November 2024 – Libertate Virtute (Virtue + Liberty)

November 24, 2024December 1, 2024

It’s the Beliefs, Stupid!

MSNBC "Morning Joe" co-hosts Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough on Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2024 after the election was called for Trump. — MSNBC “Morning Joe” host Joe Scarborough called “the scope and scale” of Trump’s victory “sweeping.”

In the 1992 political war room of Bill Clinton, James Carville famously said, “It’s the economy, stupid!” It became a cliché. To a certain extent, it’s a key factor this year. But more lies underneath the public’s fixation with the economy. A troubled economy can be the product of the wrong sort of beliefs. Furthermore, a constellation of beliefs underlies a whole range of issues as a person addresses their ballot. At this point, it’s gone way beyond the economy. It’s the beliefs, stupid!

While blaming the other side for economic problems can catapult a party to victory, as it did for Clinton in 1992, it can also hide disturbing party ideas that’ll only appear once in office. It didn’t take long for Bill Clinton to uncloak the Democrats’ fetish for government control of almost everything – in this case, healthcare, 17% of the economy. Remember Hillary Care? People didn’t vote for this in 1992. It brought to an end the nearly 40-year Democrat reign of the House in 1995. Welcome to Speaker Newt Gingrich.

Forward to 2024, in the attempted postmortem of Democrat losses, donkey party enthusiasts can’t come to grips with the reality that this radical Left version of the party isn’t popular. For instance, transgenderism swiftly took corporeal form under their tutelage and began wrecking girls’ sports, their bathrooms and locker rooms, and in tandem with the propagation of gender ideology in the schools, adolescents were exposed to porn and gender “transition”. Gender confusion for children and Hustler-grade picture books aren’t winners. Duh!

What were they thinking? The Democrats chided Republicans for bringing it up as if the issue was concocted out of thin air by the GOP and Democrats have nothing to do with it. Really? Rachel Levine (born Richard) as Asst. Health Secretary, Biden’s “God bless you” to Dylan Mulvaney after his endorsement decimated Bud Light, a transgender celebration at the White House, and the manipulation of Title IX to sanction XY “girls” in every place with a Girl/Woman identifier are but a few eyebrow-raisers while parents watched their daughters losing to girls of the XY variety in women’s sports. A hard volleyball smash to the face by an XY “girl” changed a real girl’s life forever. Women’s track and swimming were distorted beyond recognition. Women’s Olympic boxing was nearly turned into a murder scene.

May be an image of 11 people — Transwoman Rose Montoya, who bared her/his breast implants at the June 2023 White House pride event.

May be an image of 2 people, people playing voleyball and text

The muddle of broad American sentiment on transgenderism began to crystalize into general opposition, particularly when asked about specifics. The view hardened as we approached the November 5 election. In 2024, after discussion intensified and baleful stories of the ill-effects of transgenderism accumulated, support for the reality of sex at birth increased to sizeable majorities (65%) (see #1). In 2023, almost 70% of respondents to a Gallup poll viewed biological sex to be the determinant of athletic participation (see #2). YouGov in February 2024 chronicled large majorities opposing the “transition” (“gender affirming care”: psyche control, chemical and surgical interventions) of their children by authorities.

Not only were their daughters threatened by the donkey party but government was herding them into cars that they didn’t want and delivering bankrupting energy costs all around. It seemed that the worst of California had come to their neighborhood, their garage, their schools, the intimate spaces of their homes, in many more ways than the price of eggs. The border was erased and the illegal immigrants were rewarded with plane and bus rides to the interior. Towns and cities and schools and housing and streets were flooded with foreign nationals who simply walked across without our approval (violating our laws). Crime spiked. Who voted for this in 2020?

But somehow, much of the after-election analysis skips all of this and wonders into incoherence. Typical of the foolishness was AP’s Matthew Brown in his “An influx of outsiders and money turns Montana Republican, culminating in a Senate triumph” of 11/22/024 (see #4). He essentially blames newcomers and outside money for Montana Democrat Sen. John Tester’s loss and the state turning red. In fact, as of October of 2024, the Tester campaign had outspent Sheehy $69.6 million to $19.7 million. Groups external to the candidates’ campaigns, all of it outside money, broke roughly even between the two. Adding it up, Tester had the money advantage (see #5).

May be an image of 1 person, dancing and crowd — Supporters cheer at election night watch party for Republican Tim Sheehy

May be an image of 2 people — Sheehy delivers his victory speech

It showed. Sitting on my perch in northwest Montana, I watched 4-5 Tester ads for every Sheehy one, whether streaming or broadcast.

And what of those “newcomers”? “Newcomers” don’t automatically turn a state red. “Newcomers” attracted to Santa Fe/Taos ambience and the “Rocky Mountain High” turned New Mexico and Colorado reliably blue. It’s also quite possible that the migrations of the 1990’s and the early 2,000’s (to NM and Colorado for example) are politically and philosophically different from those of the last decade and a half. The bulk of recent relocators could be classified as “refugees” fleeing the shift to the radical Left on the west coast, myself included, to outposts in Idaho and Montana. Once again, it comes down to beliefs.

The west coast shifted hard Left after the end of the Cold War. The state of Governor Ronald Reagan began to resemble today’s Venezuela more than the Beach Boys. The counterculture rose to prominence as the governing philosophy. The phenomena spread to Oregon and Washington State.

What was true of the west coast simultaneously occurred in metropolitan areas and college campuses across the country. Our cities became hotbeds of grime and violence. Blue states became infatuated with climate-change ideology and its attendant central planning. Taxes, regulation, and misgovernance spread like wildfire, including the literal wildfires.

Colleges morphed into satraps of the Frankfurt School. What’s that? Marxist academics in the 1920s and 1930s coalesced in Frankfurt, Germany, and formed a “School”, a Marxist think tank hewing to the reformulated Marxism of the Italian Antonio Gramsci. It came to the U.S. as its advocates fled Hitler and took positions in America’s elite colleges such as the University of California, Harvard, NYU, etc. Thus, “woke”/critical theory/CRT/DEI arose as a rigid orthodoxy throughout academia. It’s everywhere, unquestioned, inescapable. It passed down the social digestive tract from faculty to student to K-12 to the commanding heights of the culture. You can’t watch an ad, or most anything from Disney, without exposure to it. The c-suite is consumed by it which explains why, for instance, Wells Fargo ads are filled with their various ways to reinflate the housing bubble of 2007-8, and Big Sports’ infatuation with the oppressor/oppressed schtick.

