USLV: I am SHOCKED!! that things are not working out as planned.

After 9/11 American were told by our government that it would be necessary for us to set aside some of our freedoms in order to have security.  In light of this we rewarded politicians who voted for the Patriot Act, and agreed to have the travel experienced worsened by turning over pre-flight security to the TSA.

How's that working out?  Not well....

TSA Failure: Agency Falling Short on Most Undercover Screening Tests. SmarterTravel

A recent round of undercover tests revealed an agency that continues to fail at the most basic elements of its purpose. According to ABC News, these tests of multiple airport security checkpoints found that “screeners, their equipment or their procedures failed more than half the time.” ABC News’ source indicated that number may be closer to 80 percent.

In case you're wondering, an 80% failure rate is "not good" even by government standards. In short, after all of the freedoms we sacrificed, all of the gropings and "body scans" and strip searching of 80 year old grandmothers we're just about as secure from terrorism in the skies as we were before all of this mess.  On the bright side, a ton of people who were unemployable in the pre-existing job market are now collecting paychecks funded by you.

We gave up freedom for the illusion of security and got neither.  We also got just a little more poor as well.

Well done.

USLV: We are losing our collective minds.

If I've said this once I've said it a million times.

I did not vote for Donald Trump, I'm not a fan of Donald Trump and I don't support a lot of what he's doing while President.

If you're on the left side of the political aisle none of that is going to matter to you because of what I'm about to say.

What Kathy Griffin is going through right now is not a violation of her free speech rights, nor is it "bullying" nor is it some type of artistic crisis.  Nor should anyone feel any special obligation to defend her. 

We've known for a long time that the media has a tenuous relationship with free speech. (Many, not all, of them view the 1st amendment as applying to the press ONLY and not to the cattle-class) And we know that politicians of all ideological stripes tend to agree with political speech that defends their political aims while supporting the silencing of speech that runs counter to their platform.

So it's not a great surprise that the courtesan class is starting to rally around Ms. Griffin.  Good for them.

Nor should Ms. Griffin be thrown in jail, or otherwise punished by the government of the United States of America.  THAT would be a violation of her 1st amendment rights* (which the media will deem she has as a comedian) which should not stand.

You don't punch Nazi's, you don't ban rallies by the Alt-right and you don't arrest comedians for doing stupid things that aren't funny.

But that doesn't mean that said speech comes without consequences.

And Ms. Griffin is feeling those consequences right now.  In short, she has committed temporary career suicide. For a time she'll be a pariah unable to do much in the way of productive work while she, and the left-leaning media, work overtime to try and rehabilitate her image (ProTip: Keep Jim Carey far, far away from your defense).  

Once some time has passed however the left will forgive, as they do, and she'll be back doing whatever it was she did before, but there will probably be a much, much smaller audience for her. Think of the Dixie Chicks, post Natalie Maines England melt-down, except with even less talent.

The problem is that a very large part of humanity thinks that free-speech is the exclusive providence of their side.  You can't offer an opinion if you don't believe in anthropogenic climate change and you can't have a say if you don't think the Catholic Church should have to offer insurance plans that cover abortion. If you believe in a deity you are not allowed to speak in the public square etc. From the other side everyone from Planned Parenthood should be arrested, the GLBTQ community should zip it and anyone who does not speak English should "leave America" (never mind that America doesn't have an official language, but that's another post)

And yes, each side can list a litany of offenses, while ignoring the offenses of their side, usually on Twitter, which they think is proof of case that the other side is 'in the wrong' while they walk the pristine path of free speech righteousness.  This is a lie, of course, because both the left and the right suffer from the same version of selective speech suppression as the other.

Most of us will go back to work on Monday and this will be just a small diversion in our daily lives. Probably more than anyone has thought about Kathy Griffin in a long time.  The politicians and their courtesans in the media and 'activist' groups will continue to go on and on about the stupid 'artistic' decisions of a Z-list comedian who most people couldn't pick correctly out of a police line-up.

The United States is being led off the cliffs of insanity by a rather small group of low-functioning idiots whose only talent seems to be to get the screaming horrors every time they see something coming from the other side.

The best solution to this:  Change the channel, mute all mentions of them on Twitter, don't comment on your friend's Facebook post and, should you see them in person, turn around and walk away.

You can't reason with them. It's like explaining physics to a pig.

Goodbye Ms. Griffin, don't feel the need to notify me when you emerge again on the public scene. Truth be told I didn't really pay attention to you before.  As a matter of fact, most Americans didn't.

It's to our shame then that, from that perspective, you actually might have won this round.

Shame on us.





































*although a cursory investigation by the Secret Service would not be. Provided they don't arrest her.

TXLV: The lie of tax cuts and government fiscal restraint.

The Texas Legislature has (finally) reached Sine Die.  This means that it's time for the Texas LockStep Political Media and other groups to start spinning their fantasies about what it all means.

Money Grab. The Increasingly Irrelevant Chron Editorial Board. HoustonChronicle.com ($$$)

In what is really a love letter to local State Senator Sylvia Garcia (who has been a progressive fave/rave in the area for some time now) the bi-annual unsigned editorial bemoaning Texas relatively low tax system takes a new tack this year.  Suggesting that high property tax values are due, in whole, to the lack of other taxes at other levels.

One thing that never changes at the Chron is the desire to have large wads of cash thrown into a catapult and hurled at the problem.  Of course, those taxes are best when paid by other people than them.  In an attempt to seem bipartisan the Chron lists one "solution" as being a tax proposed by a Republican (Ed Emmett's proposed County Sales Tax) and one from a Democrat (Fort Bend County Chairman Ben Brown's proposal for a State income Tax).

