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So Smart, Yet So Dumb

Last week the Associated Press approached Supreme Court Justice, John Roberts for a comment after President Trump described a jurist who ruled against his asylum policy as an “Obama judge”. In response, Roberts asserted that “We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges. What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them.”

When I read Chief Justice Robert’s comments, my first immediate thought was “how can someone so smart say something so dumb?”
According to Wikipedia it appears that Judge Roberts has always been smart. In high school he took five years of Latin in four years at a private boarding school. A smart guy. When he started at Harvard as a history major, he started as a second year student. A very smart guy. At Harvard Law School he was a managing editor of the Harvard Law Review, and he subsequently graduated in 1979 with a J.D. magna cum laude. An exceptionally smart guy!
So again I ask the same question, “how can someone so smart say something so dumb?”
To my way of thinking there are only three possibilities:
1. He is, for what ever reason, purposefully lying.
I doubt that this is the case. It makes no sense for someone of his status to willfully
lie. There is no upside to a boldface lie.
2. He is, for lack of a better word, an airhead who while being extremely scholarly in his profession, is not in touch with day-to-day things in everyday life. He thus would not be aware of what is happening, for instance, in the Ninth Circuit. Perhaps he cannot find his car in a parking lot and is constantly losing his glasses or his keys. Even though this is possible, there is nothing to suggest that this is the case.
3. He is an idealist.
Obviously he is an idealist, but I believe that he is judging the motivations of others, using his own ethics and his own behavior as the measuring stick. I think that he is, what he says that all judges are . . . “not a Bush judge, . . . but a dedicated judge doing his level best to do equal right to those appearing before him.” This is obviously an idealistic measuring standard, and while he may be that ideal judge, his error is extrapolating his personal standards of judicial behavior to other judges. He is thus, truly, a prisoner of his own naïveté. This could be because he is truly of a conservative mindset . . . meaning that he thinks things through. His major mistake here is applying conservative principles and standards to liberal judges.
If I had the opportunity to address Judge Roberts, I would ask him the following two questions:
1. If what you say is true, how do you explain the fact that the Ninth Circuit, to the best of my knowledge, has not ruled in Trump’s favor even once?
2. If what you say is true, how do you explain that in the major cases before the Supreme Court, the so-called “conservative” Supreme Court Justices may cross over and side with the liberal justices, but to the best of my knowledge, the “liberal” justices do not seem to have it in their playbook to cross over and side with the “conservative” justices.
In both #1 and #2, if what you say is true, the law of averages would dictate that the Ninth Circuit should side with President Trump at least once, and Justice Ginsberg, for instance, should side with Justice Thomas at least once in a 5-4 decision.
Even though I am not nearly as smart as John Roberts, I am not prone to say such dumb things!
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A Real Hero

On Sunday I sat behind an old guy at church. He was really old!

He was sitting next to his daughter who appeared to be in her fifties, but there was no wife – obviously he was widowed. Every once in a while during the service, the old guy would raise his left hand up next to his ear, as if he was silently saying the boy-scout oath, left-handed. At first I thought he was trying to signal a friend, but after he did it a few times, I realized that all of his contemporaries were probably long gone, and perhaps this was his way of speaking directly to his creator. He appeared to be paying attention during the sermon even though I am sure that he had heard every variation of every possible sermon topic over his umpteen years. His handshake was an unusual combination of weak and firm, as if it had always been firm, but had been eventually weakened over his many years. Did I mention that he was really old?
It wasn’t until after the service that I “got it,” for it was then that I saw his hat, a baseball type hat that said:
“World War II vet
Korean War vet
Vietnam War vet
Retired vet”
I shook his hand when the service was over and in response to my comment on his hat, he softly said, “There aren’t many of us left.”
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The Choice The Dems Do Not Like

 

