Reminder: Tomorrow is Victims of Communism Day

April 30th, 2014

Remember that tomorrow is May 1st, which means its time to observe Victims of Communism Day again, since the victims of a brutal ideology that killed over 100 million people deserve their own day of remembrance.

Here’s an Amazon carousel widget featuring a small selection of books on victims of communist oppression (and doesn’t seem to cause the redirect problem).

Here’s a link to The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, who also have an online museum about the Gulag.

More on estimating just how many people communism killed on R. J. Rummel’s Democide page.

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Administrative Note: Amazon Widgets Temporarily Disabled

April 30th, 2014

I’ve temporarily disabled the Amazon widgets in the right sidebar since one was automatically redirecting the entire page to Amazon upon load. What the hell, Amazon?

My apologies if anyone ran into this problem.

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Texas vs. California Update for April 29, 2014

April 29th, 2014

Big news, as one of the world’s largest car makers decides to abandon tax-and-spend California for the Lone Star State:

  • Toyota is moving U.S. sales and marketing operations from Torrence, California to Plano, Texas.

    California has become infamous with business executives and owners there not only for high tax rates and complex taxing schemes but also for overzealous regulations and regulators that have managed to stifle the entrepreneurial energy of thousands of companies.

  • “Criminal activity is the extreme manifestation of California’s institutionalized progressive hypocrisy.”
  • ZeroHedge (quoting a certain gun-grabbers business news service) offers up the most and least taxing states in America. Once again, California tops the list for most taxing. Plus a handy visual representation:

  • “California doesn’t just have the highest state income tax in the nation. It leads the rest of the country in almost every category of taxation: the highest state sales tax, the highest taxes on gasoline at the pump, and the highest corporate tax west of the Mississippi. And the taxes aren’t doing much for the people of the state, rich or poor. For the first time in history, the Census Bureau reports that California is also the poorest state in the nation, with 23.8% of the population living in poverty, in large part because of California’s high cost of living (which is not helped by all the sky-high consumption taxes the Democrats have enacted and the poor must pay to survive.)”
  • If that weren’t bad enough, a new bill (SB 1372) threatens to levy a class-war tax on CEO salaries. “Their bill would change the state’s fixed tax rate on publicly traded corporations to a sliding levy that’s pegged to the earnings gap between the top-paid executive and the median worker.” Evidently Democrats want all publicly traded corporations in California to move their headquarters to Texas…
  • The Pension Tsunami is going to wreck California sooner rather than later. “State and local governments in the Golden State have underfunded their golden-parachute pension promises by a terrifying half a trillion dollars. Twenty thousand public employees now collect yearly pensions of $100,000 or more.”
  • Some of the money those “public servants” are raking in is pretty staggering: “In 2012, more than 100 individuals took home more than $500,000 in total compensation; 8,248 raked in more than $250,000; 28,844 cashed in to the tune of $200,000 or more.”
  • Superintendent in a California school district who oversees 6,600 students pulled down a cool $674,559 last year. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Evidently CalPERS and San Bernardino are still negotiating.
  • If you think CalPERS is going broke now, just wait to California’s bankrupt cities start writing down debts owed.
  • Everyone knows San Francisco is as liberal as liberal can be. Yet even there voters have voted down green energy mandates.
  • California hot sauce maker Sriracha is still mulling relocation offers. Texas is still a possibility.
  • California’s tax bureaucracy will continue suing you after 20 years, even if they’ve lost in court.
  • Poll of residents shows that Texas is one of the five most popular states to live in. “Texans rank high on standard of living and trust in their state government, and they are less negative than others are about the state taxes they pay.”
  • Texas isn’t immune from California’s troubles when big city officials start spending like California Democrats. Big-spending Texas cities should learn from bankrupt Detroit’s example.

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    Posted in Budget, Democrats, Texas, unions, Waste and Fraud, Welfare State | 1 Comment »

    Weekend Roundup for April 28, 2014

    April 28th, 2014

    Not so much a #LinkSwarm per se, as a roundup of news you might have missed over the weekend:

  • NBA owner Donald Sterling, under the spotlight for a bizarre racist rant captured on tape, is a Democrat.
  • Catholic Church canonizes Popes John Paul II and John XXIII as Saints.
  • 3,000 Florida voters are registered at a single UPS store.
  • “The Europeans will never forgive the Jews for Auschwitz.”
  • John Kerry still pursuing the mirage of Middle East peace.
  • Obama Administration watchdog actually a lapdog.
  • Man up, Nancy Boy.
  • CNN analyst welches on Zimmerman bet.
  • William Friedkin’s brilliant movie Sorcerer is finally out on Blu Ray.

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    Posted in Democrats, Foreign Policy, Media Watch, Obama Scandals | No Comments »

    Donald Sterling: NBA Owner, Racist, Democrat

    April 26th, 2014

    Unless you follow the NBA, you may be unaware that owner Donald Sterling’s Los Angeles Clippers were, until very recently, regarded as one of the worst-run franchise’s in the league. Between moving to Los Angeles in 1983 and 2010, they only had two winning seasons.

