Libraries in Utah are responding to a new law that would fine staff for allowing kids to access inappropriate material by banning children. “Legislation passed by conservative lawmakers allows parents to sue libraries for books they deem obscene or otherwise inappropriate.” Rather than remove any inappropriate content, they are banning children instead.

Here’s the Library line.

Public and school libraries had 60 days to remove the book or move it to an adults-only area closely monitored by staff, or face lawsuits from parents.

However, many libraries were too small to create a special section, or lacked the resources or appetite for risk, and instead banned kids entirely.

A sign in the Idaho Falls Public Library, with a huge stop symbol, informed patrons they would need to show photo ID if they were under 30.

Children could only enter if they had an unrestricted library card signifying their parents were happy with them browsing alone, or be accompanied by a parent who ‘must sign an affidavit every time you come to the library’.

The sign sparked outrage online, and many critics contrasted it with abortions being banned under almost all circumstances, including rape and incest.

I have not read the law, which may be too subjective, but I sense this is a familiar problem we’ve covered. Every library has a fixed footprint not unlimited shelf space. They cannot have every book. Smaller libraries, even more so. But in each instance, someone decides what books will be available in print. They choose them, buy them, and shelve them, so these gatekeepers, if we play by Progressive rules, are banning books. Whether the library staff, its board, or trustees, someone assigns a value judgment for the community and includes or excludes titles.

In smaller libraries, this is amplified.

Library officials acknowledged the policy would affect homeschooled children in a ‘dramatic’ way but said it was necessary to protect staff, the library, and taxpayers’ funds.

According to Rep. Megan Egbert, keeping libraries like Donnelly open would be impossible if adult-only sections could not be fully monitored.

How did they do it before the sexually explicit material directed at children became a necessary part of any collections?

Maybe these towns need to replace staff with those who prioritize the library’s value to children over an ideological obsession with grooming that is dangerous to them. Or perhaps it is time to ban the library culture that allows this abuse to continue and invest those resources in internet access. It’s not as if we even need partisan child-banning librarians – and think how much better losing that carbon footprint would be for the environment.

Whatever you do, don’t let the Feds fund your broadband infrastructure expansions. They spend billions, but no one who needs it ever seems to get connected.

The post Libraries Ban Children so They Can Keep the Naughty Books appeared first on Granite Grok.

The left made it clear that anyone could claim to be anything they wanted! You made these rules—we’re just following them.

Remember what Saul said:

RULE 4: “Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.” If the rule is that every letter gets a reply, send 30,000 letters. You can kill them with this because no one can possibly obey all of their own rules. (This is a serious rule. The besieged entity’s very credibility and reputation is at stake, because if activists catch it lying or not living up to its commitments, they can continue to chip away at the damage.).

Again, the Left has said we can be whatever we want to be (except their code phrase is “what I identify as,” which is REALLY meant to shut down any conversations they don’t want to happen).  This kid gives these self-important “fatphilic-body positives” a Master Class in language and Social Justice (and turns it against them):

This video is entertaining, and it tends to confirm what we have long suspected about the sincerity of those who purport to believe in “identifying.” I think a lot of people on the left are happy to dismiss reality until they are dealing with something that matters to them. Enjoy:

Give this guy a medal! pic.twitter.com/6FArsDSLZY

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) March 31, 2024

“Fat-bodied People”…hilarious!

Yep, he learned their Rule and proclaimed it for himself. Or is that to play along as “he/they”? “They”?

Well played.

 

The post What Did You Expect, Lefties, as YOU Made It Clear That ANYONE Can Claim to Be Anything They Want! appeared first on Granite Grok.

It is open season on BidenX after a radio host who “interviewed” him two days ago leaked to CNN that the entire interview was a sham.

As some of us have said repeatedly, this has been going on since 2020. Yeah, it has gotten worse, but the real “news” is that you do NOT get news from the corporate media. You get Party (as in Democrat Party) propaganda. But … go, Free Press!

The post Night Cap: Biden’s Post-Debate “Interview” Was Scripted appeared first on Granite Grok.

Lloyd Alter at Carbon Upfront (heh! The “new” Treehugger”) is NOT a fan of the “Gigacasting” method that is overtaking the auto industry led by Tesla. That manufacturing technique involves high-pressure form/mold pressing of larger and larger parts for Teslas instead of press stamping lots of little pieces and then having to weld, rivet, or screw them all together.

Not only does it eliminate a lot of inventory of those parts, but it also lessens the number of steps in the manufacturing process and the hourly costs of many line workers who would be needed to do it.

The result is a much lower cost of manufacturing. Lloyd’s lament, however, is that it makes it harder and much costlier for someone to fix stuff that goes wrong.

I have to admit that when the entire gigacasted underside of a car is bent, even if only slightly after a fender-bender, the cost to repair is not just a few small pieces but most of a car’s cost. A dd in the cost of the battery bank (since we’re talking EVs) and it may well be totaled.

Like the Japanese cars coming over to the US starting in the 1950s and 1960s, EVs just happen to be getting that same bad rap – quality is cruddy, especially when compared to their gas-driven brethren.  EVs are giving new owners more headaches, and Tesla is a big reason why: J.D. Power study:

J.D. Power’s study tracks responses from nearly 100,000 purchasers and lessees of 2024 vehicles within the first 90 days of ownership, and for the first time in the study’s 38-year history, it incorporates repair visit data. Overall, internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles averaged 180 PP100 (or 180 problems per 100 vehicles), while battery electric vehicles (BEVs) averaged a whopping 266 PP100, 86 points higher than ICE vehicles.

Automakers have typically said that EVs are generally less problematic and require fewer repairs than ICE vehicles because they have a smaller number of parts and systems. However, J.D. Power’s study with newly incorporated repair data shows EVs, as well as plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs), require more repairs than gas-powered vehicles in all repair categories.

“Owners of cutting edge, tech-filled BEVs and PHEVs are experiencing problems that are of a severity level high enough for them to take their new vehicle into the dealership at a rate three times higher than that of gas-powered vehicle owners,” wrote Frank Hanley, senior director of auto benchmarking at J.D. Power, in the study.

As Steve Green at Instapundit noted, “I’m so old, I remember when TCO was supposed to be EV’s big advantage.” And it is true!  TCO, or Total Cost of Ownership, looks well beyond just the sticker price of getting the vehicle off the lot. That’s just the start of it. Two things were always hammered at us as to why we should go electric and ditch ‘Ole Faithful sitting in the garage because of fossil fuel usage:

1. While gas engines have tons of parts and are rather complicated due to Government regulations, an electric motor is much simpler.
2. Gas is much more expensive than electricity.

Yeah, well, see the quoted part about repairs; most of the needed repairs have nothing to do with the motors – it’s all of the other stuff in a car. Sure, I might give Tesla a pass on that due to “not much time in grade” with larger-scale design and manufacturing, but what about all of the other mainstay auto manufacturers getting into the EV space? Sure, they are dealing with the same issues with batteries, power distribution, and electric motors like Tesla but they’ve had a century of experience with getting all of the “other stuff” that makes up a car, right?  So what’s their excuse for all this?