School choice is “the civil rights issue of out time,” to quote Condoleezza Rice. This subject apparently had an impressive effect on the outcome of the recent Florida governor’s election according to an 11/21/18 Wall Street Journal op-ed titled “Minority Women Put DeSantis Over the Top.” This piece was about surprising effect that race had upon the outcome of the recent race for governor in Florida, for you see, the final result was determined not by race. The Democratic candidate, Mr. Gillum, was black. However apparently 100,000 black women voted for the white Republican candidate, Ron DeSantis. These DeSantis’ votes made up approximately 18% of the 650,000 black women who voted in this election, and this was critical in an election that was decided by a mere 40,000 votes. According to this WSJ op-ed, “the reason for this surprising support from African-American women . . . school choice.”  Mr. Gillum was opposed to school choice, a choice that the Dems do not like. Meanwhile Mr. DeSantis and the Republicans were in favor of the Step Up for Students program, which grants tax-credit funded scholarships to attend private schools in Florida. More than 100,000 low-income students participate in this program. Is this number, 100,000, a coincidence? I think not, as to me, a large percentage of the 100,000 black women who voted for DeSantis were mothers of children who are the beneficiaries of this Step Up program. (Also interestingly, Mr. DeSantis’ support among Latinos was an amazing 44%.)

For those of you not familiar with this Step Up program, it was created in 2001 to assure that low-income children had more learning options. The “scholarships” are based on financial need, not how well your child does in school. Families may choose between financial assistance toward private school tuition and fees, or transportation costs to attend a public school in another district. Eligibility for the program is determined yearly and scholarships are awarded with priority given to renewal families followed by new families with the greatest financial need. The program pays up to $6,519 for Kindergarten–5th grade, $6,815 for 6th-8th grade and $7,111 for 9th-12th grade for the school year until the maximum is reached. The maximum is based on both income and the number of people in the family. (Documented homeless students have no income threshold to qualify, and children in foster care receive priority.) Likewise with the income-based transportation scholarship, families can choose a $750 scholarship to assist with the cost of transportation to another public school which must be out of the student’s assigned district.

Question: Why do we not have a similar program here in California? Of course the politicians will say that California does not have the money necessary to fund such a program. To that I say, “Poppycock!” or “Balderdash!” (keep in mind that my comments must be P.G. as this is a family oriented blog), because while Florida has no state income tax, California has one of the highest state tax rates in the country! Also note that in comparing high school graduation percentages, Florida ranks #32 while California is the caboose at #50! Clearly one of the main reasons that California lags desperately behind in education achievement is political. Here in California affluent families have the option of sending their children to private schools (school choice), whereas those with lower incomes do not (“no school choice for you,” say the state’s Dem politicians). Ask yourself, “Is this fair?”, and consider your answer when voting in the next election. Many of these “school choice moms” did exactly that recently in Florida.

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Surprise!

Listen to the following comments on the governor’s race in Georgia between Stacy Abrams (D) and Brian Kemp (R), and then think about what the speakers all have in common.

Cory Booker (D, NJ) on the governor’s election in Georgia, “the election is being stolen from Abrams.”
Hillary Clinton again on the same issue, “Abrams would have won if the election was fair.”
Sherrod Brown (D, Oh), “If Stacy Abrams doesn’t win in Georgia, they stole it.”
Now obviously they are all Democrats who thought that Oprah would wrap it up for Abrams. Oops! . . . surprise! . . . and each of them sees him/herself as a possible presidential candidate in 2020.
For those of you that do not know the background, I will do my best to summarize. To begin with Brian Kemp was the Secretary of State in Georgia before the election. There was a purge of the voter rolls. The “1.5 million purged” is the total number of voters that have been removed from the rolls since 2012. Many have been removed because they moved, committed felonies, died etc. A similar purge of the voter rolls in Ohio was upheld by the Supreme Court earlier this year.
The overwhelming majority of the rest were removed because of Georgia’s “Use it or lose it” law. This law was passed in 1997 by A Dem legislature and a Dem Governor in Georgia. Similar laws have been upheld by SCOTUS. It requires the rolls to be updated by removing voters that have not voted for some time and do not respond to contact from the state.
There was another controversy concerning voter applications. Here Kemp was invoking an “exact match” law that was passed in 2017. Brian Kemp stated that he was merely following the laws, whereas the Dems were proclaiming alleged voter suppression.
While I can understand Democrat allegations of voter suppression when the laws are followed, this is no real surprise. I am, however, surprised that I have not yet heard either Sen. Brown, Sen. Booker, or for that matter any Democrat state the obvious solution to this perceived problem.
Drum roll, please!
The solution to this perceived “voter suppression” is no surprise.
The solution is to adapt Mexico’s method of voter registration and voter identification. In Mexico everyone is responsible to get a government voter I.D. card. No matter where the individual lives, no matter the age, no matter the color of his/her skin each individual is required to present his/her laminated voter I.D. card in order to vote in any election in Mexico. (In addition there are substantial penalties for fraudulent use of the card.)
If the Dems were to begin a concentrated effort right now, by the 2020 election, all legal voters would be registered and all would possess a laminated valid photo I.D with a thumbprint.
The surprise here is that the Dems have not yet thought of this solution to “voter suppression.” Oops . . . on second thought, this is actually no surprise!
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Barry and the JTP

