California Political Class Insanity and Socialism, Part 4: More Blackouts, High Gas Prices, and Bad Budget Priorities

We have done any number of posts strictly focusing on the crises in different California cities, from going broke to large homeless problems to medieval diseases making a comeback. What was once the land of opportunity is now the land of impending disasters on several fronts, fronts we will be exploring in a series of posts.

Before going further, let’s review a few California realities we have covered previously:

• There are upwards of 30,000 homeless Americans roaming the streets of San Francisco.
• Without a home to go to, the city has made it legal to defecate, urinate, and shoot up drugs anywhere in the city including in public and on the streets of the city.
• This has led to a public health hazard and has caused the city to hire five full time government employees who go around the city each day in hazmat gear to pick up human feces and to clean the spot where it was found.
• Things are so bad that residents can use a city cell phone app to report where they found piles of feces.
• There are upwards of 60,000 homeless Americans in Los Angeles that is causing some of the same problems that are going down in San Francisco.
• Public defecation and urination in LA is causing health problems in that city which has actually led to the outbreak of at least one medieval disease, typhus, and the concern is that the bubonic plague may also make a comeback, given how the exploding rat population has fed off of the garbage that homelessness causes.

The reason we are doing so is to point out that the state that has had the most far reaching intrusions into freedom and citizens’ lives, the state that has put its nose into every aspect of citizens’ lives, the state that has has misspent and overspent its way far down the road of bankruptcy, and the state that has reduced the freedom of its citizens the most is the state of California. The state is by far the most socialistic state in the union and has basically been ruled by a single party for decades, the Democrats. 

And since a number of Democratic candidates for President have basically declared themselves to be socialists, I thought it might be an interesting subject to explore what would happen if socialism took over the whole country. What would it look like if the country took on the aspects of socialism and Democratic rule that has swept up California. Warning: the future is NOT bright if California is the leading edge.

In our first two posts we discovered nine current characteristics of living in California:

1. The rate of sexually transmitted diseases is skyrocketing.
2. Gas prices are about twice as much as the average price across the country.
3. Citizens are enduring rolling electricity blackouts.
4. Medieval diseases are making a comeback in Los Angeles.
5. Solar panels do nothing for you when the electric company blacks out your area on purpose.
6. San Francisco no longer feels like America.
7. The state government financial situation is very bleak.
8. California city governments are also deep in debt.
9. California has a dysfunctional voter registration process.
10. State politicians worry more about what other states are doing rather than fix what is wrong in their own state.

Let’s find out what other “adventures” Californians are living through:

1) The state of California has over $200 billion in unfunded future liabilities. This debt burden will likely bankrupt the entire state government in the not too distant future. But rather than work fixing overspending and debt loads, the state government politicians are working on spending more, not less taxpayer wealth:

• The Democrats in the state government and in the governor’s mansion in California have recently passed a plan that would allow the state government and the state’s taxpayers to pay two years worth of tuition at community colleges.
• This will likely cost the taxpayers $42.6 million a year and affect over 30,000 community college students.
• So the governor and state legislators are worrying about helping 30,000 students avoid paying for their education while well over 100,000 state residents are homeless and roaming the streets of the state’s cities, with about 90,000 just in San Francisco and Los Angeles.
• According to the Feeding America organization, the average cost per meal to feed a homeless American is $2.94 per meal.
• Thus, in theory, that $42.6 million could provide over 14 million meals to the homeless population of California.

How many lives of needy California Americans could be helped by getting a good meal vs. paying for the college tuition of other citizens who in all likelihood know where their next meal is coming from? Such bad priorities of state politicians.

2) We have already talked about how gas costs so much more in California, in some places twice as expensive than the national average. Chris White, writing for the Daily Caller website on October 24, 2019, did an analysis of why that is the case and not surprisingly, state politicians and their over regulation of the lives of state residents are the main causes of sky high gas prices:

