Archive for Law & Order

Living in California like I do has it’s advantages.  Take the weather for example – is there a place on earth with a more benign climate?  Doubtful.  Then there is the geography with it’s diverse and staggering beauty.  This place is seemingly a paradise;  yet people are leaving in droves for places like Texas, Idaho and Utah.

No offense Texans, Idahoans and Utah…people.  But Why?

Many are emigrating for economic reasons – everything costs more in California.  Others are leaving because despite its outward resemblance to paradise, California is not a very free place to live.  The Government here intrudes into almost every aspect of  life in one form or another.  As far as the economic factors I mentioned a sentence or two ago – these economic factors have underlying causes that relate directly back to government intrusion and overreach.  We pay high taxes on almost everything, pay taxes that are called “fees” on everything else, and finally we pay artificially high prices on housing, goods and services because of the cost of regulation.

The Progressive Utopia of California is a nanny state – it’s like having your mom always there telling you to pick up your socks and eat your brussels sprouts.  Always. There.  Except that your California Nanny State Mom is an alcoholic cat lady who is also schizophrenic.  And stupid.

Turns out people don’t like being told what to do and how to live and then being made to pay for it.  They experience a sudden realization that midwest winters, Texas summers, hurricanes and tornados don’t sound so bad.  If you can keep your money and the government will leave you the hell alone, that is.

The Progressive Utopia of California is a nanny state – it’s like having your mom always there telling you to pick up your socks and eat your brussels sprouts.  Always. There.  Except that your California Nanny State Mom is an alcoholic cat lady who is also schizophrenic.  And stupid.

Of course, Nanny State Mom only wants what’s best for you.   She only needs ordinances and laws to keep SOME people from making arguably unhealthy or unsafe decisions, presumably for the good of the public at large.  The rules start out being somewhat innocuous – things like mandatory automobile seat belt laws, mandatory motorcycle helmet laws, etc.  These rules mandating (or prohibiting) behaviors are rarely objected to because most people agree that they are “common sense” or “good ideas”.  However, if they are common sense or good ideas wouldn’t people do them on their own?  Why do we need a law?

So what happens when California Nanny State Mom has a few other ideas about what’s best for us all that might seem a little…how shall I put this…nutty?  Well now we’re gonna need a law.  Or two.  Or three…hundred thousand.

Because in the Progressive Utopia of California we can’t have people just doing whatever they want.  Does that seem like an extreme statement?  If you accept the premise of the Nanny State then it is not.  Because to accept that someone else, for whatever reason has the right to make decisions for you the only remaining question is how far are they allowed to go in enforcing those choices?  In the future Progressive Utopia of California all that is not forbidden will be mandatory.  And just exactly how is Mom gonna do that without her boot on your throat?

If it’s so bad, why am I still here?  The Prog Lib Dems who pull Nanny State Mom’s strings are telling me to get out.  They don’t want me or people like me here.  LaLaLaLaLa…I’m not listening to you, mom.  I was obstinate as a child and I’m not about to change.  Besides, the very fact that I may be an obstacle however small to full realization of the People’s Progressive Dystopian Banana Republic Hellscape of California is reason enough for me to endure and stay.  Well, that and the weather.

July 4th, 1776: The Continental Congress adopts the text of the Declaration of Independence.

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Though Congress had voted in favor of actually declaring independence from Great Britain on July 2nd, Thomas Jefferson was selected to draft the document and after 2 days of writing and editing, the text was ratified on July 4th.  This was not a trivial act – it was an act of treason.  Were the revolution to fail, it would mean a death sentence.

Listen to a reading of the Declaration of Independence here.

Reflect for a moment today on what we have to be grateful for, because some men a few hundred years ago had the courage to draft and sign a document.

Cross posted at Men Out of Work Blog

If you are a new vistior here, welcome!

Let me give you a couple tips on how to get the maximum out of your time spent here.  Essentially this is my soap box, a forum to express my thoughts through writing.  My secondary goals are to entertain my readers, perhaps even to educate or inspire them as well.  For more background, click on “about” in the upper right hand corner.

The technical stuff:  the articles (or “posts”) are in chronological order – newest at the top and older below.  To the left of each title is the date the post was created.  The main page shows all the posts in all categories – if you want to narrow it down, click on a category in the list on the right and – voila!  Only posts in that category are displayed.  Also on the right hand sidebar are “recent posts” whaich are – you guessed it – the 5 most recent posts; and “popular posts” which are the posts that have received the most views in case you like to follow the crowd.  My recommendation?  Read everything.

Within each post you will notice some text in red.  These are links to additional information.  Click on the red text and a new tab will open taking you to an article, a wikipedia page, a song or something that supports or relates to the material I am writing about.  Try it – click on this link and see where it takes you.

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So – happy reading!  And enjoy!

