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  • Scattershots – 10jun25 (updated 13jun25)

    George Rebane

    Fossil Fuel Use and Human Progress: The Big Picture

    FossilFuelsMore here (H/T to reader).

    The Left’s riot lies are now historically astounding (more here).  And what makes this both sad and dangerous is that your Democrat neighbor completely believes what s/he hears from Maxine Waters, Hakeem Jeffries, Chuck Schumer, and the other leading leftwing liars of the land.

    [13jun25 update]  The countrywide ‘No King’ demonstrations scheduled for this weekend will truly be historic, especially when combined with the concurrent military parade in DC celebrating our Army’s 250th birthday.  The demonstrations illustrate the magnitude of the Left’s frustration over their ineptness in the political arena while at the same time providing ample evidence of a highly organized socialist cabal that forms the real foundation of today’s Democratic party.  My druthers would be to hold the parade on July 4th, a more appropriate date that would not coincide with President Trump’s birthday, which itself plays into the hands of the Left’s assertion that Trump is acting like a king and is seeking dictatorial control of the country.  When was the last time that America held a military parade composed of hundreds of combat vehicles and marching troops that mimic the parades common in dictatorships like China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea?

    Senator Padilla (D-CA) is a nationally ignored, desperate leftwing low-life jerk who staged yesterday’s rude interruption of Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem’s press conference.  His anonymous entrance and shouting harangue under the guise of “just trying to ask a question” fooled no one even after his identity became known.  Well, that’s not entirely correct – it did fool a good half of the nation (also represented by the No King demonstrations), those who immediately fell in line with the contrived outrages by the Democratic leadership and promptly echoed by their lapdog lamestream media.  On their part the conservative media – e.g. Fox News – has not been smart enough in their reporting to include the fact that even if Padilla had identified himself, it still would have been impolite, insolent, and illegal to burst into a scheduled presser by a senior administration official, demand its peremptory interruption, and then dominate the proceeding with his own agenda.  Even though US senators are above the social norms of good behavior, they are not above the law.

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  • Sandbox – 2jun25

    [Low cost vs affordable housing is available in the re-introduction of ‘carriage houses’.  The folks in Noblesville, Indiana are discovering that “these units cost considerably less than single-family dwellings and create accessible points into and out of homeownership while preserving neighborhood character. They also have the potential to provide rental income to help property owners afford their mortgages.  Few cities and towns are immune from rising material costs and expensive land. But we control zoning and permitting. We should expand housing options without compromising community character.” gjr]

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  • America’s Millionaires

    George Rebane

    [This post appeared (here) in the op-ed pages of the 4jun25 Union.]

    On average, all of us in America are millionaires.  In 2022 the average household net worth – assets minus debts – hit $1.06 million.  But that hopeful number is skewed by the ultra-wealthy.  The more accurate net worth of $192,900 is provided by the median where half of households have more than that, and the other half less. (more here)

    Unfortunately, many households are also living close to their paychecks because most of their net worth is unspendable – locked up in assets like their homes, 401Ks, cars, etc.  The further problem is that while wage growth is real – up 4.8% last year with inflation at 2.7% during the same period – the prices of things from real estate, appliances, vehicles, and other stuff also increased enough to pretty much eat up real wage growth.

    The problem with all this is still government at all levels with its taxes, fees, laws, regulations, …, not counting its ongoing waste, fraud, and abuse, that continue to slow our economy’s growth and impede our makers from producing things at costs that people can more easily afford.  And the ONLY way out of this financial morass is to promote vigorous economic growth that raises all boats – taxing our way to wealth has never worked and is not a reasonable option.

    The road to vigorous economic growth is not a secret.  Non-socialist economists have taught and demonstrated for years that nations’ sustainable growth is based on maximizing free market capitalism and minimizing governments’ role in their economies.  Most students of economics know that any program is unsustainable which continues to consume an increasing fraction of the GDP of a nation, state, or local jurisdiction.  Our governments at all levels are riddled with unsustainable spending which is ‘solved’ by ever greater borrowing.