• The average price of a gallon of gas in the state is $4.18, about double the national cost.
• In some places in California the price is actually over $5.00 a gallon.
• In 2017, the governor at the time, Jerry Brown, signed legislation that raised the state’s gas tax 12 cents a gallon on gas and 20 cents a gallon on diesel.
• At the same time the state raised vehicle license fees from $25 to $175 per car.
• This tax increase was not an absolute number, it was based on a percentage of the price of gas so if the prices goes up the tax goes up also, a very sneaky way of increasing taxes without having to legislate it.
• According to Kara Siepmann, a spokeswoman for the Western States Petroleum Association (WSPA): “State and federal laws like the recently approved gas tax, the Low Carbon Fuel Standard, and other fuel-related taxes and fees add a little over 92 cents to each gallon of gas and have a profound impact on California’s businesses and communities.” 
• California has the second highest gas tax in the country.
• The state’s strict, and likely unnecessary, regulations result in California requiring gas sold in the state to be blended differently, adding additional costs to refining and making it impossible to import gas from other states, reducing the potential supply and increasing the price.
• Adding insult to injury, the special California blended gas changes depending on what time of year it is, adding additional costs and reducing the supply.
• Local and state zoning strategies have reduced the available land that could be used for gas stations, further reducing supply and increasing prices even more.
• There are 40% fewer gas stations in San Francisco than there were ten years ago.
• Some California cities are suing oil companies because of their obsession with global warming and if they go too far down that road these oil companies might just stop selling and refining gas in the state which would further increase prices.

Obviously these folks in the state government have a tremendous lack of economic knowledge, supply and demand drive prices. By reducing supply in so many ways prices go up and state taxpayers get stuck with more costs of living in the state with no relief insight.

3) Let’s finish up this series on the hell that California is becoming from a daily living perspective with an update on the intentional blackouts that are still going on, blackouts that definitely reduce the quality of life in the state:

• The latest blackouts by Pacific Gas and Electric are affecting almost a million customers and likely over 2 million people.
• This is being done to try and stop the utilities’ equipment from adding to the wildfires currently raging in the state.
• These people being blacked out range over 36 counties.
• The latest blackouts will last for two days.

Now, while the utility can rightfully be blamed for these disasters and the blackouts and fires its faulty equipment causes, keep in mind it is the state government which regulates all of the utilities’ operations. They should be overseeing the operations of all utilities so the state government bureaucracy, and the politicians that oversee this bureaucracy, are also to blame for this mess.

So in summary, Democrats and liberals who dominate state and local governments in the state of California have succeeded in bringing the state’s residents high gas prices, rolling electricity blackouts, bad spending priorities, a skyrocketing homeless population, the appearance of at least one Medieval disease, skyrocketing sexually transmitted diseases, heavy government debt burdens, and a dysfunctional voter registration system. 

This is what socialism looks like as practiced in California. It is not pretty along so many dimensions and yet, Democrats think socialism is still a good idea. Proving again, that when it comes to the American political class there is still no cure for stupid.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

https://www.amazon.com/Walter-Bruno-Korschek/e/B002KYU08Q/ref=dbs_a_mng_rwt_scns_share

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:


http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

October, 2019, Part 2, I Am A Global Warming Doubter and A Believer In Science: Expensive, Non-Workable and Unnecessary Solutions To The Global Warming Myth, How To Actually Go Carbon Free and More

Every month we have enough material to return to a continuing theme in this blog, namely that “I am a global warming doubter AND a believer in science.” This became of interest because of people like Al Gore who fanatically and verbosely claimed that you had to be an idiot to not believe in man made global warming. It has been my life belief that anyone that is that loud and that obnoxious is hiding something, that rather than argue facts and reality it is better to beat down and insult anyone who disagrees.

As we have dove into the whole issue of man made global warming, or its new rebranded title of climate change, we found that Al Gore and people like him were guilty of a number of things:

• Ignoring science and realities that did not support their opinions and positions.
• Rather than have an adult conversation about climate, these types of advocates like Gore sank to the level of insulting those who dared look at ALL science by calling them a variety of names including racists, homophobes, terrorists, flat earth believers, and other slanderous names.
• Continuing to insist that politicians step up their intrusions into our lives with higher taxes, more regulations, and more control on our freedoms and standards of living based on a shaky theory at best.

To see the past posts and the multitude of evidence that we have compiled that showed it is perfectly okay to be a global warming doubter and a believer in science, enter the phrase "global warming doubter” in the search box above or go through the monthly historical post listed on the right side of this page.

Thus, let’s see the latest facts and science that prove you can be a global warming doubter and a believer in science, regardless of what Al Gore proclaims.

