Month: February 2024

Well it finally happened … in fact two things happened on 2/16/24 that I believe will clinch the 2024 Presidential election for Trump. Anyone who is not completely over the top anti-Trump will have to look at both of these things and think hmmm!  as both appear to be obviously political. I predict that most rational individuals will see right through what the far-left prejudicial New York judge and President JB are doing. Many will realize when they think about these two events that indeed, that neither of the emperors involved have any clothes!

First:

New York Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron issued a ruling on Feb. 16, ordering former President Donald Trump and Trump Organization executives to pay $355 million in damages, and barring the former president from doing business in the state for three years.

President Trump also posted a lengthy social media statement, and then called a press conference in front of his Mar-a-Lago residence.

“This ‘decision’ is a Complete and Total SHAM,” he wrote. “There were No Victims, No Damages, No Complaints. Only satisfied Banks and Insurance Companies (which made a ton of money), GREAT Financial Statements, that didn’t even include the most valuable Asset – the TRUMP Brand, IRONCLAD Disclaimers (Buyer Beware, and Do you Own Due Diligence), and amazing Properties all over the World.”

Again any rational person will recognize the absurdity of this case and the financial penalty imposed.

Second:

Finally on 2/16/2& President Biden finally made his to East Palestine. Ohio. Most of you probably remember that East Palestine is a small town of less than 5,000 located in eastern Ohio very close to its border with Pennsylvania, and it was the site of a toxic train derailment. This toxic train derailment occurred in February … however it occurred in 2023!  It occurred on 2/3/23 to be exact. So why was J.B. there on 2/16/2024, more than a year later? Everyone knows that JB finally made an appearance at East Palestine, because it is election season. Supposedly the reason why JB waited more than one year to visit this beleaguered small town was that he had a busy schedule! … and East Palestine voted Republican in 2020. 

How long would it have taken for JB to fly back and forth to eastern Ohio and spend thirty minutes in East Palestine some time in the past year? … 

probably an hour and thirty minutes! To me it seems that all suffering individuals in East Palestine had to wait in line while JB took his “well deserved” 140+ days of vacation time this past year.

One of the Democrat’s spokesman noted that for a time this area was toxic, and hinted that the reason JB has not shown up in over a year might be because air in the area could have been dangerous. This shill of a spokesman forgot to mention that Donald Trump was there less than three weeks after the derailment, visiting both the fire station and a McDonald’s for far greater than thirty minutes … without even wearing a mask!

2/19/24

Last week I read something and thought, “Is it possible that California finally got something right?”

When the Common Core State Standards were introduced in 2010, they explicitly referenced learning keyboard skills in grades 3 through 5. The standards require fourth graders to type a full page in one sitting. As a result, cursive was largely abandoned in most school districts.

However, this trend is now reversing, according to data from MyCursive.com, which tracks cursive writing requirements nationwide. 

Cursive writing is making a comeback in many U.S. states after being dropped over a decade ago. Currently, 21 states mandate some form of handwriting education. Most recently, California passed a law in October 2023 making cursive handwriting mandatory from first through sixth grade.

Is this the right thing to do? 

According to a recent study, the answer is “yes.”

From Epoch Health:

A recent study from Norway found that the old-school art of handwriting engages parts of the brain that tapping on a keyboard does not. The intricate movements involved in handwriting activate more regions of the brain associated with learning than typing does.

The new study published in Frontiers in Psychology and led by Audrey van der Meer, a neuroscience researcher at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, examined the differences between handwriting and typing. Ms. Van der Meer and her team analyzed the neural networks involved in both activities to uncover their respective impacts on brain connectivity.

“We show that when writing by hand, brain connectivity patterns are far more elaborate than when typewriting on a keyboard,” she said in a press statement. “Such widespread brain connectivity is known to be crucial for memory formation and for encoding new information and, therefore, is beneficial for learning.”

So it does appear that our legislators in Sacramento do occasionally get something “write,” or should I better say, “correct!”

2/17/24

Most of my regular readers know that I also write fiction in the form of novels. (e.g. Charles Hyde & the #7,” “The Keneally Chronicles,” “Church Key,” and “Justice in 3 Acts” … all available on Amazon)

While writing a new work of fiction, I am always on the lookout for a topic/plot for the next one. Since I am presently writing a new work of fiction, I just had an idea for the next one, I thought I would just run it by my readers and see what the general opinion might be … perhaps it would be too far out to even be considered.

Please bear with me.I will try to be as clear as possible.

In general, the basic plot involves illegal election interference on an opponent in the next Presidential campaign, and illegal spying on U.S. citizens, all members of the opponent’s staff by various U.S. intelligence communities. This interference was initiated by the CIA under the auspices of the administration then in power, and involved convincing other English speaking nations (let’s call them, the “Five Eyes Nations”) to talk with members of the opposition candidate’s staff. After being coaxed into talking to these mostly lowly opposition staff members, an English speaking rep (let’s say a rep from Australia), then reports some of these conversations as “suspicious,” and thus the FBI has a supposed reason to investigate the opposing candidate’s staff, even though they are American citizens. 

To summarize, the CIA convinced by the present President’s administration initiated the intelligence hoax with the cooperation of our nation’s English-speaking allies. Other intelligence communities, including the FBI, then launched investigations of the opponent’s staff because of “suspicious” activities.

Would anyone read this book or this scenario too far out to be believed?

*** … News Flash!!  Apparently this exact scenario is presently being reported as having occurred prior to the 2016 Presidential election by author, Michael Shellenberger. 

Oh well, Back to the drawing board!

2/16/24

If you have some spare time … specifically twenty-six minutes and twenty-nine seconds of spare time, I would recommend watching Tucker Carlson being interviewed on the World Government Summit in Dubai. This interview is basically about Carlson’s interview with Putin. For the sake of clarity I did not watch Carlson’s interview with Putin, because it was too long. (I do not have two hours of spare time.)

However I watched this interview of Carlson on X twice from stem to stern! Be forewarned that this 26:29 is not like Cliff Notes solely focused on the recent Putin interview. It is about much more than just Putin, but covers Carlson’s opinions on multiple fronts.

If you are a big Joe Biden fan, you will not like it as Carlson refers to JB as “incapacitated” and “non compos mentis.” In addition metaphorically Carlson said that if there were a Putin-Biden boxing match, it would be called for medical reasons (a TKO with Putin being the winner)!

Carlson refers to Moscow as a surprisingly clean and safe city. In fact he comments that the city Moscow is what many American cities used to be like … but are no more because of crime, filth, and graffiti.

In terms of Ukraine Carlson thought that Putin would be amenable to compromise while the plutocracy in the US is clinging to non-achievable and non-realistic goals.

I did not feel that Carlson was fed softball questions by the moderator and in fact the moderator was on Carlson’s case for not asking Putin about certain things.

In conclusion I think that watching this was 52 minutes and 58 seconds well spent. (FYI: For those of you who attend public school in California 

26:29 x 2 = 52:58)!

2/14/24

This morning while driving the grandkids to school, I was reminded of skiing … snow skiing and the inevitable moguls, which are bumps or mounds of hard snow on a ski slope. Because I was never an exceptional skier, i would often ski around or between the moguls. Why was I reminded of skiing? … because of the potholes. I had thought when I left Chicago many years ago that I had left potholes behind. However last week while making a left turn at a reasonable speed … BOOM … a large pothole which caused my teeth to chatter!  Granted we have had much more rain than usual, but is this the sole cause of these now numerous potholes? I checked back for the rainfall totals for last forty-four plus years that I have lived in San Diego, and 2023 is not in the top five as far as total rainfall. 1980, 1984, 1993, 1995, 2010, & 2016 have had more rainfall than 2023. So why all of the potholes? Potholes which now requires drivers to pay extra-close attention to the street surface ahead in order to avoid the potholes – just like avoiding the moguls while skiing.

Could it be possible that there is actually another factor that could be accounting this pothole epidemic? Because here in San Diego we typically have a lot of sunshine, we now have a lot of rooftop solar panels, which have made it much easier to own an Electric Vehicle, and merely charge it at home.

As some of us are aware, the batteries for EVs weigh substantially more than the batteries of gas-powered vehicles. 

An EV battery for a sedan weighs 1,000 pounds, and if there are a lot of EVs on our local roads, to me it is likely that this multitude of EVs are wreaking havoc with our local roads.

Meanwhile, statewide there is a lot of posturing concerning the fact that the drivers of EVs are not paying any gasoline taxes. Here in California, the drivers of gas-powered vehicles in California pay 77.9 cents per gallon in tax. This gasoline tax is what is used to maintain highways, and at present those who drive EVs are basically mooching off the rest of us. Imagine what’s going to happen in the future if all trucks are forced to be electric, as a heavy-duty electric truck batteries can weigh up to 16,000 pounds, which is 16 times more than the Tesla battery.

One can only imagine how bad the damage to one’s car will be after going over a mogul, err a pothole, on a highway at 60 mph!

2/13/24

From the beginning of the vaccine mandates, I thought, “what if they’re wrong? Is it possible that it could turn out that there are some significant side-effects from the Covid vaccine? 

I further thought, perhaps I am just a living example of the old Elvis song, Suspicious Minds.

However, I just read something quite bothersome about potential problems from the vaccine written by Angus Dalgleish who is an expert in immunology and Professor of Oncology at St George’s Hospital Medical School, London.

She said, “I have previously reported on my concern about the rise in stable cancer relapses that I have witnessed in my melanoma clinic.

… the only thing I found they had in common was to have had a recent booster mRNA COVID vaccine. I phoned around my colleagues not only in the UK but also in Australia to check their experience. In no case did they deny such a link. Indeed, they were equally alarmed at the association between booster vaccines and relapse that they too were witnessing, as well an increase in new cancers, particularly in those below 50 years old. In addition to melanoma these colleagues were also very concerned about a sudden big increase in young patients with colorectal cancer.

She continued, “Recently the American Cancer Society (ACS) has warned of a surge in new cancer cases in the United States this last year of over 2 million, with many of these cases occurring in younger patients. Indeed, the chief scientific officer of the ACS, William Dahat, announced in addition that cancers were presenting with more aggressive disease and larger tumours at the time of diagnosis, especially in younger patients.”

“The Lancet also published an article before Christmas reporting excess deaths post COVID pandemic to be up by 11–15 per cent over than expected for under-25s and for between 25–49 year olds. This is in fact the pattern found in many countries that have looked at the data. Germany for example has reported excess deaths rising from 7 per cent in 2020 to 24 per cent in 2023.

What makes this all the more surprising is that negative deaths should be the norm after a pandemic as you cannot die twice!

Now back to Elvis’s song, Suspicious Minds, the first line of which is

“We’re caught in a trap.”  

To me this line encompasses the big dilemma for all of those government agencies that played prominent roles in vaccine mandates. They are indeed caught in a trap, because if the mandates are the cause, 

they cannot truly investigate the reason why death rates and aggressive cancers are increasing,

2/12/24

Back on 6/29/23 in a landmark judgment, the US Supreme Court ruled the race-based admissions at Harvard College and the University of North Carolina as illegal. The 6-3 ruling dominated by a conservative supermajority effectively puts a closure to a decades-long effort to diversify higher education … but does it?

Recently a four-person committee of professors at Dartmouth went about reevaluating the use of test scores (SAT or ACT) in deciding who gets admitted to college.

From the New York Times:

“Three Dartmouth economists and a sociologist then dug into the numbers. … One of their main findings did not surprise them: Test scores were a better predictor than high school grades — or student essays and teacher recommendations — of how well students would fare at Dartmouth. The evidence of this relationship is large and growing.”

To me this is not a surprise as some high schools are known to have inflated grades, and with essays, how can anyone be sure who actually wrote them.

Again from the NYT:

“A second finding was more surprising. During the pandemic, Dartmouth switched to a test-optional policy, in which applicants could choose whether to submit their SAT and ACT scores. And this policy was harming lower-income applicants in a specific way.

The researchers were able to analyze the test scores even of students who had not submitted them to Dartmouth. (Colleges can see the scores after the admissions process is finished.) Many lower-income students, it turned out, had made a strategic mistake.

“They withheld test scores that would have helped them get into Dartmouth. They wrongly believed that their scores were too low, when in truth the admissions office would have judged the scores to be a sign that students had overcome a difficult environment and could thrive at Dartmouth.

“That finding, as much as any other, led to Dartmouth’s announcement this morning. ‘Our goal at Dartmouth is academic excellence in the service of training the broadest swath of future leaders,’ said Siam Beilock, the new President of Dartmouth, ‘I’m convinced by the data that this will help us do that.’

“It’s worth acknowledging a crucial part of this story. Dartmouth admits disadvantaged students who have scores that are lower on average than those of privileged students. The college doesn’t apologize for that. Students from poor neighborhoods or troubled high schools have effectively been running with wind in their face. They are not competing fairly with affluent teenagers.”

So is this a good idea? It is fair to view affluent and less affluent college applicants differently?

My answers … “Yes!” and “Yes!”

This is clearly not race based as it affects those applicants of all races, white, black, or brown.

Hopefully the rest of the woke colleges and universities will soon realize the error of their ways and reinstitute the SAT & ACT in helping determine who is admitted.

2/10/24

What I read this morning thoroughly amazed me. Indeed quite a dichotomy!

This headline from the New York Post:

“Special Counsel Determines Biden Is Too Old to Charge for Mishandling Classified Information”

“Special Counsel Robert Hur has declined to charge President Joe Biden for willfully retaining, disclosing and grossly mishandling a number of classified documents as a private citizen — taking them from his time in the U.S. Senate and after he left the vice presidency in early 2017. He had no declassification authority in either position and shared information with his ghostwriter. 

Citing Biden’s age and memory, the report states a jury would not find him guilty.”

Okay, let me get this straight. 

Because of his age and poor memory, Joe Biden is not going to be charged for mishandling classified information … but yet it is okay for him to run again as the Democratic nominee for President. If elected he will again be handling confidential information despite his advanced age and poor memory. Quite a dichotomy!

To me the other interesting part of this … does it now becomes more 

likely that the charges against Trump will be dropped if he feigns forgetfulness?

2/9/

Typically I read Jeff Childers’ Coffee and Covid every morning. Moreover,  because I not only find him to be entertaining but also agree with most everything he says, I often read him before I read anything else in the morning. However, on 2/7/24 o found myself disagreeing with his opinion on something from ABC-7 Chicago: “Mental health: California county becomes 1st in US to declare loneliness as public health emergency.

He seemed to be mainly ridiculing the all Democrat San Mateo Board of Supervisors because they were both Democrats and San Mateo County is in California. However, I was disappointed because other than mocking this Northern California county board, he had nothing to say about the ‘L’ word, “loneliness.”

Is loneliness a problem in the US? If so how big a problem? 

If someone is a lawyer, like Jeff Childers, who interacts with multiple different people on most days, then loneliness is probably not much of a problem. Likewise, if someone is married and has a wife and children to go home to every evening like Mr. Childers does, then being alone at night could well be a blessing. Similarly, since most lonely individuals are not middle-aged extroverts, like the Coffee and Covid author, maybe keeping an open mind on this issue would be beneficial.

Personally, I am basically a conservative extrovert, but do recognize that loneliness is a major issue, especially in older individuals whose friends and spouse may have died, and who live not close to their family.

While I rarely agree with Democrats, perhaps the San Mateo Board of Supervisors is on to something with reference to the ‘L’ word.

2/8/24

I remember two dances back when I was younger. I really liked The Stroll, and in fact can still do it. The Limbo, on the other hand, is a different story. It wasn’t really a dance, per se, but it did have a song by the same name. As perhaps you can recall the catch phrase of the song was, “How low can you go.”

Recently I opined on the disastrous financial situation in the state of California, but the financial situation in many of California’s big cities is equally worrisome, and getting worse … how low can they go? While the state of California has some options to alleviate its deficit, the large cities do not have the same options. 

From a recent piece by Allysia Finley in the WSJ:

As awful as the budget outlook is in Sacramento, it may be worse for cities across the state, which have few options other than to cut essential services or raise taxes. 

The city manager in Sacramento recently suggested patching a $50 million budget gap by taking longer to fix potholes and broken street lights.

San Diego projects a $172 million budget shortfall. ‘Without a new major ongoing revenue source, significant budget cuts to programs and services will be needed to address the city’s structural budget deficit,’ a Dec. 5 budget report stated.

Los Angeles City Administrator Matthew W. Szabo recently warned of a $400 million deficit owing to rising labor costs and lower-than-expected tax revenue. ‘The identification of new revenue sources is one strategy that the City must embrace in order to become more resilient,’ Mr. Szabo wrote in a Jan. 19 report to the City Council.

The trouble is, taxpayers in La La Land are as maxed out as those in the rest of California. San Francisco faces a nearly $800 million deficit despite having imposed several new taxes in recent years, including one on the gross receipts of businesses whose highest-paid manager earns more than 100 times the median compensation of its San Francisco-based employees.”

The deficits in these cities is getting deeper, and question is similar to that in The Limbo … How low can they can go?”

2/7/24