Part of that TCO is finding out that instead of getting 30-40 thousand miles on a set of tires, it’s more like 10-15 thousand—and much more expensive to boot due to larger sizes having to support all that weight of the battery bank. And the specter of replacing that bank far sooner than most have to replace an ICE engine.

This results in almost half of all EV owners starting to regret their choice to move away from internal combustion engine-based cars—they wish to rekindle that flame by ditching the EV.

We are starting to look at going back to being a two-car family again as TMEW won’t drive the F-150 crew cab (“too big!”) – it’s more like a RAV4 (and after seeing one yesterday, she’s willing to look at the new and much smaller Ford Maverick pickup). I asked her about getting an electric car. While she doesn’t read as much about them as I do, she has rejected that idea outright even as her driving will be REAL local. But what she’s read of the problems (lately, getting locked in a Tesla and unable to get out due to a malfunction), she decided she’ll stick with the known issues.

 

 

The post EVs, ICEVs, Repairability, and Outrage – Part 2 appeared first on Granite Grok.

This is the company that Terry Red-Flag Roy keeps. Specifically, Manchester State Rep (in name only) Alissandra Murray, whose reelection Red-Flag Roy essentially endorsed. Alissandra apparently believes that we should celebrate Juneteenth as Independence Day:

And NOT the Fourth of July because there is NO mention of the 4th on her X (Twitter) in contrast to the tweets above regarding Juneteenth. (Note: I am writing this on the AM of the 5th.)

Needless to say, this reflects the mindset of America’s Woke-Communists. They believe that America is evil … founded primarily for the slavery of African-Americans. Therefore, America’s founding on July 4th is NOT something to be celebrated.

The company that Red-Flag Roy keeps.

The post Useful Idiot Part VI … “Rep” Alissandra Murray Does NOT Celebrate Independence Day (Not On July 4th, That Is) appeared first on Granite Grok.

After Biden’s meltdown in the debate, support from many Democratic politicians, big-money donors, and the mainstream media is falling off the proverbial cliff and looking for Joe to throw in the towel. Joe says “NO”! Some attribute this stubborn refusal more to Jill Biden, the President’s wife, and her love of power than to Joe himself. Regardless, they say they are in it until the finish.

That’s fine by me. Joe’s support has fallen behind Trump’s even more since the debate and contributions are drying up. Anyone thinking the 25th Amendment will be applied to remove Joe might be disappointed because I don’t think Kamala has the guts to initiate the action as required. It also seems unlikely she can get a two-thirds vote from both houses of Congress to carry the motion. Again, how long would that take?

I may be wrong, but it does seem to be a real uphill climb plus a huge distraction for the Democratic party with only four months left until the election to build up a new candidate. Even if it did happen, that would throw open the Democratic National Committee’s Convention, and several new names may compete to be the Presidential nominee.

So if Joe is ousted or dies between now and then, who’s on deck?

Well, Kamala, as VP, would be in charge (in case of death) until the new President is inaugurated. The Presidential vote would not likely favor her. She is not liked by Democrats to begin with, and her being the force behind Joe being dumped would not sit well with many other Dems.

Gavin Newsom’s name is well known but the damage he has done in California plays very strongly against him.

How about JFK Jr.? He’s blessed with name recognition but is currently only drawing about 6 percent support. He might be the Democrats’ best shot, but how much time, again, would it take the DNC to come together, go through the process of removing Biden, inserting Kennedy Jr., and then start all that’s needed to build a new challenger’s campaign?

It’s a lot to think about, it seems to me, but would desperation power such a process?

Politically, we could be in store for anything. but the lazy, crazy days of summer?

The post Joe and Jill Biden Fighting On appeared first on Granite Grok.

Vermonters who don’t pay close attention to politics may have been surprised this month (July 2024) to find their paychecks a little lighter than expected, the result of a new payroll tax passed into law last year (Act 76). According to the Joint Fiscal Office, this 0.44 percent tax (0.11 percent for the self-employed) applies to everyone who earns a paycheck and will collect a total of around $100 million per year in new revenue for the legislature to spend. Of course, that’s (another) $100 million less for the roughly 350,000 Vermonters participating in the labor force to spend on whatever our priorities might be. Is this fair?

The proponents of the payroll tax think so, or at least want you to think so. Their argument is, “It’s less than half a percent tax. A mere pittance! You can afford it!” As always, they’re “just asking” you to pay a little more. But try politely declining to pay up and find out what “just asking” really means!

According to MIT’s state-by-state calculation of what someone needs to earn to cover their basic needs, a single Vermonter with no children must earn $47,892 before taxes. So, this new payroll tax would cost such a person $211 a year, bringing them that far below the level necessary to meet their own basic needs.

What is $211 for a person at this income level? In concrete terms, again, according to MIT, it’s more than two weeks’ worth of groceries. Or two months’ worth of internet connectivity. Or four tanks of gas to get to and from work, etc. In other words, real, important stuff.

A family of four (two adults and two kids) needs to earn $91,507 to cover their basic needs. This new payroll tax impacts such as family to the tune of $403 a year. Again, the state kicked the chair out from under people working hard to keep their noses above the financial waterline.

Now, according to the US Census, the median nonfamily household income in Vermont is $46,022 – or already below the basic needs income before the implementation of this payroll tax. The median household income is $96,345. According to the Vermont Tax Department, over 150,000 tax returns filed in Vermont for all households (family and nonfamily) reported income of $49,000 or less. These are the people getting genuinely hammered by this tax.

But here’s where the injury meets insult. Act 76 creates a dynamic in which you can have a single mother (or many such single parents) of adolescent children working a minimum wage job paying this tax on her wages – on top of her regular income taxes – in order to subsidize the childcare of a family earning $202,055 (or 575 percent of federal poverty levels)! And that’s just obscene.

More injury, Act 76 states, “In fiscal year 2024, the amount of $4,200,000.00 is appropriated from the General Fund to the Department of Taxes to be used for the implementation of the Child Care Contribution.” This is for “The establishment of the following 15 new permanent classified positions authorized in the Department of Taxes in fiscal year 2024.” Over $4 million of the taxes collected on this tax go toward paying over two dozen new bureaucrats to collect the tax. That’s $280,000 per new hire! How is that possible? But it is indicative of the real goal here: creating a well-paid class of government-employed elites funded, for the most part, by lower and middle-income, working-class people. (Suggested Reading: The Coming of Neo-Feudalism by Joel Kotkin.)

A final warning…. This 0.44 percent payroll tax raises only a fraction of the amount necessary to cover the long-term plans for this program. According to the Rand Study that formed the basis of this legislation, it will require three and a half to five times as much revenue. Childcare subsidies are not the only program our legislators have targeted the payroll tax to pay for. They are also eyeing the payroll tax to pay for a universal paid family leave program (H.66). So, this “little bit” is just about getting the camel’s nose under the tent.

