…comes today’s prediction:
Now that the 2025 elections are over, the government shutdown is going to end in the next few days.
Category: Politics
Trying not to start the public floggings
Stopping The Slide
We’re all familiar with the “slippery slide’ argument when it comes to laws and social policies (a.k.a. the “camel’s nose under the tent” expression).
Yesterday in Texas we went to the polls to vote on a series of propositions that either change or underline the Texas constitution.
The one proposition was that in order to vote in the state of Texas, you have to be a U.S. citizen. Now one might think that that is understood to be the case — except of course when shit-holes like Boston or San Francisco allow non-citizens to vote on “local “matters.
Well, that ain’t gonna happen in the Lone Star State, should our local shit-holes (like Austin) start getting any ideas. Best of all, of course, is that by making it a constitutional issue, Texas has the right to demand that voters show proof of citizenship before being allowed to vote. (With my very non-Texas accent, I always take my passport with me to the polls, just in case. Of course, I do have my voter’s card and driver’s license, and I’m on the voting roll anyway, but I have absolutely no problem with producing my U.S. passport if anyone wants to see it.) This is not an issue to mess around with, and I’m glad we’re going all hardass on the topic. [Update: it passed, 75-%25%.]
All the other propositions / amendments had to do with taxes, and when doing my research on each of them, I grinned broadly because they seemed to fall into two camps: “This tax is bullshit and it needs to be whacked” — e.g. that farmers have to pay a tax on animal feed. There were a few like that.
The other group of propositions are all preventative in nature, because unlike the U.S. Constitution, a product of the Enlightenment, the Texas constitution is very much proscriptive as well, i.e. we’re not going to trust the government to abide by goodwill alone: the damn government isn’t allowed to do this or that specific thing — in fact, a whole lot of specific things.
My favorite? The one that bans any kind of estate tax — okay, a “death” tax.
“But Kim… Texas doesn’t have a death tax.”
Quite right. And now that it’s expressly forbidden by our state constitution, there’s never going to be a death tax in Texas.
I voted in favor of all the propositions.
And by the way, I thought that the polls weren’t going to be too busy. In fact, the line of waiting voters was well over 200 yards long, and it never fell below that in all the time I was there. [Update: all the results are here. The margins are about what you expect.]
We take this “restricting government” thing very seriously here, deep in the heart of
Chamber Of Horrors
Good grief. Imagine being a centrist Democrat (if such a beast exists anymore), and being presented with this list of presidential candidates at the polling booth:
I would demand a pistol with a single cartridge in the chamber, just to avoid making a choice out of that lot.
Too bad that even the most centrist of Democrats hate all guns, so that option wouldn’t be on the table, so to speak.
But for the typical raving loony Democrat voter of today, that list is an embarrassment of riches.
Rats, Sensing Danger
As Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani surges ahead in New York City’s mayoral race, residents are racing to secure homes in the leafy, affluent enclaves of Connecticut and Westchester County — driven by anxieties over potential policy shifts that could reshape the city’s economic and social fabric.
These, I think, are people who are tied to NYfC by their jobs on Wall Street or wherever, and can’t join the hordes of Noo Yawkers who have already fled for Florida, Texas and anywhere that’s not the Northeast. So they have to leave the Upper East Side, but can’t go too far away from Downtown.
Hence: Connecticut and locales outside the Five Boroughs.
“Many buyers are mentioning concerns about the mayoral election as a key driver.”
Buyers repeatedly voice worries about rising levies, public safety and urban livability under a Mamdani administration.
Like NYfC isn’t a big enough shithole already.
As Stephen Green points out:
The guy isn’t even elected yet, and already the sheep he counted on fleecing are fleeing instead.
And as one famous ex-Manhattanite might put it:
Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of assholes.
Gollum Dreams
I see that the Socialists’ favorite little mascot has been getting out of control again:
Democrat strategist James Carville spelled out his “fantasy dream” for punishing Trump “collaborators” after the president leaves office in 2029 — he said their heads should be shaved, they should be clad in orange jumpsuits, and then marched down Pennsylvania Avenue while the public spits on them.
The 80-year-old political consultant unleashed the tirade Wednesday on his Politics War Room podcast while discussing the Trump administration’s higher-education reforms with co-host Al Hunt. Trump has moved to reward colleges that commit to ending institutional practices targeting conservative viewpoints.
Carville labeled universities that accept the reforms as “collaborators,” then said his “fantasy dream” is to see them punished when President Donald Trump leaves office in 2029.
“My fantasy dream is that this nightmare ends in 2029. I think we ought to have radical things. I think they all ought to have their heads shaved.”
He went on to paint the scene in graphic terms.
“They should be put in orange pajamas and marched down Pennsylvania Avenue, and the public should be invited to spit on them,” Carville continued. “All of these collaborators should be shaved, pajama-clad, and spat on.”
Ummm okay. One quick question for Gollum, though:
Exactly who is going to shave those heads, who is going to force them into orange jumpsuits, and who is going to round them all up from their home towns and take them to D.C. en masse for your little hate fest to happen? The FBI? Secret Service? Antifa squads? (Okay wait, that last one is no doubt exactly who he’d nominate.)
The old saying is when you scratch a liberal, you’ll find an evil totalitarian lurking underneath the skin. My take is that nowadays, no scratching is necessary.
On the other hand, if we’re going to follow this train of thought, perhaps (in the spirit of pure scientific curiosity of course) we should go further than a little scratching, and skin a few people like Carville alive just to see how true the original proposition is.
And if someone were to turn my question around and ask who I think should do the actual skinning, I’d have to call for volunteers among my Readers (some of whom may well have skinned animals after a hunt, and therefore have the necessary expertise not to say enthusiasm).
All right, you may all go off to that warm and wonderful place and play with your skinning knives while crooning to them: “Soon, soon, my preciousssss.”
And now, a quick poll for you, O My Readers. Here’s a quick selection of knives that would probably serve someone well in the scientific skinning of (say) James Carville. They are (top down): Puma White Hunter, Kershaw Skinner, and Anza Skinner.
Given this selection, which would be your choice? Answers in Comments.
Note to Carville: We all have our little fantasies, Gollum. As for that “spit” thing, mine differs from yours in one crucial area…
More Like This, Please
It seems as though some people — quite a lot, really — have been Very Naughty and fraudulently voted in more than one election and on more than one occasion in each election.
Ohio Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose on Tuesday announced that he has referred more than 1,200 criminal cases related to election integrity to the Department of Justice for consideration of federal prosecution.
The state election official’s recommendations include 1,084 noncitizens who appear to have registered to vote unlawfully in Ohio, including 167 noncitizens who appear to have voted in a federal election in the past four election cycles.
LaRose said nearly 100 other people also appeared to have voted in a federal election twice in two separate states, and 16 people who allegedly voted twice in Ohio in the same election.
And if this has happened in Ohio, I’d suggest that it’s happened more often and for a longer time in garden spots like California, Illinois and New York, to name just the most likely suspects off the top of my head.
Of course, voting fraud is an actual felony, but if you think that anyone is going to see the inside of a jail cell for this crime, I would suggest that it’s time for you to go and clean out your unicorn’s stable.
As to which party might have benefited from all this skulduggery… let’s just say that I’m not accepting bets.