politicnewsbusterinsiderpostreview: Daily Digest

Friday, 29 April 2022

Daily Digest

The Chauvin appeal
Thoughts from the ammo line
How Much Longer Can This Go On?
California’s Ongoing Suicide Attempt
Media Doing Its Part to Prop Up Biden

Posted: 29 Apr 2022 09:33 AM PDT

(Scott Johnson)

Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was unaccountably denied a public defender to appeal of his convictions in the death of George Floyd. Bill Mohrman answered my call for a Minnesota attorney to represent Chauvin on appeal. Bill filed his brief on behalf of Chauvin this week. It is posted online here. Derek Chauvin’s mother has set up a page to support the expenses of appeal here.

Bill’s leading argument on appeal is that pretrial publicity and related riots required a change of venue. As we noted repeatedly during trial, the martial security that protected the courthouse graphically represented the issue. So did the anticipation of riots in the event of an acquittal.

The 24-story Hennepin County Government Center was closed to everything but the trial for reasons of security. Barricades and secure fencing topped with concertina wire surrounded the perimeter. The massive building was off limits to nearly everyone who wasn’t involved in the trial. The building was locked down and everyone — and I mean everyone — knew why.

We will be living with the devastating consequences of George Floyd’s death in Minnesota for a generation. The Minnesota Human Rights Department charge against the Minneapolis police earlier this week is just the latest chapter in the saga. A few contrarians might speak up publicly on behalf of the police to contest the merits of the charge even though it is dubious in critical respects. Good luck trying to get access to the 480,000 pages of documents and other material the department compiled in the course of its investigation.

The adversary process is intended to get at the truth. It doesn’t work if two sides aren’t represented and heard. Although Chauvin has pleaded guilty to the criminal civil rights charge in the duplicative federal case, Chauvin’s appeal of the murder convictions in the state case warrants resolution in its own right.

Thoughts from the ammo line

Posted: 29 Apr 2022 03:26 AM PDT

(Scott Johnson)

Ammo Grrrll observes KAMALA'S RACE TO THE BOTTOM OF SPACE. She writes:

So early last week I had most of this column worked out when my colleague and alleged friend, Steve Hayward preempted me in discussing Kamala's speech on "Space." He knows very well because we have discussed it many times that he is supposed to wring the humor from the more intellectual, highfalutin' topics and leave the "low-hanging humor fruit" for ME. Hey, ever heard of Equity, amigo? ONE of us has a Doctorate and Professorship and one of us got a B.A. in Speech-Communication a mere 18 years and three colleges after high school. You do the Math. No, seriously, YOU do it; because Math was not covered in Speech class.

To add insult to injury, in Steve's Kamala piece dozens of clever readers – you know who you are — piled on with hilarious commentary that had me in stitches. A wiser woman might just have given up at that point and acknowledged that "The topic is burnt out. Move on." But I'm no quitter. I had my take on Kamala's Race to the Bottom of Space ready, and "As God is my witness" you will read it."

What in the world is the matter with this woman? Remember when candidate Obama said his GRANDMA (let that sink in, the lady who RAISED him in private schools in Maui) was a "typical" white person? Well, initially, I had thought that Kamala was a kind of pretty, typical Affirmative Action hire who had also been a horizontal recruit into the power elite.

Sure, there was that nervous, shrieky, inappropriate laugh. And there were a couple of other Red Flags. I knew she had failed the Bar at least once – bearing in mind that you only need a D-minus to pass — but, I never DREAMED that she was this shallow a thinker and terrible a speaker. I have heard Bar Mitzvah speeches that were far more organized and profound from 13-year-old boys whose brains were awash in a sea of unblocked puberty hormones.

In the great 1975 movie Dog Day Afternoon (to use a hip, current reference), poor Al Pacino was stuck trying to rob a bank with an accomplice who thought that Wyoming was a different country. And our Vice President — one influence peddling indictment or Montreal Cognitive Test away from Leader of the Free World — believes a major problem with West Virginia is its landmines. That came as somewhat of a surprise to me, I admit. Now, true, there are MINES in West Virginia, and they are on LAND so the opportunity for confusion can scarcely be overstated. I hope she doesn't think "strip mines" involve dancing and poles in any way. And I would avoid asking her about "fracking" altogether.