As many of you are aware, “The Goldbergs” is one of my favorite T.V. shows. It has been on for many years, and has avoided the temptation of resorting to off-color humor in an attempt to maintain ratings, which has been a risk for many other long standing comedies in the past. (Seinfeld, Mash, and Fraser are some of the most successful sit-coms that have also avoided this slippery slope.) Anyway I watch The Goldbergs because I find it amusing. I do not watch it because of any philosophical message that I might come away with, however the other day I saw a rerun of “Deadheads,” an older episode that also had the “swear-jar.” This episode dealt with the JTP (Jenkintown Posse), and Barry’s role as the de facto head of the JTP. (For those of you not familiar with The Goldbergs, Barry is the older Goldberg brother and the JTP is a small group of Barry’s friends. A word of advice: “Get familiar with The Goldbergs!”) In this episode Barry’s membership in the JTP is in jeopardy as he has become too pompous and controlling. This episode struck a chord with me because at the same time on another channel, Jim Acosta of CNN was making a fool of himself because he was being too pompous and controlling!
Make no mistake I think that Mr. Acosta is a jerk and I was wondering when and if any of the other White House reporters would afterwards comment on his behavior. But like “birds of a feather” I heard nothing until today when I read about an interview by Mediaite’s Larry O’Connor with CBS White House Correspondent Major Garrett. Mr. Garrett neither mentioned Mr. Acosta by name, nor alluded directly to his boorish behavior, but deftly used his backhand as he went into detail about the decorum and standards to which the White House press pool is expected to hold themselves.

“It’s [the White House] the most majestic political place in America – the White House. The only place second to that, in my experience, where I spent almost 15 years, is in Congress,” Garrett explained. “It can be rough and tumble there [in Congress]. It can be rough at tumble there at times at the White House but it is a place of institutional passage and commands institutional respect.”

Those on the left will counter that President Trump is also, at times, out of line, and I would agree, but that does not excuse the outlandish behavior of Mr. Acosta. Be that as it may, Major Garret is right. The White House press corp should act professional. They should respect the institution and the man the American people voted in to run the country. I do not recall anything similar occurring during Obama’s eight years in office, and that was not because everyone in the White House press pool agreed with him and his policies.

FYI: For those of you not familiar with The Goldbergs, Barry Goldberg did retain his membership and his standing in the JTP as he reversed his pompous and controlling behavior. However, to find out what happened with the “swear-jar,” you will have to start watching some The Goldbergs’ reruns!

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Not Forgotten

With the economy going great guns, the unemployment rate is down for everybody . . . everybody except for one group, the forgotten group of military spouses. Compared to a 5% unemployment rate nationally, the unemployment rate for military spouses is more than triple that, at 18%. The Department of Defense estimates that there are 641,639 military spouses, with 13% being dual military and with 87% of spouses being civilian spouses. Approximately 70% of these civilian spouses are less than 35 years old, and this is the forgotten group with high unemployment. One can understand why the unemployment rate is higher in this group as the active duty member is often deployed leaving the spouse as a functioning single parent. Likewise the fact that military families often move every two to three years makes the spouse an unattractive candidate for long term employment at any one company.