This Leftist groupthink is manifest in urban nodes where we also find the training schools – the colleges – and corporate headquarters. When put into practice, the orthodoxy drives people away. The consequences overwhelm any initial surface appeal. Local economies are warped as sensitive groups like the middle class, the skilled trades, and manufacturing flee to more hospitable states.

Media people such as the AP’s Matthew Brown, infected as they are with the orthodoxy, don’t get it. The dynamic of push/pull is as evident in politics as it is in economics. People are pushed every bit as much as pulled in a particular direction. Maybe “pushed” is more powerful this time around. Could it be that voters were more repelled by the what the Democrats have become than any great affection for Trump? In other words, has the Democratic Party become repugnant?

If so, well, we’re back to, “It’s the beliefs, stupid!”

RogerG

Sources:
1. “Cultural Issues and the 2024 Election: 5. Gender identity, sexual orientation and the 2024 election”, Pew Research Center, 6/6/2024, at https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2024/06/06/gender-identity-sexual-orientation-and-the-2024-election/
2. “More Say Birth Gender Should Dictate Sports Participation”, Jeffrey M. Jones, Gallup, 6/12/2023, at https://news.gallup.com/poll/507023/say-birth-gender-dictate-sports-participation.aspx
3. “Where Americans stand on 20 transgender policy issues”, Taylor Orth, YouGov, 2/16/2024, at https://today.yougov.com/politics/articles/48685-where-americans-stand-on-20-transgender-policy-issues
4. “An influx of outsiders and money turns Montana Republican, culminating in a Senate triumph”, Matthew Brown, AP, 11/22/2024, at https://apnews.com/article/montana-republicans-wealth-democrats-8a1fdd90ef328701127d8a21ebb82dd3
5. “Montana Senate race shatters spending records at $309 per registered voter”, Aubrie Spady, Fox News, 10/24/2024, at https://www.foxnews.com/politics/montana-senate-race-shatters-spending-records-309-spent-per-registered-voter?msockid=287a0b967a9564c61c991f537b2f65ee

November 21, 2024November 21, 2024

The Los Angeles Nullification Crisis of 2024

May be an image of 4 people and text — People sit at City Hall as the Los Angeles City Council meets to consider adopting a sanctuary city ordinance in Los Angeles, Calif., November 19, 2024. (photo: Daniel Cole/Reuters)

Yes, history seldom repeats, but there are recurring similarities in events mingled with the unique contemporary twists. Post November 5, a historical pattern reemerged in the gambits used by locally empowered militants to thwart federal authorities and their delegated powers. Prior to the Civil War, it was called “nullification”, as in the Nullification Crisis of 1832. Today, “sanctuary city/state” is the favorite nomenclature for thwarting the federal exercise of federal powers. Where else but in the deepest of blue California – Los Angeles specifically – can a city council mimic the 1832 South Carolina legislature?

Clearly, Los Angeles hates Trump as South Carolina came to hate Lincoln. “Hate”, indeed, is the proper word. What else can motivate a claque of local politicos to such extremes?

On November 19, a sanctuary city ordinance passed on a 13-0 vote of the Los Angeles city council. Strangely, history is rhyming with the 1832 South Carolina legislature and their Ordinance of Nullification, only LA is targeting federal immigration law instead of a tariff. Admittedly, there are differences between “nullification” and “sanctuary city”, but let’s not forget that the intent is the same: the thwarting of the enforcement of constitutionally sanctioned federal law by state or local governments. In that sense, sanctuary from immigration law has much in common with sanctuary from a tariff law.

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At a time of the uncertain delineation between state and federal powers in the Constitution, South Carolina hung its hat on the idea of the country as a compact with states having the power to prevent enforcement of federal laws that they declare unconstitutional and against their interests – i.e., nullification. The notion can be traced back through the ruminations of Thomas Jefferson, John C. Calhoun, and the cultural elites of the antebellum South. California’s Democrats come by the idea honestly. This latest generation of Democrats running sanctuary cities and states is following in the footsteps of their slave-owning political ancestors.

Southerners had the approval of 19th-century states’ rights apologists. LA is hiding under the Supreme Court’s Printz v. US of 1997: states and localities can’t be compelled to expend their resources for federal initiatives (i.e., gun background checks). So, what is to be done when city employees are asked to expend work hours to honor a federal subpoena for the taking into custody of illegal immigrants in their jails? Or to prevent the mayor from announcing an ICE sweep before the onset of it – an obstruction of justice – as Oakland’s mayor Libby Schaaf did in 2018 (see #1)?

According to the radical LA city council member Hugo Soto-Martinez on his link at the city’s website back in 2023, city employees would be empowered to obstruct federal immigration authorities “unless it’s legally required” to do otherwise (see #2). I assume that means some kind of judge-approved warrant. The feds will have to have their ducks fully aligned before they will be allowed to enforce federal immigration law in Los Angeles. If a suspect turns violent, it’s a grey area as to whether the city employee is forced to remain a spectator.

These latest firebrands have to be very careful that they aren’t setting the stage for another Gettysburg. The upshot of the first go-around in upsetting the Constitution (1861-5) was that nullification and secession are losers. The 1865 mad dash by federal authorities to bring into custody Jefferson Davis could be repeated this time with Hugo Soto-Martinez’s name on the arrest warrant.

What is a Perp walk - YouTube — Not Hugo Soto-Martinez, but you get the picture.

If the State of California, proudly grasping South Carolina’s brass ring from 1832, interferes in like manner – for they have their own nullification-lite ordinance in SB 54 (see #3) – it too might be forced to choose between their political obsessions and The Constitution. They too, like LA, must tiptoe between noncooperation and obstruction. And, really, is there a practical difference?

Clearly, nullification and sanctuary city have the same purpose which is to thwart the enforcement of federal law. Under Trump, or any sensible chief executive, local caterwauling about the “safety of our residents” can’t work as an excuse for the nation’s people to be obstructed in the enforcement of their laws. This isn’t merely a conflict of jurisdictions. It’s settled: federal immigration powers are exclusively the province of the federal government, period. No state or locality can pick and choose which ones, especially if delegated by The Constitution to the federal government, will be enforced in their jurisdictions.

