We the iSheeple

June 2013
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We the iSheeple

04 June 2013

George Rebane

The RR category ‘We the Sheeple’ has been renamed ‘We the iSheeple’ in order to keep up with the times that require starting certain words with the lower case ‘i’. Except for some outrageous ideas wrangled in these pages, RR has been pretty staid in its approach to format and matters of eye candy. During the life of this commentary there has been a steady rise in the number of media reports that acknowledge, nay, confirm that we live in a land of the ill-informed, insouciant, inane, ignorant, insane, and idiotic – hence the real reason for adorning Sheeple with an i, for it gives meaning and therefore belongs there.

For the few that may care, the i that metaphorically broke this camel’s back was a couple of insane non-sequitors in the 3jun13 Union. It seems that a band of idiots gathered recently to deny elephant rides to children attending this year’s upcoming Nevada County Fair. These same people are the local representatives of known regional and national organizations that concern themselves with such things as ethical treatment of animals and children’s safety, and other matters that in their daily round iSheeple are not capable of handling themselves.

And then we come to a local moving & storage company that now has to get rid of its perfectly good trucks and replace them with new ones prescribed by CARB, the enforcer of our state’s mega-albatross job killer AB32. To the tune of $1.3M they will comply with this certifiably insane legislation and accede to the mandated purchase of fourteen new vehicles that purportedly will sport cleaner engines. The result of the costly exercise will have absolutely no measurable effect on any clean air metric you care to dredge up, let alone any effect on providing a better quality of life to earth’s inhabitants.

Of course I could go on, and perusing my past posts shows that I have done so in abundance. More than ever, and with each passing day it is beyond any lingering reasonable doubt that we have become a nation of iSheeple – the ill-informed, insouciant, inane, ignorant, insane, and idiotic.

Posted in Agenda 21, California, Critical Thinking & Numeracy, Nevada County, We the iSheeple

164 responses to “We the iSheeple”

Michael Anderson

04 June 2013

Good stuff, George.
“Doctor Allenby: This won’t hurt a bit.
[Sticks Chance with a needle]
Chance the Gardener: It did hurt.
[Riding in a car for the first time]
Chance the Gardener: This is just like television, only you can see much further.
[With other poor black seniors, watching Chance on TV]
Louise: It’s for sure a white man’s world in America. Look here: I raised that boy since he was the size of a piss-ant. And I’ll say right now, he never learned to read and write. No, sir. Had no brains at all. Was stuffed with rice pudding between th’ ears. Shortchanged by the Lord, and dumb as a jackass. Look at him now! Yes, sir, all you’ve gotta be is white in America, to get whatever you want. Gobbledy-gook!
Chance the Gardener: I like to watch.”

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Ryan Mount

04 June 2013

It does seem we’re wasting a few hundred years of progress, not to mention our dwindling hegemony and colonization efforts, on a bunch of unworthy dorks. All that work for nothing! (It’s like a plot out of a Monty Python or Mel Brooks film) I think I would be more tolerant of these nihilistic dorks if they actually understood what hegemony and post-colonialism meant and were attempting to unwind that, for better or worse.
But instead, as George I think has rightly pointed out, it’s all bread and circuses for the masses of well-fed, well-entertained* (yet bored), entitled slobs.
* I took a risk the other day and asked someone who was on unemployment why they needed a data plan for their iPhone. Or even a smartphone. (I realized I was channeling my Calvinist Mother.)
His answer was, “In case I get a call for a job.”
I asked, “How many job offer calls and interviews requests have you received in the past 3 months?”
“None,” he said.
We used to joke that we’re the only people on planet Earth with overweight poor people. Now it’s more like we’re the only people on planet Earth where one can be unemployed and have a $79.00 mobile data plan.

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Bill Tozer

04 June 2013

“We used to joke that we’re the only people on planet Earth with overweight poor people. Now it’s more like we’re the only people on planet Earth where one can be unemployed and have a $79.00 mobile data plan.”
Excellent! Yes, the solution to our urban decay and falling apart urban infrastructure is to go mobile, lol.
Just saw my step brother who I haven’t seen in years at a funeral. He is 50 and went out and plunked down 80k for a used cement truck 4 years ago. He is struggling to make the payments and has cleaned out his savings to stay afloat. Now, he has been told that his cement truck needs to go to the junk yard and he must to come up with $180,000 to buy a new shinny California Compliant cement truck. Kinda hard for a one man business. He asked me if I was hiring. He figured he would be better off in the long run just going working somewhere punching the ole time clock.
Old joke: Son says to father “Daddy, I have the smallest ding-ding in the entire high school. Is it because I am Asian Daddy, is it?” The Father replies “No son, it is because you are 11 years old.”