    The Clippers have recently been on the upswing, having drafted one All Star (Blake Griffin) and traded for another one (Chris Paul), that Sterling wisely let have more input in composing and running the team. The input Sterling has on running the team, the better they tended to do. So the Clippers are in the playoffs in the powerhouse NBA West. Things were looking up.

    Well they were, until Sterling was recorded as telling his hot young girlfriend that he doesn’t want her seen in public with black people.

    It takes an extra-special brand of stupid for a man who owns a team in a league with predominately black players, with one and half black superstars on his team (Griffin is half-black, half-leprechaun) and a black coach (Doc Rivers) to be caught saying he doesn’t like black people. It’s tantamount to declaring “I never want to have another big name NBA free agent come to my team ever again!”

    Now, as for why I’m blogging it here: Though Sterling hasn’t been active giving campaign donations recently, guess which political party to which all the candidates receiving his donations belonged?

    Go ahea(D). Guess.

    STERLING, DONALD BEVERLY HILLS,CA 90210 BEVERLY HILLS PROPERTIES 11/30/89 $1,000 Bradley, Bill (D)
    STERLING, DONALD BEVERLY HILLS,CA 90210 BEVERLY HILLS PROPERTIES 11/30/89 $1,000 Bradley, Bill (D)
    STERLING, DONALD BEVERLY HILLS,CA 90212 9/27/91 $1,000 Davis, Gray (D)
    STERLING, DONALD MR BEVERLY HILLS,CA 90212 REAL ESTATE DEVELOPER 9/9/91 $1,000 Leahy, Patrick (D)

    I’m guessing the NBA will give him a token fine, but little more. One dumbass owner makes it just a little easier for all the other teams…

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    Posted in Democrats | 5 Comments »

    LinkSwarm for April 25, 2014

    April 25th, 2014

    Pressed for time, so here’s a quick LinkSwarm:

  • Forgot to include this in the Wednesday roundup: Massachusetts Democrat says that ObamaCare will “bury us”.
  • The “Obama Recovery” in action: Retail store closings worst since 2009.
  • 12% of Americans are in the top 1%. Wait, what?
  • Republicans expand Senate map yet again.
  • Man threatened with federal $525 fine for an 89¢ soda refill.
  • Things America has that Communist Cuba doesn’t: freedom, human dignity, and soap.
  • China’s Ghost Cities redux.
  • Dr. Huey Shen Wu skips to China after thumbing his nose at U.S. courts.
  • Another day, another 71 killed by Jihadests with a car bomb in Nigeria.
  • #hashtag. #facepalm
  • AT&T is trying to shed it’s legacy landline business.
  • Things I did not know: Whittaker Chambers translated the first English language edition of Bambi.

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    Posted in Communism, Elections, Foreign Policy, Jihad, Media Watch | No Comments »

    Fallout from the Supreme Court Affirmative Action Decision

    April 24th, 2014

    The Supreme Court affirmed the decision of Michigan voters in banning Affirmative Action (i.e, discrimination based on race) in college admissions

    Conservatives and libertarians have a very simple position on racial discrimination:

  • “All men are created equal, and are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights.”
  • Individuals should “not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.” (I’m going to assume that you recognize theses first two, slightly paraphrased quotes on their own.)
  • “Our Constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens.” — Justice John Harlan, dissenting in Plessy v. Ferguson, 1896
  • “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.” — Chief Justice John Roberts, in Ricci v. DeStefano, 2009

    • The liberal position can be paraphrased thus: “Racism requires racism, because racism.”

    What, you think that’s a bit reductio ad absurdum? Fine. How about:

    “Because the lingering effects of institutional racism continue to hold back historically disadvantaged groups*, the federal government must continue to impose preferential treatment for members of those groups.”

    “*Historically disadvantaged groups” are those that in pre-PC speak were referred to as “minorities.” Except of course, the Democratic Party’s current formulation excludes Asians from preferential treatment, resulting in systematic discrimination against them by colleges that practice Affirmative Action compared to less qualified black and Hispanic candidates.

    Left unsaid is when do we stop discriminating against people based on their race due to the “lingering effects” of racism? Why should someone born in 1996 (as those entering college this fall) be discriminated against due to laws scrapped three decades before they were born?

    It is also obvious that Affirmative Action sets up minorities to fail by mismatching them with institutions desperate for “diversity” where they will be at a disadvantage compared to brighter students. So someone who could have been in the middle of their class at, say, Texas Tech, is instead at the very bottom of the class at Harvard or Yale.

    Affirmative Action is a racist relic of bygone days and should be eliminated from a free, colorblind society.