If certain states and localities are deluded otherwise, there might be more than a few perp walks to a federal detention facility and federal district court. Wouldn’t it be rich to see a manacled Mayor Karen Bass, or the 13 members of the city council, or Gov. Gavin Newsom, or AG Rob Bonta, or the Democrat supermajority in the state legislature in ICE vans on their way to the nearest federal detention facility? Next time, LA and California voters, show signs of a better understanding of your place in our federal system of government. South Carolina and the ten other states of the old Confederacy learned that lesson the hard way. Are you next? You might be in for another “Lost Cause”.

Welcome to the LA Nullification Crisis of 2024.

May be pop art of 3 people and text — Here’s looking at you LA city council

RogerG

Sources:

1. “Oakland’s Mayor Warned Her City Of An ICE Raid. She Doesn’t Regret It.”, Hamed Aleazaz, BuzzFeed News, 12/26/2018, at https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/hamedaleaziz/oaklands-mayor-warned-her-community-about-an-ice-raid-she
2. “What does it mean to be a ‘Sanctuary City’?”, Hugo Soto-Martinez, 3/11/2023, on the City of Los Angeles website, link to Hugo Soto-Martinez, at https://cd13.lacity.gov/news/what-does-it-mean-be-sanctuary-city
3. “California Sanctuary Law Divides State In Fierce Immigration Debate”, Samantha Rafelson et al, NPR, 10/17/2018, at https://www.npr.org/2018/10/17/657951176/california-sanctuary-law-divides-state-in-fierce-immigration-debate#:~:text=SB%2054%2C%20called%20the%20California%20Values%20Act%2C%20essentially,law%20and%20other%20cities%20actively%20defying%20the%20state.

November 19, 2024November 20, 2024

Message to Biased “Experts”: If You Want to be Taken Seriously, Stop Being So Left Wing

May be an image of 1 person — Prof. Claire Finkelstein of Penn Law School

Case in point: Penn law professor Claire Finkelstein. In an opinion piece on The Hill news site, she lays out an excuse for left wing prosecutors to go after public figures who disagree with her and them (see #1). Ignoring all prior precedence and guidance, she’s four-square behind arming the justice system against her ideological opponents. Let’s face it, she’s another one of these tenured types in a silo of habitual left-wing partisans.

She opines that a Trump firing of Jack Smith is obstruction of justice. She writes,

“If the sole purpose of the removal of a federal employee is to immunize the president against investigations into his own wrongdoing, that is a misuse of presidential authority, and one that is unrelated to the protections that the presidency is meant to afford.”

Borrowing a Biden word, this is “malarky”. It’s tantamount to open season for the left to target the right. I don’t think that she means for the same logic to be applied against anyone on the left – hint: Joe Biden, the entire Biden clan, Hillary and her home brew server and blatant obstructions, Stacy Abrams and the original “stop-the-steal” campaign. What about the retinue of New York and Atlanta prosecutors? Partisan use of prosecutorial powers is a form of obstruction of justice, also called “abuse of power”.

Hillary Clinton using a personal server was a genius idea-IndiaTV News | World News – India TV — Hillary Clinton from around 2015

Finkelstein advocates a freebooting expedition into an elected official’s intentions, his motives, as they exercise their constitutional powers, something clearly deemed constitutionally off-limits by the Supreme Court in Trump v. US earlier this year. How else can she prove “wrongdoing” or “misuse of presidential authority”? Do intentions and motivations bedevil left-wingers? It’s odd that this kind of rationalization only seems to crop up when Trump, or anyone on the right for that matter, wins office.

Where were they on Clinton’s perjury, obstruction, and impeachment, or Obama’s autocratic use of his “I’ve got a pen, and I’ve got a phone”, or the sweetheart deals that paved Obama’s way from activist/provocateur to Senator to the White House? Not a peep. No investigations, thus no indictments, thus no trials, thus no “convictions”, all of it buried deep, deep. Her legal inquisitiveness begins and ends with Trump. For all practical purposes, the difference between the D’s and R’s in her analysis is who won the election. If the D’s win, move on. If it’s the R’s, all guns ablaze. Finkelstein is just another political hack with tenure, another reason to question the rectitude of the faculty lounge.

She can’t wrap her head around the fact that the policies of the Left aren’t popular, especially when they’re given the chance to roll out. Even that deep blue bastion, California, can only stomach so much of the consequences of its left-wing prejudices. They tossed out the criminal permissiveness of Prop 46 (in Prop 36). That mecca of the counterculture, San Francisco, previously jettisoned some of the school board and sent its social-justice-warrior DA packing (Chesa Boudin). This time, it’s mayor London Breed seeking new employment. Across the Bay in Oakland, its mayor, radical lefty Sheng Thao, and Alameda County DA Pamela Price were sent to the exits.

All About Smash And Grab Robberies - TAL Global — Screenshot of a smash-and-grab in San Francisco

Los Angeles finally had enough of DA George Gascon. Apparently, serial assault and battery, smash-and-grabs, stabbings, shootings, and overall mayhem on the streets aren’t popular, even among a left-wing electorate. Of course, the usual suspects in power gaslighted us behind deceptive stats, such as the FBI’s crime report which relies on reported crime. Who reports crime if nothing will be done about it? Think George Gascon. Rather, honestly, trust your lyin’ eyes and vote the rascals out. They did.

As a result, Donald Trump’s showing in 2024 improved everywhere. I’m reminded of the scene on the MSNBC set on election night when asked to show the precincts or counties where Harris bested Biden’s 2020 showing. It was a blank map and startled the hosts. It was no less true in California. Eight counties flipped to Trump this time around. But the state is the Marianas Trench deepest of blue so there’s ample electoral breathing room to keep alive the leftist vision of life.

Nearly everywhere else, it’s appalling. Freezing parents out of parenting is a losing strategy for adults still in touch with reality. Tinkering with sensitive, impressionable young minds with trans ideology and treatments behind the backs of parents are flat-out losers. Recommending, pushing the ingestion of chemicals to interfere with a child’s natural development, and eventual surgeries, which are irreversible, are proving that barbaric teenage genital mutilation is alive and well in a hypothetically civilized society. Is it still civilized? I kinda doubt it, so any campaign running on it shouldn’t expect election-night celebrations.