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Russ Steele

04 June 2013

A new Gallup poll reports that only a very small majority of Americans are closely following what is happening with the Obama Administration’s scandals. Why should individuals who do not pay taxes worry about corruption at the IRS? Why should MSNBC and CNN worry about what happened to Fox News Reporters. I think it all goes back to our schools, who are run by administrators and teachers that are not much more smarter than the students they baby sit each day. We now have two generations of dumbed down students, who are now ethically and culturally damaged. They do not have the ability to understand the significance of what is happening, if they even took the time to care.

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Steve Frisch

04 June 2013

Hey Michael, you manage to get all of my favorites out here eventually. I am often reminded of Chance when I drive by here.

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Gregory

04 June 2013

Et tu, Jay?
JAY LENO: President Obama says he’s renewing his efforts to close Guantanamo Bay. Guantanamo Bay? How about closing the IRS? Why don’t we do that?
[Thunderous applause]
How about shipping the IRS to Guantanamo Bay? That’s what we, yes! That’s how you do it.
[Thunderous applause]
Well, more problems with the IRS. A new report has found that they spent $50 million on employee conferences and retreats in just two years. They would have investigated sooner, but it turns out, you know, they don’t belong to any conservative groups. So nobody really noticed. They didn’t really see it. A little odd, yeah.
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2013/06/04/crowd-erupts-thunderous-applause-when-leno-says-obama-should-close-ir#ixzz2VGEFafXC
BTW, the applause really was thunderous.

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Scott Obermuller

04 June 2013

So who is hurt and who is helped by the new regs for ‘clean’ diesel engines? Small and independent businesses will be hammered or put out out of business. The large, ‘evil’ corps that the left hate will be helped by their competition being eliminated. Once again, the left blows some part of their body off and then blames the R’s.
Another problem is the left subscribing to the ‘broken window’ theory of economic growth. Having to replace the perfectly good trucks is great for the economy, they believe. Since the money comes from a printing press, it’s all good.
If you need any further proof of total stupidity, look at the new gun laws coming down the pike in good ol’ Kalifornia. Before you shoot up a bunch of school kids, you’ll need to pay 50 bucks and get a background check. That will be the only way in the world you can get ammo in this fine state. Yessir! And you’ll only be able to buy 12,000 rounds of ammo a month. The authors of this nonsense admit it won’t do a bit of good at stopping another Sandy Hook, but “it will at least make it a bit harder”. I feel so much better.

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Russ Steele

04 June 2013

Agenda 21 to become California law:
Proposed State Senate Bill 1, by Steinberg, would allow regional governments to create “Sustainable Community Investment Authorities,” unelected bodies with no voter oversight or approval. These non-voter approved “Authorities” would be ruled under the Community Redevelopment Law, essentially re-creating redevelopment agencies with the ability to use tax increment funds and eminent domain powers.

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Bill Tozer

04 June 2013

That other IRS scandal…you know the one where they sent millions of tax payer smackers to host a conference….well, it turns out not to be just any ole’ IRS shin ding. Nope. The IRS conference where they stayed in $3,500/night rooms and spent thousands parting down in the line dance was a special conference. That conference was for IRS employees who deal with the Small Business and Self-Employed Division. hahahaha. Talk about being out of touch. I should not laugh. The joke is on me and they get to keep their jobs. Truly the Great Divide is between the ordinary working folk and those that love the Gooberment.

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George Rebane

04 June 2013

RussS 1109am – I wonder how our liberal cricket brigades will respond to such news, now that we’ve been repeatedly assured that we have nothing to worry about being subjected to A21 provisions.

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Steve Frisch

04 June 2013

Re: Russ Steele 04 June at 11:09 AM
SCIA’s have nothing to do with A21.
SCIA’s are about creating TIF powers at the local government level to fund local projects, and the SCIA’s are made up of elected officials, under the same provisions as any other joint powers authority such as a regional sewer, transportation or economic development authority, and are subject to the Brown Act.
Russ, correct me if I am wrong, but you served on the Nevada County Transportation Commission, which is a JPA, and are an employee of SEDCorps, which is also a JPA. So you support the existence of what you characterize as “These non-voter approved “Authorities”, when you sit on them and are paid by them, but object to them when they have powers that you may not feel are appropriate.
I might note that the diagram explaining what the NCTC does looks eerily similar to the ven Diagram of sustainability. Is the NCTC an agent of A21?
http://www.nctc.ca.gov/About-NCTC/index.html
The same mechanisms for holding local elected officials accountable exist in this case that exist with any other board or commission that local elected officials sit on; don’t like what they do and you can show up, speak in public, make your issues known, and ultimately punish them at the ballot box.