1) Recently CNN hosted a marathon, mind numbing seven hour debate for Democratic Presidential candidates focused on man made climate change. Each of the candidates had plans, expensive plans, to fix what is likely a non-problem but in the process of this fixing would bankrupt our wallets and our freedom. Let’s do a quick review why the seven hour debate was a waste of oxygen:

• If the U.S. went to zero carbon emissions in the next year it would have very little measurable effect on global temps or climate change, mostly because the rest of the world continue to increase their use of carbon based fuel sources, especially China and India.
• We have previously covered the reality that the U.S. in a recent calendar year had made a huge reduction in its carbon footprint, despite no longer being committed to the Paris Climate Agreement, while the vast majority of the other nations of the world had increased their carbon footprint despite still supporting the Paris climate accord.
• In 1989, a major climate prediction claimed that doomsday for the Earth would arrive by the year 2000 if drastic actions were not immediately taken: drastic actions were not taken and 19 years later doomsday has still not happened.
• But that was just one of so many global warming predictions that came nowhere to coming true, destroying the credibility of every global warming scientist and politician who supported this fallacy.
• But despite this reality of the global warming fallacy, Joe Biden wants to spent $1.7 trillion over the next 10 years to “fix” the climate.
• Elizabeth Warren wants to spend $3 trillion over the next ten years to “fix” the climate.
• Bernie Sanders wants to go big time and spend a whopping $16.3 trillion over the next decade.
• None of the plans are real clear in what the actual problem is they are solving and how they would solve that fallacy of a problem without bankrupting the country and destroying our freedoms.
• None of the plans include details about how they will convince the rest of the world to follow suit and follow in their idiotic plans also because if the U.S. is the only one that initiates any of these stupid plans and the rest of the world continues on their merry way, there will be virtually no impact on the climate but tremendous downside to us.

Stupid, expensive plans from stupid, non-scientists. Think about this reality:

• Washington politicians and the Federal government have been operating a postal system for hundreds of years and it is still an inefficient, costly and near bankrupt operation.
• Washington politicians and the Federal government have been operating a Social Security system for about 80 years and still have not gotten it right, providing a paltry return on investment on our contributions while driving the entire system closer and closer to bankruptcy.
• Washington politicians and the Federal government have been operating Medicare and Medicaid for over 50 years and still have not gotten it right, with both programs hurtling towards fiscal insolvency.
• Washington politicians and the Federal government have been operating a “do not call” telephone list for many years and yet we all still get unsolicited call after call looking to pay off our student loans, get us a cheap mortgage, etc.

Thus, to think the same people that cannot operate an effective “do not call” list have the brains and ability to actually alter the Earth’s climate, even if it did need to be altered, is a fallacy, an impossibility, and a cruel joke on anyone gullible to think that Biden and is ilk have viable solutions to a probably mythical problem.

2) Richard W. Rahn is chairman of the Institute for Global Economic Growth and Improbable Success Productions actually has a way to reduce our carbon footprint without widespread economic and liberty destruction, a logical plan that eliminates the need for massive but unreliable solar and wind power and massive expenditures of taxpayer wealth. Components of such a plan include the following aspects:

• Rahn: “Assume that the goal is to move toward zero net emissions of carbon dioxide by some realistic future date. It could be done in a non-economically destructive way, by expanding nuclear to take care of most of the base load.”
• France gets about 70% of its power from nuclear based energy, imagine how much carbon would be removed from the air if everyone got to that level that France has SAFELY attained for decades without a major accident.
• The U.S. Navy has also been powered in part by nuclear power for five decades without a major accident.
• Increased use of natural gas would also reduce the carbon footprint.
• Rahn again: “Recent studies have shown there is enough suitable land for growing more trees in the United States, Canada, Russia and China to almost totally offset the carbon emissions from burning natural gas (trees inhale CO2 and exhale oxygen — and they look nice and shield much manmade ugliness). In sum, it is very possible to have a more efficient electrical system that over time is carbon neutral.”

Not mentioned by Rahn is the research and testing of better and cleaner uses of existing carbon fuel sources.For example, research work is underway using the microbes in termites’ guts to eat coal and give off clean methane gas. For these solutions we do not need trillions of dollars to be spent and wasted by the Washington political class. We just need some logical and clear guidelines and targets using existing and potentially new clean sources of energy. 

Assuming we need alternative cleaner sources at all.

3) Possibly the only less logical, less knowledgeable group of people when it comes to climate change than politicians is the mainstream media. They constantly focus and harp only on the expensive, ineffective, top down government control approach to the global warming fallacy vs. presenting all sides of the argument.

CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, hosting that recent seven hour climate change marathon discussed above made the idiotic claim that Hurricane Dorian, that hit the U.S. in September, happened because of climate change: “We’re seeing firsthand the effects of climate change as a powerful Atlantic hurricane is sitting right now off the coast of Florida. It could make landfall tomorrow in South Carolina.”