And a last point…. this latest upping of “your fair share” via a new payroll tax is just one of many such cuts inflicted by this legislature in this last biennium alone. There’s also the unprecedented property tax increase (Act 183), the Renewable Energy Standard mandates that will jack up electric bills (Act 179), the 20 percent increases in DMV fees (Act 62), and the coming estimated 70 cents per gallon carbon tax on home heating fuel (Act 18). And those are just the biggest hits. The total, on top of what was already one of the highest state tax burdens in the nation, is not small. It’s not fair.

But, as Senator Mark MacDonald admitted in a moment of candor about he and his colleagues under the Golden Dome, “We don’t do things based on helping poor people.” No, they certainly don’t.

 

Rob Roper is a freelance writer with 20 years of experience in Vermont politics, including three years of service as chair of the Vermont Republican Party and nine years as President of the Ethan Allen Institute, Vermont’s free-market think tank. He is also a regular contributor to VermontGrok.

The post What “Paying Just a Little More” Really Means appeared first on Granite Grok.

I’ve been listening to these dire predictions for LITERALLY 50 years from mid-wits who don’t have the science chops to make such predictions. These bureaucrats use this tactic to wind up and create severe doom-and-gloom anxiety among actual nitwits.

I don’t know which is worse—the meaningless yammering or the fact that I’ve reached the age where I’ve had to listen to 50 years of EVERY. SINGLE. STUPID. SOOTHSAYING message from our Climate Betters (or Climate Con-Artists trying to justify their jobs; pick one or the other).

United Nations Climate Chief: ‘We Have Two Years to Save the Planet.’

…others are leveraging the warming weather to decry the supposedly warming planet. The United Nations (UN), which never saw a socialist pry-bar it didn’t try to apply to the free world, is no exception to that.

Simon Stiell is the Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Did you know they had one of those? Nor did I, but it’s not too surprising. The UN has a plethora of offices designed to hector us to behave in the ways that the UN wants us to; we are fortunate indeed that, unlike our government, the UN can only nag, not compel.

In another example of the UN’s nagging, on Wednesday, Simon Stiell took to X/Twitter to claim that we have two years left to save the planet.

We have two years to save the world.

Starting now, we need:

A quantum leap in climate finance

Bold new national climate plans by all nations that protect people, boost jobs and drive inclusive economic growth

More https://t.co/LmM3rX8fpc pic.twitter.com/zJjIdh0VEK

— Simon Stiell (@simonstiell) April 10, 2024

See here as well: https://t.co/LmM3rX8fpc



Smug sorta guy, like all the rest of them involved in this grift.

Except for Al Gore – he’s in panic mode all the time despite none of his predictions of “climate disasters” coming true. And yet, there are followers paying good money to these prophets of doom (just like Ibram X Kendi and Robin DiAngelo are for “anti-racism” and “white fragility”). Think of these paying fools who have never realized that climate ALWAYS changes incrementally every year and tremendously over various Epochs. But a buck is a buck, and Stiell is no different in guilting people.

In his case, however, he wants governments to be the guilty “people” and cave to the UN. After all, THEIR grift is to become the “over-country” in which all other countries give up their sovereignty to the UN and tax their people to death to make the UN feel good about themselves.

See what I just did there? Anyway, two years is all we’ve got left. So, given that it’s been 50 years, can I wish that “Party like it’s 1999” also meant I’d have the young body I had back then?

However, let me be kind to ClimateBat (instead of Moonbat)  as he looks “long term” compared to a couple of the predictions from the post:

• In 2019, “Think Progress” breathlessly reported we had 14 months to save the planet.
• In 2009, United Kingdom Prime Minister Gordon Brown claimed, “We have fewer than fifty days to save our planet from catastrophe.”

Yeah, the Climate Catastrophe Credibility has worn a bit thin and is highly tattered, but that won’t stop them at all. As with all things of the Left, it’s all about the intent and never the results. They know it—they just depend on everyone else to NOT know it.

And sadly, because it’s been 50 years, too few haven’t fallen for this.

 

The post Yep, The UN Is Not Above “Climate Catastrophe” Fearmongering; “We Have Two Years To Save The Planet!!!” appeared first on Granite Grok.

Ugh. Monday.  Again.

Last week’s Friday Edition.

Remember, ridicule and mockery are effective weapons:

1. Ridicule cannot easily be fought
2. Ridicule makes the enemy angry, and angry people make mistakes
3. For those in the “squishy middle” a Thought Splinter (and Part II and Part III and Part IV) can often be hidden inside humor.

Now, let the mockery and mayhem begin.

 

*** Warning, definitely a few off-color ones, in case tender eyes are about ***

 

 

And the closer we get to November, the worser it will get.  Here, and globally.

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

 

I’ve seen the pic of teenager Jill.  She looks like a cute, nice girl.  Just how corrosively corrupt are the Bidens (and DC in general) that she’d do this now?

 

 

 

In the name of safety and saving your life from the Dread Pirate Bird Flu, they’ll starve you to death.

 

 

 

The new State Religion.

 

 

 

 

Look how long that number’s been dropping… decades and decades.  Wonder how this works out to children per couple.

 

 

 

 

OK, I’ll be nasty and opine that, clearly, not only does she “need” another raping, but have it be brutal and permanently crippling and sterilizing too.  Then, and just then… maybe… she might understand what she and others have done to her homeland.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yes, IIRC she actually said something like that.  Reminds me of a UK pol who said that ensuring that their subjects were disarmed would then appeal to a criminal’s “sense of fair play” and they, too, would not feel the need to have guns.

 

 

Quoting Reagan: The trouble with our Liberal friends is not that they’re ignorant; it’s just that they know so much that isn’t so. 

I’d add another layer – not just that they know so much that isn’t so, but that what they “know” makes them feel important and educated and superior.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Agree with the sentiment, but… it’s not Trump’s home.  It’s his workplace.  NOBODY has that White House being their permanent home.

 

 

 

I’ve posted this multiple times, but this is an in-depth take down of the whole “You couldn’t possibly win against the US military” argument:

The 2nd Amendment is Obsolete, Says Congressman Who Wants To Nuke Omaha | Monster Hunter Nation

From where this thought originates:

 

 

And related:

Belling the cat | The Zelman Partisans

Belling the Cat, Revisited | The Zelman Partisans

 

 

 

A little dated, but remember – this is who the enemedia is.  Both above and below:

 

 

 

 

 

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

PSA – PSA – PSA – PSA – PSA

 

OK, specifically Israel-related, but understand something about Pallywood / Gazawood.

First, they lie.  Like the Viet Cong, they know they can’t win on the battlefield.

Second, so many eat it up because it rationalizes what they want to believe.

Third, others eat it up because they’re so racist they think “little brown people” can’t deceive their uber-educated selves.

There is no starvation in Gaza.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Remember, in Islam, to advance jihad and conquer there are so many layers and flavors of deceit they have different names.

