If you ever wondered why we have stupid people in the United States, Robert Stacy McCain points out the reason:
…Democrats and the media (but I repeat myself) don’t want to admit the real nature of their own irrational prejudices, and Republicans are too polite to call them out on it. Has anyone in the Republican Party asked, for example, how much federal aid to education goes to elite private schools like Swarthmore College (annual tuition $49,104), where students enroll in “Queering God: Feminist and Queer Theology”? Why should the devout Catholic or Baptist be taxed to support such nonsense? Where are the GOP senators and congressmen demanding to know what kind of “education” taxpayers are being required to subsidize?
Because the Republicans are too polite (or too stupid) to call attention to what’s going on in our taxpayer-funded schools, a generation of young people has been indoctrinated in the anti-American prejudices of the Democrats who control university campuses…
Its not just that stupid people teach stupid things to youngsters but, also, because we refuse to stop the stupidity! If we want to stop the stupid, the first step is to stop paying for it…or, if that seems unfair, then at least insist that right next to Queering God there be a course on the works of C. S. Lewis or G. K. Chesterton. I’m all for kids being challenged in their views…and I think that Lewis is far more challenging than anything you’re likely to find in a major college these days (and let’s not even get into St. Thomas, or even Martin Luther, for our Protestant friends…). With the massive amounts of federal dollars pouring into education year after year, we do have a great deal of leverage…because regardless of ideology, the most important thing College Administrators serve is the dollar. We’re paying the piper, we should call the tune. Start making the dollars dependent upon intellectual diversity (ie, hiring even just a couple of moderately conservative professors every now and again) will start to break the stranglehold the left holds on higher education. And as an added benefit, the kids will actually learn something. You know, not just get a credential, but some education to go along with it.
Blogs For Victory 
This op-ed in one of our local newspapers is an excellent example of how stupidity permeates government bureaucracies.
(emphasis – mine)
Years ago on his radio show, G. Gordon Liddy coined a name for policies like this: “nitwittery.”
Spook, I think you have unraveled this gobbeldy-gook very well. At least as much as it can be. There is a reason some rulings are buried in layers of verbiage. My biggest problem with the HUD ruling is that it objects to something that is not even in the ordinance. If the quote is accurate, the ordinance merely imposes a fine on the owner of a problem property. It doesn’t say anything about shutting it down or kicking people out or “..restrict(ing) the availability of housing on the basis of nuisance conduct…”
So “…the bill was withdrawn — in part because some feared the proposed crackdown on anti-social and even criminal behavior could somehow violate federal fair-housing laws..” even though the federal ruling seemed to address only situations where housing access was “restricted” by nuisance behavior of others, which is much more of a criticism of squishy bureaucrats and spineless politicians than anything else. I don’t have a problem with the HUD ruling as it is shown here.
Let’s see if some of it can be straightened out within the verbiage itself, with just a little addition here and there:
Evidently referring to residential properties,, “….where a policy or practice that restricts the availability of housing on the basis of nuisance conduct by an individual has a disparate impact on other, uninvolved individuals of a particular protected class who share superficial characteristics of the offending individual but who do not participate in the nuisance conduct, the policy or practice is unlawful . . . ”
Actually, I can see the benefit of this particular statement. It seems to be saying that it is not lawful to deny something to a whole class of people because of the actions of a few. Obviously, it doesn’t make sense to penalize the innocent because the acts of the guilty, and closing down housing would do that. But I don’t think the goal is close off housing to innocent people. And really, the penalty is not to throw people out into the street. It is a fine, imposed only after a long period of time in which the offense is not resolved, and imposed on the landlord. Tack on a rider saying that fines incurred by management of the property can’t be added to the rent of those living there and the entire burden would be on the landlord to solve the problem.
It seems the goal is to put so much pressure on the landlords of problem properties that they will take necessary actions to get rid of the troublemakers, so they can continue to rent to people who don’t cause problems. It could possibly even be to protect them from recriminations for evicting troublemakers by making it mandatory for them to do so.
I think one goal of the ordinance was a version of Guiliani’s “broken window” theory—–if you come out and impose sanctions on certain behaviors you are sending the message that these behaviors are not acceptable.
