PIGS ARE FLYING!

Because Rasty was busy on house repairs this afternoon, he left the TV running on the wrong channel: CNN instead of MSNBC, for once.  Thus I came to see something astounding.

CNN Pundit Kmele Foster used the Jussie Smollett case as an example for a half-hour speech about the dangers of political hysteria.  He warned that the media have become so used to believing anything that could possibly be used to denounce Trump that they’ve let themselves forget not only civil discourse but logic, the rules of responsible journalism, and common sense.  He followed that with an interview with a Gay Indian Muslim TV comedian who had nothing good to say about Jihadists.

Quick, run to your window and look out, and see if you can spot a pig soaring past!

Of course, the show then moved on to explain how the Sanders/Occasional-Cortex “70% marginal tax” on the rich wouldn’t really take that much, and played an announcement for Bernie Sanders hosting a “presidential town-hall” – but still, that first speech (and its following interview) was astonishing for the corporation that has previously well earned the nickname of “Clinton News Network”.

Was it just the revelation that Smollett’s supposed attack by racist/homophobic/Trump-supporting White men turned out to be a hoax?  That Smollett set it up himself with a couple of Black Nigerian buddies?  That he did it to jack up his ratings and extend his contract? 

Or was it the announcement that the libeled Covington students had hired a really good lawyer, who was now suing the Washington Post for $250 million (coincidentally ((?)) the amount that Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos paid when he bought the Post in 2013)? 

Could it possibly be something so unrelated as the massive outpouring of negative reactions to the Green New Deal and its supporters, despite all the approving build-up the media gave it?  That does, after all, imply that the media don’t have the manipulative power that they thought they did.

Or could it be something as simple as the steadily falling subscription rates of not only print media but their online versions, and the shaky viewership-rates of the cable-TV networks?  People rarely view media outlets that they don’t trust, after all.

None of this, really, can be blamed on Trump’s insistence that many of the media push “fake news”;  after all, Trump really isn’t a very good speaker.  He doesn’t have anywhere near the oratorical skills of the average Baptist preacher, let alone the near-hypnotic abilities of Hitler.  Remember that the American political right – from one inch to the left of Hillary all the way out to the fanatic fringe – has had plenty of experience (immunization?) with skillful speakers.  It was never Trump’s speeches that won him public support.  His simply repeating the phrase “fake news” wouldn’t have worked. 

Nothing could have disenchanted the public with the media except direct and repeated experience with sloppy and biased reporting.  There’s no teacher more effective than personal experience, and in their two-years-long blizzard of anti-Trump propaganda, the media have clearly overplayed their hand. 

Possibly the icing on the cake was the too-often repeated phrase that the supposed attack on Jussie Smollett was the result of “Trump’s divisive rhetoric”, when everyone can see that the “divisive rhetoric” has been coming steadily from the other political side.  So the revelation of the hoax blew that claim completely out of the water.

It’s interesting that CNN was the first media outlet to realize that the tide had turned.  We’ll have to wait and see who else catches on, and how quickly. 

--Leslie <;)))><       

Anything to Get Trump

As I predicted a few weeks ago, Trump agreed to sign the Democrats' budget bill -- and thereby keep the fed. govt. fully open and working -- but he also declared a "National Emergency" at the US/Mexico border in order to get the remainder of his Wall built.  And of course the Democrats have gone into a feeding-frenzy of lawsuits, bills, persuading border states and land-owners to refuse to let their land be used for the Wall, and anything else they can think of.  The problem with all those lawsuits and bills is that, by the time they're settled, the Wall may already be finished.

The trick, which the Dems seem to have forgotten, is that the POTUS is also the supreme commander of the US armed forces.  Trump doesn't have to re-route money from one allocation to another to finish the Wall;  he can simply order the Army Corps of Engineers to do it, using money already allocated to the military.  Those Engineers have a history of amazingly fast construction, and part of the Wall is already up, so they only need finish it.