It is the Official Observance of the beginning of The American Revolution in 1775.  240 Years ago yesterday were fought the battles of Lexington and Concord.

Could it happen again today?  Read this:

Seventy Two Killed Resisting Gun Confiscation in Boston.

That sounds like it could be ripped from today’s headlines.  I guess that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

I may have mentioned that I am longer a Man Out Of Work.  I am now a Man Who Seems To Work Every Waking Minute Of His Freaking Life.  But that’s a poor name for a blog.  I’m not complaining, mind you, but I am playing the excuse card for light *non-existent* blogging.

I like blogging.  I want to blog.  I know that all the great bloggers whose blogs I read and who have inspired me to begin blogging work jobs that are undoubtedly more demanding than mine, yet they still crank out the content.  I just haven’t figured out how to make the adjustment from having lots of time to having almost no time.

Right now three things take up virtually 95% of my time.  Work 40%; Sleep 30%;  Wife 25%.   The wife’s time budget has already taken the biggest hit, so there’s no cutting back there.  In fact she is in need of an increase of at least 10%.  Can’t cut back on work, so it looks like sleep is gonna have to take the hit.

We’ll see how it goes.  It should be fairly easy for you to tell:  as the posts get more frequent and less coherent you’ll know I am making an adjustment to my sleep schedule.  Stay tuned!

Cross posted at Men Out Of Work Blog

You may wish to patronize another blog I contribute to:

The Men Out Of Work Blog

There are a couple new things up over there today.  Plus, it’s an Amazon portal, so you can shop.

THANKS!

San Francisco and Los Angeles, two cities long isolated from the rest of the physical world and indeed from reality itself, were delivered a beam of hope on Tuesday when ground was broken on the Bullet Train Project by California Governor Jerry Brown.  Travel between the only two cities that really matter in California will now finally be possible.

As anyone with a decent IPO fortune or a journalism degree knows, there are only two cities in California – San Francisco and Los Angeles.  Everything that happens in California revolves around their needs.  A longtime problem has been the fact that to travel between these two points, An Important Person must leave their bubble and pass through long stretches of California’s icky outerlands, populated by working class people, heterosexuals and often *shudder* Republicans, making it difficult for our Politicians and Money Traffickers to maintain their delusion that these places and people don’t exist.  Long sought was a way for the Elite to get back and forth without having to soil their shoes among the commoners.  Many ideas for achieving this outcome have been floated over the years.  One suggestion was to build a giant 400 mile long replica of the Golden Gate Bridge between the two cities, an idea that was quickly scrapped as being “too cheap” and with “not enough downsides”.  The ideas to actually use the existing system of highways for automobile travel, or using readily available and cheap air travel between the dozens of airports in each vicinity were quickly dismissed as being too “reality based” or having been “done to death”.

A problem like this, that is to say a non-existent one, called for a solution that is really big – with a really big price tag.  A price tag with lots and lots of zeroes.  It needed to have a big residual price as well.  It wouldn’t suffice to just have a big one shot spend.  No – what was needed was something that we could spend big on…year after year for eternity.  It would also need a big governing board with highly paid board members so that termed out politicians could have jobs for life.  Next, it would have to be a colossally stupid idea…so sublimely idiotic that in California’s bizarro world it would seem cutting edge and futuristic.  And finally it would need a big reason to exist…We would need it to…to…dare I say it?  To Save The Planet!

Such a big pitch would require a Pitchman extraordinaire.  Legendary California mover and shaker Willie Brown (no relation) was approached to be front man for the project, but declined stating “Are you F***ing crazy?”  If someting of this scale was to be pulled off, it woud require a visionary with a healthy disregard for reality and public opinion.   Since no one has ever accused Governor Brown of not having a good imagination, sometimes bordering on the delusional, he seemed like a natural for the job.

So, the idea of a Bullet Train to save the Planet was born.  And what better way to fund a project like this than with Tax Money We Haven’t Collected Yet (and may never).  A big fantasy project calls for an even bigger fantasy revenue stream, and so since California’s carbon tax money must be used to save the planet after all, we’ve budgeted anticipated Carbon Tax revenues for the project.  And since everyone knows that government tax revenue projections are always spot on, we’re sure to have at least a fraction of the costs covered.  Can we afford it?  How can we not afford it?  The very future of the human race hangs in the balance.  Besides, if that doesn’t work it’ll be a great excuse to raise other taxes later on.  Did I say that out loud?  Never mind.

Thus, a new moon rises over California spreading beams of hope for our beleaguered betters in San Francisco and Los Angeles!  You don’t like the idea?  Why do you hate the planet?  Also – shut up!

So finally, in only a few short decades we’ll be able to shout:  All aboard California’s Bullet Train to Progressive Utopia!  No single use plastic shopping bags, bottled water or e-cigs allowed!  Thank you for your co-operation!

