Rebane's Ruminations
November 2011
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George Rebane

California’s carbon calamity is cranking up to full speed, destroying jobs and driving companies to other lands and states.  CARB is now the loose cannon in the state’s economy, putting into full force the dictates of AB32 (q.v.).  Even the unions are screaming about job losses and arguing that California’s carbon tax n’ spend will not affect global warming in slightest.  Meanwhile the green Europeans are rethinking the carbon calamity that they were planning for themselves.  More in ‘California’s New Green Tax’.  Oh yes, and we mustn't forget about the new industry of carbon tax farming coming to California.  Don't know about tax farming? then read this little ditty.

Who are the top 1% earners around here?  Russ Steele sent me a Dept Commerce census data covered in the Sac Bee (here).  Sounds about right.  The Occupiers ought get right in there and ferret out those people who are taking food out of the mouths of us 99% folks.  Is there no justice left in the world??!!

Our beloved Union couldn’t shoot straight on complex stuff like global warming.  Their article on physicist Richard Muller’s discovery that global temps have gone up in the last 50 years is supposed to be a big black eye for the “climate change deniers”.  I’m not aware of too many such deniers.  To be sure, there are skeptics of anthropogenic global warming, but it appears that reporting on such bright lines that separate the ‘deniers’ from the ‘skeptics’ is a still a bit difficult for a small understaffed newspaper.  No problem, the local Left was happy dancing in the streets.

The prominent proto-communist truthout.com is lamenting that police are acting with unwarranted brutality in the various cities where occupying is taking place.  In a “true democracy” police would act in a manner that support the law breakers.  “So imagine how it could be different, if we had a government designed to serve the people rather than keep them in their place. In a country with a true democratic culture the local governments would be serving these people and honoring their right to dissent and protest. They would instinctively be showing up at protests like this and offering to help with any sanitation problems, etc, setting up public toilets, and other services. They would even be offering tents. If there are security problems in the occupy camps a city would be posting police in the encampment to help the people there, with a clear mission to serve them.”  (emphasis in the original, read article here)  Maybe the cops could even soil their own cars so as not to overly inconvenience the occupiers sitting in their police supplied porta-potties.

Dana Perino of Fox News is historically challenged.  A couple of days ago in a gush she identified Steve Jobs as being “the best innovator in world history.”  The poor lady had not heard of Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, …, and thousands of other engineers and scientists whose fundamental discoveries changed the world.  Jobs, while no doubt a great product designer and marketer, was not in the same league with these historical giants.  Maybe there’s now a new politically correct definition of ‘innovator’ that puts Jobs into the top spot.

What happened in Greece between last Friday and this Monday to make the Dow climb 2.86% and then dive 2.26%?  Actually nothing, and that’s the quandary.  The market’s volatility attributed to the ups and downs of the next Greek financial palliative seems to be insane.  It doesn’t matter what the eurozone economical biggies (Germany, France) or the European Central Bank do or don’t do.  Greece will default on its sovereign debt, bet the ranch on it.  That paragon of union dominated socialism is so deep in the hole that Europe doesn't have a rope long enough to get them out.

The markets can’t be so dumb in the aggregate that they take seriously the impact of Nick calling Angela a ‘fatso’ and Angela calling Nick ‘shorty’ on Greece’s certain default.  It doesn’t matter how big of a check Greece gets to service its debt, even with the contemplated haircuts to the bond holders, Greece cannot grow out of its financial excesses, it has to default sooner than later.  Now if I know this, then all the money mavens in the world must know it.  Therefore the markets are being moved by something entirely different, and the media pundits writing headlines are either stupid (not ignorant), or they’re trying not to tell us something important – like the US is really headed for Depression2.

[update]  Today the Dow fell another 2.48%, ostensibly because Greek's proposed austerity measures, as the terms of the last EU bailout, will be turned down by the Greeks as they vote in a just announced referendum on said terms.  Now, dear reader, does it really matter in the scheme of things whether the pampered Greeks accept or reject the terms?  What changed?