    And wealth redistribution is not the answer.  First, because the rich don’t have enough of it, and second, because wealth is mobile – it escapes to where it is not confiscated.  A current example of this in America is the mass movement of the makers from high to low tax states; these not only by the rich, but also from the middle class (enough to cause some avaricious states to lose congressional representation) .  A more serious problem arises when a nation’s makers emigrate to distant lands, leaving behind countries with growing fractions of takers.  Recent examples of this can be drawn from the mostly socialist Europe.

    We are now witnessing ‘London’s Great Wealth Exodus’.  After Moscow, the biggest loss of millionaires are those leaving the UK, which amount to 30,000+ over the last ten years, with 11,000 of these emigrating in the last year.  For generations London has been one of the best places in the world for the rich – not any more.  Due to its restrictive financial landscape it has not recovered from the 2008 recession and continues to maintain a risky environment for financial and commercial growth through ever increasing taxes piled on by both Conservative and Labour governments.  New financial centers in Asia and the Middle East are now the new favorite places for the world’s rich. (more here)

    All is not yet lost in the US.  Here a new resurgence of hope has enabled all levels of our economy to grow, and that includes the number of millionaires which increased by 12%, albeit at one of the world's lowest rates.  In the last years we’ve shown ourselves to be very inviting for millions of the world’s financially impoverished. But we also continue to be the land of opportunity for the makers, both homegrown and imported who are investing new billions in our country on the promise of economic security and profits.  These are people who will grow the pie for all of us, and hopefully put to shame those who, according to their lights, only seek to forcibly redistribute the current pie more ‘equitably’.

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  • California’s $8 gasoline

    George Rebane

    With most of the state’s refineries already gone, and two more packing up to leave, and with more planned refinery exits in the works, the state is heading for a transportation disaster.  The oil companies are uncertain about the reality of CA’s 2035 ban on internal combustion engines now being litigated.  Other states like Texas have much more friendly business environments than the draconian landscape created here by Sacramento’s idiots led by chief imbecile Newsom.

    Columnist Terry McLaughlin spells out more details (here) in the 29may25 Union.  The definitive analysis of the next California tragedy is documented in ‘Ensuring California’s Gasoline Security for the 21st Century’ by Professor Michael Mische of USC’s Marshall School of Business.  From the report’s introduction we read –

    California can ill afford the loss of one refinery, let alone two. The pending shutdown of the Phillips 66 refining complex in Los Angeles will reduce daily refining capacity by 8.9%. The loss, although painful in terms of its impact on consumer prices, is absorbable and the deficit in production and gasoline levels will be compensated by imports of finished fuels from Washington State and perhaps Gulf Coast refineries.

    The collective consequence of the pending refinery exits to the Golden State is potentially devastating to California’s economic growth and status as the fourth largest economy, in nominal terms, in the world. With the announced shutdown of Valero’s Benicia refinery complex accompanied by its $1.1 billion charge-off, California is confronting a potential 21% reduction in collective refining capacity from 2023 to April 2026.

    In 1982 California had about 45 refineries, with the exit of the next two the refinery count will be eleven.  There is no foreseeable end to the ongoing destruction caused by our voters ensconcing the state's socialist one-party monopoly.

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  • President Trump’s Memorial Day Message

    [In addition to the fine Memorial Day speech the president delivered at Arlington Cemetery yesterday, he went on truthSocial.com earlier and unloaded the message below that apparently reflects his true feelings, but on second thought was considered not appropriate for the polite company attending the wreath laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown. gjr]

    HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY TO ALL, INCLUDING THE SCUM THAT SPENT THE LAST FOUR YEARS TRYING TO DESTROY OUR COUNTRY THROUGH WARPED RADICAL LEFT MINDS, WHO ALLOWED 21,000,000 MILLION PEOPLE TO ILLEGALLY ENTER OUR COUNTRY, MANY OF THEM BEING CRIMINALS AND THE MENTALLY INSANE, THROUGH AN OPEN BORDER THAT ONLY AN INCOMPETENT PRESIDENT WOULD APPROVE, AND THROUGH JUDGES WHO ARE ON A MISSION TO KEEP MURDERERS, DRUG DEALERS, RAPISTS, GANG MEMBERS, AND RELEASED PRISONERS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD, IN OUR COUNTRY SO THEY CAN ROB, MURDERER, AND RAPE AGAIN, ALL PROTECTED BY THESE USA-HATING JUDGES WHO SUFFER FROM AN IDEOLOGY THAT IS SICK AND VERY DANGEROUS FOR OUR COUNTRY. HOPEFULLY THE UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT, AND OTHER GOOD AND COMPASSIONATE JUDGES THROUGHOUT THE LAND, WILL SAVE US FROM THE DECISIONS OF THE MONSTERS WHO WANT OUR COUNTRY TO GO TO HELL. BUT FEAR NOT, WE HAVE MADE GREAT PROGRESS OVER THE LAST 4 MONTHS, AND AMERICA WILL SOON BE SAFE AND GREAT AGAIN! AGAIN, HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY, AND GOD BLESS AMERICA!