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Scott Obermuller

04 June 2013

Yeah – right, Steve F. “and ultimately punish them at the ballot box.”
And who is stuck with the tab? We already have city and county govts with
taxing and spending authority.
Anything that has the words ‘sustainable’ and ‘investment’ in the title
involves investments folks won’t make with their own money and is sustainable
only with some kind of govt bailout that wasn’t talked about up front.

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Scott Obermuller

04 June 2013

I just read the proposed bill. It is nothing more than another redevelopment agency done up with some fancy language about ‘walkable communities’ and ‘energy saving’.
It’s lipstick on the pig. One thing you can be sure of is that the folks that happily vote for this pork will never live in or anywhere near one of these utopian villages.
I noticed that before they even get to the text of the bill, they make sure we understand that the prevailing wage law will be enforced. Redevelopment agencies haven been proven to be disasters. Brown ended them only to grab their money to help to ‘balance’ the budget. Now they’re trying to crank them up again.

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Russ Steele

04 June 2013

Steve Frisch@11:54AM
Neither of the organizations you mentioned have taxing or eminent domain powers. When I was on the Transportation Commission, when the issue of sustainability came up, I wanted a definition, and what I often got was just some A-21 talking points. The goal of A-21 is the development of regional governing agencies that do not have any elected control. Under some cases these agencies may not have to comply with CEQA, such as the high speed rail transit villages (modern ghettos) that are being forces on communities along Gov. Brown’s wet dream Choo Choo Train tracks.

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Ben Emery

04 June 2013

Ralph Nader calling America what it has become, fascist. We can also call it corporatism.
http://www.democracynow.org/2013/6/4/american_fascism_ralph_nader_decries_how
“It is not too extreme to call our system of government now ‘American fascism.’ It’s the control of government by big business, which Franklin Delano Roosevelt defined in 1938 as fascism,” Nader says. “We have the lowest minimum wage in the Western world. We have the greatest amount of consumer debt. We have the highest child poverty, the highest adult poverty, huge underemployment, a crumbling public works — but huge multi-billionaires and hugely profitable corporations. I say to the American people: What’s your breaking point? When are you going to stop making excuses for yourself? When are you going to stop exaggerating these powers when you know you have the power in this country if you organize it?”

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Russ Steele

04 June 2013

Steve Frisch@11:54AM
For the record, when I was on the Transportation Commission the second time, I was not on the Transit Commission JPA. The NC Transportation Commission was created by the Legislative, it is not a JPA.
Normally all the TC Members are part of the Transit Commission JPA, however the local left was very much against my rejoining Transit Commission as I had asked many difficult questions during my previous tenure about the cost of transit. There was a deal cut. I could join the Transportation Commission, but not the Transit, that seat would be reserved for a more liberal person, who was more about feelings than the hard numbers. I kept pointing out how much each one of those empty seats is costing tax payers every day and the transit buses weave about the community Not cool.
Let take this event and extend it to a regional joint powers authority. Just like in my case their would be a concerted effort to stock the board with many feeler, and no sharp thinkers who would be interest in doing some cost benefit analysis. As a result the tax payer would be left holding the bag for what ever the promoters of Agenda 21 think we need, rather than what the tax payers want.

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George Rebane

04 June 2013

BenE 432pm – Hope this doesn’t come as a shock Ben, but citing the worldview of Ralph Nader as some paragon of penultimate perception isn’t going to give you much traction here. No one doubts his sincerity, but to most of us his prescriptions are worth about one warm bucket of spit.

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Bill Tozer

04 June 2013

Hello Brother Ben:
Ralph Nader made most of his mula (that green stuff) investing in tech stocks. Tech stocks? You know them evil multibillion dollar corporations with few employees who are the USA’s biggest tax skirters. You know, them outsourcing off shore dudes who dream up ways to have a pizza delivered quicker to your apartment which is the meaning of life to them and their ilk.
If some oil company ever, ever even got close to skirting the amount of taxes Apple does, all hell would break loose. MSNBC’s Rachel Mylax would be snarling at the cameras every darn night and the Hill would be all a’twitter with Congressional hearings. CNN’s hosts would appear appalled and Maxine Waters would be shrieking (again) about nationalization and spewing misstatements and jumbled words (again) trying to read the talking points. Boxer would be screaming for another carbon tax and Ralph Nader would be skipping all the way to the bank. Pull your head out.