First, understand that at least half of the US/Mexico border is can't be built on;  it's the whole meandering length of the shallow, narrow, Rio Grande.  No, there won't be a wall there -- only drone, aircraft, vehicle and foot patrols.  Then again, whatever wall does get built will require tight patrolling too;  a wall is only as effective as its watchers.  But of course, Congress already allocated money for that -- despite demands by the new Socialist/Democrat fringe for total abolition of the border patrol.  Still more of the border can't be built on because it's fiercely jagged mountains and deep canyons that even mountain-goats have trouble crossing.

Another section of the border, right here in Arizona, lies across Tohono O'Odam land, and those "nativist" Natives won't want to give up a yard of their land -- but they're quite willing to patrol the border themselves, as they've been doing quire effectively for the last couple decades, to keep the "Aztecs" out.  They'd also be quite happy to see the border swing a mile or two southward to take in lands which they've claimed for centuries, even if that takes a chunk out of Mexico.  This isn't so impossible as it looks;  the last accurate survey of exactly where the border lies -- right down to the yard, or foot, or inch -- was done by the US, and simply accepted by Mexico.  Since those Native lands are technically a sovereign nation, Mexico would have to complain to the Tohono O'odam, and I don't see Mexico going to war with the Native tribes, seeing who their ally is.

In any case, there already are stretches of wall across several miles of the border;  they only need to be improved and extended, and the military engineers can easily do that.  If any land-owners or states complain, the border can easily be relocated southward, as in the case of the Natives.  Besides, a lot of those states and private landowners would welcome the Wall, having had more than enough of illegal immigration across their lands already.  And yes, there is an "emergency" at the border -- and has been for decades -- as the Border Patrol, and those landowners, and those Natives, can readily tell you.

So yes, I predict that the Wall will be built, and patrolled, despite the antics of the Democrats and Nancy Pelosi's determination to stop Trump from doing anything that might possibly get him re-elected.

The problem for the Dems is that, in their frenzy to Get Trump, they've encouraged their members and allies to run further and further out into the weeds.  The mainstream media, and even some of the more reasonable Democrats, have already begun pointing out the idiocies of Alldyslexia Occasional-Cortex's so-called Green New Deal, though that hasn't slowed her down any.  Reps. Tlaib and Omar have been caught in public spouting obvious Jew-hatred and showing their fondness for friends of known terrorists.  Sen. Booker's insistence on making the whole country Vegan is already a national joke.  It's one thing to claim that we've got to stop burning coal and petroleum for fuel (they're much too valuable for their use in chemical reactions to burn, anyway), but it's another to insist that the US give up all cars, airplanes, and livestock-raising.  It doesn't help that various Dem supporters are also pushing some truly astounding social and racial theories --  such as demonizing all White males as "privileged" and "racist".  The DNC's policies have stopped looking merely radical and are looking downright delusional to the majority of American voters, who are generally centrist and practical.

One has to wonder why the Dems are shooting themselves in the foot like this.  Are they so blinded by Trump-hatred that they really believe these stupid policies themselves?  Don't they realize that every time their cadre of cute/young/female/"ethnic" Reps open their mouths, the Democrat party hemorrhages votes?  Do they really believe that they can use their vast influence with the media to sell these out-of-the-ballpark policies to the voters?  Or do they believe that they can censor all the media -- including the Internet -- so that the public never hears a discouraging word?

If so, then they should remember that even in China, or North Korea, word manages to get around.  They should remember the 2016 election, which they thought they had in the bag because all their polls and experts and media pundits predicted an overwhelming win for Hillary.  They should remember that information is like water;  the more you try to squeeze it, the more likely it is to leak out -- or burst out, sometimes with explosive force.

The irony is that the same "liberal" pundits who preach that "hate" is self-destructive and self-defeating don't apply that idea to their own hatred of Trump, his cronies, and all his voters.