Thus, boys-turned-girls – er, trans-girls, “girls”, XY “girls”, whatever – invade chromosomal girls’ spaces and battle them in competitions. It’s a replay of the Christians versus the lions in the Coliseum. I’m confused – and understandably so – because boy/girl is now relegated to a state of mind and having no relationship to procreation. It’s social suicide. They’re crazy. Any parent ushering their child down this path is practicing child abuse. Don’t expect a ride to victory on the back of this buffoonery.

May be a doodle of 1 person and text

May be pop art of text

May be an illustration of welcome mat and text

It’s as if the Democrats are card sharks and knowingly dealt themselves a losing hand. The wild spending and its wild debt aren’t winners. Climate-change ideology (or actually theology) as a cover for bankrupting utility bills and the shaming for the purchase of practical and affordable family transportation doesn’t help. Inflation was met with a Salem-witch-trail pogrom against “price gouging”.

A housing crisis didn’t just magically pop into existence. It’s been building for decades thanks to the Democrats’ fealty to mammoth environmental regulation and empowered NIMBYs. California is home to the worst of it. Is Elon Musk’s embrace of Trump a consequence of the regulatory crazies in the one-party state who nixed an increase in Space X launches at Vandenberg? That’s the tip of the iceberg: try to build a Levittown in the state. It’s a nightmare. And you wonder why your young adult children are living in your basement.

Do I need to mention the Biden administration’s open invitation for the Third World to move to the United States en masse? What a goat rope.

The Democrats love what ails us. Barack Obama’s beloved Rev. Jeremiah Wright once crowed that “The chickens have come home to roost.” Well, the chickens are roosting as GOP victories. No amount of legal scheming by partisans in the ivory tower will give the Democrats what they dearly desire: power. Power is gained through elections and, right now, they’re not fit to be elected – except in bicoastal, metropolitan, and academic pits of despair.

Claire Finkelstein, Trump will fire Jack Smith if he’s still around, and you have no legal standing to stop it. Jack Smith was on the ballot only as a Trump campaign issue. Trump won and you and Jack Smith lost. Next time, try making your side more palatable instead of inventing new ways to obstruct the voters’ desire to be protected from you.

As a side note, how do you spend a billion dollars, end the race with a $20 million debt, and still lose? $1.02 billion wasn’t enough to sell this turkey.

Update: Harris collected over $2 billion, and her campaign contests any contention of leftover debt.

RogerG

Sources:

1. “Jack Smith must not drop the government’s charges against Donald Trump — here’s why”, Claire Finkelstein, The Hill, 11/12/2024, at https://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/4986125-doj-trump-indictments-jack-smith/
2. “No, Firing Jack Smith Would Not Be an Obstruction of Justice”, Andrew C. McCarthy, National Review, 11/16/2024, at https://www.nationalreview.com/2024/11/no-firing-jack-smith-would-not-be-an-obstruction-of-justice/

November 15, 2024November 15, 2024

Hagiography and Its Consequences

May be an image of 1 person and text — Charlie Kirk

Case in point: Charlie Kirk. Right out of the gate, all aglow with power in the aftermath of victory, Kirk, like a tom with his chest bellowed, threatened the new Senate Majority Leader, John Thune, with the following:

“John Thune is now Senate majority leader. If he does not support President Trump in these next 30 to 45 days to fill President Trump’s cabinet, we will remove him.” (See #1)

Who’s the “we”? It can’t be the American people. They didn’t vote for Charlie Kirk to be some sort of Tribune of the People. It can’t be a majority of the 76 million who voted for Trump. It’s pure fancy to assume that all of those voters are as enraptured by Donald Trump as he is. “The lesser of two evils” is a vote against something more than it’s a vote for. I’ll bet that’s where most of those 76 million reside. It’s a well-seasoned hunch.

A general distaste for the Democrats isn’t carte blanche for Trump to be crazy. Indeed, he can’t be any crazier than when he nominated the narcissistic, solipsistic Matt Gaetz, neo-isolationistic Tulsi Gabbard, and the magic-for-medicine RFK, Jr., to be in his cabinet. Charlie, these aren’t normal people, not normal in the sense that those 76 million would trust huge swaths of the federal bureaucracy in the hands of a young and dimwitted narcissist, a blame-America isolationist, and a kook in charge of Medicare, Medicaid, and the rest of the federal health care Leviathan. I think that I’m safe in saying that few people voted for this.

May be an image of 3 people and the Oval Office — Gaetz, Trump, JFK, Jr.

And how are you, Charlie, going to accomplish this forced act of fealty? The Senate isn’t supposed to be an adjunct of the Trump campaign, or an offshoot of Trump’s fickle brain. Charlie, it’s called separation of powers. It has the constitutionally guaranteed power of “advice and consent” for offices like these. Whose advise from the Senate did he seek? Gaetz/Gabbard/JFK, Jr. were out of the blue. No one, and I mean no one, had Gaetz, or any of the others, at the top of their list for anything. If you decide to act looney, don’t be surprised that consent isn’t forthcoming.

Maybe the Senate can save Trump, and the rest of us, from himself. I suspect that Trump was understandably scarred from his first term and immediately thereafter. Some of his troubles were of his own making (Jan. 6). He doesn’t want a solid conservative, learned and experienced on the law and the Constitution, as Attorney General. He wants a toady. No more these principled conservative legal minds such as Bill Barr who couldn’t, for clear lack of evidence, follow him down his imaginary yellow brick road to the land of Stop-the-Steal. If he gets his way, the rest of us will suffer in the chaotic administration of our – not his – laws. The same would be true at DNI and HHS.

The “disruptor” schtick belongs in the play pen, not the presidency. Trump, you don’t have a mandate to do this. And, Charlie, stop plaguing us with the lickspittle hagiography. It’s grotesque.

In graphic form, the 2024 election as a vote-against referendum:

RogerG

Sources:

1. “Charlie Kirk: If John Thune Does Not Fill Trump’s Cabinet In Next 30-45 Days, ‘We Will Remove Him’”, Tyler Stone, RealClear Politics, 11/14/2024, at https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2024/11/14/charlie_kirk_if_john_thune_does_not_fill_trumps_cabinet_in_next_30-45_days_we_will_remove_him.html

November 14, 2024November 14, 2024

The Gaetz Nomination: Does Trump play 4D Chess?

Matt Gaetz urges colleagues to abolish the ATF before it strips Americans of gun rights: 'Cannot ...

