Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => Politics => Topic started by: Jamie B on March 19, 2012, 01:19:18 PM
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http://news.yahoo.com/stockton-california-town-housing-boom-broke-121026168.html
The Rise:
Then there were what one city official called the "Lamborghini" benefits for city workers: anyone who toiled for the city for as little as one month was eligible for retiree healthcare - for life. Their spouses got it, too.
Middle-class families, priced out of the Bay area housing market, snapped up the new homes, happily trading extreme commutes for the suburban niceties of four bedrooms and a yard.
The Fall:
Stockton faces a deficit of as much as $38 million on its budget of $165 million, and is in its third year of fiscal emergency. Its retiree healthcare liabilities alone total more than $400 million.
Last year, city officials discovered that they had made $15 million worth of math errors, including double-counting $500,000 in revenues from parking fines.
The rest of Stockton's housing stock tanked even more, falling 75 percent from the peak. Soon the Repo Home Bus Tours were rumbling through town.
The problems were extensive:
Over-calculation of revenues.
Excessive spending by the mayor and city council.
Mathematical errors
Budget mis-management
Extreme dependence upon the real estate price boom (market has dropped 75% in values).
City politicians devoid of any fiscal discipline
Increased crime rates
16% unemployment (compared to 10.6% in CA overall).
The city will probably be filing for bankruptcy protection within several months.
I see this same poor attitude at all levels in government today, and it scares me.
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anyone who toiled for the city for as little as one month was eligible for retiree healthcare - for life. Their spouses got it, too.
:facepalm:
derp.
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Not a word about culture, ethny, immigration. =(
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ethny? Is that a thing?
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Try it, you'll like it. If you want the Greek term, I can use that.
To write about the growing insolvency of Inner California without discussing the great cultural transformation of that area and the complicity of Our Great White Father in D.C. with it is not only bad journalism, it's mendacious journalism. But what else is new?
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Gee, fiscal responsibility is a good long term idea. Who knew?
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http://www.clrsearch.com/Stockton_Demographics/CA/Population-by-Race-and-Ethnicity
lets try it
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Stockton is "only" 42 per Hispanic. Yeah, who knew? Of course these are the official stats, aren't they?
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those facts displease you? imagine
i thought you were the one that wanted the discussion?
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those facts displease you? imagine
i thought you were the one that wanted the discussion?
VDH has detailed what has occurred to the interior of California in the last few decades, if not Stockton specifically. It is quite the transformation...and not for the better if one considers criteria like:
rule of law
poverty
literacy
facility with English
gainful employment
equal treatment under the law
eschewing gov't handouts
etc.
better than their opposites.
Quite a bit of that transformation for the worse has been caused by the dramatic increase in illiterate, non-English-speaking, 19th century (skill and readiness level) workers from Mexico & points south. A neighborhood/polity does not have to become majority underclass before the vital middle classes put out "for sale" signs, pack up, and get outta Dodge. Given Stockton's demographic data you so kindly linked, it does not take a rocket scientist to see it is well on its way to mimicking a third-world country in its demographics: large underclass, tiny middle class, with an upper crust in its walled/gated enclaves.
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Here is his book on the topic:
Mexifornia: A State of Becoming
http://www.amazon.com/Mexifornia-Becoming-Victor-Davis-Hanson/dp/1893554732
Classics professor Hanson is also, like generations of his family before him, a fruit farmer in California's central valley. He has employed immigrants, seen them flood his community during the last 30 years of mass flight from Mexico, and endured the crime associated with illegal immigrants. Hanson is immensely sympathetic to poor Mexicans, however, and the most powerful chapter here outlines the harried life of the illegal alien. But he hates to see the ordered culture in which he grew up drowned by an alien inundation whose undeserving beneficiaries are Mexico's kleptocratic rulers, for whom an open border is a safety valve expelling the potential for democratic change. The four solutions to the mess that Hanson enumerates include continuing de facto open borders but insisting on rapid acculturation; patrolling the border effectively and reducing legal immigration; imposing "sweeping restrictions on immigration" and ending Mexican chauvinism in the U.S.; and allowing present policies to make California increasingly mirror an unreformed Mexico. Hanson thinks that the U.S. "still need not do everything right" to prevent social collapse in the Southwest and that the totalitarian uniformity of valueless mass culture may soften that collapse. He also sees very clearly what has brought this crisis on: the American globalist ideology's lust for cheap labor and emphasis on "raw inclusiveness" instead of "standards and taste."
