Month: September 2017

There are a few old topics here that I need to rehash so that I can come to some logical conclusions.
First of all, if I owned a factory and had a contract to produce a significantly larger number of “widgets” a few years hence, I would start to plan now. I would hire extra people so that I could handle the increased demand. Anticipating a significant increase in work, I would retool and possibly expand my work area, so that again I could handle the increased demand. In other words I would prepare for something that I knew was coming. So how did the Democrats prepare for the increased demand that everybody knew was coming when they passed Obamacare?
Answer: They did nothing to prepare for the increased demand.

Specifically there was not a planned increase in the number of physicians to take care of the expected significantly increased number of patients . . . in fact there may even be less physicians as more and more are choosing retirement rather than deal with the onus of Obamacare. (This is a topic for another day.) In addition, to make matters even worse, many primary care physicians refuse to take new Medicaid patients because of the low reimbursement rates. The end result is that the decreasing supply (of primary care physicians) is not able to keep up with the increasing demand (of more Medicaid patients). So now what happens to all of these new Obamacare patients when they cannot find a primary care physician? When they have a problem, what do they do?
Answer: They go to the Emergency Room.

Is there any evidence of that? Yes! For example, in Ohio between 2012- 2014 emergency room visits by Medicaid patients to ERs doubled while the enrollment increased by only 10%. This can only mean that these patients used the ER more frequently than the average patient, and thus ERs are often inundated by the increased demand.
“Okay,” the liberals say, “so what.”

Well it gets worse and significantly more relevant to one of our country’s present problems . . . a major and increasing problem, The Opioid Epidemic.

Allysia Finley wrote an excellent article on the Opioid Epidemic in the Wall Street Journal on Sept. 25, 2017. From that article read the following very carefully:
“Often providers in Emergency Rooms, where many Medicaid patients seek treatment, don’t have the time to check databases that have been set up by the states, examine patients for abuse, perform follow-up consultations, or consider analgesics or physical therapy.”

In fact, Medicaid patients are twice as likely as privately insured individuals to be prescribed opioids, and so these patients often then receive prescriptions for generic opioids. These generics are less expensive and thus favored by Medicaid. Unfortunately for the patients and their families – and now for the country – these generics have little abuse deterrence compared to the more expensive non-generic opioids.

So, in essence the Democrats have created a system that forces the new Medicaid patients into the ER where they more than likely will a prescription for potentially addicting generic opioids. Certainly these ER visits and the subsequent opioid prescriptions generated are not the only cause of country’s opioid problem, but I venture to say that they are major contributors.

In closing, I say to the Democrats what Oliver Hardy said to Stan Laurel in their classic comedy routine, “This is another fine mess you’ve gotten us into!”

Oh what a tangled web they wove! From 2009 through 2016 this country was governed by a far left president, compounded initially (2009-2010) by a liberal Democrat-controlled Congress. Yes, the standard line is that the nation voted for Barack Obama, and certainly they knew what they were getting! But did they? They knew they were getting a black president – an eloquent black president, but I doubt that they realized that they were getting an eloquent, very liberal black president – an eloquent, very liberal, conniving black president.

Am I being too harsh when I include “conniving” in my description?
No, I do not think so, as only those who saw him as “conniving” could have anticipated the mess that he and his appointees have created. Remember that prior to his election in 2008, B.O. said, “I will make [comprehensive immigration reform] a top priority in my first year as president”. Did this happen?  Wallah! . . . NO!

Now immigration is only one of a number of chaotic messes that President Trump now has to attempt to deal with. So far most of the initial eight months of the Trump presidency has been taken up by things that could have been, and probably were, foreseen by B.O. and his conniving Democratic cronies.
For months Obamacare repeal was front and center. No one should underestimate the Republican incompetence in dealing with this issue, but no one should forget that it was passed into law solely with Democratic votes. The fact that the majority of the country was against it was irrelevant to the Democratic Congress, and so . . . Wallah!

Subsequent to that debacle we now have a  slurry of dictates put forth by B.O. and his departments that are occupying the news. First and foremost we have DACA which was established by B.O. in June, 2012 and subsequently formally initiated by then Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano. Note that DACA was never passed into law by Congress. President Obama apparently just decided that it would be a good idea, and so   . . . Wallah!

Next we have the 2011 “guidance letter” by Obama’s Department of Education. This was sent to all institutions of higher learning and concerned the conducting of investigations of sexual abuse under the federal education law known as Title IX. Again Congress was circumvented, and this new policy was forced down the throats of colleges and universities basically by threatening to withhold federal funds from noncomplying schools. So the liberal Department of Education in 2011 decided that it would be a good idea to discard any masquerade of due process, and so . . . Wallah!

