Category: Gummint

So Much For Security

Crime, Gummint

Here’s one that made me go “Hmmm”:

Cocaine trafficker, 28, was caught by police after moaning on encrypted phone network Encrochat about how Covid lockdown was affecting his international drug dealing business.

Now I don’t care about this asshole — he got 16 years, and that’s good — but I can’t help wondering…

No, I’m not wondering.  It’s clear that all this encryption protection that the public imagines they’re getting is no more than a figleaf.

And yes I know, EncroChat was nothing more than a criminal enterprise facilitator — but remember that it’s the Fuzz who decides what exactly constitutes a “criminal enterprise”, and if they could penetrate EncroChat, they could have — and may already have — penetrated any encryption system or software.

Caveat emptor.

Age Limit

Elections, Gummint

There are several reasons why there are age limits set for holders of public office — the POTUS has to be over 40, for example — but here’s a classic case to support why youngins need to be kept away from the levers of power:

[Democrat lawmaker] Aaron Coleman, 21, was arrested early Saturday morning on suspicion of drunken driving, the Kansas Highway Patrol said. Coleman was already out on bond from him being detained over suspicions of domestic battery.

But that’s not all, folks!

Coleman has been a regular source of controversy in Kansas since he was elected in 2020. A legislative committee reprimanded the 21-year-old Democrat in February due to alleged past abuses against girls and young women. He was also barred from the Kansas Department of Labor due to alleged “disruptive, intimidating and berating behavior.”

And:

The Kansas Democratic Party withdrew its support of Coleman in 2020 after he admitted to posting revenge pornography.

Talk about an overachiever… this being the 2020s and he being a Democrat, I wouldn’t be surprised if he runs for President, next.  Never mind that Constitutional nonsense, it’s racist or something.

I know, you want to know what this little shit stain looks like:

Thomas Jefferson would be so proud.

“Losing”?

Gummint, Law and Order, Media Assholes, Military

I yield to no man in terms of my respect for Victor Davis Hanson, but I’m afraid the worthy professor is extremely late to this party.

Losing Confidence in the Pillars of Our Civilization
Millions of citizens long ago concluded that professional sports, academia, and entertainment were no longer disinterested institutions, but far Left and deliberately hostile to Middle America.
Yet American conservatives still adamantly supported the nation’s traditional investigatory, intelligence, and military agencies — especially when they came under budgetary or cultural attacks.
Not so much anymore.

He then enumerates said institutions:  the FBI, the military (senior officers), Big Tech / Woke journalism, federal health agencies, and the criminal justice system in general.

I will admit that the above are relative newcomers to the conservatives’ hall of shame, but as we all know, we’ve always loathed and distrusted the alphabet soups of the IRS, ATF and DHS, as well as Cabinet departments like the EPA, Energy, Interior and Education — to name but a few.

Wake up, VDH:  they’re all on the shit list.  They are very close to being — and in some cases very much already — not the “pillars of our civilization”, but active destroyers thereof.

And if you Readers want proof of this, ask yourself this question:  would you rather deal with your local law enforcement, or the FBI?  Your county tax office or the IRS?

Q.E.D.

When “Private” Isn’t

Gummint

Here’s an interesting story:

Jeremy Clarkson has been granted ‘urgent’ planning permission to build cattle shed – in time for his herd to calve in the New Year.

To any American farmer, this would cause a certain amount of head-scratching:  you need a new shed on your farm, you build it.

Not, of course, in Britishland, where ownership of property gives one no rights at all, except of course the obligation to pay taxes on it.

And if the “emergency” part hadn’t been granted, requiring an endless wait while the permission process wound its tortuous way around bureaucratic inertia, “public” input (objections from people who think farmers should be able to carry on with Saxon-era buildings) — resulting in Clarkson building an “un-licensed” shed to save his calves’ lives — why then, he’d be fined and forced to tear the thing down.

Government at its finest.

Market Response

Business, Gummint

This article is proof, as if any were actually needed, that the general public, very much including journalists and most politicians, have no clue when it comes to basic micro-economics:

Bus drivers have been flocking to jobs with haulage firms as HGV operators when companies were desperate and were handing out large signing on bonuses.

Like this should come as a complete surprise.  You have a heavy-duty driving license and are working as a bus driver, when an opportunity comes to do essentially the same job but for much, much more money.  What should you do, oh what should you do?

But let us never forget that a bad situation can always be exacerbated by government regulation:

They said the [public transportation] industry had put in place plans to hire new workers but said they were being put off due to delays in sorting licences.

…which delays are because of government red tape, as evidenced by the very next sentence:

The CPT urged the government to ensure training them was as ‘streamlined and efficient as possible’.

I’m sure that the government is getting right onto that.