    @realDonaldTrump May 26, 2025, 7:06 AM (here)

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  • Memorial Day – 26 May 2025

    MemorialDay2011

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  • Scattershots – 22may2025 (updated 26may25)

    We must now take seriously the possibility that it will be the resurrection of a shared culture, not its abandonment, that will make possible our continued survival and cohesion.  The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West (2025)

    George Rebane

    The Big Beautiful Bill is now on a rocky road through the Senate after having squeaked through the House on the narrowest of margins.  What concerns me about those Republicans who threaten to torpedo the bill is their narrow-minded concern about the $4-5T increase in the national debt that the bill is supposed to cause over the next ten years.  The problem that no one on the media (e.g. Fox News) is covering is that the ONLY soft landing to our debt burden is the massive growth of our economy which can eliminate or make deficits smaller, and lower the debt service burden as a fraction of our national income.  Do these stalwarts think that stopping this bill today will cause their inevitable Democrat successors to reduce deficits and the increase to our debt??  NFW!  Every conservative economist today understands and supports the above premise, they are all students of the Austrian and Chicago schools.  But none of them are raising the critical question to the bill’s naysayers – what is your Plan B that avoids the tax and spend Democratic deluge sure to follow?

    Bumblebrain was not in charge of the executive branch during the last four years, that much is now clear to both the Left and Right.  So the critical questions that must be answered to avoid the repeat of such travesty is 1) who ran the White House, made the devastating policies, and executed them, and 2) who were those in charge of the cover-up of Biden’s mental and physical health?  The evidence for such criminal cum unconstitutional behavior is now overwhelming (e.g. see Original Sin, 2025) as confirmed by the Democrats shouting ‘That’s old news, we have to move forward!’.  It’s not over until some people start doing hard time.

    Eliminate the Dept of Education as the embedded lobbying arm of the national teachers unions who have been the Democrats’ cash cows for decades.  The dismally ineffective, nay destructive, government agency was founded under Carter in May 1980.  It has now overseen and promoted the dumbing down of two generations of Americans.  This has served mostly to fatten Democrat constituencies across the land, and Democrats are doing all they can to save their cash cow and continue swelling their voter cohort.  Declining test scores are music to progressive ears.

    How Trump is upending the status quo is the topic expanded on by Victor Davis Hanson.  Worth watching the video (here) with a glass of wine.

    [26may25 update] The party of thieves and charlatans continues to howl at and misrepresent the ongoing discoveries of government waste, fraud, and abuse.  The latest come to light was by Dr M. Oz, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, who reported that through the joint efforts of his department and DOGE they have identified and are putting an end to $14B of fraudulent spending for Medicaid.  They discovered double payments for the same people who moved from one state to another.  Both states continue to collect at the federal trough.  The Dems, of course, continue lying their butts off to anyone who’ll listen that Republicans are cutting legal Medicare and Medicaid benefits from people who deserve them in order to provide tax cuts for the rich. (more here)

    Self-administered lipstick on the California’s pigs in Sacramento who continue to tell one and all that the once golden state is still as golden as ever.  Now they’re adding population growth to all their news about the state’s superb economy.  Middle classes and the astute rich have been leaving California in droves over the last years.  Now we hear from Gavin that the state has actually gained 0.6% in population.  A closer look, not available in the lamestream, shows that in 2024 about 240,000 left the state which still grew because 361,000 illegal aliens arrived to take their place.  California’s gross mismanagement by the supermajority Democrats have made living here unaffordable for those not on the government tit.  Our median house price at $900K is twice that of the nation, and our utilities and fuel prices are among the highest, joining other idiot-run states like New York, New Jersey, Illinois, … .  As of 2022 over 17% of California’s population were in the country illegally, and that number has easily doubled during 2023-24 given the millions Biden invited in and spread across the country.  Guess where a good fraction of them wound up. (more here)

