The gifts of government

Most politicians display an attitude that their constituents are like children in need of constant government, care and supervision from rulers who know what is best for them. It’s like they think they own us and therefore anything they do on our behalf is a gift. You see, the government owns your life and your property. Any privilege they allow us is a gift. If a law permits us some activity it’s a gift. If taxes are reduced and you are allowed to keep more of your property it’s a gift.

Yes, tax cuts and tax reform are gifts. Politicians of all stripes believe that. President Trump thinks that his new tax bill, for example, is an “incredible Christmas gift” for Americans. "They're going to start seeing the results in February. This bill means more take-home pay. It will be an incredible Christmas gift for hard-working Americans. I said I wanted to have it done before Christmas. We got it done," Trump said.

Don’t forget the Democrats either. Not a single one of them voted for President Trump’s wonderful Christmas gift, but they still all think of it the same way: It’s a gift. “Republican tax bill is a Christmas gift for the super-rich,” trumpets the L.A. Times. “Trump’s Tax Plan Is a Pointless Gift to the Wealthy,” exalts Slate. “It’s been called a ‘tax cut for the rich, a Christmas gift for the wealthy,’” and more,” says the N.Y. Times.

How about that? All the politicians admit that your money is a gift to you if they allow you to keep it. It’s just a matter about who “benefits” the most from the government allowing us to keep some of our own property – the “middle class” or the “rich.” Poor folks don’t pay any taxes so they don’t get the “gift.” Their gift is that they don’t pay any taxes.

Actually, the truth of the matter is that the politicians, bureaucrats, agents and employees of the government always get the gift no matter what. The government swamp creatures always get the gifts. Their object is to collect revenue from the people. That revenue is their sustenance. The people collectively is their golden goose.

And they realize that if they squeeze their golden goose too much by overtaxing it, the law of diminishing returns acts to reduce their precious revenue. The goose will seek to avoid taxes by producing less. So they’ve learned that cutting taxes, even though it seems counter intuitive, can increase, even maximize their revenue.

The idea that tax cuts are a gift to us is bullshit. The government that treats us like children is full of bullshit. It feeds it to us as children and continues feeding it to us when we’re adults too. President Trump and first lady Melania, for example, became Santa Claus’ helpers when they placed phone calls to children on Christmas Eve. They asked kids what they wanted for Christmas and updated them on Saint Nick’s status, thanks to NORAD’s Santa Tracker, which pinpoints his position as he races around the globe.

Yes, our President and his First Lady were lying to children and feeding them bullshit about Santa on Christmas Eve. I think it’s a form of child abuse. When I learned that Santa Claus was bullshit at the tender age of seven years, that’s when I stopped believing in God too. That’s when I became suspicious of all people of authority. Later, on Christmas day the President was calling soldiers on duty in Afghanistan to say that God was watching over them.

It’s all part and parcel with the gifts of government.

Happy New Year!!!

Federal Bureau of Injustice

Did you know that the longest serving Director of the FBI, from 1924 to 1972, a grand total of 48 years, was a crook?

That’s right! U.S. Presidents were afraid to fire this despicable human being during all that time because he used his considerable bureaucratic power to amass secret files on them as well as on hundreds of other prominent individuals for purposes of coercion and blackmail. And now Americans have to show for it a massive tribute to him, in Washington D.C. -- the J. Edgar Hoover Building -- headquarters of the FBI, the Federal Bureau of Injustice.

Fast forward to modern day FBI history and we see that things haven’t changed much. If justice really were the purpose of the Department of Justice and its investigative arm the FBI, we should see Hillary Clinton in handcuffs, dressed in a designer orange jump suit doing a perp walk before her sentencing hearing at the federal courthouse on her way to a suitable federal penitentiary for her multiple serious crimes committed as a public official.