I know it sounds obvious to those of us who don’t live in crime-ridden enclaves marked by disrespect for others and general anti-social behavior, but there doesn’t seem to be much of a set of rules or boundaries. We need to be able to start saying “This is wrong and it won’t be tolerated” even if it starts with just something as simple as putting a property on a list and eventually fining its owner. It would be a start.
If you go through a poor neighborhood, you’ll notice that most of the houses are in run-down shape, and many are clearly disasters…but then you come across some which are kept in great shape. Clearly, there are poor people who, even if they rent, take the time to make certain their living area is, well, livable. It would be better for all if everyone did this…and, so, the law your article cites is actually a good idea. But, here comes The Stupid…because such a law would have a “disparate impact”, it is unfair…but, don’t laws against drinking and driving has a disparate impact on boozers?
To me, it should be a requirement that all property owners maintain their property in a reasonably decent condition…yards cleaned up, houses painted properly, etc. To fail to do this is to negate the meaning of “property owner”. To be sure, this does involve an extra charge on the property owner, but if the property owner is either unwilling or unable to keep up his end of the property ownership bargain, then he’s not a real property owner, to begin with. The follow-on for this is that a property owner should have some care about who is renting a property…it should be, as far as can be determined in advance, someone who will have an attitude that even a rented home is a home…and thus needs input on maintenance even from the tenant.
Of course, such a “harsh” attitude would leave some people out in the cold, as it were – but it would also, over time, teach people the fundamental responsibilities of having a home, and thus prepare them in large measure for property ownership; such a skill is not something you just “have”, it must be learned. Most of us learn it by observing our parents in our homes as we grew up…but some, quite simply, don’t get that sort of instruction. It has to come from somewhere, and it must come – after all, a poor person still has a right to live a dignified life, and that means, among other things, living in a clean, respectable neighborhood. But don’t tell that to our SJW – who largely live in upscale communities and often have hired-help to keep up the property; that sort of thing is unfair…or, more accurately, preventing people from cleaning up poor neighborhoods allows people in rich neighborhoods to feel like they’ve done something for the downtrodden.
There are probably millions of examples of Liberals sounding like utter, abject fools when they talk that are ignored by conservatives. Part of this is probably a version of “who’s got the time?” Calling out every inanity and intellectual blunder would be the full time job of thousands.
Pop icon and self-styled student of natural philosophy Madonna illustrates this. She “…did explain why she thought women across the nation voted for President-elect Donald Trump.
“Women hate women. That’s what I think it is. Women’s nature is not to support other women. It’s really sad,” Madonna explained in her own words. “Men protect each other, and women protect their men and children. Women turn inward and men are more external.”
The intellectual gaps in this statement are many and obvious. She is apparently basing this on her conviction that Hillary Clinton’s lady parts qualified her for the presidency, and upon this she builds her theory that she lost because other people with lady parts did not support her because it is not in their nature to base all decisions on genitalia. The first part of this concept is pure BS—as for the second, I can only say “good for them!” Completely missing is the understanding that it takes more than a specific set of bits and bobs to be a good president. Her entire premise starts with the belief that gender is all. But only when it applies to women.
Then she gets into her explanation of natural philosophy. “Men protect each other, and women protect their men and children. Women turn inward and men are more external.” Not a word of this makes any sense, no matter how you define “protect”. As there is abundant history spanning many many centuries of men protecting women, she is probably using the term in place of “support”, a clumsy reference to the Old Boys Club, which of course is sexist because it is based on preference based on, you get it, gender. So when men are sexist it is bad, and when women are not, it is bad.
Madonna’s world is a mess, a confusing toxic stew of prejudice and ignorance, in which the rules change depending on what is now not even considered a fixed identity anyway. The only thing that makes this worth looking at is that it is a perfect example of what passes for “intellectual” analysis on the Left. And the fact that to some, she sounds perfectly rational.
http://www.theblaze.com/news/2016/12/05/madonna-has-an-interesting-theory-for-why-trump-won/
Madonna, ““I haven’t had a good nights sleep since he has been elected. We’re f—ed.”
If by “we’re” she’s referring to people who share her view, I hope she’s right. Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch. As for the sleep problem, they make a pill for that, and if she and her fellow travelers take enough of them we won’t have to worry about them any more.
Not necessarily an example of stupidity, other than that we’re stupid by allowing it to happen, but this investigation by a minor third party candidate illustrates just how pervasive voter fraud may be. Unless, of course, it’s just limited to Nevada//sarc.
