Free Republic

Can you link to the study that backs up that statement? I've been having this argument for months and there doesn't seem to be a single, definitive, clinical study that supports that assertion.

How to write an essay showing you have no idea why or how our Constitutional Republic operates the way it does.

So only 144,000 is literally true?

I live in Realville.

In Realville, a person who supports a Federal ban on abortion will not be elected President. It is not something I am happy about, but it is the CURRENT reality.

Yep.

I worked in the belly of the beast. An aide for a Democrat Congresscritter.

My coworkers were generally nice people. But even back in the 80’s - when I had this job - they lost their minds on the subject of Republicans.

Republicans were so evil, so vile, so dangerous to our nation that ANYTHING was acceptable if it stopped them.

In my neighborhood they are selling homes as fast as they can build them. Starter homes that were $300K three years ago are now $500K.

They are being bought by people move here (NM) from out of state. Real estate is still cheap here compared to the west coast, Florida and New York.

If your company relocates you, which often seems to be the case, and you have to sell your California home for $1.2 million, like my buddy did (2000 SF, 3 BR, 2 BT, 1/4 acre lot) and you had lived in it for 20 years and had bought it relatively cheap back then, buying a $500K 2500 SF home is a bargain. You pay cash, have no mortgage, and only pay the property tax and insurance which aren’t that bad here in New Mexico.

Dear people who keep bring up Biblical references.

We got it. Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior. I trust in the Lord.

The thing is...He doesn’t tell you when, or what, or how, except in rather vague open-to-interpretation terms.

This does not allay the feeling of foreboding. If anything, the books of Daniel and Revelation are not particularly comforting. I mean, yeah, the story has a good ending, but there is a lot of nasty crap that happens BEFORE the end.

My wife just asked, “Why would the government lie about the cause?”

Because if people knew how incompetent they were, and how vulnerable we are, there would be panic and consequences.

For all the money they spend - and they spend a lot - they cannot protect us against all of the bad actors. I have it on good authority that this administration is actually over confident in it’s ability to stop terrorists before they act.

I once interviewed for a part time job as a pizza delivery guy. At the time I a VP of a large imprinted sportswear company, but I wanted to make some side cash for the holidays.

I could not get hired. One manager was finally honest with me and asked, “How do I know you won’t try to take my job?”

It finally dawned on me…these were incompetent people afraid of losing their jobs.

How many times do they not hire the old white guy because he will do a really good job?

I am of two minds on this...

Yeah, as a supporter of capitalism and free markets, government handouts to anyone rub me the wrong way. The only time that “government spending” may be acceptable is during wartime, which brings me to the flip side.

We are on the brink of war with China, if not actually in a non-shooting war. They want Taiwan...badly...and if they get it, they will control the world’s chip market. We MUST get our chip manufacturing back to our shores FAST.

We have an Intel plant here in town. I can look out the front window of my business and see it over the rooftops. I have spoken to the number two guy at the plant about the future of chip manufacturing in the US. Right now, if the supply from Taiwan was cut off, ALL manufacturing in the USA would halt within six months. If the item being manufactured does use chips, the manufacturing process does. Transportation would be affected. This would impact food and energy distribution. It was pretty much a doomsday scenario.

I would probably feel better if it were a Republican administration overseeing this program, but we have to play the cards we are dealt and this really can’t wait.

A buddy of mine in the car business says that this is all smoke and mirrors to get people to accept hybrids.

Ten to fifteen years ago hybrids were polarizing. Many of the complaints you hear about EVs - the batteries are expensive, are bad for the environment, the cars have poor resale value, etc. - people were saying about hybrids.

Then the big push began on EVs. They were everything bad about hybrids...squared.

Next thing you know, laws are being passed requiring EVs by a certain date...except that the laws REALLY say EVs OR hybrids.

Compared to EVs, hybrids don’t look so bad.

If they had tried to pass laws ten years ago requiring people to buy hybrids, it wouldn’t have worked. Now it is going to look like a reasonable compromise.

Back in 2005 my Fort Lauderdale home, 1100 SF about 1.5 miles inland, above the flood level, was about to have it’s windstorm damage insurance raised to $8000 a year.

One of several factors that led to us relocating to New Mexico. Great weather, no natural disasters, low cost of living.