But no – we’re talking about the Federal Bureau of Injustice here and that means that Hillary Clinton has not received justice – at least not yet. James Comey, the recently fired FBI Director knew full well from the facts his agents found that Clinton was guilty as sin of mishandling classified materials on her private computer server while she was Secretary of State, but he deliberately edited those facts to reach a dubious conclusion to let her off the hook.

Comey, for example, knew that it was likely hostile foreign actors had gained access to her private email account containing the classified documents, but changed the facts later to indicate the scenario was merely “possible.” He knew that the facts showed Clinton was “grossly negligent” but changed his conclusion later to “extremely careless” in order to avoid a legal statutory definition of criminality from her conduct.

In short, he deliberately watered down facts showing rightful conclusions pointing to Clinton’s culpability in mishandling classified information.” We now know that FBI Director Comey was determined to exonerate Hillary Clinton long before his “investigation” of her crimes was completed. We also know that high ranking agents of the FBI are diligently working at this very moment to unlawfully undermine, sabotage and ultimately bring down the legitimate presidency Donald J. Trump.

What else can Americans expect from the Federal Bureau of Injustice?

First Amendment trumps civil rights laws

I predict that the Supreme Court of the United States will decide that the First Amendment trumps civil rights laws in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, because our government may not force us to express messages that violate religious convictions.

Having read the oral arguments I think that a SCOTUS majority will hold that a Christian baker enjoys a First Amendment right to refuse the request of a gay couple to create a custom wedding cake that expressly celebrates a gay marriage. He may not be punished for violating state civil rights laws prohibiting discrimination against homosexuals.

I can’t imagine that the Court would uphold a civil rights law that allows an atheist, for example, to force a devout Christian baker to create a cake with a message that says that “Jesus is a myth,” or that “God is imaginary.”  

Make no mistake though, a baker operating a business open to the public may not lawfully discriminate against atheists or gays in violation of public accommodations laws. Such people cannot lawfully be refused service when it comes to buying any cake in the shop, for instance, but they cannot force a baker to express creative ideas which violate his First Amendment rights.

So the baker may be punished if he puts a sign in his window that says “We do not bake cakes for gays,” but may not be punished for refusing to create cakes which expressly celebrate gay weddings.

Likewise, an African American sculptor operating a business open to the public violates public accommodations laws if he refuses to serve folks he doesn’t like, but may not be forced to create a cross which expressly supports a Ku Klux Klan service.

This is a no-brainer in my opinion.

I’ll be surprised if SCOTUS doesn’t decide that the First Amendment trumps civil rights laws.

Shocking verdict! Really?

The rabid media mob, pundits, politicians and most Americans are in a state of angry apoplexy over the “shocking verdict” in the San Francisco Kate Steinle “murder” case where a jury acquitted an “undocumented immigrant.”

Shocking verdict! Really? Well, no, of course not.

The defendant was grossly over charged, and the angry mob was focused upon facts which had nothing whatever to do with his guilt or innocence. This was not a murder or manslaughter case. There was virtually no evidence of violent propensities, intent or motive to kill Kate Steinle.

Yes, the defendant, Jose Ines Garcia Zarate, was a criminal; a bad egg; a homeless undocumented Mexican immigrant; a multi-convicted non-violent felon; an alien in the U.S. illegally; deported previously five times, he shouldn’t have been here but took advantage of San Francisco being a sanctuary city.

Now, I’m just as outraged as everyone else by these facts but they certainly had nothing to do with any issue in the case involving this defendant.

Prosecutors argued that Zarate intentionally shot Steinle as she and her father walked on San Francisco's Pier 14. But his defense attorney showed sufficient evidence of reasonable doubt. It was a freak accident he argued as the bullet ricocheted off the ground and traveled about 80 feet before hitting the woman.

Was it intentional or accidental? That was the issue before the jury. They ultimately sided with the defense. Why? Because of ample reasonable doubt that he had intentionally taken Steinle's life. They did find him guilty of being a felon in possession of a firearm because they were convinced beyond a reasonable doubt of his guilt on that charge.