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    ObamaCare: Still an Electoral Loser

    April 23rd, 2014

    I know it’s more of a “dog bites man” story by now, but given Obama’s ever-louder declarations that “debate is over,” here’s the most recent reminder that ObamaCare still has all the popularity of an album of Yoko Ono/Gilbert Godfried duets:

  • One indication of how unpopular ObamCare remains is how little Democrats want to talk about it. “If the law was really working, and voters were excited about it, Democratic candidates would be talking about it all the time, rather than trying to change the subject.”
  • Did you get health insurance through ObamaCare in Concord, New Hampshire? Sucks to be you. “Only a single insurer in the state offers policies through the new law. Ten of the state’s 26 hospitals and one fifth of its primary care providers aren’t in its network. Residents of Concord, the state capital, have to drive to other cities to get covered hospital care.”
  • Should Democrats run on ObamaCare in November? In a deeply shocking and unexpected development, Democratic consultants say yes, while Republican consultants say no.
  • Signed up for ObamaCare? Thanks to Heartbleed, you might want to change your password.
  • North Carolina Democratic Senator Kay Hagen dishonestly accuses her Republican opponent of supporting ObamaCare. Even liberal Politifact rates it mostly false.
  • Temporary workers are at an all-time high. Guess which piece of legislation NBC declined to mention when reporting on the story?
  • Wisconsin Rep. Ron Johnson and 38 other Republican congressmen fle suit against the Obama Administration over congressional ObamaCare subsidies.

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    Update on Certain Hidalgo County Democrats

    April 22nd, 2014

    You may remember back in 2012 when I reported on Democratic Party candidate for Hidalgo County Precinct 1 Constable Robert “Bobby” Maldonado being caught with over $1 million cash in his car’s trunk. Well, I now have a Hidalgo County guilty plea update.

    But not on Maldonado. Last time I checked, he was out on a $200,000 bond.

    No, I have an update on a completely different Hidalgo County Democratic Party law enforcement officer charged with money laundering.

    Former Hidalgo County Sheriff Guadalupe “Lupe” Treviño, a nine-year veteran of the office and a fixture of the region’s Democratic Party, pleaded guilty on Monday to federal charges of money laundering. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas said the former lawman “received cash contributions for his election campaign from alleged drug trafficker Tomas ‘El Gallo’ Gonzalez.”

    Trevino’s former chief of staff, Maria P. Medina, also plead guilty.

    Also keep in mind that this was after Trevino prepared termination papers for his second in command, Jose Padilla after the feds arrested him for “marijuana smuggling and money laundering,” also reportedly in the pay of Gonzalez.

    I wonder how many other shoes might drop.

    Texas Attorney General (and 2014 Gubernatorial favorite) Greg Abbott penned this editorial on the topic, containing this great quote (albeit it one only tangentially related to the question of border corruption):

    Conservative is not a color, it is not a race, it is not an ethnicity. It is a commitment to the idea that every American has a chance to succeed; that faith and family are foremost; that jobs and education are the best pathway to a better future; and that secure communities are a part of all that.

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    Posted in Crime, Democrats, Texas | No Comments »

    Leland Yee/Shrimp Boy Chow Update for April 21, 2014

    April 21st, 2014

    More details and repercussions from the indictment of California State Senator Leland Yee and his criminal associates on gun-trafficking and other charges:

  • Feds plan to add racketeering charges to the Yee indictment.
  • Prominent Democrat Willie Brown (former Speaker of the California House and Mayor of San Francisco) wonders what the big deal is with the Yee indictment:

    Give the guy a break. When all is said and done, his alleged crimes come down to taking campaign contributions in return for issuing proclamations, using campaign funds to set up a meeting and taking campaign funds for writing a letter.

    Never did he sell his vote, steal public money or actually put money in his own pocket, as far as I can tell.

    None of Yee’s decisions affected the public.

    I’ve gone over the FBI’s criminal complaint and, from what I can see, the biggest crime he was accused of was trying hustle some undercover FBI agents who were out to get alleged Chinatown gang leader Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow.

    First, I don’t think Brown has read that indictment carefully enough. Second, notice how prominent Democrats seem to think that some felonies are just no big deal…

  • “Leland Yee symbolizes the pay-to-play virus that has infected our entire body politic.”
  • But don’t worry, Californians! Your Democratic Party-controlled government has the solution to all this slime and corruption: “intensive ethics training for senators and staffers.” Because ordinarily people just wouldn’t know that engaging in illegal arms trafficking to Islamic rebels was wrong. “Was that wrong? Should I not have done that?”
  • Alleged money laundering co-conspirators Leslie Yun and James Pau granted bail. They’re also accused of stolen stolen cigarette smuggling, marijuana distribution, and owning “a massage parlor that provides sexual services for its customers.”
  • Back when Yee was a mere school board President, someone once sent him a message in the form of a pig’s head with a clever embedded in its skull.
  • Yee’s defense team accuses FBI of entrapment.
  • Chow’s lawyers also accuse the FBI of entrapment, saying that the FBI threw millions of dollars at him. His lawyer also says that “the $58,000 Chow received from undercover agents were legal gratuities, not kickbacks for illegal activity.” Yeah, good luck pushing that theory…

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    Posted in Crime, Democrats, Guns | No Comments »

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