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those facts displease you? imagine
i thought you were the one that wanted the discussion?
I do, and the facts support what I said. Stockton is not just a bedroom community for the Bay Area. Investigate the gang situation there and the shadow population of illegals.
As Roo_ster has noted, Victor Davis Hanson has detailed--beyond the statistics--the real and manifest changes in Inner California in the last 20 years. You cannot expect honesty from the press on these matters, and I'm sure you understand that.
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Hahaha, oh that's rich - its not the financial crisis that left the entire central valley under water on its mortgages, it's mainly those minimum wage earning illegals who control the property markets!
Victor Davis Hanson should stick to fruit farming and pronouncing mundane words in a "classical" sounding accent - his historical and cultural analyses make the various [blank] studies people look like real scholars.
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Hahaha, oh that's rich - its not the financial crisis that left the entire central valley under water on its mortgages, it's mainly those minimum wage earning illegals who control the property markets!
Victor Davis Hanson should stick to fruit farming and pronouncing mundane words in a "classical" sounding accent - his historical and cultural analyses make the various [blank] studies people look like real scholars.
De Selby is very much correct.
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He lives there, you don't.
And he wasn't just talking about the mortgage problem, he was talking about the change in, and decline of, the culture in the area.
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He lives there, you don't.
And he wasn't just talking about the mortgage problem, he was talking about the change in, and decline of, the culture in the area.
How has the culture declined, apart from involving historically low crime levels?
Stockton isn't the most exciting city (wasn't when I grew up either) , but it's still better than when I was a kid.
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Here is his book on the topic:
Mexifornia: A State of Becoming
http://www.amazon.com/Mexifornia-Becoming-Victor-Davis-Hanson/dp/1893554732
"I taught classics for one year as a visiting professor" now makes you "classics professor" for life?
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"I taught classics for one year as a visiting professor" now makes you "classics professor" for life?
he'll be emeritus in a couple years
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he'll be emeritus in a couple years
Apparently already.
a professor of Classics Emeritus at California State University
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"I taught classics for one year as a visiting professor" now makes you "classics professor" for life?
In fairness, he's probably as professional as over a third of the professors I had at the university.
(That is not a compliment.)
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How has the culture declined, apart from involving historically low crime levels?
From http://www.areavibes.com/stockton-ca/crime/
•The Stockton, CA violent crime rate is 262% greater than the California average and 341% greater than the national average.
•The Stockton, CA property crime rate is 90% greater than the California average and 93% greater than the national average.
•Overall, the Stockton, CA crime index is 110% greater than the California average and 117% greater than the national average.
Also, Stockton is #11 on Forbes' 2012 list of America's Most Miserable Cities: http://www.forbes.com/sites/kurtbadenhausen/2012/02/02/americas-most-miserable-cities/
(although, to be fair, they were #1 on Forbes' 2011 list, so maybe things are looking up. Or Miami, Detroit, et al got worse ...)
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Y'all can make pissant comments about VDH all you want, but he writes about changes that I have seen my own self, in the southwest, even though his stomping grounds are 1000+ miles from mine.
Angel Eyes, how dare you introduce data into the discussion when folks are belittling their betters?
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That doesn't contradict what De Selby said.
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That doesn't contradict what De Selby said.
" . . . historically low crime levels."
Since some remain unconvinced:
http://www.cityrating.com/crime-statistics/california/stockton.html
Stockton crime statistics report an overall upward trend in crime based on data from 11 years with violent crime increasing and property crime increasing. Based on this trend, the crime rate in Stockton for 2012 is expected to be higher than in 2009
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" . . . historically low crime levels."