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Russ Steele

04 June 2013

I thought that State SB-1 proponents should know about the next big meeting to marry climate change and agenda-21.
The city of Bonn, Germany is currently the location of a big meeting for the United Nations and the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI). Two climate change conferences are being held there from June 3 through June 14. Bonn is also hosting UN climate talks aimed at creating a binding climate treaty by 2015.
But the planet is not warming. It has been cooling for sixteen years at this point despite Kerry’s lies that “the science is screaming at all of us and demands action.” Kerry will set the agenda for the U.S. delegates to the UN climate talks.
As many readers of this blog know the ICLEI was formed in 1990 for the purpose of promoting the UN’s vision of ‘sustainable development’ as embodied in a document called Agenda 21 You may think that it does not have any impact you locally? Wrong.
Those advocating Agenda 21 “insist that every societal decision be based on environmental impact, focusing on three components; global land use, global education, and global population control and reduction.”
In addition to worrying about the lack of global warming the ICLEI and UN delegates are in a sweat over the success of the Tea Party and other grass roots organizations who are pushing back on the work of local ICLEI committees. Add a few conservative think tanks who are dealing in real world data, some blogs like Watts Up With That and the fear gets palatable. Even this blog maybe adding to the concern.
Given the reaction of the Obama Administration, who set the IRS on the Tea Party and other conservative organizations, I can see why the UN and ICLEI are worried. The Tea Party is changing the game. We need to oppose SB-1, it is just more implementation of Agenda 21.

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Ben Emery

04 June 2013

George,
“but citing the worldview of Ralph Nader as some paragon of penultimate perception isn’t going to give you much traction here.”
It should, Ralph Nader is one of the biggest fighters against tyranny be it by governments or corporations on the planet. He has saved millions of American lives with his consumer advocacy . He is one of if not the most intelligent and educated person in our nation on how our government works and how corporations use the government to benefit themselves over the people. I didn’t think fascists/ corporatists like yourself and many of the “conservative” regulars at RR would be swayed but figured you would like to know what is being said about your ideology.

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Ben Emery

04 June 2013

Here is another group being targeted. I am sure you all will be outraged.
“On May 20, 2013, DBA Press and the Center for Media and Democracy  released the results of a year-long investigation: “Dissent or Terror:  How the Nation’s Counter Terrorism Apparatus, In Partnership With  Corporate America, Turned on Occupy Wall Street.”   The report, a distillation of thousands of pages of records obtained  from counter terrorism/law enforcement agencies, details how  state/regional “fusion center” personnel monitored the Occupy Wall  Street movement over the course of 2011 and 2012.
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Government_Surveillance_of_Occupy_Movement

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Bill Tozer

04 June 2013

Brother Ben, you finally posted something which is a good use of taxpayers dollars, lol. Welcome to Chicago style politics where no one is safe and only the government is above the law.
Nixon had his dirty tricks that was limited and focused in scope, but Chicago style government is unprecedented in our nation’s history. Welcome my brother to the real world.
For the low information voter, please use the 6 brain cells you have left and realize the Constitution is ALL about limiting the power of government, not limiting the power of the people. Brother Ben, we can now join hands and shout Amen!

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Bill Tozer

04 June 2013

PS to my Brother Ben: To be fair, OWS imploded under its own diverse weight. When that Councilwoman from Oakland joined their ranks and slept a night in the Occupy Park, she came singing a different tune. Even Queen Nancy changed her “power to the people” sympathetic attitude in short order. Occupy Wall Street just turned into a homeless camp by day and a good old fashion carnage fest by night. Throwing a couple of chairs through a Starbucks window ain’t going to start the revolution, especially when so many OWS sympathizers are rather fond of Starbucks. And trashing the local ATM’s kinda made it rather inconvenient for the locals trying to get cash to make posters and buy Marxist literature. But, when the revolution does come, my brother, there will be no more bull pucky or want or poverty or money or evil banks or hunger and life will be just one big love fest…until that naughty thing called pride and human nature rears its ugly head and the control freaks emerge once again, spouting poetry.

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Scott Obermuller

04 June 2013

Gee – the lefties here have their undies in a bunch about ‘fascism’. Been tryin’ to point that out for decades – just sayin’. How about trying to follow the US Constitution? Just maybe? Course it means no more goodies for the free loaders and loafers, so whoops – maybe you lefties will find fascism not so bad after all! Flip flop – flip flop.

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Scott Obermuller

04 June 2013

“He has saved millions of American lives with his consumer advocacy”
Really?
Name two.