So, Wolf, let me understand what you are saying:

• Climate change has caused this “powerful Atlantic hurricane?”
• Previous powerful storms over time, e.g. Hurricane Camille, Hurricane Andrew, etc. they were not caused by climate change, only Dorian was caused by climate change?
• Or are you saying that Dorian would not have occurred without climate change?

I am so confused. Hurricanes have been happening over eons. Climate change has been happening over eons. And yet you got all excited because there was a single hurricane, one that while powerful was nowhere close to being the most powerful of all time.

So, in review: we have Democratic Presidential candidates proposing mega expensive, liberty sapping, ineffective government programs that would make us all poorer and less free all over a probable climate fallacy while other, less expensive and more viable options exist while the mainstream media continues to embarrass itself by not using facts or presenting a balanced picture of the issues. Which in turn reinforces why I am a global warming doubter and a believer in science.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

https://www.amazon.com/Walter-Bruno-Korschek/e/B002KYU08Q/ref=dbs_a_mng_rwt_scns_share

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:


http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

October, 2019, Part 1, I Am A Global Warming Doubter and a Believer In Science: Obama's Hypocrisy, Firing Real Scientists, and More

Every month we have enough material to return to a continuing theme in this blog, namely that “I am a global warming doubter AND a believer in science.” This became of interest because of people like Al Gore who fanatically and verbosely claimed that you had to be an idiot to not believe in man made global warming. It has been my life belief that anyone that is that loud and that obnoxious is hiding something, that rather than argue facts and reality it is better to beat down and insult anyone who disagrees.

As we have dove into the whole issue of man made global warming, or its new rebranded title of climate change, we found that Al Gore and people like him were guilty of a number of things:

• Ignoring science and realities that did not support their opinions and positions.
• Rather than have an adult conversation about climate, these types of advocates like Gore sank to the level of insulting those who dared look at ALL science by calling them a variety of names including racists, homophobes, terrorists, flat earth believers, and other slanderous names.
• Continuing to insist that politicians step up their intrusions into our lives with higher taxes, more regulations, and more control on our freedoms and standards of living based on a shaky theory at best.To see the past posts and the multitude of evidence that we have compiled that showed it is perfectly okay to be a global warming doubter and a believer in science, enter the phrase "global warming doubter” in the search box above or go through the monthly historical post listed on the right side of this page.

Thus, let’s see the latest facts and science that prove you can be a global warming doubter and a believer in science, regardless of what Al Gore proclaims.

1) We have often discussed and pointed out examples where global warming advocates either make up data and statistics or misuse them in order to make a point that is often pointless. We know that leading global warming scientists around the world have been caught fudging research numbers to get the answers they want, not what reality is telling them. We are told over and over again that 97% of climate scientists tell us that mankind is causing global warming and just as often we have shown what a bogus number that 97% is.

Unfortunately, a real life scientist using real life data got royally screwed for the simple act of being honest:

• According to an article by Warner Todd Huston on October 21, 2019 reported on the Godfather Politics website how a real scientist got fired because she proved that polar bears are not being killed off by climate change/global warming.
• Susan Crockford, a zoologist by training and profession, proved that polar bears are not dying out because of climate change.
• After teaching at the University of Victoria for 15 years, her contract was not renewed and she has been shown the door at the university without any comment or reason from the university.
• She has been a leading researcher in both the history of dog domestication and an in-demand speaker on her scientific research into polar bears.
• She claims she was fired because her views did not support the theory of man made global warming and climate change.
• According to the Washington Times: “Ms. Crockford accused officials at the Canadian university of bowing to “outside pressure,” the result of her research showing that polar bear populations are stable and even thriving, not plummeting as a result of shrinking Arctic sea ice, defying claims of the climate change movement. Her dismissal, which she announced Wednesday in a post on her Polar Bear Science blog, has spurred alarm over the implications for academic freedom and the rise of the “cancel culture” for professors and scientists who challenge climate catastrophe predictions: “When push came to shove, UVic threw me under the bus rather than stand up for my academic freedom,” said Ms. Crockford, who earned a Ph.D. in interdisciplinary studies, specifically biology and anthropology, in 2004.”

When you cannot argue facts and logic then just attack the credibility of your opponent. That is what the global warming, climate change cultists have devolved to, not wanting to hear alternative viewpoints, only their own biased myths.