No reasonable jury would find an accused guilty of murder just because he was an illegal alien. But President Donald Trump, like all the other pissed off pundits, called the verdict "disgraceful." "No wonder the people of our Country are so angry with Illegal Immigration," the President tweeted hours after the verdict… His exoneration is a complete travesty of justice. BUILD THE WALL!”

Conservative pundit Ann Coulter said Steinle "would still be alive if we had a wall," referring to the President's call for the construction of a border wall between the US and Mexico.

Well, yes, it’s definitely a travesty; I’m for a wall and hate sanctuary cities too, but no one can blame this jury verdict for something not relevant to their lawful decision in the case. Obviously, the debate over immigration didn't belong in the case. "Nothing about Mr. Garcia Zarate's ethnicity, nothing about his immigration status, nothing about the fact that he is born in Mexico had any relevance as to what happened on July 1, 2015," the public defender Francisco Ugarte said.

Shocking verdict! Really?

Don’t blame the jury. 

Blame the Authority!

Creepy Joe

What do you suppose a young female child would think about a male stranger using his status and position to take intimate physical liberties with her in the presence of her family? How would she feel about him putting his hands on her; fondling her; caressing her; sniffing and running his fingers through her hair; putting his face in hers; whispering sweet nothings into her ear and trying to kiss her?

She’d be creeped out, of course.

That’s why every mother everywhere has a parental obligation to teach her sons emphatically to keep his hands strictly to himself when it comes to politely socializing with the opposite sex. Sadly, if Joe Biden’s mother ever taught him that essential lesson, he forgot it immediately. He turned out instead to be Creepy Joe. And amazingly he doesn’t think he’s done the slightest thing wrong.

In the midst of the recent explosion of sexual misconduct and harassment incidents in the news these days it’s become apparent to me that some men, Creepy Joe Biden, for example, who are guilty as sin of the most egregious examples, have no clue that they are doing anything wrong. He gropes and fondles little girl’s right in front of their parents. And he believes his creepiness -- taking liberties with all females -- time and time again, is perfectly normal.

Just look at all these examples. You have to see it to believe it.

According to an ex- Secret Service agent who spoke on condition of anonymity, Biden “would mess with every single woman or teen.” A Christmas get-together at the VP’s house had to be canceled “because Biden would grope all of our wives and girlfriends asses.” The Service often had to protect female agents from him. Biden was prone to parading around the VP residence late at night with no clothes on. “I mean, Stark naked… Weinstein level stuff,” said the agent.

During one alleged incident in 2009, Biden cupped the breast of a Secret Service agent’s girlfriend during a photo, prompting the agent to shove Biden and almost hit him. Men would often stand in front of female agents and Navy women or create false pretenses to have them leave the room just to get them away from Biden, according to the agent.

That’s why he’s known as Creepy Joe.

The Moore dilemma

If you were obliged to choose between two unwanted animals to put up with as a guest at your picnic, which one would you find less objectionable -- a skunk or a bear? The skunk would be a nuisance and create a stink. The bear would frighten the guests to panic and eat all the food. That’s the kind of dilemma faced by Republican Party voters in the Alabama senate race.

Which to choose?

Why, the skunk, of course!

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey said that she will vote for Roy Moore in next month's special election in the hope of preserving Republican control of Congress. This despite the plain fact that the skunk, a former chief justice of the Supreme Court of Alabama, was twice removed from the Court by a judicial ethics panel for deliberately defying federal constitutional law.     

Now Moore is accused of sexual misconduct toward several women who were in their teens when he was a deputy district attorney in his 30s. Ivey has no reason to disbelieve the women, is bothered by their allegations, but says: "We need to have a Republican in the United States Senate to vote on things like Supreme Court justices, other appointments that the Senate has to confirm and make major decisions."

I love it when politicians like Ivey on rare occasions tell the truth about their motives.  

She’d choose the skunk over the bear because the skunk is less objectionable.