Deception in Islam: Taqiyya, Tawriya, Kitman and Muruna – Trevor Loudon’s New Zeal Blog

Taqiyya: Deception and Lying in Islam (thereligionofpeace.com)

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

 

Which is why this is so worrying:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It took a video by an open racist/white supremacist for me to grasp that white people are, actually, very diverse.  It was an interesting shift in perspective.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Funny how fast that switch happened.

 

 

 

 

After the election, or even before…

 

 

 

My bet?  The Potato gets fully baked by the end of the summer.

 

 

Lather, rinse, repeat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Randy Weaver and Ruby Ridge… in case you’re wondering.

 

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Link section (some mine, some from my Jarhead friend):

 

The Jab / Vaccines / Medical:

JUST IN: Mainstream Media 7News Australia Airs Groundbreaking Segment highlighting COVID Vaccine Reactions (aussie17.com)

And there are others.  More and more other exposures of the harms the Jab does.  Word is getting out.

The Lies We Were Told About Covid And The ‘Vaccines’ | Principia Scientific Intl. (principia-scientific.com)

Evidence existed to us in the research & medical field as far back as 2,500 years ago with the Athenian Plague (PELOPONNESIAN WAR) that natural immunity was robust, life-long, bullet-proof; far super- (substack.com)

 

 

https://blog.maryannedemasi.com/p/merck-misled-participants-in-gardasil

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23078778/

Being pushed hard on my daughter right now.

Recent study we completed e.g. Risch, McCullough, myself, Hulscher, Hodkinson etc. titled “A Systematic REVIEW of Autopsy findings in deaths after covid-19 vaccination” has been published (substack.com)

Dr. Naomi Wolf Uncovers Pfizer’s Depopulation Agenda, as Evidenced by Its Own Documents – DailyClout

—

Moonbattery Coeur d’Alene Shows How to Respond to Tyranny – Moonbattery

I would cheerfully and enthusiastically carry a cross here to support Christians.

—

Muslim Brotherhood Plan Exposed! | Erick Stakelbeck | It’s Supernatural with Sid Roth (youtube.com)

Echoes Brigitte’s video:

Muslim Brotherhood Plan Exposed! | Erick Stakelbeck | It’s Supernatural with Sid Roth (youtube.com)

Over and over and over, their own words outline what they plan.  And nobody believes them.

—

Tyranny / Globalism:

Sounds Right | NC Renegades

SHEEEESH! One of the best anti-Islamization “Xers” – Radio Genoa – is being targeted by Rome prosecutors for alleged “hate speech” (barenakedislam.com)

PURE EVIL. Kamala Warns that President Trump Will Jail His Political Oppenents – She Actually Said This! | The Gateway Pundit | by Jim Hoft

They always project.

 

 

—

 

 

 

 

—

Prepping:

The Other Things to Prep – Tactical Wisdom (tactical-wisdom.com)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

—

WW3 Watch:

‘She eats Russians for breakfast’: Who is Kaja Kallas, the EU’s next foreign policy chief? — RT World News

Wants NATO troops in Ukraine.

How Biden’s debate performance could lead to WORLD WAR III as China and Russia are emboldened by his ‘message of incompetence’ | Daily Mail Online

If they’re going to do something “big” it’ll be soon.

Chinese Fighter Jets Breach Taiwan’s Air Defense Zone (legalinsurrection.com)

Transfer of Dutch F-16s to Ukraine imminent – defense minister — RT World News

 

 

I repeat: We’re going to tit-for-tat our way into WW3.

—

A popular AI chatbot has been caught lying, saying it’s human (nypost.com)

Fill me with wonder at the new miracle of AI.

—

Border / migration / invasion:

Biden Regime Bringing Back Migrants Deported by Trump. (thenationalpulse.com)

The devastating effects of ‘Islamic multiculturalism’ on the women of France (barenakedislam.com)

House Democrats are “Bringing Out the Big Guns” to Allow Illegal Aliens to Vote in 2024 Presidential Election | The Gateway Pundit | by Jim Hᴏft

—

Bill Gates owns synthetic fruit coating — what’s in It? – Nexus Newsfeed

I trust nothing – NOTHING – he has his fingers in.

—

 

 

 

 

 

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Pick of the post:

 

 

They LIED to you to get you to take the Jab.  Pull this into the core of your being.  They LIED to you.  Just like the LIED about Ivermectin and HCQ.

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Palate Cleansers:

 

 

I have to wonder.  Not that I’m in a courthouse much, but if I’m there, I will look.

—

—

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Come back Wednesday for another edition.  Same Meme Time.  Same Meme channel.

Please do consider buying me a coffee.

Buy Me a Coffee

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

The post MONDAY MEMES appeared first on Granite Grok.

The most important election in 2022 was in Wisconsin. The Left went all out, pouring millions into the race, while the Right, as usual, sat on its hands. The liberal, activist, Democrat candidate won a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, which flipped the court from majority Republican to majority Democrat.

The corrupt Democrat (now that’s a redundancy) majority just (I’m writing this on 7/5) gave the okay to use drop boxes in the 2024 election. It is impossible to verify ballots deposited in drop boxes. No matter how many legitimate votes Trump gets … it won’t be enough. You are going to see a repeat of 2020. The voting will be “paused” and then resumed and the drop boxes will produce obviously incredible margins for Biden, just like 2020.

 

The post Biden Just Won Wisconsin’s Ten Electoral Votes appeared first on Granite Grok.

A 2015 McKinsey report promised real growth and opportunity for corporations that embraced Diversity, Equity, and inclusion (DEI), but in the nine years since, no one has been able to duplicate those results – not on paper or in practice, because it wasn’t true.

The [2015]  study gave corporations air cover to promote ideologically motivated diversity programs while saying that it was simply “good for business.” It wasn’t. What it was good for was transforming the world of Big Business into an outpost of academia.

In that sense, it worked.

But the original pro-business justification has turned out to be a scam.

According to The Wall Street Journal, “academics have tried to repeat McKinsey’s findings and failed, concluding that there is in fact no link between profitability and executive diversity.”

There is not, however, a missing link between DEI and a loss of sales or brand value. Companies suffering from Diversity dysphoria can speak to this truth. Go woke, go broke is a common refrain following the diversification of executives, including activists interested in political agendas and not profits (despite the enormous salaries they often command to do their dirty work). Disney, Bud Light, Target, and others have felt the sting of business decisions that undermined corporate success and their brands.

But not all of them got mugged. Tractor Supply put its toes on the ledge earlier this year only to quickly take the hint as customers informed them that this wasn’t the way to gain custom or continued loyalty.

You’d think titans of industry or at least competent boards of directors would know from essential business school texts that the demographics of leadership matter less as your reach gets broader. A local business might benefit from looking like the neighborhood, but does anyone know or care if the people in charge of making sure the product pages at Amazon work (or the planes at Boeing stay in the air) represent the local, regional, or national racial or sexual demographics?

