Posted on 12/23/2020 10:57:44 AM PST by Tippecanoe
Discussed on Rush today: =========== The Sovietization of California -------------- By Dennis Prager December 22, 2020 6 min read
I am writing this column upon returning home to California after five days in Florida. For the first time since my first trip to Los Angeles in 1974 and moving there two years later, I dreaded going to California.
That first trip, as a 25-year-old New Yorker, I experienced the palpable excitement looking at the American Airlines flight board at JFK airport and seeing "Los Angeles." For most Americans, the very name "California" elicited excitement, wonder, even envy of Californians, and most of all ... freedom. While America always represented freedom, within America, California exemplified freedom most of all.
Yet, here I am, sitting in a state where corruption reigns (one of the leading Democrats of the last half-century told me years ago that politicians in California are window dressing; the real power in California is wielded by unions) and where, for nine months, normal life has been shut down, schools have been closed and small businesses have been destroyed in unprecedented numbers.
During these last five days in Florida, a state governed by the pro-freedom party, I went anywhere I wanted. First and foremost, I could eat both inside and outside restaurants. At one of them, when I stood up to take photos of people dining, a patron who recognized me walked over and said, "I assume you're just taking pictures of people eating in a restaurant." That's exactly what I was doing. I even took my two grandchildren to a bowling alley, which was filled with people enjoying themselves playing myriad arcade games as well as bowling.
None of that is allowed almost anywhere in California. It is becoming a police state, rooted in deception and irrationality.
Restaurants have been shut down (except for takeout orders), even for outdoor dining, for no scientific reason. After ordering Los Angeles county restaurants closed, the health authorities of Los Angeles county acknowledged in court that they had no evidence that outdoor dining was dangerous; they ordered restaurants closed, even to outdoor dining, solely in order to keep people home.
The left's claim to "follow the science" is a lie. The left does not follow science; it follows scientists it agrees with and dismisses all other scientists as "anti-science."
Science does not say that eating inside a restaurant at least six feet from other diners, let alone outside a restaurant, is potentially fatal, but eating inside an airplane inches from strangers is safe.
Science does not say mass protests during a pandemic (when people are constantly told to social distance) are a health benefit, but left-wing scientists say they are — when directed against racism. In June, Jennifer Nuzzo, a Johns Hopkins epidemiologist, tweeted: "In this moment the public health risks of not protesting to demand an end to systemic racism greatly exceed the harms of the virus." She cited the former head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Tom Frieden: "The threat to Covid control from protesting outside is tiny compared to the threat to Covid control created when governments act in ways that lose community trust. People can protest peacefully AND work together to stop Covid. Violence harms public health."
Even The New York Times, in July, acknowledged the double standard: "Public health experts decried the anti-lockdown protests as dangerous gatherings in a pandemic. Health experts seem less comfortable doing so now that the marches are against racism."
Science does not say, "Men give birth" or, "Men menstruate." But the left routinely argues that "science says" such things and that "science says" there are more than two sexes, many more.
The last time I felt I was leaving a free society and entering an unfree one was when I visited the communist countries of Eastern Europe. As a graduate student majoring in communism, during the Cold War, I would travel through the countries known as Soviet satellites: Poland, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria. In the middle of my trips, I would stop in Austria to breathe free air.
Never did I imagine I would ever experience anything analogous in America, the Land of the Free, the land of the Statue of Liberty and of the Liberty Bell. But I did yesterday, when leaving Florida and returning to California.
There is no question that America is becoming, if it hasn't already become, two countries: one that values liberty, from small businesses being allowed to operate to people being allowed to say what they believe, and one that has contempt for liberty, from eating in restaurants to free speech.
I am asked almost daily by friends around the country and by callers to my national radio show whether I intend to stay in California. Were it not for all the close friends who live here and the synagogue I and a few friends founded, the answer would be no. But at a given point, I am sure that I will leave this Soviet satellite for a free state. The bigger and far more important question is: How long will the Soviet states of America and the free states of America remain the United States of America?
Like New York, its become a one-party state. The one-party, crony rule is enforced my a coalition of government unions and employees, special-interests, media, and a plethora of regulations. A corrupt electoral system ensures the right people are elected.
The primary difference between CA and the USSR is that you can still flee CA. But I understand they are even working on that. They want to pass a wealth tax that you will have to pay for ten years after you move out of the state.
Anything to avoid discussing the Chynese.
We have to stop using the words Soviet, socialist and communist when describing what the Democrat Party is doing.
Those words are smokescreens to mask the real Democrat politician agenda.
Easy money.
Stolen money.
Swindled money.
Unfortunately, we have the same lockdown situation going on in Washington State. We will be leaving our lifetime home, our friends,and our family as soon as it is possible. We never imagined something like this could happen here.
Real communists believe in everyone, including themselves, doing hard work.
Senator Bernie Sanders was thrown out of a commune because he’s a lazy turd.
He liked to talk.
He didn’t do any hard work.
Some people never change.
Rush is amazing, still on the job most days of most weeks.
Given his condition, that cannot be an easy thing to make happen. Thanks Rush, for every additional hour you are there helping to inform the people.
Under a Biden Administration, do not be surprised if someone starts trying to revive the Fairness Doctrine, meaning more efforts to restrict conservative broadcasting will become policy.
Well said and absolutely true.
No, it’s about complete and total control of everything you do in life — where you live, what you eat, how you get health care, the type of car you are allowed to drive, who our neighbors are, the type of fuel powering that car, the education your kids get, forcing you to believe men can change into women, forcing you believe a man can “marry” a man, limiting what you are allowed to say, etc.
I wouldn’t mind politicians enriching themselves (Ike they always have) if they would let us be free men and women. Paying them off with money is a small price to pay compared to the complete loss of all of our liberties and freedoms.
They are power mad despots.
You got to wonder how much longer California will have the largest GDP in the nation.
With full Democrat control, it will be a short path to federally guaranteed borrowing for states and large cities.
(and yes I know the fed is broke too, but the party continues on)
Bump
Most of the wealth coming from a few digital companies which have world wide markets.
Isn’t Cal still the top state for agricultural exports?
Well said... Florida is open for business, thou the news media are trying to shut Florida down with Covid death rates...
California is China is California.
That’s not communism.
They use words like socialism and communism to distract people while they enrich themselves from our treasuries.
If they were power mad, we would already have death camps and they would be at them laughing gleefully.
It’s about the money.
How many houses does Soros have?
How many houses does Hillary have? Pelosi?
Yeah, that is one thing that bugs me about these guys. Allowing freedom and free enterprise would enrich the government class even more than shutting down economic activity and patronage, which is always what they fall back on.
Why not just set up a political president for life with economic freedom for the country? You'd probably have less resistance from the populace if they are left alone and you do good things for the country. It's basically a monarchy... People have happily lived in monarchies for centuries.
But no, power mad dictators always go for crushing the country they rule.
> The primary difference between CA and the USSR is that you can still flee CA. But I understand they are even working on that. They want to pass a wealth tax that you will have to pay for ten years after you move out of the state.
Technically not quite correct. SF Bay counties are currently under travel lockdown, with (so i understand) no one permitted to leave unless they are involved in a really, really serious essential occupation task... (almost makes me wish i was into drug running or smuggling, lol...)
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