Next on the list is “transgenders in the military.” In June, 2016 Ash Carter, Secretary of Defense under President Obama announced that he was changing the Pentagon policy concerning transgenders in the military and was ending the ban on transgenders in the military. Ostensibly this was B.O.’s way of rewarding his political allies in the LGBT community, and basically those in the know (Center for Military Readiness) were told to accept this decree even though they disagreed vehemently, as apparently Ash Carter decided that this would be a good idea, and so . . . Wallah!

Mark my words,”There will be more ‘Wallah moments’ to deal with in the near future.”

After President Trump was called a ‘dotard’ (rhymes with ‘boat-yard) by “Rocket Man” Kim Jong Un, everybody scrambled to the dictionaries and Google to find out what a ‘dotard’ is. The KCNA (North Korea’s official translators) must be using very old and outdated Kor-Eng dictionaries, as although it was used occasionally by Shakespeare, the New York Times has used that word only ten times in the last thirty-seven years, and usually in its Fine Arts coverage.
FYI – a ‘dotard’ is a person, especially an old person, exhibiting a decline in mental faculties; a weak-minded or foolish old person.

The problem with Kim Jong Un calling Donald Trump a dotard is that Mr. Trump is not actually very old, and although he is many things, he almost certainly is not known to be weak-minded.
Sadly when I read the definition of ‘dotard’, I immediately thought of another American political figure – John McCain. Now don’t get me wrong, John McCain is an American hero, having fought for his country and having been a P.O.W.  However Senator McCain does not appear to be what he used to be, and now he seems to be trending more toward being a dotard.
Why do I say that?
First of all he is an “old person” . . . 81 years old, and he seems to be “exhibiting a decline in mental function.” Prior to his last election he campaigned on repealing Obamacare, and yet just in the last month or so, he has twice cast the deciding vote that in essence is keeping the ACA afloat. Did he forget what he had said during his last election, “this law is doing disproportionate harm to the people of Arizona.” The people from his home state of Arizona are suffering terribly because of Obamacare (116% increase in premiums last year along with high deductibles), but yet he does not vote to end the suffering of Arizonians that is being caused by Obamacare.
He has been a life-long Republican. In fact he was the Republican nominee for president in 2008. I voted for him! So how come he has recently distanced himself from his Republican base such that he has a higher approval rating with Democrats than with Republicans? He appears to be “weak-minded” in that he no longer seems to be able to stand up for what we all thought he believed in..
Previously I had always thought that John McCain was a man of principle, but now I view him as being a simply vindictive “foolish old person.”

Senator McCain:

“Yes, Donald Trump said some nasty things about you during his presidential campaign, but come-on, you are a better man than this. You are in the process of destroying your legacy, which is really too bad, because you never used to be a dotard.”

To be clear let me state that I am writing this at midday on Sunday, 9/24/17, instead of watching the NFL on TV. Those of you who have been paying attention already know that I am boycotting the NFL because of the apparent condoning of these National Anthem protests by a minority of the players. The TV channels that broadcast N.F.L. games are losing viewers in droves as the ex-viewers are singing the refrain from an old song by Patience and Prudence    . . . ” gonna get along without ya now.”

 

This morning my wife had a suggestion concerning how to deal with this issue – or more precisely how the seemingly gutless NFL and the befuddled owners should deal with this issue. In fact I thought that this was such a brilliant idea that I embellished it just a bit and submitted it in a letter to the editor as follows:

“Another day, more anti-National-Anthem protests, seemingly condoned by the N.F.L. If the N.F.L. wanted to seriously demonstrate to the American people that it was on the side of our military and the freedoms that they sacrifice for, it would do the following:

Before the playing of the National Anthem, introduce three disabled military veterans – one white, one brown, and one black. These distinguished men/women would stand at midfield and salute the flag with the playing of the National Anthem.

Before kickoff and behind both benches, position active duty military standing at attention. With the playing of the National Anthem they would salute the flag, and then after the anthem they would escort the disabled veterans off the field.”

Brilliant!
This idea seems like a win-win.

Multiple benefits would accrue from doing this as follows:
-The A.C.L.U. would not get bent out of shape.
– LeBron James, Jessie Jackson and the other ‘I’ve got to give my opinion so       that I can   be quoted in the liberal media’ “celebrities” would not get their spotlight taken away.
– The NFL owners would potentially demonstrate that they really do deserve     to wear    big-boy pants.
– The N.F.L. Commissioner would be spared from having to actually make a decision  on this matter.
– The TV networks could potentially stop the hemorrhaging of their viewers.
– The genuflecting recalcitrant “please put the camera on me” athletes
would maintain their “1st Amendment rights”, and as you all are aware of . . .      That is  my most pressing concern!
– And finally, maybe I could consider going back to watching the N.F.L.