We can close the books on another year – I hope 2014 treated you all well enough.  For me it was not the best of times, nor was it the worst of times and so I can’t complain too loudly.  It’s not that I don’t like to whine, you’ve all heard it often enough.  I’ll try to save it for when it really counts.  So here’s to a hopeful look forward to 2015 – may it be a Happy, Healthy, Prosperous year for us all!

I owe my legions of faithful readers an explanation for my long absence from the keyboard *eyeroll*.  I have recently become un-involutarily retired.  In other words, I found a job.  So yay.  And the Blogs have taken the back burner.  In fact they’ve been in the freezer.  I’m going to do my best to keep them going, but I’m still trying to find time to schedule all the things that filled my life during my long involuntary retirement.  Don’t Worry!  I’ll work it out!  Things may  lighten up after the Holidays.  Please be patient.

This has been in my draft folder for a couple months.  In light of the recent Lena Dunham kerfuffle, I decided to finish it up and post it.  If you don’t know what the Lena Dunham kerfuffle is, keep reading.

One of Life’s cliches is the occasional episode of kids “playing doctor”, which is considered innocent exploration under most circumstances such as when the participants are very young, all approximately the same age, none are coerced, and when there is no overt attempt at sexual stimulation or gratification.

In November of 2011 in Grant County Wisconsin, felony sexual assault charges were brought against a 6 year old boy for an incident of playing doctor.  If the details of this story are true then playing doctor appears to be what happened, yet the Grant County District Attorney opted to charge the 6 year old “perpetrator” with first degree felony sexual assault.  The kids involved even said they were playing “butt doctor”, and the parents of the “perpetrator” (scare quotes intentional) said their son had recently been to the doctor and had his little bottom examined and had an enema.  So it’s not surprising that he might want to reenact the event, this time as the examiner rather that the examinee.  The charge of sexual assault was levied because the perpetrator is alleged to have inserted his finger into the victim’s anus, though the victim denies this.  According to the article, penetration of any kind is defined by Wisconsin law as “sexual intercourse”, and so the way the prosecutor sees it sexual intercourse occured and a Judge affirmed there was probable cause for the charge to stand.

Since I’m not an attorney, nor am I familiar with Wisconsin law, I have a few questions.  What is the rationale behind charging a six year old with such a crime?  Doesn’t there have to be some form of intent behind a crime, and can a six year old form that intent?  These questions will not be answered because this case was settled by a consent decree and so was never adjudicated.

Which brings us to…Lena Dunham, star of the HBO series Girls, during which Dunham apparently spends a lot of time being randomly naked.  Disclaimer: I have never seen, nor will I likely ever see an episode of Girls.  Nowadays in current pop culture, persons with…*ahem*…unique personalities are routinely celebrated, and Dunham is no exception – she is the poster child of the “accept me for who I am without judgement”movement and for some reason has become a feminist icon.  Anyway, someone convinced her that it would be a good idea for her to write her autobiography.  She did so and it was published.  Via her own words, we learn that her upbringing was atypical, being the spoiled daughter of rich Manhattanite artist parents:  father, Carroll Dunham and mother Laurie Simmons.  And we also learn of several instances of Dunham’s…uhh…”exploration” of her little sister’s genitals.  Dunham herself described her behavior as that of a “sexual predator” which she now claims was an attempt at humor.  For her part, her now grown sister Grace claims no harm done.  Controversy arose when certain journalists read her book, and expressed opinions that her exploits with her younger sibling may have amounted to child abuse if not outright sexual assault.  Those parties have been characterized in the media as being “on the right” which is code for “religious busybodies who want to get involved in everyone’s business”, but I have seen concern regarding Dunham’s actions come from all sides of the political spectrum.  Dunham has now threatened to sue some of the journalists for falsely defaming her, though they claim they were only quoting her work verbatim.  So we’ll have the law involved here, too.

I guess it’s time to make my point.  While I am always up for some good old pop culture bashing, I’m having a hard time getting on this particular bandwagon.  The original notion of this post was that little kids do stuff, usually innocently.  They always have and I suspect they always will, and adults didn’t make a huge deal out of it in the past, but seem more eager to make a big deal of it now.  Maybe this is happening because of a perceived coarsening of our culture combined with a belief in a need to be more vigilant in protecting the innocent.  The point of my “Old and Busted…New Hotness” posts is generally that American society, if not human society as a whole is going straight to hell in a handbasket, so let me be clear that I still think that’s true.  But throwing charges of sexual assault around at children isn’t going to slow the descent.

Childhood “exploration” may be common, but it is not universal.  People who did experience it seem not to be harmed by it, while people who did not experience it are revolted and disgusted by it.  I doubt that anyone thinks it’s a good topic to bring up in a public forum.  Unless you like a good kerfuffle.