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  • Sandbox – 19may25

    [Thoughts on the new 'Executive Branch' exclusive club in Georgetown started by Donald Trump Jr et al that has a membership fee of $500,000 which will allow members to network and mingle with administration officials out of the public eye?  (more here) gjr]

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  • Scattershots – 15may25

    George Rebane

    “California’s poverty rate has increased significantly, with disproportionate impacts on Black and Laninx residents” during the Biden years (2021-2024).  The California Budget & Policy Center reports (here) on the continuous disaster foisted on our formerly golden state by the double dummy Democrats who inhabit Sacramento at all levels.  And it is getting worse by the month as we hear from our know-nothing  governor.  With its policies of providing all kinds of social benefits to illegal aliens, thereby inviting more of them to come, the state has run up another deficit of over $12B this year.  This, of course, requires more taxes and fees that will mostly impact the state’s poor, thereby raising the poverty levels even more.  The terminally ignorant liberal constituencies (some comment here) have no idea what’s happening or what’s causing it.  They are focused happily on the lamestream reports that California has the world’s fourth biggest economy (contributed by Silicon Valley companies which employ a minimal workforce of highly paid employees that give rise to the large income gap among Californians generated by the exodus of middle class workers).

    Birthright citizenship reporting again reveals the strong progressive tilt of our National Propaganda Radio.  As SCOTUS starts to hear arguments on the matter, the NPR Marxists go through all the tragic tales of not granting such citizenship to the offspring of illegal aliens.  With serious mien they intone the provisions of the 14th Amendment, citing its “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”  Not once do they mention that the post Civil War amendment was written to unambiguously grant citizenship to the South’s slaves freed by Lincoln’s 1863 Emancipation Proclamation.  The 14th was never intended to be a y’all come invitation to illegals crossing our purposely porous borders to provide legions of future Democrat voters through planned amnesties to the parents of newly born birthright citizens.  Again, the lamestream media makes sure that their audiences never hear any of this.

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  • The Matter of Abrego Garcia

    George Rebane

    Democrat lies abound in all sizes and shapes; they wash over us daily during our consumption of the news, be it from conservative or progressive outlets.  The lies about the deported gang member and wife beater Abrego Garcia have gotten a lot of mileage, and proivdes a lot of holier-than-thou comments on blogs from leftwing readers.

    Unfortunately, the rightwing outlets fall down on explaining to viewers the crux of the Garcia deportation argument – maintained by the Left that he was denied due process.  In reality Garcia was provided all that he had coming under our deportation laws.  The Heritage Foundation makes this clear in ‘Abrego Garcia: The Poster Child for the Left’s Demands of Endless “Due Process”’ –

    When an alien becomes deportable—either because they entered the U.S. illegally, overstayed their temporary visa, committed a crime, committed fraud, participated in terrorist activity, or other reasons—ICE charges the alien with ground(s) of deportability, which initiates removal proceedings with the Justice Department’s administrative immigration court system.

    These are civil proceedings, not criminal. The administrative immigration judges are Justice Department employees in the executive branch; they are not federal judges under the Article III Judiciary of the U.S. Constitution.

    That means deportable aliens in deportation proceedings do not have the same rights as a person in a criminal trial, such as being innocent until proven guilty, the right to a taxpayer funded public defendant, etc. Removing a deportable alien is not a criminal sentence

    The unsuspecting news consumer is told that Garcia was wrongfully treated like a criminal and denied the ‘due process’ that US criminals receive after being arrested.  The Left emphasizes this point while the Right remains silent, thereby letting the Left’s lie remain unchallenged.  Hopefully, this little bagatelle will explain the matter to open-minded readers, while true believers of the Left remain unreachable.

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12 comments on Scattershots – 10jun25 (updated 13jun25)