Let’s pretend that I am a football coach. No, not in the NFL as I am boycotting the NFL thus far this year. Anyway on first down I call a running play and we lose five yards. On second down I call another running play and we lose another five yards. Now it’s third and twenty. Do you think that I should call another running play? Let’s think about this logically . . . the first two plays were a disaster; it’s now third and long. Would the smart thing be to persist and call another running play. Only a knuckle-head would say, “Let’s run the ball again!”
Well welcome to the knuckle-heads of the NFL!

After a poor showing in week 1, the ratings crashed in week 2. CBS had its lowest ratings for NFL football since 1998. The ratings for the first two weeks of the season are down double digits compared to last year. Likewise as a result the shares of the parent companies have also taken a significant hit. Shares of Comcast (NBC) are down 9%. Shares of Disney (ESPN) are down 3%. Shares of CBS are down 5%. The Hollywood Reporter reported that CBS, ESPN, Fox, and NBC could take a $200 million hit if NFL fans continue he to turn off their TVs.
Fans seem to be leaving the NFL in droves, and several recent polls have shown that political activism is the big reason. In a poll last year 44% of fans stated that they “would stop watching if the protests against the National Anthem continued.” A recent J.D. Power survey showed that anthem protests are the big reason that people have stopped watching NFL games.

So the NFL ratings “lost five yards” in ratings in the first week, and then “lost another five yards” in ratings again in the second week. Again it is third and long. So what would a knuckle-head do next? Obviously a knuckle-head commissioner would consider celebrating and promoting “Activism Awareness Month” as has been suggested by the same recalcitrants that are refusing to stand for the National Anthem.

Couldn’t happen, you say . . . the coach (commissioner) wouldn’t be dumb enough to continue running the ball with ten men in the box (this is a football term which implies that if he did continue running the ball, he would be a real KNUCKLE-HEAD). Remember that this is the same person, commissioner Goodall, who offered support for Michael Bennett (Seattle Seahawks) in the aftermath of his altercation with Las Vegas police without waiting for any details or evidence to be presented.
Okay coach, what’s the play on third and long?

Many many years ago when my kids were in high school, their weekend curfew was 11:00 pm. One Saturday night one one of my daughters did not arrive home till after 11:30. She said that it wasn’t really her fault because she was talking with her friend who needed emotional support. Fortunately my wife and I agreed, and unfortunately, for my daughter, she was grounded.

For the sake of discussion let’s assume that my wife and I had not agreed, and my daughter had one sympathetic and one unsympathetic parent. The unsympathetic parent, in essence, saying that rules were rules, and they needed to be enforced if they were to mean anything. The sympathetic parent in essence saying that since our daughter’s intent was good, that the kind thing to do would be just to forget the rules and come up with some sort of compromise.
In this sort of situation there would be two basic things that our daughter, an adolescent, would never have done if she expected opinion to go her way:
The first would be to demand an immediate lifting of the grounding restriction, and to further add that if she was grounded that she would hold both parents accountable.
The second would be to start yelling at the sympathetic parent and telling the sympathetic parent that no compromise other than the full lifting of her grounding would be acceptable. Anyone with any common sense recognizes this behavior would spell doom on two fronts:
Demanding anything is just going to make it more unlikely that either side is going to feel sympathy for your plight.
and
Yelling at and confronting the one that is on your side is the epitome of being a dumb-ass as confrontation never engenders sympathy!

Well on Monday September 18 those representing D.A.C.A. did both.

That afternoon in San Francisco a group of pro-D.A.C.A. demonstrators confronted Rep. Nancy Pelosi (the sympathetic parent) while she was attempting to give a pro-D.A.C.A. speech. They called her, “a liar” and eventually embarrassed her into leaving the podium after she pleaded with them, “Stop it! Stop it right now”!
That same evening a D.A.C.A. recipient (illegal alien), Ivan Ceja, was on the Tucker Carlson Show demanding that the U.S. be nice to them. Trying to be the adult in the room, Tucker Carlson said, “Follow a logical train of thought. What right do you have to demand anything?” To this Mr. Ceja responded that both parties (Rep. & Dem.) will be held accountable [if they did not get their way].”
From my perspective, both Mr. Ceja and the demonstrators at Mrs. Pelosi’s rally may have helped to make up the minds of those of us on the fence on this issue. They could not have acted more like spoiled brats if they had wanted to, and by making demands they could not have demonstrated any more clearly that they are not deserving of our empathy.