Does Trump play 4D chess? Possibly, but I have to be convinced. The subject was raised in connection with the puzzling Gaetz nomination for Attorney General. Occum’s razor might be the best path to a credible explanation for the farce. It stipulates that it’s far more likely that the simplest explanation is best when facing a quandary. The fact of the matter is that Trump may just like the guy. I don’t know. Who does?

How Jack Smith's three-dimensional chess moves outwitted Trump's legal strategy...

The JFK assassination is instructive. Some people have scrounged and sifted the mountains of evidence like an archeologist at Hisarlik looking for ancient Troy. They’ve connected the millions of dots into elaborate, twisting and turning plots. It’s made a lot of people rich. For them, it can’t be something as simple as a sociopathic Marxist exploiting an opportunity to make a big splash. There’s no money in that. There’s also no doubt Oswald did it; the rest of the mongering is overheated embellishment. Ditto for 4D chess and Trump?

I’m not dismissing any other scenario. Other alternatives can also be in full accord with Occum’s razor. It’s undoubtedly true that the bulk of people in both wings of the Capitol hold Gaetz in a much-deserved low esteem. Gaetz resigned his congressional seat after the nomination, so the House ethics investigation goes away . . . but not the evidence. It doesn’t take a genius to realize that rheams of that stuff will make its way to the Senate. Sitting in the Senate hearing, Gaetz will face some compromising questions that could force upon him the risk of perjury. Voilà, the House gets rid of a two-legged clown car and Trump still gets his second, maybe real, choice.

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That’s the best pro-Trump spin. On the other hand, in the meantime, Trump’s reputation takes a hit. Is it worth it to risk scarce political capital on a complicated venture that could blow up in your face? But honestly, it’s nice to know that Gaetz is out of the House and Gaetz’s nomination will be dispatched like so much junk mail. Now that’s a possible two-fer for the rest of us.

RogerG

November 14, 2024November 14, 2024

Matt Gaetz, Attorney General? You’ve Got to be Kidding!

Donald Trump is often referred to as a disruptor. He is, but “disruptor” is another one of those vacuous words waiting to be filled with whatever biases a person wishes to pour into it. A lot of people are disruptors, up to and including criminals. It’s nonsense. Well, the “disruptor” Donald Trump nominated the “disruptor” Matt Gaetz to be the nation’s Attorney General. Moving beyond the adolescent titling, Gaetz as AG has got to be a joke. He’s about as fit to be AG as Baby Huey heading the National Science Foundation.

May be a doodle — Matt Gaetz? Our next Attorney General? Next head of the National Science Foundation?

The guy is a prima donna, a narcissistic attention-getter on a continual hunt for a camera and mic. He’s a better fit to be a kid’s birthday clown, scarry and funny at the same time. He’s responsible for the chaos in the majority Republican House caucus and coup against Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R, Ca.). Gaetz and his few fellow dimwits (including Matt Rosendale, R, Mt.) were rightfully called the “Knucklehead Caucus” by Hugh Hewitt. Now, General Secretary Knucklehead is nominated to be America’s top cop. Is Trump paying too much attention to Laura Ingraham of Fox News fame? Has he lost his mind?

May be pop art of fireworks and text

The guy has some skeletons, and maybe a few teenage girls, in the closet. He’s been under investigation for allegedly inducing the travel of an underage girl (age 17) across state lines for the purpose of a “relationship” (see #1). The investigation ended with no charges recommended. That doesn’t matter. If the Democrats can turn the actions of an unruly crowd on Jan. 6, 2021, into “insurrection” and “the worst threat to our Constitution since the Civil War” and entangling Trump in lawfare for the next four years, imagine what they can do with this.

Speaking of titles, “pervert” isn’t a glorious start to a nomination (Is a “pervert” a disruptor?). There’s an entire House Republican caucus that had to put up with the self-destructive antics of Gaetz and his Knucklehead Caucus. I wonder what House Republicans are whispering in the ears of Senators in the other Capitol wing. Some Republican House members called it a “a reckless pick”. One responded with “no good comment”. Max Miller of Ohio was quoted as saying, “I think he has a zero percent shot of getting through the Senate.” Key Republican Senators were left speechless or rolling their eyes. Few if any kudos rolled off their lips. If Politico can be trusted (an iffy proposition), stunned disbelief is probably the more accurate descriptor (see #2).

A roll call of important Republican Senators tells the story. Sen. John Cornyn was said to roll his eyes. Senators Tom Cotton and Shelley Moore Capito refused to comment. Sen. Susan Collins was “shocked”. Sen. Lisa Murkowski said that “it’s [not] a serious nomination for the attorney general.” Sen. Thom Tillis: “I think he’s [Gaetz] probably got his work cut out for him to get a good, strong vote.” Sen Ron Johnson was more guarded: “We’ll go through the process. Can’t make any predictions.”

If Ron Johnson won’t, neither will I. The Gaetz nomination, though, is proof that a “disruptor” can also be a “fool”. Maybe Trump’s head has been turned by too much worship in the usual right-leaning outlets. For all you classicists, the weakness in the human character is distilled in Hubris-Atis-Nemesis-Tisis. In short, arrogance leads to self-destruction. For Trump, success can breed failure. Trump, be careful. Withdraw the nomination.

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RogerG

Sources:

1. “Matt Gaetz Accuses Former DOJ Official of Extorting Him with Underage Sex Allegation”, Zachary Evans, 3/30/2021, National Review, at https://www.nationalreview.com/news/doj-investigating-matt-gaetz-over-potential-sexual-relationship-with-17-year-old-girl/
2. “‘Reckless pick’: Lawmakers express doubts that Gaetz can get confirmed as attorney general”, Anthony Adragna, Politico, 11/13/2024, at https://www.politico.com/news/2024/11/13/matt-gaetz-attorney-general-confirmation-doubt-00189382

November 12, 2024November 12, 2024

The Election Was a Rejection of California

Why the focus on California? Simple, California is the head of the progressive snake. Its ideological tendencies permeate the national Democratic Party. Our Vice President, and their losing candidate for president, was politically bred in the specialized, socio-political one-party petri dish of – you guessed it – California. California Democrat muckety-mucks populate Biden’s executive branch posse with a left coast view of the world.