Since some remain unconvinced:
http://www.cityrating.com/crime-statistics/california/stockton.html
I am sure DS was comparing 2012 Stockton, California, to Germany during the 30 Years War. It is the obvious comparison in some social circles, second only to comparing Stockton to the trench warfare of WWI.
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Police to ignore California impound law amid concern of fairness to illegal immigrantsI
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/03/22/police-to-ignore-california-law-requiring-authorities-to-impound-vehicles/
The Los Angeles Police Department will soon start ignoring California state law, which requires police to impound the vehicles of unlicensed drivers for 30 days.
The majority of unlicensed motorists in Los Angeles are immigrants who are in the country illegally and have low-income jobs. The LAPD says the state's impound law is unfair because it limits their ability to get to their jobs and imposes a steep fine to get their car....
Opponents of Beck's decision are furious and refer to studies showing unlicensed drivers are among the most dangerous on the road. Indeed, a 2011 AAA study titled "Unlicensed to Kill" finds they are five times more likely to be involved in fatal crashes and more likely to flee the scene of a crime.
Did someone mention rule of law or equal treatment under the law upthread?
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wait re they only releasing the cars of "undocumented" unlicensed drivers? or all unlicensed drivers?
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Stockton is "only" 42 per Hispanic. Yeah, who knew? Of course these are the official stats, aren't they?
You're barking up the wrong tree with this crap, and hijacking the original thread to showboat your racisit tendencies.
If you've got hard data to post that proves the demographics of california are to blame for its demise, then put up or shut up.
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You're barking up the wrong tree with this crap, and hijacking the original thread to showboat your racisit tendencies.
If you've got hard data to post that proves the demographics of california are to blame for its demise, then put up or shut up.
That's an awfully nice straw man you've constructed there.
OTOH, were you interested in discussion rather than misplaced indignation, it might be helpful to point out to us who has blamed California's woes solely on demographics. Or provide a reason why an article addressing California's difficulties would legitimately ignore such a large factor as demographic change via illegal immigration, their anchor babies, and the costs they impose on the state & local polities.
Heck, here are some close to your neck of the woods that indicate demographic change is an elephant in the room:
http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/Illegal-immigrants-may-be-majority-at-Harris-1699591.php
http://www.portfolio.com/industry-news/health-care/2009/11/20/illegal-immigrants-cost-local-hospitals-while-feds-avoid-issue/
Also, nice cheapening of the word "racist."
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That's an awfully nice straw man you've constructed there.
OTOH, were you interested in discussion rather than misplaced indignation, it might be helpful to point out to us who has blamed California's woes solely on demographics. Or provide a reason why an article addressing California's difficulties would legitimately ignore such a large factor as demographic change via illegal immigration, their anchor babies, and the costs they impose on the state & local polities.
Heck, here are some close to your neck of the woods that indicate demographic change is an elephant in the room:
http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/Illegal-immigrants-may-be-majority-at-Harris-1699591.php
http://www.portfolio.com/industry-news/health-care/2009/11/20/illegal-immigrants-cost-local-hospitals-while-feds-avoid-issue/
Also, nice cheapening of the word "racist."
It was directed at long eyes and his constant noise about "culture" and any other little buzz words he likes to toss around.
Your points about anchor babies and illegal immigrant expense isn't lost on me and is one I agree with. Along with the liberal policies that pander to groups solely based upon their ethnicity and heritage.
Long eyes doesn't bother making those points....he just jumps in with his double speak and round about ways of saying things.
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As a resident of California, I am interested in seeing how this all plays out.
Amid the city worker unions wanting to stop nearby Vallejo filing for bankruptcy in 2008, Vallejo finally became fiscally solvent in 2011.
According to an article in the San Francisco Chronicle: "Declaring bankruptcy gave the city protection from creditors and allowed it to renegotiate its employee contracts. Among other changes, city staffers now contribute more to their health insurance, new firefighters have lower pension plans, and the fire department no longer has minimum staffing requirements."
I certainly do not think bankruptcy is the answer to all of Stockton and Vallejo's financial problems, merely the result of the bigger problem of Keynesian economics. Vallejo blamed the "housing boom" for all their financial woes which is simply another example of failed Keynesian economics.