Should the real meaning of D.A.C.A. be:                                                                        Dumb-Ass Confrontational Adolescents ?

Whether or not Bernie was a nice guy was irrelevant, as he was homeless.

What was his story?

Bernie was 58 years old and had lived his entire life in Michigan. He was a productive member of society until he got fired from his railroad job. He was not old enough to receive his pension, and subsequently ran out of money. As he was estranged from his family and could no longer support himself, he decided that he was ready to die. He was an atheist, but a quick exit was not for him. For whatever reason, he wanted to die in a warm place, so he rented a car and drove to Southern California. He ended up in a strip mall in Chula Vista, just south of San Diego, and figured that he would just starve to death. However, after a few days in the strip mall’s parking lot, a woman who owned a taco shop noticed him living in his car, and started to feed him. Whether he would have died if not for the taco lady is a mute point. Bernie survived, and I subsequently met him at the soup-kitchen as he had gotten into the short term accommodations at St. Vincent de Paul. Whether he would stay in California or not, he was technically no longer homeless, as he now had a regular place to sleep.

Even though he had some issues with certain authority figures, he was a hard worker.

He was a nice guy, and I liked him

Out of the blue, one day he was gone! Possibly homeless again. Whether or not he had a disagreement with an “authority figure” . . . ???

 

Being homeless is defined as not having a fixed regular and adequate night time residence. Certainly when Bernie got here, he was homeless and living in his car.

It is estimated that there are over 500,000 homeless individuals in the U.S.A., and about 50% are over 50 years old – just like Bernie. In 2015, 21% of the nation’s homeless lived in California, and even worse about 1/3 of the chronically homeless live in California. Contrary to the national trend (a decrease of 11% from 2010- 2015), the number of homeless had increased by 1.6% in California between 2014 and 2015.

Why are there disproportionately so many homeless in California? The question is whether or not, there is something else that draws the homeless to California other than the weather.

Warm weather could not be the sole reason as homelessness decreased from 2007-2016 in Tampa, Atlanta, and Phoenix in a recent U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (H.U..D.) study.

After I asked myself whether or not there could be another reason that Democratic California has more than its share of the homeless, I saw some interesting data from the same H.U.D study about “Metros with the largest increase in homeless”, 2007-2016. Four metro areas in California had the “distinction” of being in the top ten spots. What was interesting was that the other six top spots were also metro areas that are predominately Democratic with liberal mayors, including Honolulu, Seattle, Washington D.C.., and New York City!

I am not sure whether Democratic metro areas are the cart or the horse, but the correlation of increased homelessness where the Democrats are in charge is certainly more than would be expected by chance alone.

 

The decision before the San Diego City Council was whether or not to legalize local cultivation, manufacturing, and testing of marijuana. The Police Chief had warned of significant threats to public safety if the City Council passed the bill.
If I were a councilman I would have looked at the experience in Durango, Colorado.
Durango is a small city in southwest Colorado. In 2010 its population was 16,877 and by 2016 the population had grown to 18,503. Why did the population of mountain resort town grow by almost 10% over those 6 years?
As most of you are aware Colorado passed their recreational marijuana law in 2012, and the thinking of many Durango residents is that it is the marijuana that has attracted much of this population increase. Their once upscale community near the New Mexico border is now being overrun by panhandlers and transients who are not just pot users, but also homeless drug addicts as they are now finding needles on the streets.
Cobb Preston, a store manager in downtown Durango says, “Just this year there has been a major influx of 20-30 year olds who are just hanging out on the streets. While many are pretty mellow, there are many more who are violent. Most of these kids are from out of state, and I would say that it has a lot to due with legalized pot.”
Shoplifting has become a major problem in Durango and there has been an increase in crime with the property crime rate now 12% higher than the national average. A clerk at a local hotel stated that she is frequently harassed when she goes to the supermarket and summed it up when she says, “I have lived here all my life and I don’t feel safe anymore!”

San Diego already has a significant homeless problem, and there is little doubt in my mind that an easy marijuana policy will just attract more homeless just has it has done in Durango.
Before the vote Councilwoman Lorie Zapf stated, “We were elected, if nothing else, to oversee public safety, and [if we pass this bill] we are absolutely going down the wrong road.”
However, despite these warnings the Democratic City Council on Sept. 11, 2017 passed the marijuana bill 6-3. This is actually not a surprise as “Democrats always know what is best for everybody”, and they probably figure that potheads always vote Democratic!

Now is the time that I wish we were a Nielsen family . . . again!