Let’s take a look at California’s election results to get a hint of the chaos and what could have been in store for the rest of us. Wait, they aren’t finished counting in the golden state, and won’t be till Dec. 3, maybe not even then. Speaking of chaos. The state has turned itself into a model of election incompetence, and the national party has adopted it, seizing the COVID panic as an excuse to nationalize the falderol. Much vote fraud was legalized, or made easier to go undetected. Mail-in ballots, election season instead of election day, ballot harvesting, a profusion of provisional ballots, failure to clean voter rolls, and, here’s the kicker, the “curing” of ballots, were pioneered in California.

What’s the “curing”? “Curing” is how the entrenched party discovers new votes. First, the state’s Democrat honchos know the state’s blue precincts, for there are many, and target the “curing” on them. “Curing” refers to seeking out a voter who didn’t properly submit their ballot – missing signature, unmatched signatures, wrong envelope, etc. – and is allowed to correct the mistake (Hmmmm!), and, all of a sudden, a Republican victor on election day wakes up to their loss a couple of weeks later.

Millions of dollars in Democrat war chests exist to fund the cherry-picked treasure hunt. Gov. Newsom has millions left over from his recall treasury to devote to combing blue precincts for more votes. Interesting question: Why vote in elections that have more in common with the shams in Maduro’s Venezuela? California, Californezuela.

If Venezuela’s lefty caudillo, Nicolas Maduro, was California’s governor – no, it’s not as crazy as you think – he’d probably adopt Gov. Newsom’s appropriation of John C. Calhoun. Remember the nullification crisis of 1832? South Carolina asserted the power to prevent the enforcement of federal law (the tariff) within the state at the urging of the influential John C. Calhoun. That’s “nullification”, and blue state fiefdoms in the mold of California have been doing a form of it for decades regarding immigration law. Newsom doubled down on nullification-lite when he blustered after the election (see #1 below), “The freedoms we hold dear in California are under attack [after Trump’s victory] — and we won’t sit idle.”

What freedoms? The “freedom” to obstruct immigration law by blocking the cooperation of state and local authorities? The “freedom” of government employees (teachers, administrators) to hide from parents the porn curriculum in third-grade classrooms or the transition of their daughter into a son, all backed up by the Democrat AG Rob Bonta? The “freedom” of XY “girls” to occupy girls’ spaces and sports? The “freedom” of the state to undermine out-of-state parenthood by its self-designation as a transgender sanctuary state for minors from anywhere? The unlimited “freedom” of a woman to end the life of her baby up to the exit from the birth canal, maybe after, who knows? The “freedom” of the state to force you onto government mass transit or into dopey EVs? The “freedom” to experience bankrupting utility bills, blackouts, brownouts, and hypothermia after the nuking of nuclear power and fossil fuels? The “freedom” of the state to be the missing link in the supply chain from ship to shore at its ports by mandating EV 18-wheelers and locomotives, something that doesn’t exist or is impractical beyond measure? The “freedom” of the state to run you out of business? The “freedom” to pay more for everything and fewer jobs to accomplish the feat? The “freedom” to be harassed on everything you say or do, especially religiously? Thanks, Newsom, for the “freedoms”.

Biden followed the California script. Biden’s version of fiscal responsibility is additions to the national debt going from $1 trillion every 100 days in 2021 to today’s $1 trillion every 200 days. Either way, your kids are being robbed.

California is tax-happy and adores the issuance of gobs and gobs and oodles and oodles of bonds. Propositions 2 and 4 (school building, water/flood/drought projects) on the California ballot appear to be headed for approval. It’s astounding that the state’s current budget of $311 billion and its panoply of taxes, taxes everywhere aren’t enough. $25 billion in more debt will be added to the outstanding total state bond debt of $79 billion, and more than $1.6 trillion if you combine state and local obligations (see #3).

California pulls out its credit card, and so does Biden/Harris/DNC; only the feds have a much more robust one, one without limit. They can gin up the money supply by making dollars appear out of thin air. They’ve got a Federal Reserve. Thus, they borrowed California’s fiscal philosophy to achieve new heights of inflation. The old Keynesian adage of spending in bad times and saving in good times was jettisoned. It’s just the spending now, no need for the saving. With the pandemic over and recovery well under way in 2021, and Biden filled with delusions of FDR grandeur, the Democrats jumped at the chance by piling $6.17 trillion of new debt onto the backs our kids (see #5). What did we get for it? Problems . . . and a few EV chargers. Sounds like California.

The country became a goat rope in the manner of California. Every celestial grouping in the radical-left progressive universe was hyped up on taxpayer dollars and deficit spending. It was enough to make drunken sailors appear judicious.

They were doing everything but the bottom-line function of government’s existence. Namely, safety and security. We have a Vice President who personally gave money to bail out rioters, under the euphemism of “protesters”, who were responsible for making hell zones of our metropolitan downtowns. It did nothing but cause the price for out-bounded U-Hauls to skyrocket.

All kinds of bedlam were celebrated on Capitol Hill and the White House. Gatherings of the transgendered were held at the White House with participants exuberantly baring their surgical scars and implants to the world and the assembled press. In the midst of the 2020 riot season and later, the Democrats went full neo-Marxist in Capitol kneelings, calls to defund the police, “reimagining” policing, and full DEI racism. Hiring practices throughout the executive branch were altered as part of the war on merit. A candidate for air traffic controller was golden so long as they exhibited the appropriate intersectionality.

As for the border, it became the apex of bedlam. Not only was the border patrol turned into the Welcome Wagon, but the border jumpers were rewarded with gifts and jet flights to the country’s interior to the chagrin of local officials. Certainly, in this instance, crime does pay. And to think that there’s an entire wing of the Democratic Party devoted to California’s favored position on immigration law, which is decriminalization. They’d like it to be the equivalent of a jaywalking ticket. Harris, their choice to accelerate the misrule, tried to hide her own calls for California-style immigration chaos but failed. Chaos, chaos everywhere, from girls’ bathrooms to the border.

This election was a repudiation of the worldview of 60-65% of the California electorate. The rest of the country rejected the state’s favorite daughter and its approach to governance. When the donkey party decided to go full California, the rest of the country said, “Whoa, whoa there! We won’t sign onto a California neo-Marxist revolution.”

There, that’s my take on what happened November 5.