If 2% of the population is Wiccan, does P&G have an obligation to their shareholders to ensure they are seen? The entire idea is ludicrous, but after McKinsey released its “study” …

BlackRock, according to the Journal, cited the study as evidence that diversity created financial benefits when it created an exchange-traded fund that tracked a diversity index. That index has done quite poorly, “returning about 55% against more than 70% for the global index without diversity conditions.”

BlackRock has gotten into hot water over its corporate practices and has announced that it is stepping away from environmental, social, and governance investing.

The not-so-amusing reality is that DEI and ESG are academic partisan political world views that discriminate by design. You can’t embrace them and anything else, which is probably why the wheel has been coming off the bus. If you run your business like some intractable bureaucracy, even the best intentions will bloat your non-productive expenses and slowly sink your ship. It will impact the culture and the customer base, which affects actual diversity and the revenue stream you need to pay to pander to it.

Besides, no one wants to work in that environment for long except those who poisoned it. All that constant tension is bad for your bottom line. The fact that smart business people bought it tells you something about how smart they are—DEI and ESG are just social taxes paid by investors and consumers on top of all the others that produce nothing of value. But it’s not a total loss. DEI may not be proven to create growth, but like rising CO2 follows warming, it appears that diversity follows business growth and success.

The only thing that the study found was that profitable companies ended up with more diversity—after they had succeeded, not before.

If this does not sound familiar, it should. Almost everything the left espouses does the opposite of what it advertises, and DEI is no different.

You’d have thought all these “experts” would have figured that out by now.

The post There Is No Link at All Between DEI and Corporate Success appeared first on Granite Grok.

The COVID-19 pandemic changed many aspects of our lives forever. Masks and social distancing were suspended as the Pandemic lifted. I bet most people purged their cars and homes of masks, hoping never to have to wear one again. Other changes are not so easily defined, and one of these would be the workplace environment.

People either lost their jobs until COVID ended, had their workplace modified so they could continue to work, or their job was changed to remote, meaning they could work anywhere they had an internet connection. These remote jobs were the slowest to respond after the Pandemic. Many workers became accustomed to “working” from home and were resistant to returning to a brick-and-mortar office. This new thinking did not sit well with traditional and more conservative leadership/ownership teams and set up a line of demarcation to be negotiated. I put “working” in quotes because most people are not disciplined enough to work unsupervised at home; therefore, productivity suffered, as did any team environment.

The other side of the equation, and possibly a weaker argument, is that workers are happier, healthier, and more productive for the time working when they are remote. They find the work/home balance beneficial to their professional efforts. The time saved by not commuting was advantageous to both sides of their life balance, and the reduced stress allowed them to focus more on their tasks. These points may sound good, but who is actually setting the criteria, the company or the employee?

At some point, many companies took a stand, and the employees returned to the office or forfeited their jobs. Dell, one of the country’s leading tech companies, is offering an option. If an employee chooses to work remotely, they pass on future COLA increases and job advancements. In the case of older workers, neither of these is enough to return to the office. Younger workers who may need the COLA increase yearly, and advancement opportunities are leaving home for the workplace. Dave Ramsey, one of the leaders in money-handling plans, employs a team of 1,100 people, all required to work in-house. Ramsey feels that the team approach is essential to serving the customer, and his team is under one roof or can find employment elsewhere.

This conundrum was forced on us by a Pandemic with little thought to how it would impact worker relations down the road. Remote was necessary for businesses to remain viable during a once-in-a-lifetime medical emergency. Now that COVID is fading in the rearview mirror, it is time to assess what works best for the business. After all, if the company does not succeed, there is no need for discussion and a policy.

Unlike education, where the impact of remote learning was seen in lower test scores and reduced graduation rates, the business world does not have specific data on how remote workers impact the company. One of the other factors in remote education and business is the continued deterioration of social and interactive skills. We are creating a generation of children and adults who are satisfied to be alone rather than amongst others. There is just something that does not seem healthy about the impact of choosing remote.

This question of which side of the remote argument the government favors is unclear, and it is probably good that it stays out of the discussion. They would probably side with the remote worker, as it promotes fewer people/cars on the road and less carbon into our air. But this government favors a six-hour workday, three days a week, with a nap included for our president. We know how inefficient the government is. Let’s let the companies and their workers duke this one out.

The post COVID Has Redefined The Workplace appeared first on Granite Grok.

This is pathetic and insulting, pretending that the desiccated husk of BidenX is running the Executive Branch. Yet, that is how low this country has sunk. Here’s BidenX on July 4th rehabbing his rep … by confusing Christmas and the 4th of July.

Who is the real Commander-in-Chief? Who will be calling the shots if China moves on Taiwan? If Russia retaliates for the joint American/Ukrainian attacks on Russian soil? If a general war breaks out in the Middle East? We have NO idea, EXCEPT that it’s not Joe BidenX. Some “democracy” we live in.

Biden: “Ho, ho, ho! Happy Independence Day!”

The rehab tour is not going at all well.

pic.twitter.com/VDUAtFgFyQ

— Western Lensman (@WesternLensman) July 5, 2024

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After Joe’s debate fiasco, he must limit his campaign appearances, concentrate on small personal ads that drive a message home, and avoid the verbal gaffes for which he is famous. Joe’s inability to be coherent in a 90-minute debate has created a chaotic situation in every nook and cranny of the Democrat Party. According to insiders, Joe Biden can only carry out the Presidency’s duties from 10 AM until 4 PM. The debate was clearly outside the window of viability for the President. We must accept the 6 hours a day as adequate for the job.

This thinking is lunacy, and anyone who believes it is unfit for the job.

Dems claim Joe must stay in the race to defeat Donald Trump. Anyone else would fall short and set up an existential crisis. In the old days, the only existential threat was nuclear annihilation. The Cold War between the United States and Russia left us one push of the Red Button from the end of the world. The only thing that saved us was Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD). Whoever launched first would trigger an instantaneous reaction, and the world would be destroyed. There is no winner; everyone loses, and the solar system has an opening in the third ring for a new planet.

But we have progressed from the Cold War of the sixties and seventies, and now everything is an existential threat (ET) to the world for the Democrats. Do these folks on the Left ever have independent thought, or do their political leaders program them?

Global change-ET. Republican control-ET. Fossil Fuels-ET. Donald Trump-ET.

It would be comical, except the Left is so brainwashed that they believe every talking point from Democrat politicians or legacy media. This past week has been all about the Democrats eating their own. Biden is toast, but Jill and Hunter keep lathering on the butter and jelly. They know they have to keep this shell of a man upright and breathing until Hunter’s second trial is complete, and he needs to have his conviction pardoned or his sentence commuted. That is Biden’s motivation to stay in power. They have stolen enough money from the American people, and now they have to defeat the justice system by letting it run its course and then overriding it. That is what Joe means by respecting the rule of law. It works fine when putting your political foes behind bars, but not your son.