Stockton and Vallejo should be allowed to fail. Bailing them out only prolongs the inevitable.
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And speaking of Stockton, CA:
Hello,
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As instructed by the aforementioned authorities, we are to pay 100 Nigerian Scam victims $1,000, 000 .00 ( One Million United States Dollars) each. You are listed and approved in the payment schedule for this payment as one of the beneficiaries to be paid this amount as compensation. As a result of this laudable recommendations, it is imperative to bring to your notice that during the official meetings held at Washington DC, it was alarmed so much by the rest of the world in the meetings on the lose of funds by various foreigners to the scams artists syndicates operating in all over the world today. In other to redeem the good image our relationship with African Countries, the New President of Economic Community of West African States has agreed with United States Government, World Bank and International Financial Bodies to ordered the payment of $1,000,000 .00 each to the affected victims in pursuance with the U.N. recommendations.
This was resolved in a meeting held between World Bank , United Nations , Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Authorities and Officials of United States Government in Washington DC last week, as a condition from the International Monetary Fund to support Asia Countries , Canada , European Union (EU) and United States of America in receiving total debt cancellation or forgiveness from the International Financial Bodies.
However, as per the instruction given by the authorities, recipients are to visit Bank Of America Stockton, CA- USA and sign for the documents and pick up your card with all the documents that covered it.
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Thanks for banking with the Bank of America, while we look forward to serving you better.
Mr. Frank M Cook,
ATM Master Card Delivering Department.
Bank Of America Stockton, CA- USA
Office Line: 209-227-0347 (9Am - 5Pm)
Fax : 209-644-7697
frankfharacelis100@bankofamerica.com
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It was directed at long eyes and his constant noise about "culture" and any other little buzz words he likes to toss around.
Your points about anchor babies and illegal immigrant expense isn't lost on me and is one I agree with. Along with the liberal policies that pander to groups solely based upon their ethnicity and heritage.
Long eyes doesn't bother making those points....he just jumps in with his double speak and round about ways of saying things.
[gilda_radner]Never mind.[/gilda_radner]
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Y'all can make pissant comments about VDH all you want, but he writes about changes that I have seen my own self, i
You summed it up pretty well here. You chose a reference that agrees totally with your quaint perspective.
The truth is that people like you, long eyes, and VDH are taking the easy way out. You rage against imaginary forces (communists, illegals from whatever nation is trendy at the moment.)
At the end of the day, all of your hurr-durring won't have done an ounce of good.
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Yeah, stockton is worse than some other parts of california and always has been. It's not seen as a great place to live (a lot like Modesto).
Like I said, it's still better than when I was a kid in the 80s. Not sure how the "cultural" change is bad in that respect.
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You summed it up pretty well here. You chose a reference that agrees totally with your quaint perspective.
The truth is that people like you, long eyes, and VDH are taking the easy way out. You rage against imaginary forces (communists, illegals from whatever nation is trendy at the moment.)
At the end of the day, all of your hurr-durring won't have done an ounce of good.
Ah, wisdom from the ivory tower, where complete unfamiliarity with reality on the ground is waved away as easily as any other inconvenient facts. "Well, first I'll assume I have a can opener..."
My wife works at a hospital where "imaginary forces" grunt out nigh on 10,000 anchor babies per year on the backs of local taxpayers. The same hospital spends millions saving them after these imaginary forces shoot each other up, drive drunk into bridge abutments, of don't strap their kiddo down in a car seat and the tyke goes ballistic head-first out the windshield and into a persistent vegetative state. Approximately 35%+ of the local metro gov't school district is filled up with illegals and those same anchor babies.
These "imaginary forces" have a real effect on the cost of gov't and the burden taxpayers must lift. I would be one of those taxpayers and I am not going to shut up because some twits living a clue-free existence outside the southwest can't see past their nose.
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Yeah, stockton is worse than some other parts of california and always has been. It's not seen as a great place to live (a lot like Modesto).
Like I said, it's still better than when I was a kid in the 80s. Not sure how the "cultural" change is bad in that respect.