President Trump also voiced support for Moore, who is facing off against Doug Jones, the Democratic candidate, (bear) citing the skunk’s vigorous denials. “He totally denies it,” say’s Trump. Asked by a reporter about whether electing “a child molester” was better than electing a Democrat in the Alabama race, Mr. Trump responded again by insisting that Mr. Moore denies the charges against him. “He says it didn’t happen… You have to listen to him, also.”

Trump suggested that a victory by Mr. Jones would jeopardize his administration’s agenda. “We don’t need a liberal person in there… I’ve looked at his record. It’s terrible on crime. It’s terrible on the border. It’s terrible on the military.”

Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the president, said that Mr. Jones could not be counted on to support the tax changes that Mr. Trump is trying to push through Congress. “Doug Jones in Alabama, folks, don’t be fooled,” she said. “He will be a vote against tax cuts. He is weak on crime. Weak on borders. He is strong on raising your taxes. He is terrible for property owners.” Asked whether that meant that the White House was urging a vote for Mr. Moore, she replied: “I’m telling you that we want the votes in the Senate to get this tax bill through.”

Let’s face it; Republicans know that Roy Moore is a skunk. They know his past and believe the accounts from the women he abused. If Alabama votes elect him, they know he’ll be a nuisance and create a stink, but at least he will support the Republican agenda in Congress. So they’ll probably hold their noses and vote for him knowing that their political agenda is far more important to the country than holding him accountable for his past creepiness of 40 years ago.

They figure that they or certainly God will do that later. As Ivanka Trump said, “there's a special place in hell for people who prey on children “and “I have no reason to doubt the victims' accounts." Republicans also know that, with precious little margin for error, no Democrat has voted for any part of Trump’s agenda. They hate Trump. If they vote for Jones (the bear) he’ll do his best to cause damage to them all. All Republicans will suffer.

I agree with them.

So I reckon that smart Alabama Republican voters will resolve their Moore dilemma by holding their noses and voting for the skunk.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Parasite Perks

Did you know that, among the numerous overly generous government perks enjoyed by our parasitical elected lawmakers in Congress, are confidentiality and immunity from the financial consequences of their own egregious illegal discrimination and sexual harassment conduct with employees and staff at the office?

That’s right! We the taxpayers pay the price for it. It’s not the parasite’s problem. It’s our problem. And it’s all kept a secret.

Let’s say that Congressman Hans Groper, for instance, is fond of taking unwanted sexual liberties with one of his young female staffers. She files a complaint about it. Her claim is eventually settled in secret for a specified amount of money. A nondisclosure document is signed. The money comes from a fund within the US Treasury set up to handle such settlements. That’s how it goes. Between 1997 and 2017, Congress (i.e. taxpayers) has paid $17 million in settlements for the benefit of its parasites.

Reports call sexual harassment rampant on Capitol Hill. Female lawmakers are making allegations of sexual harassment against unnamed members who are currently in office, and the unveiling of a new bill on Wednesday to change how sexual harassment complaints are reported and resolved.

The Congressional Office of Compliance (OOC) has come under fire in recent days for what lawmakers and Hill aides alike say are its antiquated policies that do not adequately protect victims who file complaints. There have been 268 settlements. The fund was set up by the Congressional Accountability Act, the 1995 law that created the Office of Compliance.

Yes, and what about the victims who don’t file the complaints and have done nothing of what is complained of – the taxpayers who are stuck with the bill? What about the parasites who cause all the trouble but face zero consequences?

We chalk it to parasite perks.

Will Moore sanctimony prevail again in Alabama?

Roy Moore’s relentless political sanctimony has made him the darling of adoring evangelicals in the Bible belt State of Alabama. He’s fashioned his entire judicial career as an attorney and state Supreme Court judge attempting to impose his religion upon the populace by defying the law. Now he’s a controversial candidate for Alabama Senator and the question is whether his creepy religious sanctimony will save his career again.