Joe Biden will not be on the ticket in November. The Party has to find a way to get Kamala to step aside. She will need a position of prominence, and that won’t be easy, but it will not be President. Unlike the Republicans, the Democrat bench is weak. Please don’t tell me that Gretchen Whitmer or Kathleen Hockul are Presidential material. Don’t gaslight me that Hakeem Jeffries or Gavin Newsom have a story that puts them behind the resolute desk.

The existential threat to America, not the world, is the Democrat Party. They want this country transformed per the directive of Barack Obama. He may be out of office, living the good life in one of his many mansions, but he is still running the Democrat Party. He doesn’t need Michelle in the White House. He has all the power he needs, and that is existential to me.

The post Existential Has Been Rendered Useless By Democrats appeared first on Granite Grok.

The battle over Biden continues as a small cadre of insiders circle the wagons to protect their political sugar daddy. The insiders aren’t interested in what’s good for the nation, and the outsiders aren’t either; they don’t want Trump to win and are convinced that Biden 2024 is the best thing to happen to Trump since Hillary Clinton.

To prevent that some are prepared to hold the checks and stop the fundraisers.

Screenwriter Damon Lindelof who has been a significant contributor to the party proposed on Wednesday a “DEMbargo”, withholding funding until Biden stands aside.

“When a country is not behaving how we want them to, we apply harsh economic sanctions. It’s a give and take – short term hurt for long term healing,” Lindelof wrote in Deadline.

According to CNBC, philanthropist Gideon Stein will pause almost all of a planned $3m in planned donations. “Virtually every major donor I’ve talked to believes that we need a new candidate in order to defeat Donald Trump,” Stein said.

On Wednesday, Reed Hastings, the co-founder of Netflix and a Democratic party megadonor, joined calls for Biden to take himself out of the presidential race.

Netflix! Isn’t that the Obama network now? Barry must be at cross purposes. Joe has been his bitch, and now he needs a new one, but the Muppet won’t take a walk. That suggests to me that he’ll meet with the experts (The Clintons) to figure out how to blame the proud Boys for Joe’s timely departure before November. It’s not like Joe is going to go paddle boarding in Edgartown Great Pond.

Will The Bidencott work?

Abigail Disney, granddaughter of Roy O. Disney, who co-founded The Walt Disney Co., told CNBC on Thursday that she plans to withhold donations to the party she has funded for years until Biden drops out. The president has said he has no plans to withdraw from the race, despite calls for him to do so.

“I intend to stop any contributions to the party unless and until they replace Biden at the top of the ticket.

Walt’s wacky relative is one of many in her well-heeled position who insist they respect Joe (F you Tara Reade) but thinks he is clearly past his use-by date and risks poisoning the rest of the pantry if not removed and placed away from the other fruits in the progressive line-up. This desire runs in direct opposition to that small group of people (mostly named Biden) who might find themselves charged with any number of crimes if the Big Guy isn’t pretending to be President, and efforts to portray Biden as in his right mind aren’t having the desired effect.

The Debate debacle was just too much of a shock, as I noted here.

Nothing in recent memory seems to have confounded as many people in one evening at one time -around the world – as seeing Joe Biden a week ago, Thursday; Liberal people, mostly, mouths agape with the slightest patina of the crap sandwich the media has been feeding them still on their lips.

It was one of those ripped-off-bandaid paradigm-shifting moments when progressives realized that the media doesn’t just lie to independents and Republicans. Jarring! How Dare You! And Joe, of course, has no clue what’s going on. He does what they tell him while Jill Hunter and the rest of his family try to keep the wheels on the bus. But I don’t think they get it. Democrats who have been making excuses or Defending Joe have to run from him. If they don’t, they are not only guilty of not giving a damn about the nation but Democracy itself. All while (and this juicy) having to contend with their unabashed support for him during a primary in which Bdein was clearly not all there.

New Hampshire Democrats ran a massive and reported successful write-in campaign to ensure the Vegetable in Chief won the Democrat NH Primary and had a shot at winning the party nomination on purpose.

Happily for us, they have to live with that as we stumble, like Joe, toward election day 2024 with – perhaps – a lot less money than they’d hoped for, with a caveat to the doom bloggers: yes, they will try to steal the election, no matter what. The problem is, how do you steal something when you may need to do it in more than just a handful of swing states?

 

The post DEMbargo – Wealthy Left-Wing Donros Revolt: No Money Until Biden is Replaced appeared first on Granite Grok.

In 2022, JR tried to recruit me to primary my senator.  I won’t take the readers on a scenic side trip discussing the details of my multiple reasons for declining his request, but he did stroke my ego and I agreed to hear his 30 second ad on why I should say yes because I was flattered that he thought I was “senate material.”  Though I instead chose another rep run in a trashy blue district, I had a conversation with a local about it months later.

This was no ordinary local, but one who served on the school board and has run for other offices.  Though residing in the most trashy senate district, this was someone who knows JR well and home schooled 6 kids all the way to ivy league acceptance and is therefore no dummy.  The strategic advice I heard for primarying an incumbent senator was to choose 3 major campaign talking points in which the incumbent has been an abject disappointment.

Rep Emily Phillips is following that model in her race against Senator Gannon, who has the establishment’s blessing.  I will review them in the order that I have personally selected, starting with the one that any respectable Nashua resident ought to be outraged about. Some people might think that I’m beating a dead horse by stewing over the RTK Tax, which Senator Gannon cosponsored.  My apologies to any equestrians that might be among them, but HB 1002 should have suffered a fate worse than the glue factory.  Instead, the Damn Emperor signed it.  Senator Gannon’s “Queen Sharon Sheepledom” was on full display since that assault against transparency had its April 18 executive session in the Judiciary committee.

And if that’s not enough, I encourage all the Kelly Ayotte critics to examine the relationship between those two lawyers.  In addition to endorsements, the money trails should be scrutinized, but let’s move on to the other two talking points. Senator Gannon sponsored SB 456, a student debt forgiveness bill that fortunately died in the House.  Otherwise it would have transferred debt to the taxpayers, something DC swamp rats are regularly trying to make happen.  NH deserves better, especially seeing that Concord should never be “little DC.”

The third reason can be broken up to multiple reasons, but there’s a hive minded common theme, and I will get into that as well the importance of the roll call.  The first example is Defend the Guard, a nationwide movement happening at the state level.  In NH, it was HB 229.

You can read all about its death in the senate without a roll call, but Senator Gannon could have requested one as could have any of his peers.  He chose to go along to get along and my understanding was that’s from being a “Jeb Sheeple,” which is just as bad as being a Sharon Sheeple.  Another example of such dereliction of duty that involved the absence of a roll call was SB 501, a very bad enemy camp bill that would license alien drivers to share our roads and usher in more voter fraud.  Furthermore, it got a 5-0 blessing from Judiciary, which Senator Gannon is a member, and sailed past the whole senate in the name of consent the same way that HB 1002 did.  It later made it though the House and was vetoed.  Just like a broken clock being right twice a day, the Damn Emperor does the right thing once in a while.