The audio portion of the post is worth listening to.
This comes as no surprise, and I have often wondered why no independent organization hasn’t done what this “third party candidate” did.
Hopefully this will push a national voter registration cleanup.
Just curious—does Nevada require a photo ID to vote? Somehow a lot of dead and/or non-existent people voted. Gee, do you think a requirement to show a valid state-issued photo ID might have had an impact here?
There’s a story out today about how Detroit can’t even conduct a recount because the number of voters in the books don’t match the number of votes…no surprise that it is Democrat-heavy Detroit (Wayne County, really – which includes Detroit) which has this problem. How do Democrats – who have destroyed Detroit – keep getting re-elected? Here’s how: voter fraud. I refuse to accept any other explanation for it. People can be dumb, but not that dumb. After a while, when the school is shut down because it is uninhabitable and half the houses in your neighborhood are burnt out hulks and the street lights don’t even come on at night, you start to go, “hey, maybe there’s someone else I can vote for?”. And the flip side is, “wow, our city is in lousy shape and the people in charge have made it that way; maybe I can run on the Other Party line and win?”. This doesn’t happen in Detroit – and it is impossible for it not to happen unless everyone involved knows that the election outcome is always pre-determined that someone juiced-in gets the win (there are internal fights about how gets to be in charge, of course…but there hasn’t been a credible Outsider challenge to Detroit’s Ruling Class for decades).
Jill Stein is right that the vote needs to be audited – but not in how she thinks. She thinks that Progressives can only lose if some Nefarious Russki jumps in…but the reality is that Progressives likely can’t win unless someone is skewing the vote. I’d like to see an audit of Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Philadelphia, New York City…just about every heavily Blue city out there. Oh, sure, we can audit some heavily Red cities, too, if someone really insists…but I bet that the discrepancies we would discover would congregate heavily in the Blue cities…and the worse the condition of the city, the longer it has had a uniformly Democrat government, the more fraud I expect to find.
I think the whole Russian hacking claim started off as a way to imply that Hillary’s server was really not so insecure after all, certainly not something easily accessible. No, it could only be hacked by some superpower with vast tech resources—-RUSSIA !!! So she wasn’t as sloppy as people claim. Then it kind of took off with a life of its own and pretty soon it was RUSSIA !!! trying to cheat poor Hillary out of her rightful place, blah blah blah.
We really, seriously, desperately need a national purge of our voter registration rolls. No matter what problem we talk about, no matter what scandal or corruption we uncover, nothing has such an impact on our nation, its course and its future as our elections. If they are corrupt and bogus, nothing else can be resolved.
This guy in Nevada showed us how it can be done, and why it must be done.
If I were in charge, I’d keep the whole thing under wraps as much as possible, getting the mailing done before making big public statements. Only after undeliverable envelopes started flooding back in would I make a public announcement about what was going on. Before that, I would cross reference all registrations, which in this computer age shouldn’t take all that long, to look up duplicate registrations, and those people would get special letters sent to each of their addresses, telling them that they had showed up as multiple registrants, that being registered in more than one place is not legal., and that they would be required to fill out and sign a different form than that sent to most registrants. A nice, polite letter, but firm.
The day after the letters were sent out I would ask Congress to pass a couple of new laws making various forms of voter fraud felonies if they are not already,
In a very short period of time, a month or so, the hammer would fall. And if the same address shows up many times on many different registrations, I would investigate that address. If it is a homeless shelter, it is probably not a problem. If it is a residence, it should be looked into further.
We’ve got to get serious about this.
We’ve got to get serious about this.
We definitely do! I have always thought there was more vote fraud than was ever made public. This is what happens when you have a media that favors one political side by about 10-1. They either know this is going on and willfully cover it up or……..well, I don’t think there is an “or.” I think this tiny study in Nevada is the top inch in a 100 foot pile of fraud and deceit. There will always be cheating — that’s just human nature, but if the voter rolls could be judiciously purged it would eliminate the kind of fraud that can affect the outcome of an election.
There are ways to do it that would ensure fairness. A massive publicity campaign at the time of the mailings would make sure that most people know about it so they have plenty of time to get in and re-register if they have just moved and spaced it out. I could see moving somewhere else in your same voting area and not thinking of changing your address on your registration. But it can be resolved.