My friend was in Japan last October. This crap with Johnny Somali would be fresh in their minds. No wonder he got a less than warm reception!

He did this crap 38 years ago when I worked with him and his staff.

My boss - The not-so-Honorable Lawrence J Smith - was having a big Democrat fundraiser in Miami and was bringing in some “names” from around the country. One of those was Biden. I was in charge of coordinating his transportation from the airport to the event and back. Simple, right?

His staff wanted me to know that he had to have a private limo - no sharing with any other politicos or staff. He also had a preferred model - I think it was a Lincoln Town Car - and he wanted a particular brand of bottled water in the car. They were petrified that I would get it wrong. They must have checked with me three times before he landed that everything was set. When I asked my boss what was going on, I was told about his temper and how he would fire staff at the drop of a hat. When I told my boss that I had planned on meeting him at the airport, I was told to leave it to the limo driver. Larry would meet him at the event. No staff was to have direct contact with him...or else.

Had a black friend recently return from a trip to Japan.

He loved all things Japanese. He read manga. He watched anime. Loved sushi. He saved for years for the trip. Two weeks in Japan. Included Tokyo Disneyland.

He was not the same when he got back.

He said he never understood racism...real racism...until he went to Japan. He said he felt like an exhibit, an animal on display. He was stared at and most of them were angry. He says that at more than one restaurant he was ignored by the staff, especially when they were outside of the more urban areas. He learned a lot of Japanese so he could communicate, but he said they felt very free to correct him, when he saw white tourists also mispronouncing words the natives smiled and encouraged them. He couldn’t wait to go home.

He did say that it gave him a new perspective on racism in the US. We, he now says, are not really racist.

Does New Mexico have any CEMENT trucks???

Oh, the rather complex rules, with the phase in and exemptions, pretty much covers that, allowing SOME exceptions, but +90% of drivers will be stuck with no NEW CAR purchase choice but EV. The jokes about New Mexico looking like Havana with nothing but old cars on the streets in a couple of decades are already out there. These states with these stupid rules will become the magnet for all the used cars in the country. Of course, the left is already talking about ways to close that loophole as well…no registration for vehicles over 10 years old, EXPENSIVE registration for vehicles over 10 years old, etc.

Here in NM we idiotically follow California’s lead and are also banning the sale of ICE vehicles by 2035.

The big question now is what will come first. A reversal of that policy, or a Supreme Court decision allowing people to buy cars in other states and register them in New Mexico.

You see, people have already started plans for automotive supercenters on the borders of the states that don’t allow sales of ICE vehicles. The eco-states are countering with preparing laws that do not allow you to register ICE vehicles purchased out of state. Some legal pundits claim that this violates free trade between the states. Proponents claim that states have the right to determine what kind of vehicles are driven in their state.

It is going to be a mess.

Let’s not forget fake religion.

Scientology is the glaring example, but Gaia worship - and the accompanying climate change nonsense - is a less obvious, but still very fake, religion.

Worship of the government as the bestower of rights - the only stance one can take if one is an atheist - is another modern fake religion.

She died because she was mentally disturbed.

She died because her mother and her school thought that by encouraging her self-destructive fantasies, they were helping.

She died because such “helping” only reinforces the cognoscente dissonance they are already suffering from. When the mind says one thing, and reality says another, THE MIND IS WRONG! To say and act otherwise is HARMFUL TO THE INDIVIDUAL!

The mother and the school killed the girl as certainly as if they had shot her.

It wasn’t the media that jumped my wife when she was 16 for no reason. Punched her in the mouth.

It wasn’t the media that jumped my youngest son, three on one, for no reason other than they wanted to steal his trumpet. Beat the snot out of him. He was 11 at the time.

It wasn’t the media that chased me and three other kids for half a mile during a race riot. It was a mob of about 12 black kids that were stopped by a timely intervention of two police officers in a patrol car.

It wasn’t the media that tried to sucker punch my eldest son when he was in middle school. The puncher was a beast - 6’ 2” and at least 250 and still in middle school. Lucky for my boy he got a shouted out warning at the last second. Also lucky he had been taking karate classes for 4 years and was a high red belt. His training kicked in...he stepped aside and did a block that dislocated the bigger kid’s elbow.

My eyes are wide open. There is a problem in this country and 13% of the country doesn’t want to admit what it REALLY is.