The institution of the roll call is so important because it promotes transparency and accountability.  When a bad bill makes it though either chamber, constituents deserve to have a record of whether or not their own elected officials supported or opposed it.  Even if your elected is a dissenter of a bill being steamrolled though the body, if s/he requests a roll call, that dissent becomes archived and available for review before the next election.  If your senator claims to have voted on the non prevailing side by way of the voice vote in a bill or amendment of great importance, you can politely point out how ineffective that was with regard to transparency.  I remember a 2022 dining room discussion with Senator Giuda telling me and a bunch of fellow listeners “it’s all about being effective” and he happens to be right.  As for Senator Gannon, he had an opportunity to go on record with his votes by requesting or seconding roll calls, but he didn’t.  That’s particularly disappointing because a lawyer should understand and embrace that more than all the non lawyer peers.

SB 263, the enshrining of Mass Health, interestingly did get its roll call and the socialist hive mind unanimously prevailed.  Peer pressure, anyone?  The good news is that the House blocked that abomination sponsored by Jeb.  If you look at the bill, you will see that it was left over from last year and has all kinds of activity that was presumably an attempt at life support.  Thank God, it’s dead and thank God, the 1/4/24 House attendance had the right composition of participants to make that happen.  Roll calls matter, and Emily plans to request them though one must keep in mind that another senator must second each request.

In review, I encourage everyone who votes in District 23 or knows someone who votes there to read my earlier article introducing her and get involved in helping make her victory happen on September 10.  Please check her events page often for opportunities to meet her and don’t hesitate to donate because senate campaigns are not cheap.

The post Future State Senator Emily Phillips appeared first on Granite Grok.

So-called moderate French President Macron went to bed with the Communists to stay in power, and after Today’s second set of “snap” elections, he appears to have succeeded.

In a disappointing result, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN), which won the first round of voting last week, was relegated to third place, with between 132 to 152 seats. Finally, the centre-right Les Républicains are projected to have won between 57 to 67 seats, Le Figaro reports.

The results confirm the ability of the French establishment to use the antiquated parliamentary system created in the 1950s to limit the power of outsiders amid deep political strife verging on civil war.

While the populist right-wing party would have become the largest party if last week’s results were final, the second round of voting gave the government and political establishment the ability to rally their supporters, sparking the highest turnout in decades to thwart the Le Pen party. Macron’s faction reportedly made deals in some 200 constituencies with the far-left to undermine the populist party’s ability to gain a majority.

Interestingly, Macron and his allies justified an open alliance with the socialists to avoid a civil war if Le Pen and the “right” were to win.

The hyperbolic rhetoric from the government was continued by Macron’s deputy, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, who said this week: “I think a majority dominated by the extreme right and the RN would be dangerous”.

“There would be a lot of violence in society if the RN program were to be implemented… It would also be a disaster for our economy”, he added.

And, as usual, it is not the right (which in France isn’t all that “right”) but the actLeftLeft that is always ready to engage in violence.

However, despite the warnings from Macron’s globalists about the so-called “far-right” — a term which Le Pen rejects given her largely left-wing economic platform — it has been Macron’s now far-left partners who have been behind major violent uprisings over the past year, including riots last week following the National Rally’s victory in the first round of voting.

Indeed, even before the initial results were announced, shop owners along the Champs-Élysées began to barricade their storefronts in the expectation of further leftist riots in the capital. A total of 30,000 police officers, including 5,000 in Paris, have been mobilised in preparation for potential leftist violence on Sunday evening.

We’d say France has fallen, but that would be old news. Macron already has France on a path to self-destruction. Lying down with the Leftleft will only accelerate the decline. But it shows you what global elites will do to cling to power. Anything.

The post The Commies Come Out to “Save” France from A Brush With Sanity appeared first on Granite Grok.

This is for those of us who have daughters that the Biden Administration (and his LBG and Trans minions) are forcing to undress in front of males who believe they are females and then can rightly invade girl bathrooms and locker rooms.

Back in April, they did the usual Progressive, Anti-Traditional American Norms thing and rejiggered our common language to suit their political agenda. Eliminate any sense of biological sex differences with the socially constructed term “gender identity.”

Biden Guts Trump-Era Title IX, Issues Rules to Protect LGBTQ Students, Eliminate Gender-Based Categories

“The new final rules re-write discrimination as “based on stereotypes, sexual orientation, gender identity, sex characteristics.” But not actual sex.  They are eliminating sex-based categories and distinctions. And gaslighting us into accepting that there is no actual difference between males and females.

There is only gender identity, sexual orientation, and sex “characteristics” which are not the same as biological sex. They are playing games with language. And smuggling in lies. “

With (sarcastic) thanks to Governor Sununu for forcing us to deal with the repercussions after signing SB263; an Act bringing the “gender identity” Culture War to New Hampshire. 

US Secretary of Reeducation Miguel Cardona was called to the Congressional carpet for implementing these changes to LAW via simple “interpretations” (sound familiar?); reformatted, emphasis mine:

Education Secretary Falls Apart When Asked Whether He Would Force His Daughter to Undress in Front of Men

Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona declined to answer questions about whether he would let boys fight his daughter in sports or undress in front of her in bathrooms at a Tuesday hearing. President Joe Biden’s administration released a finalized rule in April that extends Title IX protection to encompass “sexual orientation” and “gender identity,” but it does not address transgender athletes. Cardona refused to answer the questions from Republican Utah Rep. Burgess Owens, saying he would not comment on rules related to athletics that his department has not yet proposed.

<snip>

“Would you force your daughter to undress in the bathroom with boys, who are also undressing?” Owens asked.

“I am not going to be commenting on athletics rules that we haven’t proposed,” Cardona answered.

How evil is this Biden Administration, how COWARDLY are those in it, in not admitting what he really thinks as a DAD?  That Cardona decided that his fealty as a Protector was NOT to his daughter but to this pernicious ideology that states that biology doesn’t matter and to the Biden Administration.

And you can watch the video at the Daily Caller (can’t embed it here), Cardona hides behind the rubric of “Once we finalize our regulations on Title IX” nonsense – note that he REFUSES to answer the question ABOUT HIS DAUGHTER AS HER DAD! This isn’t “politics over country”, it’s “politics over family”.

I’m glad that Owens followed up with this question as it skewers the talking point that the Militant Trans-Authoritarians have been making that if you don’t accept AND affirm us, you’re nothing but a bigot. That *I* am more important than your stupid role, as a Parent, in protecting your children; your CHILDREN are bigots and so are you Parents!”.

“If your daughter was reported, she felt uncomfortable in a boy’s presence in a bathroom or locker room, would that be considered by your administration to be discrimination or bigotry?” Owns followed up.

And such a coward:

Cardona again declined to provide a “yes or no” answer as Owens pressed him. “Girls have now entered in contact sports of boxing and wrestling. Would you allow your daughter to physically fight and get beat up by a boy who called himself a girl?” Owens asked. “Yes or no.”

“Be happy to, once we finalize our regulations on Title IX athletics, to come back and have a conversation with you,” Cardona said.

And he wouldn’t even answer the question,  Would you agree that women are physically different from men?”