In reality neither of these would put much of a dent in property taxes.  The idea that government will enact one tax while lowering, or eliminating another is a false promise placed in front of gullible voters which has historically never come to fruition.  Remember when the Texas "Margins" Tax was supposed to lower property taxes?  How did that work out for you?

The problem, although it won't be admitted to publicly, is that there are too many organizations with too many hands reaching into the taxpayer pie, each with different agendas.  Let us say, for grins, that the County gets a sales tax of .05% and decreases their property tax burden proportionately. OK, but the City of Houston is already pushing to raise their property tax rate due to pension under-funding and the fact that the past three mayors have acted in fiscally imprudent manners, so Houston will raise their share of the takings until resident's eyes bleed.  This will lead to more people moving out of the city and into the county, who will then be forced to re-raise property taxes to keep up with infrastructure demand.

So now, especially if you live in the city, you're saddled with higher property taxes that are still increasing due to appraisal creep AND you have to pay more in sales tax and a state income tax to boot.

Even Steve Radack's idea to "expand Medicare" to cover costs is not the bag of free money that's being promised.  Medicare is nearing insolvency, and to make up the loss the United State's federal government is going to have to get serious about fixing their tax system soon. Also, there's a 10 year limitation in what's left of ACA for "free" access to those funds. Eventually, the bill comes due and the State has to start covering those costs. There is not now, nor has there ever been, any such thing as a free lunch.

Here's the rub.

Things (stuff, trinkets, etc.) have to be paid for, political legacies have to be enshrined and no one wants to have their name attached to the phrase "tore down the Astrodome".  In order to continue to bribe the electorate the government has to figure out a way to increase tax burdens while convincing a majority of the citizenry that they're doing it to "the other guy". People are more likely to accept a small tax increase on themselves if they think those slightly more well off than they (or even better, evil "corporations") are shouldering a much larger share of the version. Politicians, who are rational actors despite being (for the most part) functional idiots, understand this and have done a great job convincing most of academia and the media that this is a swell way to run a country.  How else do you explain a man who owns three homes running around suggesting that he's a 'man of the people' and really only wants healthcare and higher education to be "free" not being laughed out of the building?

Even though the ideas are wrong the country still has to run, things need to be purchased, the general security provided for and debt service paid.  What this means is that serious, meaningful tax reform has to be broached at every level of government. The goof-balls in Washington D.C. could do a lot worse than simplifying the tax code to the point that the IRS is not really needed while the pugilists in Austin (and other state-houses) should start by figuring out what NEEDS to be done, fund that and then do those "nice to have" things based on remaining money.  Counties and Cities just simply need to go on a diet. Public works is a must, of course, as are policing and other emergency services.  But after that?

Yes, I get it that you feel you really NEED that $100K per year from the County to hold your civic club's annual garden party but the facts are that you don't. If the business community feels that parks and green space is vital to their ability to attract talent than allow them to underwrite the cost. If nothing else it will save us from having politicians gloating that their legacy is a sidewalk on which dogs pee and poop. (The Bill and Andrea White promenade at Discovery Green in case you're wondering).

A trap that conservatives (including little l libertarians) fall into is the fallacy of "no".  You cannot run a government simply by shouting that and hoping for the best.  Because things have to be done.  The biggest issue for what's left of the conservative movement is not sanctuary cities, or bathroom obsessions, it's making the case for real, meaningful tax reform for all. And doing a better job explaining to the family of four making $45K per year why it's a boon for them.

The alternative is in the link above, an asinine argument that by failing to increase taxes sufficiently the government has failed to cut them.

To be fair, there is one thing on which the Chron and I agree.  In order to get nice things from our government we're going to have to elect new, serious people to do the governing.  This might come as a shock but I am referring to your elected representative, including the one in your district that you like.  They need to go. (as do mine)

Until that happens we're just whistling past the graveyard.

HALV: This is GOOD News for Houston.

It seems that the NCAA is deciding that cities providing a special accommodation to transgenders in regards to bathroom access is going to be a key component in their decision making for location evaluation.

NCAA to survey potential host cities on discrimination laws. Morganton News-Herald.

The board in April adopted a requirement for host sites to demonstrate "how they will provide an environment that is safe, healthy and free of discrimination and also safeguards the dignity of everyone involved in the event." The questionnaire is intended to bolster that requirement.

The good news for Houston, and Texas (for now), is that they haven't passed any laws or ordinances that are "discriminatory" in nature.  Yes, the State leaders are vowing to pass a silly "gender bathroom" law which strips the rights of individual businesses to make the determination themselves regarding who can use bathrooms within their (private) establishments but, as of now, no other laws exist.

While it's true that Houstonians, wisely, refused to provide transgender people with a special accommodation regarding bathroom access that other's don't enjoy (and, in the process, refused to establish the urinal tribunals that former-Mayor Annise Parker envisioned) there's nothing in the law that prevents private businesses from implementing so-called "gender neutral" restrooms should they so desire.

Of course, we'll now be on the receiving end of numerous articles in the increasingly irrelevant middling-regional daily and fainting couch, think pieces from it's editorial blog (Gray Matters) telling us that Houston is doomed, DOOMED mind you, because they didn't pass and heartily endorse Parker's Folly but it's just not true.

In fact, I would argue that Houston's relatively open regulatory structure regarding the same is a feature, not a bug in the way we handle the delicate matter of who potties where.

A city, and State, possessed of real leadership would be able to make this case to the NCAA strongly, loudly and confidently.

Unfortunately Houston and Texas are ran by an incompetent group whose main goal is to pander to the increasingly under-informed masses and protect their patronage.

And the NCAA is allowing Baylor to continue operations.

Which tells you pretty much all you need to know about their commitment to providing a "safe environment" versus their pandering to the media as a bastion of modern-progressive thinking.