Her staff — which leave her employ faster than shoppers leaving a mall with an active shooter — claims that they prepare research and talking points for her but she refuses to look at them. So along with "vapid" and "unqualified" let's add "lazy" and "arrogant" to the mix. That's a deadly combination, by the way. Not everyone is a genius, heaven knows, and people can go far in this great and good land with just a B.A. in Speech and hard work.

"Winging it" may work for some things but is painful to watch on the national stage. Al Franken has not done anything funny in decades, not counting the knee-slapping photo of him – a Senator and a married man — pretending to grab a sleeping woman's breasts on a plane. But one outstanding Stuart Smalley routine he did had Stuart announcing to his television audience, "Today I will not prepare." Predictable dead air ensues as he just sits there staring into the camera. It's both hilarious and painful to watch.

On a couple occasions whose memories I continue to repress I have failed to prepare for something, hoping my natural glibness might save me. It did not. But I sure did not enjoy the experience and learned from it.

I would like to review just a small sampling of Kamala's unserious remarks and include my own reactions. Her Deep Thoughts are in bold, my reactions in brackets.

I think everyone here recognizes how extraordinary space is. [Yes, I think it is important that EVERYONE, every last person here, agree with the settled science that space is "extraordinary."]

It affects us and connects us. [Huh? Explain, please, how "space" connects us. Usually, it's something that separates us, like the Magic Six Feet that protect us from other people's COVID cooties. Things are not more profound just because they rhyme. Why not just throw in "if the glove doesn't fit, you must acquit?"]

Whether it is satellites that orbit the earth, humans [well, only men so far] that land on the moon, or telescopes that peer into the furthest reaches of the universe [telescopes, technically, do not "peer"; they are made mostly of mirrors; it's people who peer INTO things. But I think you are thinking of microscopes], space is exciting. [Good grief! Extraordinary AND exciting! Who knew?]

It spurs our imagination. [Spurs? Really? I think "stimulates" may be the verb you are looking for here, but, hey, hook 'em horns and spur that imagination out of the chute.]

And it forces us to ask big questions. [I have a sizable question myself: You are a grown woman with a staff of writers, and this is the best you could do?]

When I first saw the little clip of her speaking, I assumed from her tone that she was talking to a pre-school class. But no, we know that can't be right because she never once mentioned her race, her gender, her pronouns, or what she likes to do in bed.

No, friends, as the camera moved back, we realized she was addressing the Space Force, presumably a smart and elite group who do not need to hear some chirpy lamebrain opine that "space is exciting." I give them all high marks for remaining as stoic as a Spartan whose innards were being gnawed on by a fox. I would have been rolling on the floor, a disgrace to my unit. They might have had to turn a cold water hose on me like you do to separate over-amorous dogs for me to regain control.

But, hey, as all our beloved military vets can attest, retaining a neutral expression in the face of idiocy is an important part of military training. To wit: Admiral Robert Willard interrogated by a sitting member of Congress about his fear that Guam might capsize did not burst out in gales of laughter, wiping his eyes, while saying, "Good one, Hank. Oh man, you really had me going for a minute there…wait…you are serious?" Instead, exercising the kind of discipline that makes one an Admiral, he said, "Uh, no, we don't anticipate that, sir."

Perhaps next Kamala will have remarks for Obama's famous United States Marine Corpse. "War – ughn! What is it good for? Absolutely nuthin', say it again. War hurts us. And deserts us. War is terrible. Unbearable. But if we have to have war, and we can't find someone to surrender to or apologize to, then it should be fought by the toughest, badasses in the world. And that is you Marine gals and, grudgingly, a few toxic males, plus all the other genders. Also, war is exciting and soon war will be Green, yes, greener than a kindergarten groomer's hair. Tank charging stations every few feet on the battlefield. That will be extraordinary. Gaia will be so proud."

I have been saying for a very long time now – and, in the words of John Lennon's awful “Imagine” – "I am not the only one": DO NOT VOTE FOR OR APPOINT A CATEGORY. Vote for a responsible, smart, competent serious PERSON who may also be from some prized quota-worthy group, but do not just vote for a category. Because this is what you get.

Though I am not a biologist, I believe that Kamala is a woman. So am I. Big Deal! She is no more qualified to be President than I am. Kamala is of some "color" other than Stark White, though she certainly seems more Beige than Black to me, but whatever. She is a "first" in several utterly meaningless categories. And she is not an "inspiration," but rather a perfectly terrible role model for little girls.