I posted in March or 2012 that Moore was Alabama’s Chief Justice for three years but was forced off the court in 2003 by a unanimous 9-member judicial ethics panel after he defied a federal court order to remove a 2.6 ton stone monument of the Ten Commandments he had commissioned himself and placed at the courthouse. It constituted a government endorsement of religion in violation the federal Constitution First Amendment Establishment Clause.

He put himself above the law by "willfully and publicly" flouting the constitution the ethics panel concluded. “God has chosen this time and this place so we can save our country and save our courts for our children," Moore defiantly proclaimed. "I will continue to acknowledge the sovereignty of God."

Then by some miracle of miracles in 2015, he won an election to reclaim his former job as Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court. The people of Alabama seem to love their religious extremists. They want their justices to follow the word of God – not the Constitution. Religious extremists are drawn to Moore like moths to a flame.

And flouting the law is exactly what Judge Moore did once again. He refused to abide by a federal court judge who ordered Alabama county probate judges to issue marriage licenses to gays. And he ordered all Alabama probate judges to ignore the federal court decision and continue to deny marriage licenses to gays. He doesn’t believe that gays are entitled to equal protection of the law.

Then he defied the United States Supreme Court. “The court now holds that same-sex couples may exercise the fundamental right to marry,” US Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in the majority opinion. “No longer may this liberty be denied to them.” Oh yeah? Tell that Judge Roy Moore. He wasn’t listening.  He wasn’t learning. So another Alabama judicial ethics panel booted him off the Court again.  

That’s why he’s unfit to be a judge, and that’s why alone, without any other bad deeds in his past, he’s unfit to be a U.S. Senator.

But his adoring Christian evangelical supporters have made him a Republican candidate for U.S. Senator – because he’s convinced them that, despite everything, he is a moral upstanding man of God. It’s OK with them that Moore has sanctimoniously flouted the law and the Constitution; they want to make him a lawmaker.

Well, now five credible women so far who don’t know each other have come forward to accuse his honor of aggressively pursuing them romantically as young teenagers when he was an Alabama district attorney aged well into his thirties, and two say in detail that he sexually assaulted them in the process.

"Mr. Moore attacked me when I was a child," said Beverly Young Nelson, recounting that Moore was a regular customer at a restaurant where she worked as a waitress when she was 15 and 16. She described a harrowing chain of events that ended with Moore attempting to force her into a sex act in a parked car -- an episode that, she said, left her with severe bruising on her neck.

Moore claims he doesn’t know Ms. Nelson, even after she produced her 1977 high school yearbook including this inscription signed by him: "To a sweeter more beautiful girl I could not say 'Merry Christmas' Christmas 1977 Roy Moore, D.A. 12-22-77 Olde Hickory"

We have to wonder whether his creepy religious sanctimony will save his career again.

American class crap

I’ve always thought that at its inception and by design the United States of America, our beloved country, is distinguished from other lesser aspiring nations by its lack of a caste or class system among its people. We are all equal under the law as the founding documents provide.

No royals; no aristocracy no wealthy, first or upper class, for example. No bourgeois; no proletarian; no second, modest income or middle class. No peasants; no serfs; no third, poor or lower income class. Oh sure, there are differences in the amounts of material possessions among us but that fact is not supposed to determine class – not in the USA.

Of course we all know that the opposite is true – equality among the people is a myth -- we’re full up to our eyeballs with three categories of American class crap.

If you doubt that just look at all the current news today from our parasite politicians about federal income tax reform. It’s all about class. The president wants to cut taxes and reform the tax code to benefit primarily the “middle class.” Both Democrats and Republicans in Congress are prepared to fight about whether or not the tax reform might benefit (gasp!) not just the “middle class” but the “wealthy upper class” too. Neither is talking about the “lower class” because they don’t pay federal income taxes anyway.

Their bickering might end up killing tax reform altogether.  No Democrats will vote for tax reform no matter what is proposed unless the “wealthy upper class” gets no benefit. Some Republicans won’t vote for it or will try to water it down because they simply don’t like the President and don’t want him to succeed.  They stupidly forget that tax cuts usually benefit all Americans at all income levels.