Do you have data supporting your claim of "historically low crime levels"?
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[relevant post]
So, what actually happens happens when a city declares bankruptcy?
[/relevant post
Ah, wisdom from the ivory tower, where complete unfamiliarity with reality on the ground is waved away as easily as any other inconvenient facts. "Well, first I'll assume I have a can opener..."My wife works at a hospital where "imaginary forces" grunt out nigh on 10,00 anchor babies per year on the backs of local taxpayers. The same hospital spends millions saving them after these imaginary forces shoot each other up, drive drunk into bridge abutments, of don't strap their kiddo down in a car seat and the tyke goes ballistic head-first out the windshield and into a persistent vegetative state. Approximately 35%+ of the local metro gov't school district is filled up with illegals and those same anchor babies.
These "imaginary forces" have a real effect on the cost of gov't and the burden taxpayers must lift. I would be one of those taxpayers and I am not going to shut up because some twits living a clue-free existence outside the southwest can't see past their nose.
OK, let me get this straight. You're saying that illegals, that do undoubtedly cause a burden on taxpayers, were a major contributing factor in a city of 292,000 getting to the point of declaring bankruptcy?
(Inb4 you call a strawman)
I'm sure Thomas Nast would agree with you, were he here.
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You're barking up the wrong tree with this crap, and hijacking the original thread to showboat your racisit tendencies.
If you've got hard data to post that proves the demographics of california are to blame for its demise, then put up or shut up.
It's there, find it yourself. If you don't understand, YET, the impact of changing demographics on California--the amount budgeted for illegal aliens at all levels of California government might be one clue for you--I can't help you. If you lived here you'd understand that California politics is controlled by a Mexicanist lobby in Sacramento and the public sector unions--which, by the way, are heavily minority-influenced--and that is why the GOP here has become impotent.
Anyone who calls it the way it is in America today is called a racist. But, hey, sticks and stones, bro', sticks and stones...
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It was directed at long eyes and his constant noise about "culture" and any other little buzz words he likes to toss around.
Your points about anchor babies and illegal immigrant expense isn't lost on me and is one I agree with. Along with the liberal policies that pander to groups solely based upon their ethnicity and heritage.
Long eyes doesn't bother making those points....he just jumps in with his double speak and round about ways of saying things.
Please. I'm either using double-speak and roundabout speech or, rather that, as I suspect, I'm instead being all too clear and blunt in ways you find uncomfortable? Which is it? I suspect you have a problem with the latter, which is why you call me--dishonoring the rules of this forum, by the way--a racist. I am anything but, just a realist about what is going on culturally. If you understand the significance of the term you understand that you can't understand these problems without examining a lot of different factors.
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It was directed at long eyes and his constant noise about "culture" and any other little buzz words he likes to toss around.
Your points about anchor babies and illegal immigrant expense isn't lost on me and is one I agree with. Along with the liberal policies that pander to groups solely based upon their ethnicity and heritage.
Long eyes doesn't bother making those points....he just jumps in with his double speak and round about ways of saying things.
Your self-description as a "Booze-fueled paragon of pointless cruelty and wanton sadism" is all too apt. I imagine that's intended somehow to be funny. I make EXACTLY the points you refer to here and have for years now. That you don't like where I see the country heading unless we create a serious mass movement that unites those of us who care about our Founding values--and those indeed transcend race and ethnicity--is just another symptom of your intemperance. You don't like me. Who gives a damn, bro'? I avoid responding personally unless personally attacked. It's the classy way to comport oneself. You should try applying these rules on this forum and stop calling names.
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You summed it up pretty well here. You chose a reference that agrees totally with your quaint perspective.
The truth is that people like you, long eyes, and VDH are taking the easy way out. You rage against imaginary forces (communists, illegals from whatever nation is trendy at the moment.)
At the end of the day, all of your hurr-durring won't have done an ounce of good.
The easy way out is not to see things as they are. Where we go from there is the hard way. As for imaginary forces, I would not include hard leftist and illegal aliens in either of those groups. You do?