"Hey, kids, if you are a shade darker than typing paper, you too can fill multiple prized Entitlement Slots if your birthing person's obstetrician made a pretty good guess about your gender, and your Papa is a Jamaican professor and your Mama is an Indian from the most privileged caste. But, frankly, it's much easier to attach yourself to a powerful adulterous male and leap many squares ahead in the Game of Life. Just sayin'. So, you go, girls!"

Extraordinary.

How Much Longer Can This Go On?

Posted: 29 Apr 2022 12:25 AM PDT

(Steven Hayward)

Today’s Biden struggle with the Teleprompter delivered this 15-second gem:

Back in 2010, P.J. O’Rourke said the Republican mid-term landslide was a restraining order against Obama. Maybe this year’s likely mid-term GOP blowout will be understood as a national intervention, in which the people will tell Democrats that it is time for Biden to be put out to pasture and the Democratic Party sent to rehab.

Chaser: Maybe I am being too harsh on Biden. It’s understandable that Democrats would have trouble pronouncing “kleptocracy.” It could just as easily happen to Elizabeth Warren.

California’s Ongoing Suicide Attempt

Posted: 28 Apr 2022 09:49 PM PDT

(Steven Hayward)

When the news was announced a year or two ago that San Francisco would start paying to house the homeless in hotel rooms, you pretty much knew how it would turn out. An indeed it has turned out so predictably that even the San Francisco Chronicle has had to acknowledge reality. Start with the subhed:

San Francisco spends millions of dollars to shelter its most vulnerable residents in dilapidated hotels. With little oversight or support, the results are disastrous.

In a complex arrangement, the city's Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, or HSH, pays nonprofit groups to provide rooms and aid to formerly homeless people in about 70 single-room-occupancy hotels, known as SROs, which the nonprofits generally lease from private landlords. The buildings are the cornerstone of a $160 million program called permanent supportive housing, which is supposed to help people rebuild their lives after time on the streets.

But because San Francisco leaders have for years neglected the hotels and failed to meaningfully regulate the nonprofits that operate them, many of the buildings — which house roughly 6,000 people — have descended into a pattern of chaos, crime and death, the investigation found. Critically, the homelessness crisis in San Francisco has worsened. . .

At least 166 people fatally overdosed in city-funded hotels in 2020 and 2021 — 14% of all confirmed overdose deaths in San Francisco, though the buildings housed less than 1% of the city's population. The Chronicle compiled its own database of fatal overdoses, cross-referencing records from the medical examiner's office with supportive housing SRO addresses, because HSH said it did not comprehensively track overdoses in its buildings.

Residents have threatened to kill staff members, chased them with metal pipes and lit fires inside rooms, incident reports show. At the Henry Hotel on Sixth Street, a tenant was hospitalized after a neighbor, for a second time, streamed bug spray into their eyes, public records show. Last May, less than a mile away at the Winton Hotel, a resident slashed another tenant's face with a knife, leaving a trail of blood out of the building. Much of the instability stems from a small group of tenants who do not receive the support they need.

There’s a lot more in the full story if you want to take in complete account of the failure of urban liberalism.

This chart that accompanies the story may convey the real lesson of the scene. As I have asked before, with rising budgets for “homeless services,” does anyone think San Francisco’s political class actually wants to reduce homelessness? Expect the budget to double again over the next year or two, and for more homeless to turn up in San Francisco.

Chaser—breaking tonight:

Large fire burning near homeless encampment in Oakland

A large fire was burning in Oakland, California, Thursday evening. Residents who live nearby took to social media to say it is burning at a homeless encampment. The video also appeared to show firefighters on the scene. . .

One social media user said the encampment had been in the area for at least a year with no action taken to clean it up.

Media Doing Its Part to Prop Up Biden

Posted: 28 Apr 2022 07:25 PM PDT

(Steven Hayward)

Today we discovered that the Biden Administration has reached the “stag” part of stagflation, with a first quarter negative economic growth rate. One more quarter qualifies as a recession, but I am sure Biden will call it some kind of “growth recession” or something.

The media has been stepping up for months to prop up Biden’s overstimulated but underperforming economy. This deserves its own headline gallery.