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216 responses to “Ruminations – 1nov2011 (updated)”

  1. mike thornton Avatar

    I’m not changing the subject at all.
    I agree that violence (especially when you have no chance of winning that type of fight) is counter-productive.
    As far as message “clarity” the message is pretty clear. The way the system is currently operating doesn’t address the legitimate concerns of the 99%.
    There are plenty of people that have reform plans and alternatives that they articulate quite clearly and are ready to be implemented. Steve F. being one of them!
    The people in the streets are doing one thing and doing it very well. They’re saying “Things are #$%@-ed Up and We’ve had Enough!” “No More Business as Usual!”
    What’s really clear is that the Regressives and the “Gang of 8” only care about coporate funded “baggers” acting as shills for the very corporations that aren’t paying their fair share of taxes. Once again, you guys don’t care about rich people ripping off the system. I just wish you’d be honest about it and quit wrapping yourselves in the flag, while hiding behind a Constitution, that you really don’t believe in or a Bible, that most of you have clearly never read1

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  2. Todd Juvinall Avatar
    Todd Juvinall

    Yawn.

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  3. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    ‘The people in the streets are doing one thing and doing it very well. They’re saying “Things are #$%@-ed Up and We’ve had Enough!” “No More Business as Usual!” ‘
    That’s pretty much what I noted coming from the tea party populists. How is that Occupy Wall Street caucus coming along in the House and Senate?

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  4. D. King Avatar
    D. King

    “What’s really clear is that the Regressives and the “Gang of 8” only care about coporate funded “baggers” acting as shills for the very corporations that aren’t paying their fair share of taxes.”
    Yeah, and the other stuff and something!

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  5. Todd Juvinall Avatar
    Todd Juvinall

    [deleted]

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  6. Mike Thornton Avatar

    Well, GG, they’ve only been at it for a month and they don’t have the Koch Brothers pouring millions of dollars into the effort or a 24/7 cable “news” network (FOX) trying to make a national news story out of every time they fart, so I guess we’ll just have to see what happens…..

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  7. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    The New Yorker mentions the Koch bros. have donated $100 million lifetime total to libertarian causes. George Soros spent $24million for the 2004 election alone just to try to get Bush to lose, and in the last 10 years, Soros’ contributions to 527 organizations has dwarfed the Koch donations.
    Sorry, Thornton, the Koch’s are not the all purpose bogeymen you need them to be.

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  8. Mike Thornton Avatar

    No?
    This is the type of guy they’ve been funding to run for President
    http://www.sacbee.com/2011/11/03/4028989/the-herman-cain-crack-up.html
    And another BIG difference between Koch and Soros is that Soros funds things that would actually COST him money. The Kochs fund things that help them MAKE money!

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  9. Dixon Cruickshank Avatar
    Dixon Cruickshank

    Ya Thorton viva Libya – viva Egypt – you need a vacation don’t cha
    report back should be interesting, if you make it – k

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  10. Todd Juvinall Avatar
    Todd Juvinall

    The Koch brothers own many businesses all around the country that employ over 50,000 people. Soros trades money. I think the left would be down on Soros and up on Koch since they are crying about jobs.

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  11. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    Not any mention of the Koch’s in that link, Thornton.
    Gee, I’ll have to think for awhile how all that money to PBS has actually been lining the Koch Bros. pockets all along. Can you help me with connecting the dots?
    Soros made his zillions mostly under Democratic rule. Doesn’t seem to have hurt him at all.

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  12. George Rebane Avatar

    ToddJ – that’s a very interesting point which clearly deserves a counter from the Left (or a re-evaluation of Soros?).

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  13. Todd Juvinall Avatar
    Todd Juvinall

    We know there will be no counter, only a misdirection or change of subject. We who have a noggin with a bit of brains know the left is a phony baloney makeup of takers. Soros is a taker. He bets against countries currencies, undermining the very economies these OWS scofflaws say they are concerned about. But let me see, umm, who said that line about some enemy of my enemy? Well he is “our” enemy (lefty enemy/pal) per Thornton. Something like that. The left likes Soros because even though he is head of a corporate monetary empire, he is their head of a corporate monetary empire.