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[relevant post]
So, what actually happens happens when a city declares bankruptcy?
[/relevant postOK, let me get this straight. You're saying that illegals, that do undoubtedly cause a burden on taxpayers, were a major contributing factor in a city of 292,000 getting to the point of declaring bankruptcy?
(Inb4 you call a strawman)
I'm sure Thomas Nast would agree with you, were he here.
I live in Los Angeles. Why don't you check the amount this city and county pay out in toto to illegal aliens and their offspring--the numbers are available--and compare those numbers to our continuing city and country deficits. Be sure to count education, welfare, and health services. You may be in for a shock.
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"I taught classics for one year as a visiting professor" now makes you "classics professor" for life?
I think you'd better re-visit his C.V., Micro.
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Your self-description as a "Booze-fueled paragon of pointless cruelty and wanton sadism" is all too apt. I imagine that's intended somehow to be funny. I make EXACTLY the points you refer to here and have for years now. That you don't like where I see the country heading unless we create a serious mass movement that unites those of us who care about our Founding values--and those indeed transcend race and ethnicity--is just another symptom of your intemperance. You don't like me. Who gives a damn, bro'? I avoid responding personally unless personally attacked. It's the classy way to comport oneself. You should try applying these rules on this forum and stop calling names.
Maybe I'm not smart enough to get it, but your posts quite often come across as if your problem is people who are different from you based on ethnicity. If I'm off base then say so....or, better yet, stop being so damn ambiguous all the time.
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I'm not being ambiguous. I personally have no problem with "ethnicity," but then I take people one at a time and don't view them as members of a "class." I deal with race and ethnicity by seeing past it. Unfortunately many do not. And that is my point. We've discussed tribalism many times on this forum. My comments are aimed at group-think, which is all too often these days based on race and ethnicity. Whites are guilty of it too, but they don't have the full force of the Federal government or the many special interest groups on the Left behind them. In politics we are seeing our politics re-shaped by ethnic and racial interests, preferences, and enclaves where what counts is nothing more than "helping one's own and sticking with one's own." This, unfortunately, is especially true in California. You can witness what I'm talking about with the recent decisions about car impounding in Los Angeles; those decisions are rooted in creating a special legal class above and outside the law (illegal aliens, mostly from Mexico). It's wrong and this kind of lawlessness, this kind of rogue governmental activity is going to sink what's left of the Republic. We have a lot of politicians who care more about "their own" than anything else and certainly more than they care about the people at large, as a whole. I lament the fact that the Left is determined to make everything in American politics about race, ethnicity, class, and gender and to utterly ignore individual liberties, but that is the way it is and we'd best understand it and try to combat it.
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"I taught classics for one year as a visiting professor" now makes you "classics professor" for life?
from wikipedia:
Hanson, who is of Swedish descent, grew up on a family farm at Selma, in the San Joaquin Valley of California. His mother was a lawyer and judge, his father an educator and college administrator. Hanson's father and uncle played college football at the College of the Pacific under Amos Alonzo Stagg.[3] Along with his older brother Nils and fraternal twin Alfred, Hanson attended public schools and graduated from Selma High School. Hanson received his B.A. from the University of California, Santa Cruz in 1975[4] and his Ph.D. in classics from Stanford University in 1980. He is a Protestant Christian.[5]
Hanson is currently a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and Fellow in California Studies at the Claremont Institute. Until recently,[when?] he was professor at California State University, Fresno, where he began teaching in 1984, having created the classics program at that institution.
In 1991 Hanson was awarded an American Philological Association's Excellence in Teaching Award, which is awarded to undergraduate teachers of Greek and Latin. He has been a visiting professor of classics at Stanford University (1991–92), National Endowment for the Humanities fellow at the Center for Advanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford, California (1992–93), as well as holding the visiting Shifrin Chair of Military History at the U.S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, Maryland (2002–03). He was a visiting professor at Hillsdale College in 2004, 2006, 2007, and 2012.[6]
Hanson writes two weekly columns, one for National Review and one syndicated by Tribune Media Services, and has been published in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Commentary, American Heritage, City Journal, The American Spectator, Policy Review, the Claremont Review of Books, The New Criterion, and The Weekly Standard, among other publications. In 2006, he started blogging at PJ Media. In 2007, he was awarded the National Humanities Medal by President George W. Bush.