2) It seems that anything that happens in the world today is a result of man made global warming/climate change and must be addressed IMMEDIATELY or we face dire consequences:

• Warner Todd Huston writing for the Godfather Politics website on August 24, 2019 provided an example of this false and incorrect panic.
• Brazil has recently suffered through some horrific wildfires, fires that got so bad that the Brazilian government called out their military to help put out the flames.
• Almost immediately the word got out from the global warming crowd that the fires in the Amazon rain forest in Brazil are endangering 20% of the world’s oxygen.
• Thus, if the fires were not stopped soon we would run out of oxygen.
• As always not to be bothered with facts and realities, Presidential candidate Kamala Harris tweeted out this false statistic about 20% of the world’s oxygen: “Brazil's President Bolsonaro must answer for this devastation. The Amazon creates over 20% of the world's oxygen and is home to one million Indigenous people. Any destruction affects us all.”
• CNN, never missing a chance to misrepresent global warming, got into the 20% act also: “The Amazon, which produces about 20% of earth's oxygen, is often referred to as "the planet's lungs. An inferno in the world's largest rain forest, two-thirds of which is in Brazil, threatens the ecosystem there and also affects the entire globe.”
• Congresswoman Barbara Lee: “The Amazon produces 20% of the oxygen in the Earth's atmosphere. If we fail to combat climate change now, soon we won’t have clean air to breathe. We must take #ClimateActionNow. This is not a drill or a hoax.”
• The article also contains a slew of other less famous people mimicking the same statistics, the Amazon rain forest produces 20% of the world’s oxygen
• And while their concern is admirable, their statistic is way off.
• According to stats and real research cited in the article and research by a Dr. Jonathan Foley, it is physically impossible for the Amazon rain forest to produce 20% of the world’s oxygen, best case it produces 6%, less than one third of the nonsensical number being tweeted about by global warming advocates.

Three things of importance here:

1. The fires are serious and are causing damage to the environment, animals and the economy in Brazil and need to be addressed as quickly as possible.
2. However, I really cannot take a global warming advocate seriously if their emotional response to the fires is off by a factor of three which tells me they are either intentionally lying to get their view across or are too ignorant or too lazy to do a simple look up on a simple statistic.
3. And finally, I would rather believe a real scientist, Dr. Jonathan Foley, than a failing Presidential candidate, a Congresswoman who probably has absolutely NO climate expertise, or a biased news network who usually loses out to the Hallmark Channel or Cupcake wars for viewership ratings.

3) One of the biggest advocates for man made global warming and the myth that 97% of climate scientists believe in man made global warming, was former President Barack Obama. He was supposedly so into global warming that he entered the country into a stupid, idiotic climate agreement that was signed in Paris, an agreement that had no teeth and would have done nothing to curtail so-called global warming while making American considerably less wealthy.

I say supposedly because:

• According to Richard W. Rahn, writing for the Washington Times, Obama recently purchased a home on Martha’s Vineyard:
• Rahn: “If you really thought that the ocean level was rising rapidly, would you buy a house next to the sea? If you really thought that increased carbon dioxide emissions threatened the very existence of mankind, would you be so selfish as to fly around in a private jet, have houses with many times the carbon footprint of the average person, etc. etc.? Former President Obama just bought his family a very large seafront home. Many of the most vocal Hollywood crowd have multiple large homes, including on the beach, private jets, limos, etc. Their actions are more important than their forked-tongue utterances.”
• This Obama mansion costs in excess of $15 million so there seems to be a disconnect: if global warming was going to destroy the world unless the U.S. signed off on the Paris Climate Agreement, as Obama insisted, then why did he risk putting $15 million of his wealth at such a high risk?
• Or did he view the global warming fallacy as a way to gain more control over us, reducing our freedoms, but enlarging his control and greed?

Since Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez predicts that the world will end in about ten years because of man made global warming and climate change, it does not sound like a good investment by Obama.

We are being sarcastic, of course. Obama is not a real estate idiot, buying an island out in the Atlantic that would be one of the first dry land pieces to be submerged by global warming melted glaciers. Nothing illustrates the hypocrisy of the whole global warming fallacy than Obama buying an island in the ocean.

The hypocrisy of Obama, the fallacy of false statistics, and punishing real scientists who tell the truth based on real science. Another three reasons why I am still a global warming doubter and a believer in science.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

https://www.amazon.com/Walter-Bruno-Korschek/e/B002KYU08Q/ref=dbs_a_mng_rwt_scns_share

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:


http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

The Horrors and Destruction That Donald Trump Has Imposed On America...Just Kidding, An Update To The Hundreds Of Accomplishments We Already Identified

Before we start today’s discussion, let’s review my voting history: 

• I have never voted for a Republican for President in my life.
• Thus, I did not vote for Trump. 
• I have rarely voted for a Republican for national office in my life. 

Almost three years ago, many liberals, Democrats, and millennials were besides themselves with grief and fear because their pre-ordained queen, Hillary Clinton, was not elected President. Instead, Donald Trump was elected, an individual that these same people despised, hated, and feared, an individual they felt would endanger and possibly destroy the country and our democracy. They fretted, worried and lashed out at anything or anyone that even remotely smelled of Donald Trump.

Given that Trump has been in office for well over two years, I thought, that as someone who did not vote for him, it would be a good idea to review the horror, trauma, and terrible things that Trump has subjected the country to in just eighteen month’s time. This is obviously a very sarcastic comment when you take an unbiased look at what has happened during the Trump Presidency.

The many previous posts we did on this topic identified hundreds of good things that have happened to America and Americans since Trump became President. These posts can be found by entering the phrase “the horrors and destruction” in the search box above. 

We continually list out some of Trump’s many accomplishments and we have done that in the previous 20 posts on the topic. As the previous paragraph points out, we have already named hundreds of ways that American is better off today than it was almost three years ago when he took office. 

Today’s update to his accomplishments come from the Freedom Headlines website. We have identified many of these accomplishments already but it is a nice review of Trump’s accomplishments:

1. Because of Trump’s pro-growth policies, real gross domestic product (GDP) growth exceeded 3 percent over the last four quarters

2. More than 5 million jobs have been created since Trump’s election and the unemployment rate remains well below 4% and is currently at a 50 year low.

3. The unemployment rate for African Americans in May fell to 5.9% which is the lowest rate on record.

4. Since Trump’s election, 4.6 million Americans have been removed from food stamp dependency.

5. More than 6 million workers received tax cut bonuses and benefits.

6. Trump signed legislation that reauthorized the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act, making more than $1 billion available for career education programs.

7. The female unemployment rate is at its lowest level in 65 years.

8. Trump signed legislation to roll back burdensome Dodd-Frank regulations that harmed community banks.

9. Trump negotiated a new, better trade agreement between the United States, Canada, and Mexico to replace the North American Free Trade Agreement.

10. Trump held an historic summit with North Korea Chairman Kim Jong-Un, hopefully bringing beginnings of peace and denuclearization to the Korean Peninsula.

11. Trump secured a record $73.1 billion in funding for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to provide quality medical care for our veterans.

12. Every quarter since taking office, Trump has donated his salary to worthwhile charities and other benevolent organizations, fulfilling a campaign promise he made.

13. Trump implemented a five-year ban on lobbying for White House employees and a lifetime ban on lobbying for foreign countries.

14. In a historic show of transparency and accountability, the Trump Administration completed the Department of Defense’s first ever audit.

15. In 2018, programs at the VA and the Department of Housing and Urban Development helped more than 51,000 veterans find permanent housing and access supportive services.

16. Trump signed the Veterans Affairs Accountability and Whistleblower Protection Act, making it easier to fire failing employees and protect whistleblowers.

17. Trump convinced the NATO nations to strengthen their counterterrorism activities, and NATO formally joined the coalition to defeat ISIS.

18. Trump has imposed tough sanctions on the corrupt regimes in Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua.

19. ISIS’ territorial caliphate has been crushed and President Trump has announced that he is starting to bring America’s troops in Syria home.

20. President Trump ended the devastating defense cuts of the past Administration and has secured historic investments to rebuild our military.

To these accomplishments, let’s add some others that the article missed:

- The U.S.unemployment rate recently dropped to 3.5%, reaching a 50 year low, and getting to a level once thought to be impossibly low by standard economic theory.

- According to Josh Wright, chief economist at iCIMS: “The unemployment rate usually rises ahead of a recession, so a fresh decline pushes out the timeline for any potential recession into late 2020 at the earliest.” 

- On average the Trump administration has eliminated 14 unnecessary government regulations for every new government regulation that his administration put in place, blowing away his campaign promise to drop 2 regulations for every new government regulation.

- The median household income is up $4,000 since Trump became President.

- A new NPR/PBS/Marist poll shows that Trump is trusted more than the media and Congress with 31% saying they trust Congress, 29% saying they trust the media, and 40% saying they trust Trump.