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RogerG

Sources:

1. “‘We won’t sit idle’: Newsom goes on offensive against Trump”, Wes Venteicher, Politico, 11/7/2024, at https://www.politico.com/news/2024/11/07/newsom-california-legislative-session-trump-resistance-00188119
2. “2023-24 State Budget”, State of California, at https://ebudget.ca.gov/budget/2023-24EN/#/Home
3. “Overview of State Bond Debt Service”, California Legislative Analyst’s Office, 2/27/2024, at https://lao.ca.gov/LAOEconTax/Article/Detail/798
4. “California State and Local Liabilities Total $1.6 Trillion”, Edward Ring, California Policy Center, 2/28/2022, at https://californiapolicycenter.org/california-state-and-local-liabilities-total-1-6-trillion/
5. “U.S. debt by president: dollar and percentage 2024”, Annabel Burba in Consumer Affairs, 11/7/2024, at https://www.consumeraffairs.com/finance/us-debt-by-president.html

November 8, 2024November 12, 2024

California Dreamin’ or California See Ya?

Poll: 40% of Californians are thinking about leaving the state – HotAir — (Photo: AP Photo/Nick Oxford)

It’s “See ya”, or so it seems according to the outlook for the 2030 census. Don’t expect California’s current allotment of 52 congressional seats to stay there. It lost one after the 2020 count. The next census will probably be more brutal (see #2). Look at the map below.

After the last census, the numbers were explained away by the state’s chattering classes by emphasizing that the state actually gained population. It just didn’t grow as fast as others, they say. Yes, but according to the website San Fransisco Gate, its population has been generally static since 2017 while our country’s South and Southeast have blossomed (see #1).

Something about population decline: it doesn’t happen in a mad dash for the exits, all at once. The gradual slide begins with a birth dearth and flights to other areas of the state. Whereas before, the state benefitted from foreign migration, not, mind you, an influx from other states. That has slowed, so the total population numbers start to bend south (see #3).

Now add the numbers who’ve skedaddled. Who’s left the state entirely? It’s the socio-economic backbone of any state: the middle class and families. Even the left-of-center California Public Policy Center acknowledges the shrinking middle of the demographic pyramid. Raking in all the numbers results in a guesstimate (California Dept. of Finance) of a decline of over 57,000 in 2023 alone. After that, they expect the numbers to rise, which is normal, but not enough to keep from losing additional seats (see #4).

Thus, by the 2030 census, hopefully, the rest of the country will be saddled with 4 fewer Adam Schiffs (now a plague on the US Senate). One outcome of the last election is that the state of Gavin Newsom is slipping into irrelevancy. Really, who cares how California votes, even if they’re still counting at Christmas time? As far as the race for president goes, there are more than enough states who don’t want to be like it. The so-called “blue wall” has given way to a red wall abutting the socialist republic. Whew, what a relief.

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RogerG

Sources:

1. “What everyone is getting wrong about California losing a congressional seat”, Amy Graff, San Fransisco Gate, 4/27/2021, at https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/2021-04-California-House-Seat-Census-Population-16133275.php
2. “2030 Apportionment Forecast – 2023”, The American Redistricting Project, 12/19/2023, at https://thearp.org/blog/apportionment/2030-asof121923/
3. “California’s population shrank in 2020, but don’t call it an exodus”, Ben Christopher, Cal Matters, 5/27/2021, at https://calmatters.org/politics/2021/05/california-population-shrink-exodus/
4. California Dept. of Finance: Report P-1A, “Total Projected and Estimated Population for California: July 1, 2020 to 2070”, at https://view.officeapps.live.com/op/view.aspx?src=https%3A%2F%2Fdof.ca.gov%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2Fsites%2F352%2F2023%2F07%2FP1A_State_Total.xlsx&wdOrigin=BROWSELINK

November 6, 2024November 12, 2024

Trump II, a Mea Culpa of Sorts

Harris and Trump want to strengthen the middle class. It could use the help | CNN Politics

Right now, in the aftermath of victory or defeat, things look rosy or depressing. Clear away the fog of euphoria or sadness. Settle down. Here’s what I take from the results:

I was wrong about Trump’s chances. I overplayed Trump’s negatives. Not that he doesn’t have any. He’s got plenty. Not that he wasn’t the weakest general election candidate in the GOP stable. He still is. The fact remains that the country is center-right, and the Dems fell off the left cliff. Trump had the advantage of a thoroughly discredited opposition party. At this moment, I wonder if the great bulk of the country just had enough of the left’s culture war; its eco-assault on the kitchen table, shelter, the gas tank, electricity, and the family sedan; and the socialist spending spree fueling an out-of-whack economy.

Thus, this was actually a change election, a dash away from what the Democratic Party has become. Trump didn’t have to be loved. He only had to be viewed by a majority as better than the alternative. Now, no longer facing a billion-dollar smear campaign and a recent history of radical left policies to lambast, I expect Trump’s negatives to eventually revert to norm. Where I went wrong is in not recognizing the very simple and smart calculus of it being either him or them.

But don’t forget, tomorrow is another day.

And don’t dismiss the fact that the Republicans were better organized this time around. The craziness of running an election during a pandemic, and given the Democrats’ chomping at the bit to “never let a crisis go to waste” by pushing through wild election law changes, left the Republicans flat-footed in 2020. Legislative changes were made at the state level to smooth the rough edges, but the asinine mailed ballot remains. Still, kudos to the RNC. It’s proof that even Republicans are open to life’s lessons.

Will Trump II be a repeat of Trump I? The guy may be either more unhinged or older and wiser. We’ll see. Will he be as stubborn as Biden, who forced an Afghanistan bugout at all costs, in imposing a rash of protective tariffs on friend and foe alike? All of this without addressing our own role in hampering American manufacturing. American mismanagement, unions, and regulation did more than Asia to wreak havoc on GM and USX. Will he sellout Ukraine to Putin? What about federal spending which is putting America on a path to Argentina? Early indications aren’t promising.

Storm clouds, many of them possibly of Trump’s own making, loom over a second term. Good luck, America.

Oh, and I don’t blame you for not listening to me.

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RogerG

November 5, 2024November 12, 2024

The Democracy Prattle

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Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder is hot across streaming channels proclaiming “democracy is on the ballot” in a dash to get everyone to vote. Well, Eddie, if there are people who shouldn’t have driver’s licenses, there are people who shouldn’t vote. If you don’t care enough to know anything, don’t plague the rest of us with your choices. Also, not voting can be very rational and the best option.

It’s more than that. Democracy is not on the ballot. Democracy is a factor in our system of governance, not the determinant, especially when we choose a president across the 50 different states. Eddie, it’s a republic under law. 50%-plus-one isn’t how we govern ourselves. We choose representatives by popular vote in single districts apportioned to each state after every census per The Constitution. Senate representation, though, is equal among the 50 states, regardless of the number of warm – and maybe not so warm – bodies on its sacred soil, and is not subject to amendment (Article V, last phrase). The Electoral College ensures that we are governed by more than New York City, California’s coastal plain, and Chicago’s Democratic political machine.

Eddie needs a civics education. And maybe some History too. The dividing line between a mob/mass tyranny and democracy is a blurry one, shifting with the groupthink tides. Popularly elected tyranny is still tyranny. The late 18th-century Parisian mobs – the soldiers of the Reign of Terror – and going back further to the Melian Massacre (416 B.C.) by Athens are but two examples of popular brutalities. History is festooned with democratic inhumanities. The Jews have been victimized by them for centuries.

As we gear up for the November 5 election, two things stand out about our “democracy”: the drive to circumvent the states in the Electoral College in the “National Popular Vote Interstate Compact” (NPV) and the simple fact that the popular vote is a fiasco. The second one undermines the first.

The NPV is an enthusiasm of the Left (liberal, progressive, socialist, whatever) due to the occasional breakthrough of the Right in the Electoral College. They’d like to close off any avenue of escape from their clutches each 4-year election cycle. With the NPV, the choice of president would reflect the norms of the Acela Corridor, Chicago, and the California coastal plain. All other urban nodes imitate them. That’s right, run up the score by hook or by crook in a few congested spots and, voilà, the mayor of Los Angeles is next in line to be president. I jest . . . or am I? (See #3 below)

30-point margins in New York and California might do the trick. Right now, these two states are shedding residents like my dogs shed hair in the summer; yet, they still possess a wreaking left-wing critical mass to make a neo-Marxist the betting choice to run the executive branch and much more. Xi is more popular in these places than a Republican.

Any state to vote for this thing (NPV) outside these hotbeds of left-wing activism is by implication violating their oath of state office in sacrificing the choice of their people to the whims of New York and California. It’s an impeachable offense, or should be. It’s probably unconstitutional as well. The NPV violates the 14th Amendment’s privileges and immunities clause, and as a compact, it must be approved by Congress. This one skips over Congress.

The compact is a conspiracy among states equaling 270 electoral votes to gang up on the others. It creates the likely scenario of someone with the barest of majority to lock in the presidency, even though he or she reflects the worldview of only a quarter of the states.

How accurate is that popular vote? Who knows? These left-wing one-party states don’t clean their voter rolls, exceedingly complicate the voting process by allowing noncitizens to vote in local elections, and created barriers to voter verification. Once deposited and stripped of its envelope (if mail-in), the ballot from whatever source, by whomever, cannot be retrieved from the humungous pile. The culprit could even be convicted of vote fraud but the vote will still count. It’s untraceable.

May be an image of book and text — Mail-in ballots

How often does this happen? Who knows? It’s rarely found out due to the nature of the secret ballot – a godsend but makes the fraudulent vote untraceable once deposited. Since the process is so loosey-goosey in these states, the malefactor must admit to it and bring it to the attention of authorities before anything is done, but the illegal vote will still be counted.

Left-wing donkey party registrars and secretaries of state try to allay fears by saying that voter fraud is so rare. The percentage number is bogus. They take the number of discovered incidents, which are infinitesimal, against the total number of votes cast to produce a statistical piece of nonsense. It’s a lie because they, and no one, can ever know the full picture of fraud given the way they have set up and run show. Without a culprit standing out like a sore thumb or walking up to them and admitting to the crime, life goes on and the donkey party candidate wins by 30 points. There’s your “virtuous” national popular vote.

We have a recent and shameful example (see #1 and #2 below). A University of Michigan noncitizen student voted and submitted his ballot. Later, he asked for it back, maybe after realizing that it was illegal, or simple second thoughts. Only then were authorities aware of the criminal act, when the offender brought it to their attention. And he won’t be getting it returned; it can’t be; it’s dispersed into the ocean of early-vote ballots.

What happens in a close election when a tidal wave of ballots flood the thousands of local voting bureaucracies around the country? Well, get ready for a months-long battle in the media and courts as our embarrassment of a “democracy” plays out in full view to the rest of the world. Recently, we have a habit of close presidential elections. In 1960, JFK beat Nixon by a scant .17% in the popular vote. The 1968 election was won by Nixon by .7%. Trump and the Dems have been locked in an evenly matched embrace since 2016. This election might continue in this pattern. Our democracy is a debacle.

That’s our “democracy” for you. We get to vote on things and offices that we don’t understand. Campaigns don’t inform, only gaslight us. Every election is not decision time. It’s a looting expedition in how much we can load up on the national debt, and thus on our kids, or on the backs of the “rich”. The NFL has a 5-month season, just like our election “seasons”. Ballots are thrown about in the mail; monster blue states won’t verify identity; and early voting is a ticket to rashness.

I long for the days when we had a deliberative republic. We elect representatives to debate, deliberate, and decide the great issues before the republic. We choose a chief executive that reflects the wishes of a broad swath of the country, and who stays in his lane of the administration of the laws. And all within a matrix of rights. Instead, we’ve gone from republic to shame.

Good luck, America.

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RogerG

Sources:

1. “Joint statement of Secretary Benson and Washtenaw County Prosecutor Savit on charges filed in noncitizen voting case”, Michigan Department of State, 10/30/2024, at https://www.michigan.gov/sos/resources/news/2024/10/30/joint-statement-of-secretary-benson-and-washtenaw-county-prosecutor-savit-on-charges-filed
2. Thanks to Jim Geraghty of National Review for the information and sources In “The Election Crimes of 2024”, 11/4/2024, at https://www.nationalreview.com/the-morning-jolt/the-election-crimes-of-2024/
3. “The National Popular Vote Idea Is Unconstitutional and Should Be Abandoned”, Peter J. Wallison, National Review, 6/27/2023, at https://www.nationalreview.com/2023/06/the-national-popular-vote-idea-is-unconstitutional-and-should-be-abandoned/