The fact is that a tiny minority of American taxpayers -- the hated “wealthy upper class”-- pays the overwhelming majority of the income and business taxes in America so that the other two “classes” may benefit. They are the ones who should have their taxes cut because they are the ones who create the new jobs and investments that make our American economy boom.

John F. Kennedy succeeded with tax cuts across the board in the 1960’s. The American economy boomed. Everyone at every income level benefited. Ronald Reagan succeeded with tax cuts in the 1980’s. Again, the American economy boomed. The markets enjoyed the longest bull market in history. Everyone at every income level benefited. Just in anticipation of our current president succeeding, the economy is starting to boom. Millions of jobs are being created. Wages are moving higher. Government revenue is higher when taxes are lower. Everyone at every income level is benefiting.

So if the foolish political parasites in Congress kill tax reform this time because of their idiotic bickering, all because they hate wealthy successful people – the golden goose of our nation --  there will be Hell to pay. The stock market will crash.  The economy will stagnate.  Government revenue will dry up.  Everyone at every income level will suffer.

That is the result of American class crap.

Confronting the ultimate Authority!

It all started last April when I awoke in the middle of the night with the A/C remote in my hand but couldn’t figure out how to operate it. I tried to speak my thoughts out loud but the words came out as gibberish. I couldn’t speak. It was unbelievable. But I knew then I had suffered a stroke.

Next morning I discovered to my dismay that I couldn’t write either, except with great difficultly.  I needed to see a doctor. After several minutes and numerous failed attempts I finally was able to scrawl out on a note pad in block letters the message: “I HAD A STROKE,” and took it to my doctor’s office. As a general practitioner he knew immediately when he saw it that there was nothing he could do. He made an appointment for me to go to a hospital right away to see a neurologist.

A CAT scan determined that it was indeed a stroke affecting the speech area of my brain. Thankfully there was no bleeding and minimal damage. Blood thinner medication and frequent medical monitoring will be necessary for the rest of my life but it was a huge relief to know that my speech and related skills would slowly be restored to mostly normal within the next six months.

So I left the hospital that day with a smile on my face and the feeling that this old man had dodged a medical bullet. Little did I know then that my confrontation with the ultimate Authority was not over; not by any means; it was only the beginning of a long ordeal.

Not long after, I was stopped on my motorbike at a traffic light when suddenly I was hit hard from behind and woke up in an ambulance on the way to a hospital. Among several contusions and abrasion injuries my R shoulder was fractured. My lower spine (diagnosed much later) was fractured. A deep vein thrombosis developed in my R leg. After preliminary treatment I insisted and was allowed to go home – I had a small dog to take care of -- but the next morning I was racked with severe pain and couldn’t get up. Another ambulance was called to take me back to the hospital.  

Bug, my beloved little 13-year-old Chihuahua dog, was taken to the vet/pet hospital/hotel to be cared for while I was gone. He couldn’t understand what had happen to his dad. When I got out of the hospital and brought him home, he couldn’t understand why I was so different, so crippled, unhappy, and in so much pain. He was traumatized. It was too much for him. Very soon, his health started to fail; he became infected, wouldn’t eat, and wouldn’t come out of his crate.

Due to my own condition I couldn’t give him the care he needed so he had to go back to stay with the vet. Not long afterward the vet called to tell me that he had died. I had to go to the office to see him dead in a cardboard box, pet him for the last time, cry my heart out and say my goodbyes.

That’s where I’ve been these last few months.  Today, I’m still in much pain, have many physical limitations, but am doing OK and slowly getting a bit better day by day. All of the considerable medical treatment I’ve needed has been entirely out of pocket because my Medicare benefits aren’t payable in Thailand. But the loss of my little dog, Bug, was the lowest point and caused the most grief for me by far in this horrible ordeal.

