a terrorist leader containing the word “but” is not a good statement.

--snip--

While all of these people, and all of their fellow travelers in Congress and the media, lament that the killing of a man actively murdering people will only lead to more murder, what do they think leaving him alive would’ve done? Did they think he was getting bored of killing and was about to take up knitting?

It’s obvious they did...or they didn’t really care that he was killing Americans they saw as ‘deplorables’.

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It appears Iran’s mullahs have put out a “hit” on President Trump, willing to pay an $80 million bounty. Trump could reply, putting out a $1 billion bounty on the mullahs. Which one to do think will likely be paid?

Should Trump be assassinated by Iranian-paid assets, how long do you think the mullahs would remain alive? If Congressional Democrats refuse to act on the matter, how long will they remain in office, assuming they aren’t arrested for treason before the next election?

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And that’s the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where the weather is all over the place, the lake is almost entirely ice free, and where more weird weather is on the way this week.

We Has A Sad

Sadly, I have to announce that we lost a member of the Weekend Pundit Feline Contingent yesterday.

Henry, whom we adopted 11 years ago, passed away yesterday. He was suffering from lymphoma, a diagnosis he received not quite two weeks ago. He’d been acting “off” for about a month before the got him to the vet, and we finally managed to get him rangled into the carrier. He was an expert at eluding capture and knew more ways of blocking us from actually putting him inside the carrier than any cat we’ve ever had. It took us almost two weeks of trying before we finally managed to get him into the carrier and to the vet.

While we could have taken heroic measures including surgery and chemo, it would have bought him a year, maybe, but he would have been miserable, sick, and hurting the entire time, something we couldn’t do to him. After discussing it with Deb, we made the decision that we couldn’t let him suffer. He had declined considerably in the two weeks since his diagnosis, becoming less active, losing weight, not sleeping well, and having difficulty finding a comfortable position to sleep.

We had no problem placing him in the carrier, an indication that he really wasn’t feeling well, and took him to the vet. I won’t go into any details, but he died with both Deb and I petting him, telling him he was a “good boy”, and to ‘go find Miss, Tommy, and Charlotte,’ and that we would see him again some day.

It brought to mind a song we used to sing about him (with apologies to Herman’s Hermits.)

He’s Hen-ery the Cat he is
Hen-ery the Cat he is, he is
He was adopted by the family next door
They’d adopted seven cats before
But none of them was a Hen-ery (Hen-ery)
Nor a Tom, Dick, Harry, or a Sam
He’s the only cat named Hen-ery
Hen-ery the Cat he is, he is
Hen-ery the Cat he is...

Sleep well, Henry. Til we meet again.

Is California's Governor Really That Clueless?

Just when I thought that California governor Gavin Newsom couldn’t possibly be any more clueless about what’s been happening to his state, he proves me wrong.

The proof? His tweet about what Progressives have managed to do to California over the past year.

Happy New Year! What an incredible decade. We’ve accomplished so much in CA by standing up for our values and taking on some of the biggest issues -- from healthcare to gun violence to climate change.

Let’s keep it going.

Here’s to 2020 and the decade ahead!!

Can this tweet be any more clueless? Does he really think he and the Progressives have ‘helped’ California residents? Lets take a look at just how he and his minions done so, shall we? Here are a number of responses to his self-serving tweet:

- You turned San Fran-sh!thole into a s**thole, and now you're doing it to the entire state of California.

- Definition of insanity. Doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result.

- The decade when California turned into everyone’s toilet on the streets. Good job Gov.

- I’m out in 3 months. There’s a mass exodus and no politician will talk about it.

- The only thing I've noticed is higher taxes and fees.

- Really Gavin?! What have you accomplished? Our state is in complete disarray. You are being recalled. Look at your city! Look at our state!! You have destroyed CA as we know it. So many people have left that we may LOSE a seat in Congress! What have you done to improve life here?

- Yay! Which values Gav? I want to live free to make my own decisions about my future and my kids to be safe but instead we are regulated and taxed up the wazoo, our votes and voices are silenced and our beautiful city streets are lined with shit and needles.

California in 2019:

- dangerous, unprecedented black-outs

- homeless pop. increased 130,000 to 151,000

- homebuilding *declined* 20%

- 200k person exodus = first-ever loss of congressional seat

All the result of your failure to confront reality & show courage for a change.

- Not to mention that CA's sanctuary state status for protecting illegals is costing Californians around $23 billion every single year.

- Straws banned, but feces and needles on the streets and in grocery stores. Progress!

- California has brought feudalism back. It's a state where some of the wealthiest people live on the coast and some of the poorest live inland whilst the middle class is high-tailing it out to states with lower taxation and less-restrictive regulations.

On top of that, a federal judge blocked AB-5, the so-called Anti-Gig Economy bill from taking effect, limiting the stay to the 70,000 independent truckers affected. The stay was issued when the California Trucking Association petitioned the court, saying the limitations imposed by AB-5 violate federal law. The court agreed and issued the stay.

It is possible the court could make the stay permanent because it does step on federal law. But whether the rest of AB-5 would be affected is unknown. It would be a win for the ‘gig’ workers who are seeing their jobs disappearing because of the ill-considered law, one of Gavin’s “wins”.

With the damage Newsom and his fellow progressives have done to California in 2019, it will be interesting and scary to see what they have in store for the once Golden State in 2020.