This is the same attitude that I ran into from my School Board when going after their unconstitutional mandate of ripping away Free Speech Rights and demanding that staff lie to Parents concerning the transgender status of their child in their Govt schools.

And the SPLC wonders why many of us can be “anti-government” when it can’t even give us straight answers!

 

Editors Note: Cardona is off the hook for now. Using SCOTUS’ vacating of Chevron, a Federal Judge Just Blocked DoE’s new Title IX rules the day before they were to go into effect.

The post Biden’s Sec.of Re-Education Is a Coward When It Comes to His Title IX Undressing Rule appeared first on Granite Grok.

Years ago, someone working for Ron Paul’s campaign was searched by TSA before getting on a plane,.  Because he had a box containing close to $5000 in cash campaign contributions that he was transporting to campaign headquarters, TSA agents detained him, questioned him, and ultimately arrested him.

The ACLU filed suit on his behalf.  In response, TSA revised its guidelines to make it clear that TSA officers are authorized to conduct searches related to safeguarding flight safety, not to engage in general law enforcement.

As the ACLU explained:  ‘The airport is not a Constitution-free zone, and the price of traveling is not exposure to limitless government searches.

But the same is true of roads, isn’t it?  The price of traveling is not exposure to limitless government searches.  A road isn’t a Constitution-free zone any more than an airport is.

And yet, it seems that about every two minutes in America, someone posts a new video online showing police officers behaving just as badly at a traffic stop — using an alleged moving violation as a pretext for a search, in which they hope to turn up evidence of some crime that is unrelated to traffic safety—and using rhetorical tricks, outright lies, extended detainment, and threats to coerce the driver into allowing the search.

At many of these stops, the officers seem to be afraid that the people whose rights they are violating might decide to offer resistance, possibly armed resistance.  This makes them hyper-vigilant, which results in people being pulled out of cars, guns being pulled out of holsters, and occasionally in motorists being shot — all over alleged traffic violations.

This is yet another place where the Live Free or Die State could take the lead in simultaneously promoting both individual rights and officer safety By passing a law requiring traffic stops to deal only with safeguarding traffic and nothing else.

Such a law should

(1) prohibit officers at a traffic stop from engaging in any behavior not related to the reason for the stop (including asking such apparently innocuous questions as ‘Where are you coming from?’ or ‘Where are you going?’);

(2) disallow the use of any information obtained during a traffic stop in court, or in the furtherance of any investigation, except when directly related to the reason for the stop; and

(3) assess significant personal fines for police officers who engage in such behavior anyway.

Under such a law, if an officer sees a traffic violation, he issues a warning or a ticket, and that’s the end of the encounter.  No chit chat, no fishing expeditions, no ‘smelling illicit substances’ or ‘noticing furtive movements’, or making up other excuses to conduct a search or pursue a line of questioning unrelated to the reason for the stop.  It would be as simple and straightforward as checking out at the supermarket.

Note that under such a law, since not even a cursory search (like peering into the back seat with a flashlight) will be conducted, there’s really no reason in most cases for a stop at all. With video evidence (which, at this point, is ubiquitous), the car owner can just get a ticket in the mail.

So, under such a law, there would be fewer opportunities and less motivation for police officers to violate the Fourth and Fifth Amendments.  (Why go to the trouble of inventing pretexts to gather information that can’t be used and which might end up costing you money?)  There would be less reason for drivers to fear the police and for the police to fear drivers.

What’s the argument against this?  The only losers here would be those who reject one of our oldest and most cherished principles, that it’s better to let some of the guilty go free than to punish any of the innocent.  When did we stop believing that?

The post Laws We Need: Increasing Officer Safety … appeared first on Granite Grok.

We just celebrated the 248th celebration of the Signing of the Declaration of Independence! Happy Birthday, America! I am sure you know that the Declaration of Independence was meant to be a list of grievances leveled against Great Britain for her being “deaf to the Voice of Justice.

Although the list of grievances comprised the bulk of the Declaration, the Founding Fathers made it clear that they respected and honored Great Britain but that it was now time for them to become an independent entity of 13 colonies. This was the foundation for the Constitution. They saw the need to make men aware that their personal rights and powers are first and foremost from God and not derived from their fellow men.

Over eleven years later, the founders met to discuss a form of cohesive government that would unite the colonies into one nation. Thus, they delivered to the world the first civilization in which the people determined how they would be governed by choosing among themselves men (today women) who could convert the necessities of civility to laws of regulation that would not usurp the peaceable lives of its citizenry.

There is much talk today of preserving our democracy. Our Founding Fathers did not view America as a democracy, having studied pretty much every form of recorded government known to mankind. They created a Constitutional Republic. This allowed the people to have power but not unlimited power so that a majority could not rule over the minority = (democracy). It allowed the government to guide through debate and balanced representation the need for civil order, thus greatly diminishing its power to rule over others in a Monarchy or Dictatorship.

We want to thank Pastor Allen Cook for this Contribution – Please direct yours to Steve@GraniteGrok.com.
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This is the most marvelous form of government that been created so far since mankind has begun. Its proof is in its sure standing for these many years, and instead of being diminished or demised, it has flourished. We often say there is a reason for everything. Well, I believe the reason we have stood as a nation that is a beacon of hope for the world is because in the foundation, we sought the care and protection of Almighty God from whom our freedoms and rights are given. Note the speech Ben Franklin gave when the gathering for the Constitutional Convention hit a real snag in the process:

“In this situation of this assembly, groping as it were, in the dark to find political truth, and scarce able to distinguish it when presented to us, how has it happened, sir, that we have not hitherto once thought of humbly applying to the Father of Lights to illuminate our understandings? At the beginning of the contest with Britain, when we were sensible of danger, we had daily prayers in this room for Divine Protection. Our prayers, sir, were heard, and they were graciously answered. All of us who were engaged in the struggle must have observed frequent instances of a superintending Providence in our favor….And have we now forgotten that powerful friend? Or do we imagine we no longer need His assistance? I have lived, sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth: that GOD GOVERNS IN THE AFFAIRS OF MEN. (emphasis, mine). And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid? We have been assured in the sacred writings that except the Lord build the House, they labor in vain that build it. I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without His concurring aid, we shall succeed in this political building no better than the builders of Babel…and we ourselves shall become a reproach and a byword down to future ages. I therefore beg leave to move, that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations, be held in this assembly every morning before we proceed to business, and that one or more of the clergy of the city be requested to officiate in that service.”

Franklin’s motion was not addressed or voted on but the Convention did recess for three days to attend church and listen to leaders of the day. They gathered at the Calvinist Reformed Church in Philadelphia and were prayed over by Rev. Willam Rogers. Needless to say, after this brief hiatus, they began to make progress.

So many historical records and documents emphasize that the Founders (whether practicing Christians or not) invoked God’s wisdom and blessings upon the new Nation. Perhaps we should consider Franklin’s word as most appropriate for us in this dark hour.

Until Next Time…

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