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Ben Emery

04 June 2013

Scott,
You have to kidding right?
Have you heard of a seat belt?
Maybe if his advice was taken 3,000 lives on 9/11 could have been prevented with a small safety feature of reenforced cockpit doors. The Bush campaign gave him the nickname “Captain Cockpit” for this advice. You should read
Collision Course
The Truth about Airline Safety
Excerpt of review of the book by Publisher Weekly
“Their findings are sobering: planes of the major airlines are aging and sometimes corners are cut on inspections or repairs. Additionally, airports are increasingly overcrowded, which has an impact on both security and on airplane landings. Then there’s the FAA, whose performance is “inadequate.” Nader and Smith point out that the FAA is required by an executive order (enacted under Reagan) to conduct a cost/benefit analysis before promulgating safety regulations: i.e., the agency must weigh the expenses of new measures against possible loss of life. Concluding that the level of passenger risk is growing, the authors offer recommendations not only for the industry but also for individuals on making air travel safer.”

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Ben Emery

04 June 2013

Bill,
I have been an activist for over two decades and being targeted is nothing new, except for groups like the Tea Party who have been asleep for most of their lives. The revolution is taking place all over the planet including the US. It is happening incrementally at the moment but when the dollar crashes, which it will most definitely, the sh!# will hit the fan. We will see global chaos, which will result in bio regionalism on a political and resource scale. Unfortunately there will much suffering in the transition. Hopefully we can pull our heads out of our arses in time to minimize the hard times for billions of people.

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Ben Emery

04 June 2013

Bill,
Here is another example going on in Turkey right now. Peacefully protesting the tearing down of a park to put up a mall and they are getting hammered. Eventually young activists or just people getting fed up with the bs will begin to return the violence. That is what happened with Occupy in many cases also police provocateurs incite violence getting the ball rolling for a way overreach push back by police.
http://news.yahoo.com/woman-red-becomes-leitmotif-istanbuls-female-protesters-215621314.html
“In her red cotton summer dress, necklace and white bag slung over her shoulder she might have been floating across the lawn at a garden party; but before her crouches a masked policeman firing teargas spray that sends her long hair billowing upwards.”

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Bill Tozer

04 June 2013

Yep, the dollar will crash eventually. Can’t keep living on borrowed money and expect no consequences. Like the law of gravity, what you sow is what you reap. But no one wants to take the medicine. Even “austerity” has become a dirty word. Sustainability is grand if you got a chest of gold buried in the back forty.
The only reason we have the Fed and Central Banks across the world doing the monetary thing is cause governments refuse to do the fiscal thing.
Many years ago I read the Civil Defense plan in case of an all out nuclear attack on us. Pretty short document. Basically it said to pass out morphine to the masses. After pondering that for years, I have come to the conclusion that that was the best plan. Short and sweet. Give the masses morphine to ease their pain.
When the dollar crashes, it may be like the rescuers who traversed the Sierras to save the Donner Party. First thing they heard was a weak voice uttering “bread”. Yes, I omitted the Truckee Indian part.
So, what shall we do? Form some committee or think tank and come up with a plan that is better than morphine and bread? OK, no more big banks and no more lobbyists and no more….fill in the blanks. After coming up with the plan to save us from ourselves,, we look around and some killjoy asks “Where are we going to get the money to fund this project?” After throwing out ideas, we decide to get a grant from the gooberment, hire a lobbyist and….fill in the blanks. We have become “Da Man”, our foe. The enemy without has become the enemy within. And then there is the issue of the pesky US Constitution. The living document that refuses to die a quick death.

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Scott Obermuller

04 June 2013

Hey Ben – seat belts? That would be those things that my father put in our 58 Rambler. You said millions and I asked you to name 2 and you couldn’t name one. Not one!
I can back my postings with fact, reason and honesty. You can’t back a blind mule off a cliff.
Car And Driver loved to post yearly listings of how many human lives could have been saved if folks had just used the seat belts in the cars they drove. The number went so far past your 3K for your sainted Nader it isn’t funny. Every freakin’ year. Year after year. And they thought Ralph was an idiot. So your 3K don’t look so hot, does it? You want to talk lives saved? Actually, I don’t think you really do. Because Bush would soar so far past the sainted Ralph, you’d have to apologize. Bush’s initiatives against AIDS in Africa are recognised as saving tens of thousands of lives. So what are your metrics here? Number of lives saved? Or just left wing BS? 3K is peanuts compared to what others on the conservative side have saved. Try again.

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Bill Tozer

04 June 2013

Ben, thank goodness that fine young Turkish woman does not live in Iran or Egypt or Saudi Arabia or Libya or Iraq or Somalia or….fill in the blanks. She has a good pair of legs that looks rather splendid in her lovely red dress, if I may say so myself. Maybe the police security forces were just trying to blow some smoke up her dress to see if she had any suicide bombs in her undies.
I am so glad the UN is concerned about this terrible situation. Don’t know if I will be able to sleep tonight, but I probably will knowing the UN is on top of this travesty of justice. Its not fair. Am looking forward to seeing more of her. Peace out Bro.