Blue Star Families, an organization that coordinates services for military families and spouses, has called on companies to do more to battle against a real problem for this forgotten group – military-spouse unemployment. Not all military spouses are the same as far as the likelihood of getting hired when their family is relocated. Whereas those in computer related fields as well as those in diverse parts of the medical fields have a much better chance of securing new employment after a move, oftentimes those families that are at the lower end of the military pay scale need the spouse’s income the most, and often these are the less well educated spouses. They need someone to get a clutch hit for them.
Stepping up to the plate . . . WalMart, who already in 2013 made a pledge to hire 250,000 veterans by 2020, and who are on track to surpass that goal next year.
On 11/12/18 as reported by the Associated Press, WalMart announced a new initiative called “Military Spouse Career Connection” under which they are going to start giving a hiring preference to this forgotten group of military spouses. WalMart already offers military veterans and spouses the ability to transfer from one WalMart to another when a military active duty spouse is transferred, and now it will be going out of its way to hire this forgotten group!
Kudos to WalMart . . . a home run!
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Nuff Said

Recently I was sent an article about a survey that was dealing with “presidential greatness.” Who and why would someone send me the results of such a survey? For starters the person who sent this to me, let’s call him, Jim, is a great guy . . . a hard working, smart, family man who, by the way, is very liberal . . . or perhaps, more precisely very very uber liberal. Based on Jim’s political persuasion what do you think that this survey about “presidential greatness” showed? (A hint – President Trump was not at the top of the list!) Nuff said !

Now even though Jim is a bright guy, I doubt that he did any research about who wrote the article, in which esteemed publication it was published, who participated in this “greatness” survey, and what were their political leanings.

Interestingly, the article describing the survey was from 2/18/18, and so the survey was obviously done prior to that time. In January, 2018 President Trump had been in office for one year. (I considered listing here all of Trump’s first year accomplishments, but I have enumerated them before, and in a more practical sense, I am limited here to 1,000 words or less!)
The article to which Jim was referring was from The Daily Beast. This is the same Daily Beast that “merged” with Newsweek in 2010. Nuff said !
The author was Emily Shugerman. No, I had never heard of her, so I looked up some of the titles of her other outstanding Daily Beast articles over the past month. (One was, “Moonlite Burning Ranch Brothel Owner Dennis Hof Divides Sex Workers, Even in Death.” Another was, “Home Abortion Hotline Pledges to Help Women Navigate the Law.”) Nuff said. Ms. Shugerman who is Daily Beast’s “gender reporter’ proudly proclaimed on her Twitter account in 2017, “I am a revolutionary . . . “ Nuff said !
Next I went to the actual 2018 Presidents & Executive Presidential Greatness Survey.
In this survey there was a response rate of only 53.1%. Does a response rate of only a bit over 50% say anything about the accuracy of the results of the survey? Nuff said !
32.5% of the responders identified themselves as liberal, whereas only 5.4% identified themselves as conservative. Likewise 57.2% were Democrats and 12.7% were Republican. Does this say anything about the fair and balanced nature of this survey? Nuff said !  (My guess is that the respondents were most likely college professors in which case the proportions and ratios of the respondents may be an accurate reflexion of that mileau.)
As if I needed any more info about this survey, there were some amazing responses concerning Barack Houssein Obama. He was judged to be the 8th greatest president of all time, up from #18 on the last survey four years ago! But even more amazing was the response to the question of which president should be next on Mt. Rushmore . . . Obama was #2 on this list! Wow!! Do I need to say, “Nuff said” again?
(FYI: The respondents to this survey put President Trump last on this list!)
At this point I would like to thank Jim for educating me on the subject of “presidential greatness.” Perhaps the next survey he should send me the results of could ask the question: “Which is the greatest baseball team of all time?” . . . asked only to the residents of Boston! The results would probably be as accurate and dependable as those of this “presidential greatness” survey!
Nuff said!
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Yikes II

To start this I need to reiterate the amount of the federal debt – $21,700,000,000,000!!

In the last piece I went over two general “categories” of government waste and irresponsible spending:
“It’s so unbelievable that I cried!”
“WTF, Are you kidding me!”
Today I am going to expound to the last two general categories of waste and irresponsible spending:
“The best laughs I have had in years”
“You can’t make this stuff up!”
The first time that I read through the list of items from which the following have been taken, I was actually laughing out loud! However, seriously how can they actually be wasting our tax money on this tripe?
I have arbitrarily divided the following into two sections . . . the first from different government departments and the second from individuals in Congress. Remember that the following examples are a mere drop in the so-called bucket!
Yikes!
“You can’t make this stuff up.”
-Federal funding into the 50 worst junior and community colleges (FY2017-FY2018,  Dept. of Ed.) – $923.5 million! That is an $18+ million reward to each of these schools for being a bad school!
-Federal payments, subsidies, and tax breaks for Ivy League Colleges (FY2010-
  FY2015, all Federal agencies) – $42 billion . . . That’s Billion with a B to some of the most affluent schools in America!
-Funding a frequently investigated childcare facility in Texas (FY2014-FY2016, Dept of  HHS) – $14.9 million. No, I do not know why this facility was “frequently investigated,”
  but I doubt that it was for its excellent care!
-Reframing beliefs about death and dying among Latinos
  (FY2015, Cornell Univ.,  NIH,HHS) – $883,000. I did not
  realize that Latinos had some special beliefs on this
  subject, but despite spending almost $1 million, I have not
  heard anything on the  news on this subject!
-Payments to gay Mexican prostitutes for safe sex
   (FY2015, Brown Univ, NIH) – $53K. I don’t even know
   where  to start on this one! Does anyone know anybody
   that went to Brown Univ. that might help us out here?
-Dystopian climate change voicemails from the future
   (FY2012, Columbia Univ, National Science Foundation –
   $5.7 million!) Granted I did not go to Columbia, but I
   have absolutely no idea what these millions were spent
   for!!
-Two sculptures for a V.A. facility that serves blind veterans
 (FY2016, Dept of Veteran Affairs) – $670,000
Yikes!
“The best laughs I’ve had in years!”
-Sex Ed for prostitutes in California (FY2016, B. Lee, D, Ca) –
   $1.4 million
-Mobile App for sex diary (FY2016, G. Napolitano, D. Ca) -$1
   million
-Study: Disease susceptibility of translocating tortoises
   (FY2016, G. Thompson, R. Pa.) – $ 360,773
-Virtual reality to teach children in China how to cross the
   street (FY2016, T. Sewell, D. Ala) – $183,750
-Virtual shoe fitting (FY2015-FY2016, M. Griffith, R, Va & A.
   Espoo, D, Ca) – $902,789! Apparently they can work
   across the aisle when they are wasting our money!
-Researching stigmatization of Danish smokers (FY2016, L.
   Barletta,R, Pa)-$330K
-Measuring blood pressure at black barbershops (FY2016,
   A. Schiff D. Ca) – $2.1 million. What about Latino or white
   barbershops?
Yikes!
For those of you who possibly think that I have made-up some of these, I suggest that you go to: www.OpenTheBooks.com and you will discover that “You ain’t seen nothin’ yet,” and Yikes! will turn to Yikes!
President Trump has directed everyone in his administration to focus on waste, irresponsible spending, and cut their budgets by five percent. Perhaps, just stopping the buying guns, ammunition, etc. for those government agencies that do need military-style weapons might be a good first step!
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Yikes !

This commentary is totally non-political. What you are about to read should have the same effect on everybody . . . male, female, conservative, liberal, black, White, brown, or green! Hopefully, after you read the following, you will forward it to everybody that you know, and perhaps even those you don’t know.
I had a difficult time trying to pick out the best title for this piece. The main contenders for the title were:
“The best laugh I have had in years.”
“It’s so unbelievable that I cried.”
“You can’t make this stuff up.”
“WTF, Are you kidding me.”
As I thought this over, I decided that all of these were applicable, as you will see.
Yikes!
To begin, most of us are aware that the federal debt is high. FYI – the federal debt is $21.7 trillion. These large numbers are now being used so frequently that we have become numbed to what they actually mean . . . a million here, a billion there, a hundred billion everywhere! To emphasize this point I spelled out what $21.7 trillion actually looks like
 . . .  $21,700,000,000,000.
Yikes!!
We can probably all agree that this debt is too high. We can probably all disagree about some of the reasons for this . . . taxes too low, somebody not paying his/her fair share, subsidies too high, etc., but I think after reading this, we will be able to agree that there is too much waste and irresponsible spending.
“It’s so unbelievable that I cried!”
Each of the following things made me cry, and by the end I was a sobbing idiot!
-Mistakes & improper Medicare payments (FY2004-FY2017) – $387 billion
-Mistakes &  improper Medicaid payments (FY2004-FY2017) – $234 billion
-Mistakes & improper payments distributed 20 federal agencies (FY2004-FY2017) –
   $1.2 Trillion
-Mistakes & improper student loans and grants (FY2016-FY2017) – $11 billion
-Use it or lose it spending (final week of FY2017, all federal agencies) – $50 billion
-Mistakes & improper farm subsidy payments (FY2004-FY2017) – $3.7 billion
-Farm subsidies into urban areas with pop.>250K (FY2015-2017) – $626 million
-Farm subsidies into America’s 150 most expensive zip codes (FY2017) – $4.8 million
-389 farm subsidy recipients of +1 million – $667 million
And the farm subsidy finale!! . . .
-Farm subsidies to 12 members of Congress (FY2017) – $637,059
At this point you are probably saying, “Only 637K! Well that’s not so bad!”
Yikes!
“WTF, Are you kidding me!”
Fasten your seatbelts for these next few, as although the amounts are “comparatively small,” they are over the edge.
-67 non-military agencies purchase of guns, ammunition, and military-style equipment
  (FY2006-FY2017)- 2.2 billion. I shudder to think of why these 67 different agencies
   need all of this stuff!
-IRS purchase of guns, ammunition, and military-style equipment (FY2006-FY2017) –
  $15.5 million. Can someone, anyone, tell me why the IRS needs any of this!
-VA purchase of guns, ammunition, and military-style equipment (FY2006-FY2017) –
 $17.5 million. Can anyone explain to me why the Dept. of Veteran Affairs needs any of
 this?
-EPA purchase of guns, ammunition, and military-style equipment (FY2014-FY2017) –
  $3.4 million. Help, again! But at least they did not need as many guns, etc as either
  the IRS or the V.A.
-Fleet of armored vehicles for The Dept. of Health and Human Services (FY2017) –
  $1.5 million. Why would this department need one armored vehicle? A fleet!!!!!
Yikes!
I can’t take it anymore, so I must stop for now.
However make sure that you read  the next piece, as it will include:
“The best laugh I have had in years.”
“You can’t make this stuff up!”
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Hope ?

Today while at the gym I caught a glimpse of a tee shirt that said in large letters “Reagan-Bush 84! The guy wearing the shirt had his back to me, but I kept an eye on him so that I could ask him about the shirt when he got off his exercise bike. That was the first Reagan tee shirt that I had ever seen, and so I was interested. When he finished, I caught his attention and waved him over to my treadmill. My first surprise was that he was Hispanic.

A Hispanic with a Reagan tee shirt! “Is this a sign of hope?”
He was young, and obviously could not have been alive in 1984. Since the shirt looked new, I figured that it must have been passed down to him, unused, from his father, and so I asked him whether the shirt had belonged to his father.

“No, it’s mine,” he said. “I was not alive in ’84. I am 19.”
A young Hispanic guy with a Reagan shirt! “Could there be hope?” I thought!
“I heard a speaker at school, and I liked what he said. The speaker was Ben Shapiro and I became interested in politics after listening to him.”
A young Hispanic college student with a Reagan tee shirt! “There is hope,” I thought!
“But the shirt looks so new. Where did you get it?”
He responded, “I searched it out, and bought it on Amazon.”
An enthusiastic young Hispanic college student with a Reagan tee shirt!  “Perhaps more than just hope,” I mused.
And to top it off, the gym that I go to is in California.
A young Hispanic California college student with a Reagan tee shirt!
I started to feel more than just hope, and actually began to feel confident about the future!!

Continue reading “Hope ?”