Then coming up to an election, when people are paying attention to various media, another reminder would be helpful. If there is too much shrieking about it all, and you know there would be, we could even offer SOME registration areas. Not the wholesale street corner/supermarket kind of thing we see now, and most definitely no Motor Voter, but some help. It just has to be through authorized people, not just turned over to anyone who volunteers. But allowing registration at post offices would be OK, and occasional registration drives at malls and so on would be fine.
But mostly we have to purge the rolls of dead people and multiple registrants, as well as illegals. If you are a citizen and you can’t figure out how to register, or don’t care enough to make an effort to register, then you probably shouldn’t be voting anyway.
I am so pissed off at people like your snowbird neighbors, I would even like to see action taken against them. Perhaps a semi-amnesty, allowing anyone who comes forward and admits to breaking the law pay a fine and anyone who sits back and waits to be found being found guilty of a felony and having probation if not worse. Any non-citizen who voted should never be considered for citizenship. And people like those on that video and those who drive the vans around from polling place to polling place to get homeless people to vote several times need to go to jail. Period.
There are ways to do it that would ensure fairness. A massive publicity campaign at the time of the mailings would make sure that most people know about it so they have plenty of time to get in and re-register if they have just moved and spaced it out.
The thrust of such a campaign should be that the goal is to return integrity to the voting process, not exclude eligible people from voting. I think the vast majority of people on both sides would accept and welcome such an approach. Only those bent on subverting the vote would object, and, as you say, they should be in jail anyway.
I think we need to explain EVERYTHING we do. This is why I suggested that possibly the most important appointment Trump can make is his press secretary.
Speaking of which, am I the only one relieved at the imminent departure of Josh Earnest? I know it’s a crappy soul-sucking job, having to take a bullet for Obama day in and day out while lying lying lying, but his misery is tiresome. He always looks like he should be in one of those dog shaming photos—–that sad sack look on his face wearing a big hand printed sign around his neck saying I LIED FOR OBAMA AND EVERYBODY KNEW.
This isn’t WHY we have stupid people, but another example of how stupid people can be.
You know that song “Baby, It’s Cold Outside”? It’s been done hundreds/thousands of times, but has become a target of the search for something to screech about. These whiners claim it is too “rapey” and promotes sexual aggression. (Yet they seem just fine with actual rape songs, if you can call them songs, by such as Obama BFF J-Z and his ilk. Go figure. Think it might have something to do with race and being Liberal fellow travelers?)
Anyway, a couple of PC twits have decided to rewrite the song with “consent” lyrics. I heard it yesterday on a Denver radio show, and the comments were hysterical. One listener emailed the host of the show with the comment that the new song completely missed the mark, having passed up the opportunity to include global warming, the tragedy of dying polar bears, and a litany of other Lefty causes.
This is part of the song. And yes, it is just as sick-making to the ear as it is reading it.
In their reworked version — recorded in only 15 minutes and since played 360,000 times on Liza’s SoundCloud web page — the man in the song immediately accepts the woman’s desire to leave.
“I’ve got to go away,” Liza sings, to which Lemanksi responds, “Baby, I’m cool with that.” And when she says, “I ought to say no, no, no,” he replies, “You reserve the right to say no.” As for when she asks what drink he’s serving her, the cheeky answer is, “Pomegranate La Croix.”
Cheeky. Got that? Not smug, not smarmy, not utterly inane and stupid, but darlingly “cheeky”.
The writer’s bias is more and more obvious, right up till the end of the article when he links to the original presentation of the song in a movie and refers to it as “seedy”. Watching it, it is merely a replay of a centuries-old minuet, the dance of yes/no/maybe that has entertained couples for many many decades of playful back-and-forth. There is no real coercion, there is no threat of dominance, and it is clear that both parties know the game and enjoy it.
But it is FUN, and OMG does the Left ever hate fun!
So “Here’s an original version of the song used in the 1949 movie “Neptune’s Daughter,” which pretty well captures its seediness.” is its take on the scene in the movie.
http://www.startribune.com/twin-cities-musicians-tout-consent-in-viral-remake-of-baby-it-s-cold-outside/405066306/
What he said….
http://koanewsradio.iheart.com/onair/mandy-connell-57129/penn-and-teller-on-flag-burning-15347478/