Many years ago we were a designated Nielsen family for a couple of years. For those of you not familiar with Nielsen, it is a national T.V. ratings service which gauges viewership of T.V. programs by putting their equipment into random families’ homes to monitor and subsequently report which T.V. shows are being watched and by how many people. It had been said in the past that each monitored home represented 15,000 homes in the Nielsen survey.

Why do I wish that now we were a Nielsen family again?  Because now I am protesting the anti-American shenanigans that are occurring during the National Anthem before many of the NFL games this season. I personally protested this past weekend by not watching any of the multiple NFL games that were on Sunday morning and afternoon, Sunday night, Monday night, and Thursday night.

 

Although I have not read the stats on the viewership of the NFL games this past weekend, my hope is that the viewership will be down. Of course the NFL will turn a blind eye to this decreased viewership as they did last year when the viewership was down significantly. They will do nothing and blame the decreased interest in their product on Hurricane Irma, instead of looking inward at those “protesters” on the field.

Some teams apparently have condoned their actions, in essence saying, “It’s okay to sit down or raise your fist during the National Anthem; don’t worry we will just look the other way”?

The teams on which these anti-American malcontents play on are as follows

Seattle Seahawks

Green Bay Packers

Los Angeles Rams

San Francisco 49ers

Oakland Raiders

Philadelphia Eagles

and

Kansas City Chiefs.

 

As alluded to above, my protest is of no actual practical consequence since we are not now a Nielsen family, and the major networks do not care about my individual protest!

If anyone knows anyone who is a Nielson family, please beseech them to tune–out  NFL football so that the networks and the NFL both get the message.

 

 

Just the other night I saw Shakespeare’s Hamlet. It was a wonderful two-act play, but over three hours long. So, not unexpectedly, my mind did wander. For those of you not familiar with Hamlet, it is a tragedy (just about everybody dies in the end), and it has a multitude of memorable lines. In the beginning I was sure that I would be able to equate Hamlet, the hero, to President Trump. However, in the second act, I accepted the fact that this was going to be difficult as Hamlet was very hesitant which does not appear to be Trump-ian trait at least as far as his tweeting is concerned. Also in the second act Hamlet feigns madness. I do not think that Trump is feigning anything – what you see, is what you get, and he does not fake anything!
Again for those of you not familiar with the play, the really bad guys are King Claudius and Queen Gertrude who did whatever dastardly deeds that were necessary to get power and are intent on keeping it – using just about any means possible. I had no trouble seeing Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi as the king and the queen as they seem to have very similar character traits.
Certainly Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern could easily be Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan, as they are supposed to be Hamlet’s friends, but sneakily turn into his enemies. They are convinced by King Schumer and Queen Nancy to turn on Hamlet and late in the second act they “sell him down the river”, when they are prime players in a plot to have Hamlet killed. From my way of thinking this fits as both McConnell and Ryan say that they want to help our hero (Trump) but instead only seem to hurt him.
In the end I did conclude that the play could well be a metaphor for the Republican Party as everyone kills each other, just as the Republicans are doing now.

As I listened to some of the lines in the three hour marathon, my mind did wander to the present day political scene. Listen to some of these famous lines, and let your mind wander . . .

“There is something rotten in Denmark”
This is certainly describing the Fake News and the Swamp.

“To be honest, as this world goes, is to be one man picked out of a thousand..”
This certainly describes an unusual person in today’s Washington.

“To thine own self be true”
Advice from Republican voters who cannot understand why those that they elected are now changing their stripes.

“To be or not to be, that is the question!”
Either you are with our President or you are his enemy, and I am having trouble figuring out where both elected and non-elected conservatives stand.

“Brevity is the soul of wit.”
Hard to describe Trump’s tweets as anything else.

“Sweets to the sweet”
When one of his compadres is in trouble and appears to have been railroaded, Donald Trump stands by him . . . Sheriff Joe Arpaio.

“The lady doth protest too much, me thinks.”
Certainly seems to be describing Maxine Waters!

“If we are true to ourselves, we cannot be false to anyone.”
If Trump continues to keep his campaign promises, how can anyone who is honest be critical.

Before going into the play, I was talking to a woman who was originally from St. Louis Park, Minnesota. She proudly stated that both Al Franken (uber liberal Senator from Minnesota) and Thomas Friedman ( far left columnist of the New York Times) were both from St. Louis Park. Since Hamlet is a tragedy, I could not find a way to get either of these jokers into this essay. As this encounter was before the play, I was then thinking to myself, “Was there something toxic in the St. Louis Park water?”
If it had been after the play, I would have been smart enough to have said to her (just as Hamlet said to Polonius), “Get thee to a nunnery!”