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Ryan Mount

05 June 2013

Sometimes I get the feeling that some folk secretly, and not so secretly I guess, want the world to come apart into an all-out societal bar fight.
For some, it’s just a case of “I told you so” satisfaction. For others I suppose, they see no other course but to burn the barn down and start over. There are some would like to hasten the return of some savior who will come and put the barn back together for them.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQqq3e03EBQ

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Steven Frisch

05 June 2013

Russ Steele | 04 June 2013 at 02:30 PM
Well Russ, since you are playing the “guilt by association” game so popular amongst some segments of the populist revolutionary right, why does the very “Commission” you sat on use the Venn Diagram, the overlapping three circles that has become the virtual brand of the sustainability movement, as its primary outreach tool to explain their work? Why do they embed within that circle Nevada City, Grass Valley, Nevada County, Truckee and Caltrans? Could it be that they are engaged in “regional planning” for transportation? Isn’t it true that Caltrans is not elected, they are appointed, and they sit on the Technical Advisory Committee for the “Commission”? Isn’t it true that many unelected people sit on the various committees that set policy for the “Commission”? And although the Commission itself does not have the power to tax, don’t the people who sit on the “Commission” have the power to tax through their individual jurisdictions? Are you saying the “Commission” has no power over the jurisdictions that make it up? Funny I seem to remember that that is exactly what happened in the past: the “Commission” set regional transportation goals, and the Cities that make up the “Commission” put tax measures in front of their voters? None Dare Call It Conspiracy!

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Steven Frisch

05 June 2013

Russ Steele | 04 June 2013 at 04:38 PM
“For the record, when I was on the Transportation Commission the second time, I was not on the Transit Commission JPA. The NC Transportation Commission was created by the Legislative, it is not a JPA.”
So let me see if I have this straight, you were for it before you were against it? And you were against it only because ordinary citizens who questioned your judgement denied it to you?
The NCTC is both a “Commission” which includes unelected public members making decisions about how our tax dollars are spent, and a JPA making decisions about Transit. And you served on the JPA during you first stint, but not your second stint, but only because, ” the local left was very much against my rejoining Transit Commission”.
So you, as an unelected member of the public served on both a “Commission” which allocates tax dollars to transportation projects and a JPA that makes decisions about allocations of Transit dollars. So you were for it. But now you are against it? I’m a little confused, are you John Kerry or John Galt?

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Steven Frisch

05 June 2013

Steve Frisch | 04 June 2013 at 11:54 AM
“…and are an employee of SEDCorps, which is also a JPA. ”
Oh, and one more thing, you did not answer my question about being an employee of SEDCorps. Are you an employee [or contractor] to SEDCorps? I think you are, or at least have been in the recent past. Isn’t SEDCorps a JPA? Isn’t SEDCorps a private non profit corporation on whose board several elected officials sit? And don’t unelected private citizens also sit on the SEDCorps board? Don’t they receive tax dollars [and ratepayer dollars] and redistribute them according to “need”? And isn’t SEDCorps also a JPA, making decisions regionally? And didn’t you receive funding from SEDCorps to provide a service? And didn’t the funding to pay you come from the taxpayers and the ratepayers as part of a surcharge on their telephone bills imposed by the CPUC, another unelected entity?
I ask all my Tea Party friends out there, do you want to pay a surcharge on your phone bills so an unelected private non profit body can redistribute wealth and give it to Russ to run a blog for SEDCorps?
Really Russ, it is kind of hard to tell where your pocketbook ends and your ethics begin.

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Steven Frisch

05 June 2013

Russ Steele, “Commissioner”, ex-member of a JPA, ex-member of a regional governance organization that uses the Venn Diagram of Agenda 21 as part of its brand, getting paid by unelected people ratepayer dollars as part of a wealth re-distribution scheme.
This game is fun!

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Ben Emery

05 June 2013

Scott,
Yeah your dad had to put the seat belts in the car. Ralph Nader made it so seat belts were in all cars. Crash tests, non metal dashboards, safe windshields, gas tanks, and so on. All of which save lives and injuries every year. He was such a threat to the automotive industry, especially General Motors, they hired a team of private investigators to dig something up on him and when they came up with nothing tried to set him up.
In 2003 my wife and daughter lives were saved by the auto safety standards of today. Does that work for the two you were looking for.
I liked the Bush administration increase in Aids Relief but on just about every other issue he was horrible for humanity.

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Ben Emery

05 June 2013

Ryan,
“Sometimes I get the feeling that some folk secretly, and not so secretly I guess, want the world to come apart into an all-out societal bar fight.”
I wouldn’t say “want” but have accepted the idea that it is going to happen despite all the effort to prevent it from happening.