Many of Hanson's readers refer to him by his initials, "VDH".
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I'm not being ambiguous. I personally have no problem with "ethnicity," but then I take people one at a time and don't view them as members of a "class." I deal with race and ethnicity by seeing past it. Unfortunately many do not. And that is my point. We've discussed tribalism many times on this forum. My comments are aimed at group-think, which is all too often these days based on race and ethnicity. Whites are guilty of it too, but they don't have the full force of the Federal government or the many special interest groups on the Left behind them. In politics we are seeing our politics re-shaped by ethnic and racial interests, preferences, and enclaves where what counts is nothing more than "helping one's own and sticking with one's own." This, unfortunately, is especially true in California. You can witness what I'm talking about with the recent decisions about car impounding in Los Angeles; those decisions are rooted in creating a special legal class above and outside the law (illegal aliens, mostly from Mexico). It's wrong and this kind of lawlessness, this kind of rogue governmental activity is going to sink what's left of the Republic. We have a lot of politicians who care more about "their own" than anything else and certainly more than they care about the people at large, as a whole. I lament the fact that the Left is determined to make everything in American politics about race, ethnicity, class, and gender and to utterly ignore individual liberties, but that is the way it is and we'd best understand it and try to combat it.
Thank you for breaking down your points on it and I apologize for the "racist tendencies" jab then.
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Appreciated, thanks.
This is a excellent forum with a lot of valuable contributors, people of good faith and serious intelligence. We should all take advantage of the opportunity to sharpen our thoughts and test our positions.
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I'm not being ambiguous. I personally have no problem with "ethnicity," but then I take people one at a time and don't view them as members of a "class." I deal with race and ethnicity by seeing past it. Unfortunately many do not. And that is my point. We've discussed tribalism many times on this forum. My comments are aimed at group-think, which is all too often these days based on race and ethnicity. Whites are guilty of it too, but they don't have the full force of the Federal government or the many special interest groups on the Left behind them. In politics we are seeing our politics re-shaped by ethnic and racial interests, preferences, and enclaves where what counts is nothing more than "helping one's own and sticking with one's own." This, unfortunately, is especially true in California. You can witness what I'm talking about with the recent decisions about car impounding in Los Angeles; those decisions are rooted in creating a special legal class above and outside the law (illegal aliens, mostly from Mexico). It's wrong and this kind of lawlessness, this kind of rogue governmental activity is going to sink what's left of the Republic. We have a lot of politicians who care more about "their own" than anything else and certainly more than they care about the people at large, as a whole. I lament the fact that the Left is determined to make everything in American politics about race, ethnicity, class, and gender and to utterly ignore individual liberties, but that is the way it is and we'd best understand it and try to combat it.
How does lawlessness and destruction of the republic translate to lower crime rates, which is what you have???
The worst things about California have nothing to do with illegals - the roads are crap, and the economy is in the tank. Neither of those is controlled by illegal immigrants.
There's this fantasy that illegals are out there grabbing all the resources with government help. There is not a shred of evidence to support it.
Listening to Spanish on the street and looking at signs in Spanish doesn't violate anyone's rights. Yet that seems to be what most of these gripes boil down to.
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How does lawlessness and destruction of the republic translate to lower crime rates, which is what you have???
The worst things about California have nothing to do with illegals - the roads are crap, and the economy is in the tank. Neither of those is controlled by illegal immigrants.
There's this fantasy that illegals are out there grabbing all the resources with government help. There is not a shred of evidence to support it.
Listening to Spanish on the street and looking at signs in Spanish doesn't violate anyone's rights. Yet that seems to be what most of these gripes boil down to.
Your arguments are demonstrably, provably false.
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How does lawlessness and destruction of the republic translate to lower crime rates, which is what you have???
The worst things about California have nothing to do with illegals - the roads are crap, and the economy is in the tank. Neither of those is controlled by illegal immigrants.