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  14. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    George, I made essentially the same point earlier in the threat. “Currency speculator and famed 1%-er George Soros has outspent the Koch bros on think tanks… at least the Koch family empire made their fortunes by actually making stuff.”
    Soros is as bad an actor as any on Wall Street, and was convicted of insider trading. A case can be made that his legendary spending on ‘progressive’ causes are his Indulgences.

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  15. RL Crabb Avatar

    The White House and the House of Representatives put forth competing proposals that they already know are dead on arrival, but will serve as talking points to rally the troops. The left wants to raid the bank accounts of the rich while the right seems to think the rich should get richer. All the while, actual human being citizens sink lower into the economic quicksand. There is growing concern that the ‘supercommittee’ will not be able to deliver the turkey before Thanksgiving.
    And you guys wonder why I refuse to support either of these decrepit, festering carcasses I laughingly call public servants? It’s time for a change.

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  16. Mike Thornton Avatar

    I’m just curious, what do Koch’s boots taste like?

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  17. Mike Thornton Avatar

    Here is a breakdown of Koch vs. Soros (as of 2010)
    http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2010/09/opensecrets-battle—koch-brothers.html
    It’s quite detailed and very interesting!

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  18. George Rebane Avatar

    An interesting spate of comments indeed –
    Apologies GregG for overlooking that observation.
    Bob, I thought it was guaranteed that the super committee’s delivery would definitely be a turkey.

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  19. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    I’m just curious, Mike, how does it feel to be a classic ‘useful idiot’?

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  20. Mike Thornton Avatar

    I think that’s a question that you should ask the rest of the: “Gang of Eight”
    The way you guys line up for your masters regardless of the facts would be impressive, if it wasn’t so blatantly idiotic

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  21. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    Funny, Mike, the opensecrets link was where I got my info on the Soros-Koch 527 contributions.
    How does Soros’ boots taste, Mike?

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  22. George Rebane Avatar

    Common guys, let’s not let this dialogue get too sophisticated for the rest of us.

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  23. Mike Thornton Avatar

    Anyone can “cherry pick” GG.

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  24. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    Cue “Fanfare for the Common guys”.
    The real fun may be at the next Democratic Convention, North Carolina. Could be the ’68 Chicago moot all over again.

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  25. Todd Juvinall Avatar
    Todd Juvinall

    Well George, they dodged it like we thought they would. Soros and his lackies are as Greg said, “useful idiots”.
    Besides, didn’t Soros collect the possessions of his fellow Jews as they were loaded onto the railroad cars? The man has no soul which makes him that much more attractive to the left.

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  26. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    Regarding cherry picking, there was plenty else that made it clear that Soros’ meddling with domestic US politics is rampant, and there’s just no way to sugar coat how he made the money he spreads around.
    Like the trust fund babies here, and in New York, folks who didn’t actually have to earn their money have a curious need to nudge the government to take away the money from other trust fund babies. Only problem is that not only are the coupon clippers making their living from corporations, but most middle class retirement funds are in the markets. The government draining more from corporations in the name of “fairness” is akin to a mobster skimming earnings from the casino. Taxes on all corporate earnings are eventually paid by the owners of the stock even if there is no corporate income tax.

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  27. Mike Thornton Avatar

    Who are the “trust fund babies here”?

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  28. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    Thornton, you don’t know any leftist trust fund babies in Nevada City?

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  29. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    Cue the Final Jeopardy theme while Thornton thinks about his answer.

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  30. Douglas Keachie Avatar
    Douglas Keachie

    How the Maunder minimum theory going Greg? You don’t know any trust fund babies locally do you, Greg? if you do, why be so coy? Jeopardy theme song while Greg reviews:
    http://www.space.com/13497-largest-sunspot-years-observed-sun.html

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  31. Douglas Keachie Avatar
    Douglas Keachie

    If the police don’t infiltrate protests, please explain the following video.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eCpcA5D-Lc&feature=share
    Of course as occupiers, they’d NEVER do anything illegal….