Of course, my confrontation with the ultimate Authority is not over, just as it is never over for you and me and for everyone. It’s an epic struggle for us all. The ultimate Authority is nature, i.e. the reality of existence. It is and always will be. Most people call it God. That’s fine for those who like to put a human face upon it.

Yet we’re all confronting the same ultimate Authority!

White chicks can’t wear braids

I’ve always thought that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but did you know that it is considered by many politically correct snowflake morons as extremely offensive and bad form for members of one ethnic group to “appropriate” the cultural aspects and practices of a different ethnic group?

Yes, it’s difficult to for me to imagine why someone in her right mind might become violently offended enough to physically assault another person simply because a hairstyle, for instance, was supposedly “culturally appropriated.”

But now it happens all the time.

Hampshire College student, Carmen Figueroa,  for example, recently assaulted a member of the Central Maine Community College girls’ basketball team over concerns that one of their players had “culturally appropriated” a hairstyle.

Cultural appropriation is defined as the “taking over of creative or artistic forms, themes, or practices by one cultural group from another. It is in general used to describe Western appropriations of non‐Western or non‐white forms, and carries connotations of exploitation and dominance.”

Figueroa had the nerve to order white members of the Central Maine Community College girls’ basketball team to remove braids from their hair, claiming that their use of the hairstyle is black “cultural appropriation.” When they refused to comply with her ridiculous demands she reportedly assaulted one of them.

So you see, in today’s convoluted insane politically correct society, white folks can’t eat soul food; white folks can’t listen to blues music; white chicks can’t wear dreadlocks, because it might offend black folks; because that is offensive and exploitative; and, yes…

White chicks can’t wear braids. 

Liberty criminalized in Michigan

Statist lawmakers in the state of Michigan have once again criminalized the fundamental constitutional right to liberty. That’s right. In Michigan it is unlawful to use your own property as you like on your own property when the statist government goons deem it so.

What would you think of a law that prohibited persons from leaving their own lawn furniture or any other personal property unattended outside on their own patio? How about a law that prohibits people from leaving their doors unlocked?  Or what would you say about a law that prohibits turning the lights inside your home off at night?

That’s ridiculous, you would say. It’s unconstitutional!

They can’t criminalize our liberty like that, can they?

Of course we can reason the statists. If you leave personal property unattended outside on your patio, thieves might be inclined steal it. If you leave your doors unlocked, you might be burglarized. If you If you turn off your lights inside at night, that might encourage criminals to enter your home and victimize you. The government has an obligation to prevent such crimes. So it can criminalize you for furnishing criminals with opportunities to victimize you.

That’s statist reasoning for you and the Constitution may be damned.

Nick Taylor, (no relation), committed a “crime” in Roseville Michigan by leaving his own car unlocked and idling unattended to warm up in his girlfriend’s driveway on a bitterly cold winter morning. "Every person warms up their car," he explains. "We live in Michigan!" Not that it should matter, but he didn't want his girlfriend's son, who has cerebral palsy, to get into a cold car on a freezing day.

Never-mind flimsy excuses croaked the Roseville cop who slapped Taylor with a $128 ticket for violating a city ordinance. "This is purely a public safety issue," claims Police Chief James Berlin. "You see it all the time, people hop in a running car and steal them. Something bad happens when that occurs."

Yes, we see it all the time; people walking outside on a public sidewalk with their own wallet in their back pants pocket enticing pickpocket’s to steal it. Yes, something bad happens when that occurs. So let’s pass a law to criminalize a pedestrian for carrying his own wallet in public. Let’s criminalize the victims of crimes for causing lazy police goons to have to do their jobs.

Let’s criminalize liberty in Michigan. 

Offensive speech makes snowflakes feel unsafe

The current trend among leftist snowflakes these days is to demand censorship of any ideas that “offend” them. Snowflakes are offended by any expression of ideas they don’t agree with. So they seek to shut down free speech rights by force on the grounds that offensive speech makes them feel “unsafe.”