- Trump signed an executive order that aims to improve the fiscal health of Medicare and offer more affordable Medicare plan options.

- Trump dedicated $25 million to support the U.N. effort to promote religious freedom around the world and fight genocide against religious groups.

Okay, let’s stop the list here, you get the idea. Another 27 items of success from the Trump Presidency. The previous posts under this topic found hundreds of other successes and good things since Trump took office. Higher wages, better job opportunities, higher economic growth, better approaches to health and drug addiction, stronger actions and respect in foreign affairs, reductions in government bureaucracy, hardly the disaster that liberals, Democrats, and Hillary Clinton predicted.

For those of you that have hated on Trump since day one, and given your obvious gross error in judgment relative to Trump given the hundreds of accomplishments we have previously listed, let me ask that you to do us all a favor by implementing the following changes in your behavior and attitude:

• Chill out, tamp down your TDS affliction. No matter how much you hate Trump on a sexist, personal basis, get over it. He is the legally and duly elected President, he will be around for a while so refocus your hatred on more constructive issues and matters. You will live a lot longer if you take your hatred out of your heart and soul and devote it to something positive.
• I would really appreciate it if some of you would apologize to the Trump voters you have disrespected in some of the grossest terms possible over the past year. You have called millions of voters racists, ignorant, stupid, Nazis, KKK members, and other horrible names simply because you disagreed with their voting choice. No American should be called such disgusting names simply because they exercised their Constitutional rights to the best of their abilities. Plus, slandering over 60 million Americans is no way to unite the country and get it focused on the real issues facing us all.
• More personally, I would like, no I am demanding, an apology from some of you for your slanderous and disgusting name calling because in doing so, you insulted and disrespected my sister, my family members, my friends, and my co-workers who simply voted their conscience. I will defend their right to vote anyway they wanted and will no put up with your childish and vicious venom and bile directed at them, very important people in my life.
• And finally, I challenge you to read the following blog post, a post that shows quite clearly that it was hateful people like some of you and your silence during the Obama years that actually caused Trump to be elected. Thus, the people you hate for voting for Trump are actually looking back at you in the mirror:

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2016/03/how-american-liberals-and-washington.html

If you were silent in the dozens of instances listed in this post then you were responsible for the very thing you hate: a Trump Presidency. Or put another way, a so far successful and productive Trump Presidency. Hundreds of accomplishments in just a few years is not too shabby despite many of you wanting both Trump and the country to fail.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

https://www.amazon.com/Walter-Bruno-Korschek/e/B002KYU08Q/ref=dbs_a_mng_rwt_scns_share

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:


http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

California Political Class Insanity and Socialism, Part 3: Bad Government Priorities, Bad Voting Processes and Cities Going Bankrupt

We have done any number of posts strictly focusing on the crises in different California cities, from going broke to large homeless problems to medieval diseases making a comeback. What was once the land of opportunity is now the land of impending disasters on several fronts, fronts we will be exploring in a series of posts.

Before going further, let’s review a few California realities we have covered previously:

• There are upwards of 30,000 homeless Americans roaming the streets of San Francisco.
• Without a home to go to, the city has made it legal to defecate, urinate,and shoot up drugs anywhere in the city including in public and on the streets of the city.
• This has led to a public health hazard and has caused the city to hire five full time government employees who go around the city each day in hazmat gear to pick up human feces and to clean the spot where it was found.
• Things are so bad that residents can use a city cell phone app to report where they found piles of feces.
• There are upwards of 60,000 homeless Americans in Los Angeles that is causing some of the same problems that are going down in San Francisco.

Public defecation and urination in LA is causing health problems in that city which has actually led to the outbreak of at least one medieval disease, typhus, and the concern is that the bubonic plague may also make a comeback, given how the exploding rat population has fed off of the garbage that homelessness causes.

The reason we are doing so is to point out that the state that has had the most far reaching intrusions into freedom and citizens’ lives, the state that has put its nose into every aspect of citizens’ lives, the state that has has misspent and overspent its way way down the road of bankruptcy, and the state that has reduced the freedom of its citizens the most is the state of California. The state is by far the most socislistic state in the union and has basically been ruled by a single party for decades, the Democrats. 

And since a number of Democratic candidates for President have basically declared themselves to be socialists, I thought it might be an interesting subject to explore what would happen if socialism took over the whole country. What would it look like if the country took on the aspects of socialism and Democratic rule that has swept up California. Warning: the future is NOT bright if California is the leading edge.