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  32. Douglas Keachie Avatar
    Douglas Keachie

    I guess Greg’s memory is no better than Herman Cain’s……

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  33. bill to0zer Avatar
    bill to0zer

    I can understand why the peaceful Occupy Oakland souls got rather upset last night. Sometimes people act that way when they perceive their belief system is sinking in quicksand. Just before the peaceful march by school teachers and various and sundry union members, the news from Colorado sent a shiver up their already jellyfish spines. Yep, Colorado. That Rocky Mountain state that boasts liberal bastions such as Boulder and turned from Red to Blue. The special election results came in and shocked Oakland. The good people of Colorada rejected outright all additional special taxes and levies to boost funding for the state’s public schools. The horrid news was a body blow and a call to arms and trash cans in Oakland. Oakland is little California city that already spends $18,000.00/per student and wants more, a bunch more. Guess the folks in Colorado finally got fed up with paying more and receiving less out of their public school system. Meanwhile in the little city called Oakland, teachers where chanting for more money given to them so the can continue the dumbing down of America. Who wants to pay more for less, a lot less? Time to light some fires.

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  34. George Rebane Avatar

    When will the ‘99%’ fiction crash and burn? Those people represent neither 99% of Americans nor American households. I am not in the 1%, so therefore I am in the 99%, and the Occupiers don’t come close to embracing my grievances with our current government, corporations, or body politic in general. And there are literally millions like me.
    I would though give them the 47% who don’t pay income taxes. For anything above that they will have to give stronger evidence than can be gleaned from their inane signs and mouthings. In sum, I’m not sure whether the folks, those who constantly refer to their representation of the 99%, are either butt stupid or just inept propagandists.

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  35. Douglas Keachie Avatar
    Douglas Keachie

    To0zer, 99.9% of those in Oakland stayed peaceful, and those that didn’t weren’t part of the movement in the first place. As noted before, the videos plainly showed that the Oakland police were switching between civilian and uniformed dress. not to say they were responsible for the actual acts, but I watched an apparent FBI agent do encouragements to violence in GG Park forty years ago. I thought he was odd at the time, and took a bunch of pictures.
    Later on that night, of all things he showed up at our commune, all chummy and palsy with some other members. I headed for the lab, processed the film, made prints, and went back to the house and showed him the images. He freaked and ran for the door and down the street, I ran after, and three blocks away he jumped into a brand new black Ford Galaxie with a bunch of antennas on top. Not much doubt about what happened, this is not a story I heard from elsewhere. I experienced it first hand. Prior to then, I would have poo-pooed such a tale.
    A million Rebane’s Ruminations in this country? I rather doubt that. you are more unique than you think, George.

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  36. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    Here I’m off doing other things, including getting hit by a Mexican driver who went over the centerline on Bitney Springs Road into my driver side door (got the left rear door, quarterpanel and rear wheel too) in an accident he caused this evening, and Keach gets impatient. Yes, it was what passed for my ‘good’ car. I think I’m mostly OK, couldn’t stomach dealing with the good old SNMH emergency room for being stressed out and headachey, doctor visit tomorrow will have to do.
    Keach, the solar magnetic connection to climate is alive, well, and getting stronger with numerous papers in the refereed literature added regularly, with the first CERN CLOUD experiment papers leading the way. The current cycle 24 remains much less active than originally forecast (not to mention most of the cycles of the last 60 years) and there is one group of astrophysicists who believe a grand minimum may well start with cycle 25 due to one major solar indicator currently in a linear trend leading to zero in the next cycle. And the Berkeley BEST data shows no warming in the last 13 years.
    I’m pretty sure Thornton knows at least one spoiled rich very left of center person active in Nevada City politics who is very comfortable due to inherited wealth. He’d have to be blind not to.

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  37. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    Keach took pictures of decades ago of bad old reactionaries provoking violence.
    Keach forgets that the left controls Oakland’s government, the left controls the state government, the left controls the executive branch of the Federal government and California’s Democratic governor was recently the mayor of Oakland, followed since by two other Democrats. I’m not sure where these provocateurs Keach theorizes would have come from.
    Perhaps the OWS fellow who took the crap on the cop car was actually a disgruntled Republican former FBI agent? Once you start thinking Keachie, the sky’s the limit. Or maybe the gutter.