Can you imagine that? They’re sentiments are so delicate. They’re offended so easily. They irrationally melt with the slightest rise in ideological temperature. That’s why they’re called snowflakes.

Snowflake fascist protesters actually claim the right to muzzle any expression they don’t agree with because it makes them feel unsafe. They did it recently with violence in the city of Berkley California, for example, to conservative pundit Milo Yiannopolos preventing him from giving a public speech. His expression was canceled because it made the snowflakes feel unsafe.  

Everything President Trump says offends them and makes them feel unsafe. They’re calling for his impeachment because his ideas make them feel unsafe. They simply cannot stand to hear any ideas they don’t agree with. They melt into apoplectic rage.

Now the snowflakes are in another escalating uproar complaining bitterly over the fact that former Indiana governor and currant Vice President of the United States, Mike Pence, is scheduled to deliver a commencement speech in South Bend, Indiana at the University of Notre Dame. The poor pitiful students claim that his mere presence on campus will make them feel unsafe.

The poor little snowflakes are walking around protesting with signs containing quotations attributed to Pence which they deem “racist, sexist, homophobic, and xenophobic.” Pence makes them feel so unsafe. “For me personally, [Pence] represents the larger Trump administration,” whined one student.

“His administration represents something, and for many people on our campus, it makes them feel unsafe to have someone who openly is offensive but also demeaning of their humanity and of their life and of their identity…  I know that during his time as governor of Indiana and also during his campaign trail, along with Trump, he has made offensive statements towards minority groups that affect me, like women and African-Americans,” he explained plaintively.

Pence’s ideas contradict with the school’s Catholic mission complains the snowflake. “I feel that is offensive to such a large population here at Notre Dame, and I also believe it goes against certain Catholic Social Teaching, which is something the University likes to broadcast that it stands behind, but it picks and chooses when it wants to stand behind them,”

You see, offensive speech that they don’t agree with makes snowflakes feel unsafe.

Was this wicked witchy woman cursed with ineffective assistance of counsel?

A nasty old lady was convicted in Oklahoma recently on a plea of guilty to multiple counts of felony child abuse for terrorizing her 7-year-old granddaughter while dressed as a witch. Few would argue, least of all me, that this wicked witchy woman deserved to be dealt with severely, but where was her lawyer when the judge cursed her with a sentence of three life terms in prison?

The 6^th Amendment to the United States Constitution is part of the Bill of Rights which guarantees to even the worst wicked and depraved of criminals the right to a lawyer for her defense, and that right has been interpreted to include the “effective assistance of counsel.” In short, the accused is entitled to a competent attorney to provide an effective defense.

Geneva Robinson, 51, admitted that she dressed up in a mask as "Nelda" the witch with her hands painted green to scare her granddaughter. She scratched the child’s neck, struck her face, hit her hand with a rolling pin, and cut her hair while she slept according to court records. 

"What she did was horrific and what she did will forever impact this child and her siblings," said the Assistant District Attorney. "She deserves the same amount of mercy that she showed this child, and that's none."

OK, maybe this nasty witch indeed deserves a large dose of the same medicine she administered to her granddaughter, and perhaps even a prison sentence too, but life in prison; Really? Under these circumstances that seems way too harsh to me, especially in view of the fact that granny says she’s receiving treatment and taking medication for bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.  

What does her lawyer have to say about all this?

Tanya Jones, Robinson's defense attorney, said Robinson lacked resources to control the child. "She understands she went too far,"

Is that all? Is that the sum and substance of her defense? Is that effective assistance of counsel? Do you think that a plea of insanity or diminished capacity might have been advisable? 

Do you think that counsel might have offered a case for a more reasonable sentence all things considered? I guess not. This lawyer simply advised her client to plead guilty and watched her get hauled off to prison for life. My goodness; many murderers don’t get life sentences.

Joshua Granger, Robinson's boyfriend, was also sentenced after pleading guilty to one count of felony child abuse. He is expected to serve 30 years in prison.

What’s wrong with this picture?