In our first two posts we discovered six current characteristics of living in California:

• The rate of sexually transmitted diseases is skyrocketing.
• Gas prices are about twice as much as the average price across the country.
• Citizens are enduring rolling electricity blackouts.
• Medieval diseases are making a comeback in Los Angeles.
• Solar panels do nothing for you when the electric company blacks out your area on purpose.
• San Francisco no longer feels like America.
• The state government financial situation is very bleak.

Let’s find out what other “adventures” Californians are living through:

1) America has been and should always be the land of the free where respecting others’ opinions is a given. But according to a recent article by Mairead McArdle, writing for the National Review website, California politicians not only force their control and ideas on California residents but they are trying to do the same with people outside of California:

• California politicians now have banned state sponsored travel to 11 states because they disagree with some aspect of those states’ laws and priorities.
• Iowa is the latest state to feel the “wrath” of California politicians.
• Apparently Iowa politicians do not want to use scarce Medicaid funds to pay for gender transition surgeries, preferring to use their limited funds for real sicknesses and real illnesses Iowans are suffering with.
• This ticked off California’s politicians so they put forth a ban that prohibits California state employees and college students to travel to Iowa using California state government money.

So, we know from previous discussions that there is a massive homeless problem in California, the state is going bankrupt, the state has seen the rise of Medieval diseases and the skyrocketing of STD disease rates, sky high gas prices and they are worried about what is going on in another state 1,500 miles away relative to tiny, tiny portion of the population in that other tiny, tiny state. Talk about bad priorities.

2)A recent report from KTLA discussed a voter registration study in California and the results were not good:

• Auditors found that in just a five month period that there were 84,000 duplicate voter registration records put on the voting books of California.
• In Los Angeles county there are 1.6 million more registered voters than there are eligible voters living in the county which is equivalent to having another city the size of Philadelphia in the state.
• Almost 20% of all counties in California have more registered voters than eligible voters.

It goes without saying that the potential for voter fraud and the destruction of one’s right to vote and their First Amendment rights is very high when the error range of your voting processes are so screwed up.

3) In our last California post we discussed the reality that the state of California has far more unfunded future liabilities than it has assets and tax revenue streams to pay for those liabilities. In fact, according to the Truth In Accounting organization, every California taxpayer would have to write a check to the state government for about $21,800 just to cover the debt shortfall, assuming that the shortfall does not get any larger, a highly unlikely event in that state.

The $21,800 is not the only check Californians would have to write from a debt perspective, seems that local government politicians have also dug their voters and constituents a deep debt hole at the city level:

• While Truth in Accounting gave the state government of California an “F” rating relative to its financial situation, it gives the city of Los Angeles a “D” rating, not much better.
• Every taxpayer in the city of Los Angeles would have to write a check for $6,000 to eliminate the unfunded debt liability of the city, meaning that a Los Angeles resident would have to spend $27,800 to keep their city and state governments from going bankrupt.
• But LA residents get off easy since if they lived in San Francisco they would have to write a check for $22,800 to help eliminate the deep debt hole that their city politicians have dug for their city, bringing their total debt burden to a whopping $44,600 to keep their city and state governments from going bankrupt.
• And the city debt burden per taxpayer is also bad in other California cities, $21,100 in Oakland, $4,000 in Sacramento, and $7,200 in Anaheim.

Thus, state politicians have created giant holes of unfunded liabilities at both the state AND local levels, holes that can only be filled by large increases in taxes or eventual bankruptcy.

So, what did we learn today about California politicians:

1. They have really bad priorities, worrying about a nit of an issue over a thousand miles away when major issues in their own state go unresolved.
2. Local California governments still do not know how to run an efficient and effective voter registration program.
3. It is not only the California state government that is likely headed towards bankruptcy because of its pathetic handling of the state’s financial obligations but local city politicians have also dug major debt holes for their city residents.

Combining the past three posts we see that the state of California, a laboratory for socialism and intrusive politicians, has resulted in: high rates of sexually transmitted diseases and the comeback of Medieval maladies, financial ruin, rolling electricity blackouts, bad priorities of politicians, high taxation, high homelessness rates, high gas prices, and a voting registration process that is out of control and open to massive fraud.

If California is a leading edge for the rest of the country, then this is the world we can expect.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

https://www.amazon.com/Walter-Bruno-Korschek/e/B002KYU08Q/ref=dbs_a_mng_rwt_scns_share

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:


http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w