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  38. Douglas Keachie Avatar
    Douglas Keachie

    Sorry about your misfortune, Greg, hazards of a rural lifestyle, but since the timeline of the comments was as follows:
    “Cue the Final Jeopardy theme while Thornton thinks about his answer.
    Posted by: Greg Goodknight | 03 November 2011 at 06:03 PM
    Douglas Keachie
    How the Maunder minimum theory going Greg? You don’t know any trust fund babies locally do you, Greg? if you do, why be so coy? Jeopardy theme song while Greg reviews:
    http://www.space.com/13497-largest-sunspot-years-observed-sun.html
    Posted by: Douglas Keachie | 03 November 2011 at 06:17 PM”
    You might understand why I was sort of expecting a response, as I would not have expected an trip to town at dinnertime, and not on a dark and stormy night. I’ve noticed that all of our various types of trees have dropped a tremendous amount of foliage in the last week, as have trees everywhere. I’m going to forgo going to the NU game in Rocklin tomorrow night, just as I have not gone into town today. Even on 49 I once had a guy slide clear into my lane, going up from the bridge towards town, on a frosty morning. We didn’t collide, but the guy following me did major damage to his little car. Tacoma unhurt.
    Glad to know science is moving forward, but I’m still not sure what body of data is allowing for such long range predictions, and no, I don’ t expect you to provide it. Twenty questions. Is the wussy fund baby male or female?

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  39. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    Interesting story in The Chronicle:
    “Developer with shotgun scared off Oakland rioters”
    http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/11/03/MNCM1LQ5FU.DTL

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  40. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    “Is the wussy fund baby male or female?”
    Yes, they probably are.

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  41. Greg Goodknight Avatar
    Greg Goodknight

    Here you go, Keach, from those reactionary Deniers at NatGeo:
    http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/06/110614-sun-hibernation-solar-cycle-sunspots-space-science/
    I’d have dug out the papers for you (the guys at Kitt Peak have a particularly interesting take) but I know you prefer pretty pictures.

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  42. Douglas Keachie Avatar
    Douglas Keachie

    I hadn’t even ever heard of the word, “gigaboo,” until I read it here.

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  43. RL Crabb Avatar

    Hey Greg, if trust funds are such a big deal to you, maybe we ought’a extend the death tax on these parasites so they’ll have to suffer with the rest of us. Where’s your libertarian sensibilites?
    Keachie – As someone who spent a lot of time in the People’s Republic of Berkeley, are you telling us that there aren’t a fair number of anarchists in that neighborhood who would love to burn down the establishment? Since no one has claimed responsibility for trashing the Men’s Warehouse, it’s anyone’s guess who threw the first brick, but automatically blaming the Kochs smacks of paranoid delusion.

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  44. RL Crabb Avatar

    Here’s a look at the Oakland chaos http://www.calbuzz.com

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  45. Mikey McD Avatar

    Greg, sorry to hear of ‘your’ car accident and glad it was not worse. You appear to be as sharp as ever.

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  46. Mikey McD Avatar

    “To compel a man to give money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical.”-Jefferson

    Like

  47. D. King Avatar
    D. King

    “One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas I’ll never know.”
    -Marx…G. Marx

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  48. Douglas Keachie Avatar
    Douglas Keachie

    “To compel a man to give labor for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, because it’s the only job he can get, is sinful and tyrannical.” quote modified to show relationship between democratic leaning non unionized worker and Tea Party boss.
    I do like pretty pictures, Greg, but a lot has happened since the article went to bed, so let’s both keep watching the skies.
    Shotgun is good, but only if you live to use it, but for nighttime special effects, a bunch of lasers scanning the streets below, and apparently remotely targeting the incoming perps, would be far safer. Up here, having a safe spot in the darkness, and a way to leave the house discretely, is probably your safest bet, if the are armed and outnumber/outgun you. Up here that is a real possibility, and based on the grows found, that’s just about all of this and the surrounding counties. In Oakland, a shotgun and you being lit well enough for it to be seen? Invitation to a bullet from a 15 year old.

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  49. Douglas Keachie Avatar
    Douglas Keachie

    For every left leaning trust fund baby in Nevada county, how many Righty trust babies are there?
    For those who need help fostering the enculturating their children into money, there is even a book and a website built around that book. The intro to that book has some very interesting statistics about the wealthy families of the USA.
    http://www.kwandc.com/

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