Of course my solution, as always, is: "A plague on both their houses: vote Libertarian", but that's looking a lot more popular as the Democrats continue cutting their own political throats.

--Leslie <;)))><



         

   

They're Everywhere

Bear in mind that my hometown, Buckeye, is some 20 miles west from the center of Phoenix, Arizona.  It was a sleepy farming and ranching town of maybe 7000 inhabitants until about 20 years ago, when its city council decided to "upgrade" the town by giving over the northern half of its territory to real-estate developers.  In short order, a lot of old ranch-land and some undeveloped desert became a "bedroom town" of close-built overpriced houses, which raised the town's population to 40,000 -- without increasing the number of local businesses.  Apparently the inhabitants of the New Town all drive into Phoenix for their jobs.  They don't spend much of that income here in town, which is why the city government is always putting on fairs and festivals to attract spending.  The town's actual industry hasn't increased any.

Another effect of this social engineering has been an influx of the homeless.  There's a stretch of land owned by the railroad, less than 5 miles from my house, that's turned overnight into a tent/shantytown full of homeless folk.  The neighbors, whose back yards back up to the railroad, have tried giving the homeless folk flyers listing the local social services available, and also calling the railroad HQ to ask that the "squatters" be removed.  In any case, the homeless can't stay there;  winter, even in Arizona, is a bad time for living in a tent.  Besides, there's no running water out there, or sanitary services.

Obviously our town, and county, need to create more homeless shelters.  They could also reinstate the institution known as the "poor farm";  this being farming and ranch land, such a farm could actually support itself -- and possibly even turn a profit.

But beyond that, the problem of  homelessness is becoming visible all over the country.  Regardless of what the media may claim, average people can see from looking that there are a lot of homeless poor clustered around our cities and even small towns. 

The first question is, where do they all come from?  It's also visible that a lot of them are drunks and druggies;  the number of empty booze-bottles and needles obvious in the trash around the homeless encampments make that clear.  Certainly some of them are victims of their own weaknesses.  Others are victims of bad luck and economic "downturns", though the unemployment numbers have been going down for more than a year.  But there are more who are visibly illegal immigrants.  Seriously, this isn't hard to see.  Regardless of skin-color or clothing styles, people who cannot speak the local language are obviously from somewhere else.

Federal  agencies admit that the US's population right now is 327 million that we know about.  That alone gives the US the third largest population in the world -- behind only India and China.  There are also an estimated 12-20 million "undocumented" that we don't know much about.  The obvious solution is, as the old saying goes, Throw The Bums Out.  This is why Trump's Wall is gaining in popularity down here in the border states.

More to the point, the citizens were dissatisfied with the govt. long before Trump was elected (which is one of the reasons he was elected).  The growth of our economy since he got into office has mitigated the dissatisfaction somewhat, but not entirely.  The number of those homeless has only added to the problem.  Worse, anyone who chooses to look -- the Internet being not entirely censored yet -- can see that the homelessness problem is worst in those towns and counties that have given themselves "sanctuary" status, thus attracting more illegal immigrants.  It's no secret that these govts. have primarily Democrat administrations.  Not that Republican govts. look much better;  most of them are notorious for doing nothing.

The citizens are still dissatisfied.  This explains why the shiney-new Democrat majority in the House of Reps. is losing its glamour so fast.  The best propaganda-engine in the world (which, arguably, the Democrats have in the US news media and academia) can't outweigh what the citizens can see for themselves every week if not every day.  The citizens are also losing trust in the media, which explains why so many of them are losing circulation.  The laboriously-constructed wave of pro-Democrat enthusiasm that swept those new Reps into power three months ago can fade faster than it rose.

And where will those cynical and disgruntled voters go then?  Not to any political party that wants to import or allow more floods of immigrants, and not to any party that has done nothing about the problem.

If the Libertarian Party can reconsider its "open borders" policy, it just might take a much bigger chunk of the vote than it's had before, and that alone could change the political game seriously.

--Leslie <;)))><