MaxRedline

Come To The USA!

Ray does some good stuff.

 

Bureaucrats

When Portland's BES slapped an "environmental overlay" on my property, they sent me about 20 pounds of paper to tell me what I couldn't do with "my" property. They killed a lot of trees in the name of "environmental protection". 

You see, there was a tributary of Fanno Creek which ran though the very back of "my" property. The fact that I took care of it, even leaving a couple of dead trees standing as snags for wildlife habitat along the bank - that wasn't good enough. No, in the reams of paperwork, they informed me that I could not plant non-native plants within 50 feet of the bank. A vegetable garden, then, was out of the question, as none of those plants are native. They did provide a list of approved plants, which I would be allowed to plant on "my" property. Very big of them.

Also included in the paperwork was a notification that I could make no changes to my home without their approval. Well, the deck was unsafe, so I made the mistake of telling them that I planned to replace it. In order to do that, I was told, I would have to submit plans to them, together with a $1200 fee. They would then examine the plans and decide whether or not I could proceed.

Very big of them.

I'd had about enough of their crap, so I tore off the old deck and built a new one. I didn't submit plans for their approval, and I didn't pay them $1200. They didn't get a dime. Then I sold the place and moved out of the reach of BES.

And people wonder why I hate bureaucrats.

Phonehenge West from Devin Schiro on Vimeo.

 

Shark!

Now, this is interesting: Kroger may be a dismal failure as Oregon AG, but Dave Frohnmayer was certainly no better. Yet Dave's calling for a full-scale criminal investigation over at the DOJ because he thinks something funny was going on in connection with the destruction of department of emails by Sean Riddell and possibly other Justice Department employees.

See, Riddell hit the "delete" button. Now, in most agencies, that just removes mail from your account: backup copies are generally retained by IT as a matter of course. What this means is that, if Riddell was actually able to destroy emails, one of two things happened: the DOJ IT staff was so incompetent that they failed to maintain backups of all copies, or Riddell had an access code that allowed him to delete the backups. If the latter, there's a lot of dirt at DOJ. If the former, they really need to get some professional IT staff on board.

Either way, there's blood in the water, and the sharks from the old Friends Of Neil club are swimming in, attracted by the scent.

 

Snark

Willy Week goes all snarky on Eileen Brady, co-founder of New Seasons Markets and now running for Portland mayor. Not sure what's up with that; she beats the heck out of "Streetcar" Charlie Hales and potential candidate Jeff Cogen. On the other hand, so does my dog. And my dog would beat incumbent Sam Adams in a nose-to-nose race.

Geithner

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

"Um, well, you know how Barry was sayin' that the middle class wouldn't see their taxes raised by so much as a dime? Yeah, well, about that...".

(CNSNews.com) - Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told the House Small Business Committee on Wednesday that the Obama administration believes taxes on small business must increase so the administration does not have to “shrink the overall size of government programs.”

"See, there's your problem, right there: we like big government, and if we don't tax the begerbils outta you, then government's gonna have to shrink, and that's just unacceptable."

Geithner’s explanation of the administration's small-business tax plan came in an exchange with first-term Rep. Renee Ellmers (R.-N.C.). Ellmers, a nurse, decided to run for the U.S. House of Representatives in 2010 after she became active in the grass-roots opposition to President Barack Obama’s proposed health-care reform plan in 2009.

“Overwhelmingly, the businesses back home and across the country continue to tell us that regulation, lack of access to capital, taxation, fear of taxation, and just the overwhelming uncertainties that our businesses face is keeping them from hiring,” Ellmers told Geithner. “They just simply cannot.”

She then challenged Geithner on the administration’s tax plan.

“Looking into the future, you are supporting the idea of taxation, increasing taxes on those who make $250,000 or more. Those are our business owners,” said Ellmers.

When Ellmers finally told Geithner that “the point is we need jobs,” he responded that the administration felt it had “no alternative” but to raise taxes on small businesses because otherwise “you have to shrink the overall size of government programs”—including federal education spending.

Federal spending still accounted for only 8.2 percent of spending for public primary and secondary education in America in the 2007-2008 school year. Historically and presently in the United States, local and state governments have  funded the cost of public education.

"We don't want to have to raise your taxes, but ♪It's For The Children!♫", he trilled.

 

Surprise!

Image by dflorian1980 via Flickr

Barry went to New York on a fund-raising mission, and it was under-whelming. After three years of vilifying Wall Street, he apparently expected to be welcomed with open wallets and accolades, and golly...it didn't happen. "I think there are a lot of Wall Street-types who are unhappy," said a financial exec who has supported Obama in the past.

That has to come as something of a shock to our duffer-in-chief. Oh, he raked in some cash, but a lot of heavy-hitters skipped his events. That's gotta leave a mark.

Related articles

• Can Obama Win Back Wall Street's Campaign Donors? (alternet.org)

He Won't Stay Paid Off

ATF Director Kenneth Melson was widely expected to have resigned by today. He hasn't, and Attorney General Eric Holder has to be sweating bullets. Everything Holder touches seems to fall apart, and his Mexican gun-running scheme is no exception.

Obama 2016

These two need the spotlight too much. There's an argument to be made that they won't be going away any time soon.

Did The Developers Leave?

Something's going on: Portland's pervy little "mayor" has pulled the plug on the west-side "couplet" plan, claiming that "the money didn't materialize". This is really weird, as failure of money to "materialize" has never, ever, been a problem for this clown. He just borrows more. Something else is going on here. Maybe the developers have decided that he'll be looking at signing into the unemployment line, and they're hedging their bets.

Bad Finance

Bernanke admits he's clueless. He doesn't know what to make of the economic situation in America - and he's supposed to be in charge of it. Who does know? Maybe the Chinese. For most of the rest of us, this is just uncharted territory. We do know that under Ohbozo, the debt has doubled in less than three years. We need some adults in the room.

Related articles

• CBO Director: Yeah, Obama's Budget Reduction Speech Was Meaningless To Us. Also Biden Debt Reduction Talks Falling Apart? (minx.cc)
• Stop delaying foreclosures, study suggests (scienceblog.com)