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Scott Obermuller

05 June 2013

“Ralph Nader made it so seat belts were in all cars”
And Gore invented the internet. GM made a nobody famous by spying on him.
Nader was a threat to GM? In what way? I’m sure he was an annoyance to some of the folks that managed GM, but we have already shown that the massive amount of regulation that the govt imposed on the car manufacturers helped GM by getting rid of smaller competing companies.
I’m not aware of the details of what happened to your wife and daughter, but will take your word that they were saved from injury or death because of the design of the car they were in and I’m glad to hear that. I seriously doubt that the design of that car had anything to do with Nader. Auto safety didn’t start with Nader and he only got to be a player of note because of GM’s stupidity and the resulting publicity. Americans can have far safer cars than what we have now and could always have had safer cars. It’s all a matter of what their collective priorities are and how much they want to be inconvenienced and how intelligently they want to drive.
Americans were far more interested in A/C and power steering and automatic transmissions and that’s what GM delivered. GM has always been happy to sell whatever the public wanted. If GM doesn’t have what you want, you are free to buy from some one else. In fact, that’s what happened and GM went broke. Now we taxpayers are 10 billion poorer so we could bail out the auto worker union at GM.
So GM is still making cars nobody wants. Since free market principles are not followed, we go downhill.
A govt run the way Nader wants would be a awful. He means well, but doesn’t have the intelligence to understand the end result.

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Ben Emery

05 June 2013

Scott,
I get it you really don’t understand how movement politics works and how citizen groups can really educate and affect legislation. Unfortunately money has overshadowed the needs/ wants of the average American so we are stuck with a government controlled by big business, which is screwing medium and small businesses. Those regulations that you don’t like are written by big business because only those with access to huge sums of capital can afford to comply. Or companies like Monsanto will receive an exemption from the regulations all together by getting a get out of jail free card.
My wife and daughter hit a tree going 50mph after my wife blacked out while driving. My wife was sandwiched on three sides with her door, engine/ dash/ and her seat. The seat belt kept her in her seat, the door/ seat being securely mounted to the frame kept her in the vehicle, and having a crash safe frame/ bumper reduced the impact. Our daughter broke her back in two, ruptured her intestines, and fractured her skull. My sister in law who is a doctor gave her a 50/50 after seeing the x-rays and reading the reports of her injuries. She was unfortunate enough to sit in the middle seat that only had the lap belt that morning but with no seat belt she would have perished for sure, so we are thankful. The recovery took years and dealing with the Blue Cross/ Blue Shield took even longer and was even more stressful once we got passed the first few critical days.
Our daughter graduates Nevada Union on Saturday possibly with a 4.0gpa and will be attending university in SF in the fall.

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Todd Juvinall

05 June 2013

I see the Frisch thinks he has some sort of “high ground” on Russ Steele since Russ was a Transportation Commissioner. What a hoot. Grasping at straws thgere Frischie. At least he did something good for his community. You on the other hand suck $100,000 a year plus from the taxpayers in your 501-c3. Shameful.

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Steven Frisch

05 June 2013

First, Todd, I do not get paid by the taxpayers, I get paid by a private non profit corporation who sometimes does business with the state, which comprises about 20% of our revenue, …..just like Russ. Second, you do not get to decide which activity is “good for [his] community”, that is a judgement made by all of the people. Sorry, you don’t get to exist in a baby state where you stomp your feet and get your way.
So if you are going to ding me you have to ding Russ at the same time.
As Greg pointed out here recently, being a member of a 501c3 is freedom of speech, protected by the Constitution since our founding, and a quintessentially American right.
Finally, I find your obsession with how much money I make hilarious…..it really sounds like class envy to me….similar to the class envy you said motivated liberals who critiqued Mitt Romney….. perhaps you should do something useful in life instead of sitting on your fat arse and hurrumphing all the time.

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Steven Frisch

05 June 2013

I should have known that Todd would not get the nuance of my posts.
By the way George, weren’t you on the planning commission, both here and in Simi Valley? Didn’t you serve on a citizens committee that wrote a General Plan in Simi Valley?
So the planning commission in Nevada County makes quasi-judicial decisions about individuals ability to exercise their property rights. Were you elected? No. You were appointed.

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George Rebane

05 June 2013

It appears that both the Left and Right foresee a high likelihood for blood in the gutters, and for pretty much the same reasons. The isheeple will be extremely distressed when Obama’s stash (or its future equivalent) runs out. DHS and FEMA are preparing for it.
Re implementation of A21 provisions. It’s not so bad if the ‘commissions’ get the people (even the isheeple) to vote on their propositions. The distinction that our Left misses is when such unelected bodies are able to get their dictates directly (and surreptitiously) into laws, regulations, and codes without the mediation of any consideration by the electeds or their constituencies.