There's this fantasy that illegals are out there grabbing all the resources with government help. There is not a shred of evidence to support it.
Listening to Spanish on the street and looking at signs in Spanish doesn't violate anyone's rights. Yet that seems to be what most of these gripes boil down to.
I have never argued that illegal immigrants are the sole source of what's going wrong with California, but to deny that they contribute, hugely, to the current state of affairs is odd indeed and grossly misinformed. When we talk about illegal immigration we are also talking about anchor babies and family reunification, not just the first generation of what SPLC has called "latino travelers" [pick your favorite provenance if you don't like latino]. It is indisputable that the costs of the the children of illegal aliens in California are considerable, not just welfare but health and education. One estimate was $10 billion a year, probably half or more of the current annual deficits we're running up. The majority of children in LAUSD's K-12 program are now either illegal aliens or the offspring of illegal aliens. Do you know what the annual budget of LAUSD is? Seven billion dollars. Monies are diverted to the needs of illegals and their children that might well have gone to better roads or to business incentives; meanwhile, there's the issue--by no means trivial--of law-breaking, vote tampering, and cultural displacement. It's not just "listening to Spanish on the street" it's the profusion of Spanish-speaking radio stations--I believe there are now more in L.A. than English-speaking ones--that impairs the homogeneity of the society and reduces its economic viability. Half this city is now marginal in English language fluency; now while that means some businesses may thrive--albeit with illegal labor with all that implies--it also means that the kind of business that can be done here is being changed--and not for the better. You can only have so many car washes and restaurant kitchens and gardener auxiliaries if you want anything resembling a middle-class economy.
Public sector unions are the other major factor in California's slide. They comprise a tiny percentage of the population yet run this state with an iron grip. Our current governor, who was responsible over three decades ago for empowering public sector unionization, has one solution for all our problems: higher taxes. It seems not to have occurred to him that more and more productive Californians are heading elsewhere, or, perhaps, Mr Brown doesn't care and is merely implementing his vision of "mission" economics.
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How does lawlessness and destruction of the republic translate to lower crime rates, which is what you have???
The worst things about California have nothing to do with illegals - the roads are crap, and the economy is in the tank. Neither of those is controlled by illegal immigrants.
There's this fantasy that illegals are out there grabbing all the resources with government help. There is not a shred of evidence to support it.
Listening to Spanish on the street and looking at signs in Spanish doesn't violate anyone's rights. Yet that seems to be what most of these gripes boil down to.
Illegals may not be the only problem we have, but the expense they have imposed on some cities have definantly contributed to ther economic failure of some hospitals, and that's just plain history.
No one is complaining about listening to Spanish on the street. I actually will be complaining about Spanish street signs if they start displacing English signs because I ought not have to speak a foreign language to navigate in my own country.
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Ah, health care costs - the illegals don't pay bills in some cases, but then again, they're not responsible for making the costs so extraordinarily high.
That reminds me, my private cover bill just went up - I'm now paying a whopping $73 a month for full cover on sports and any accident injuries, joint surgeries including replacements, and substantial coverage (50 to 75 percent plus freebies) on eyes, dental, and alternative medicine. I also get a tax break for buying it.
Nope, can't see how the illegals explain that.
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Ah, health care costs - the illegals don't pay bills in some cases, but then again, they're not responsible for making the costs so extraordinarily high.
That reminds me, my private cover bill just went up - I'm now paying a whopping $73 a month for full cover on sports and any accident injuries, joint surgeries including replacements, and substantial coverage (50 to 75 percent plus freebies) on eyes, dental, and alternative medicine. I also get a tax break for buying it.
Nope, can't see how the illegals explain that.
When they DON'T pay, those charges have to be covered by those who DO pay. I'm not saying that illegals are the only force that's driving up the cost of health care (a lot can be found in the halls of government as well) but in the southwest, yes, they are one of the more significant causes of the problem.
Sorry your bill just went up. Mine does that on a regular basis. And I am not thinking it's going to stop going up ....let alone go down. :mad: