One Finger Salute

I have previously predicted that President Obummer would do many things in his last year in office to show his disdain for the American people ... see: Hell Year and Skulduggery. Now we see yet another of his one-finger salutes ... coming on the heels of the San Bernardino, Paris and Brussels Islamic terrorist attacks ... and defying the obvious concerns of his citizenry. Obummer is re-pledging to admit 100,000 Syrian immigrants to the U.S. this year ... not in 2017 as he originally dictated ... posing an obvious threat and economic burden to the communities wherein they are to be settled ... see: Washington Examiner Story.

Me thinks that the more criticism that Obummer gets, the more punishment he intends to inflict on us. Maybe we should try a different tactic and distract him for another ten months with oodles of paeans, encourage him to play more golf, and have him teach economics at Columbia ... he is obviously well qualified ... see: Real Clear Politics.

Justice Blinked

The Department of Justice blinked in its attempt to force Apple to open up the IPhone of the San Bernardino terrorist, Sayed Farook. The FBI now says that it has found a third party (NSA?) to open up this possible source of further intelligence and doesn't need the court to force Apple to comply ... see: Politico Story. This all sounds very fishy and halfway supports Apple's position that this FBI request was a red herring really meant to open up the IPhone to generic government access (not that there is necessarily anything wrong with that.)

This FBI vs. Apple issue is all about personal privacy. American people want to believe that our Constitution guarantees them an inviolate cocoon of privacy that our government cannot pierce no matter what national security issues involved. Clearly this may not be the case. However, in a related development, Edward Snowden, our traitor hero,  avers that the federal government is not the only risk to our personal security. He says that large technology companies such as Microsoft are equally guilty of the invasive collection of our personal information ... far more than we suspect ... see: Sputnik News Story. I agree with the rat-fink Snowden and would add at least Google, Apple and Facebook to his named snoop.

If you think that Big Brother government is the only risk to your little secrets, you are just another babe in the woods.

Immigrant Vetting

The immigrant vetting process ... that has been claimed to be so effective in screening out Muslim terrorists ... apparently has not been that effective afterall. We know how it failed in San Bernardino and now an additional forty-one such Islamist immigrants have been uncovered and arrested ... see: Free Beacon Story ... bringing the total to 113 just since 2014.  And the Obummer administration is hiding the immigration screening details of these new arrests ... so as not to diminish its previous shame-faced falsehoods about how good its vetting process has been.

Are we surprised?

California Dreamin'

San Bernardino, Stockton, Mammoth Lakes, Compton … this is a list of the cities/towns in California that have recently gone bankrupt … or, are about to slip under the fiscal waves (see: Fox News Story). Expect many more … and, very possibly, the state of California itself will give up the ghost. Yes, spending and accounting shenanigans are partly to blame for these problems, but may I suggest a much more structural issue? Two of these bergs are in the Central Valley, the vegetable/fruit basket to this nation. Or, at least, it used to be. The economic health of this region has been greatly sacrificed to save the Delta Smelt, a small endangered fish that has caused our federal government to impose onerous water restrictions on the farmers there (see: Central Valley Water Crisis). Without water, crops won’t grow … and, without crops, farmers are impoverished … and, without agricultural income, taxes can’t be paid … and, without tax income, bergs go bankrupt. It’s that simple.

And since Central Valley agriculture was a large part of California’s fiscal strength, this short-sighted eco-suicide is one reason that the whole Golden State itself is on the ropes. Another reason is that oil exploration and extraction in California has been seriously curtailed by these same tree-hugging limousine liberals who claim to care for the downtrodden … while, at the same time, trodding them down. Will Governor Moonbeam recognize and remedy these problems? Keep California dreamin' …