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Todd Juvinall

05 June 2013

Steve Frisch doth protest too much. You rent seekers are all the same. I hear your testimony on the political shows and you all get the same talking and walking points. Just a bunch of sheeple as George has said. If you had a unique idea about the world then perhaps we would not dismiss you as easily as you make it happen. Regarding money and me. No, I am not jealous, I have all I need SteveF. I have seen scoundrels like you too many times try and twist words and their meaning to fit you illegitimate behaviors. (tax evasion etc.)
I usually blow by you absurd comments but trying to equate public service by Russ or George with your placing $100,000 a year in taxpayers money into your bank account is just too funny.

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Scott Obermuller

05 June 2013

Ben – I wasn’t being facetious about the accident. I was taking you at your word. My point was that Nader was not involved in any meaningful way in the design of the car your wife and daughter were in. He’s just a blow hard that got lucky with GM.
I’m quite familiar with your pie in the sky vision about how to be governed.
Money controls our lives and our govt only to the extent that we allow it to be the only honest player. Folks can talk and talk, but when it comes time to pull out the wallet, truth emerges. In a free market, money is just a convenient way to express a variety of things of value. Food, energy, labor, comfort – stuff. We need some of these things and so we need money.
Money doesn’t “control” politics any more than it ever did. If the electorate would invest time and energy to learn how things work, read about candidates, and ignore TV and radio soundbites, the total amount of money being spent on elections would go down but the wealthier campaigns would still (mostly) be winning. Popular causes and candidates attract more money than less popular ones. Every time I hear about ‘getting the money’ out of politics, it always ends up being a way to stop the conservative side from spending and the left is free to spend all they want. In fact, there is no way to get money out of politics any more than getting money out of our lives. As long as we have an uninterested and uneducated electorate, we’ll have bad govt. Money is just a symptom of the problem not a root cause. But if we take care of the root cause, you won’t like the results, so you just go after symptoms. And the disease rages through the body. And yes, violence is in the offing. I want a govt that primarily protects innocent citizens and their rights as outlined in the US Constitution. The folks that wrote the Constitution knew all about ‘redistribution’ of wealth. And they tried to forbid it in the fed govt. It will always lead to bad things. Always. There is no magic, proper way to do it. You want something going in a different direction.
Eventually, something has to give. Not looking forward to it and don’t know if and when it will happen. Just noticing that 2 trains are on the same track headed towards each other doesn’t mean we want a collision. We learn from history or we repeat it in some way.

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Ben Emery

05 June 2013

Scott,
Thanks for the thoughtful response. The role of government isn’t to redistribute wealth but shape and form our economic system to benefit the most people. Why? Because we are a democratic republic and our government should be representing the interests of the people not a small few that have been able to accumulate wealth morally or immorally. Free Trade is a perfect example of this phenomena. Free Trade Agreements have not served a majority of Americans well and in fact it has destroyed the middle class in my opinion. Both parties support them while a majority of Americans oppose them, who are our representatives serving? In supporting such policies who are our representatives serving, us or big money special interests? I could handle living in a conservative run nation if that was the will of the people but we have one of the most progressive electorates and yet have one of the most conservative governments in the developed world.

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Russ Steele

05 June 2013

Gee Wiz Ben, I did not know that citizens really did not like the lower priced goods at WalMart, Costco, Kmart and Target. I was unaware that they did not like the jobs that exports provide. Thanks for keeping me informed on these critical issues. /sarc

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Scott Obermuller

05 June 2013

Ben – Artificially propping up wages for a minority of union workers is redistributionism because free choice for me to support or not support those wages is eliminated. Nobody has a Constitutional right to any wage whatever outside of what they earn in the free market. If a worker has to compete against another in Columbia then that’s life. If anyone’s choice of goods or services is restricted by trade barriers, then they are being made to hand over money against their will. Your ‘progressive’ electorate votes to shop at WalMart. Remember my little talk there above about when the wallet comes out? That’s your progressive electorate voting and they’re voting for free markets. The Constitution is for everyone, but it doesn’t say everyone gets what ever they want. And there is nothing in the Constitution about everyone having a certain level of material goods. You have rights – not the rights to goods.

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Ben Emery

05 June 2013

Scott and Russ,
Where in the Constitution does it give permission for a non government non treaty organization or entity to have authority over US policies?
Do you guys understand the WTO courts supersede US law?
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/11/28/175797/as-trade-rulings-against-us-mount.html#.UbAVUoVOj-k

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