Tony Katz has an excellent write-up on last week’s Rawesome raid, a government action I find absolutely asinine. Look, I don’t care if you want to make the choice to purchased labeled raw dairy or local, organic food. I love to eat massive amounts of homemade beef jerky, young organic coconuts, and oven-baked bacon (don’t knock it, only way to do it). I don’t want the government busting up in my butcher shop, or any shop, any private facility with proper licensing (copious licensing is soft tyranny) and prevent the private sector, free market exchange of cash for goods. I also don’t trust a government that can’t find the time to produce a budget, yet can micromanage the citizenry, telling me what I can and cannot eat.
We all talked about the FDA when the Amish were jacked for selling raw milk; we bemoan the administration’s plans to control school children’s diets; regulate restaurant menus; we complain when the state cracks down on lemonade stands run by hopeful 10-year-olds from their parents’ front yards, 10-year-olds who want to experiment with capitalism and participate in citizenship; so why are more not talking about this latest government overreach? Because it’s in Venice, CA? More importantly, why are LA folks not making the connection between their desire for food freedom and the tea party’s desire for food freedom? If this were my hood I’d be rallying right about now.
The investigation ended in the raid of the Venice market, Rawesome Foods, and a farm, Palmer’s Healthy Family Farms in Ventura County. Prosecutors claim that Rawesome Foods did not have a license to sell unpasteurized milk, which is required by the state of California. Rawesome Foods, however, is not open to the public. It is a private club that requires a paid membership. It is not known how undercover officers got into the club to purchase the dairy items, or if they paid for a membership. This is not the first raid on Rawesome Foods. They were raided in 2010 for the sale of unpasteurized, or “raw” milk.
About three miles south of Beverly Hills in the upper-middle class neighborhood of Beverlywood is Hamilton High School. An otherwise ordinary Los Angeles Unified School District-sponsored juvenile detention center, Hamilton is home to a couple of well regarded magnet programs, particularly the Academy of Music Magnet. The Music Magnet is the old stomping grounds of pop stars, Broadway talent, and even Hollywood A-listers who were drawn to a public school program that has a focus on the arts. Yet, even this rare LAUSD high school that students actually want to attend has become a casualty of the horrendous budget crises in the state of California.
Reporter Steve Lopez was dispatched to the scene to write up the various cutbacks for the Los Angeles Times. Lopez is known for being the journalist whose articles on a schizophrenic musician inspired the Robert Downey Jr./Jaime Foxx film The Soloist. Then all of a sudden, what had the makings of a compelling human interest piece on one of the handful of quintessentially Hollywood high schools quickly devolved into a sob story about how these poor teachers and students have been victimized by the dastardly Republicans and their resistance to tax hikes.
How did he do this?
First, Lopez paints a rosy picture of the school by glowingly describing a performance by the jazz band and cherry-picking quotes raving about teachers; his portrayal of Hamilton is a lot like Sean Penn’s depiction of Iraq in Team America:
As it happens, Hamilton is my local high school and I have family and friends who have graduated from the Music Magnet in recent years. To put it bluntly, many of their experiences didn’t resemble the mythical land of incredible teachers and students anxious to learn that Lopez describes. An anonymous Hamilton graduate told me she recalls students doing cocaine in the state-of the art auditorium (which was overhauled with a lavish grant to the Music Magnet)—in fact, the source recalled students showing up to class on an assortment of drugs. Faculty members were seen “celebrating” with students at cast parties after plays.
And I thought programs like these were meant to keep kids off drugs. (more…)
Earlier this month, the National Organization For Women (N.O.W.) endorsed Jerry Brown for Governor of CA a mere 24 hours after an audio tape surfaced wherein Jerry Brown was heard agreeing with an aide that Meg Whitman should be called a “whore.” What’s a little sexism if it is aimed at a Republican woman! I mean, Jerry Brown is totally For The (Real) Women ™ , right? And The Children, of course. Only, not so much.
The above linked screen shot of a newspaper article, via RedState, is back from when Jerry Brown was previously Governor of California. It refers to women “pestering” Jerry Brown, who was himself quoted as saying, “Can’t you get the women off my back on child care?” So, the N.O.W. endorsed Jerry Brown thinks that pester-y Meg Whitman, daring to run against him, is a “whore,” mammograms are a luxury that need not be covered by insurance and child care issues are oh-so-tiresome. Get off his back, man! More accurately, get off his back, kids and broads!
If someone were to ask you how many now convicted child pornographers Senator Barbara Boxer has employed, what would your answer be? My answer would have been none, before beginning an investigation into media double standards, as a result of the Charlie Wilson case.
Ohio Democrat Congressman Charlie Wilson was first elected to Congress in the Democrat wave year of 2006. Prior to that, he had been a long-time member of the Ohio state legislature, first elected to the Ohio House in 1996 and the Ohio Senate in 2004. (One of his four grown sons succeeded him in the legislature and is currently an Ohio State Senator.) He was also married for 27 years to his wife, Clara. The marriage ended in divorce in 1990.
A high-level adviser for Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Cali) was charged Wednesday with receiving and distributing child pornography. [...] Although Jeff Rosato was arrested and fired last Friday, this story has garnered very little attention from the mainstream press.
Eventually, Rosato pled guilty and was sentence to five-years in federal prison, as reported on May 02, 2009. However, he’s not the only former Boxer employee recently convicted for child pornography. Enter Bernie Ward. (more…)
Jerry Brown’s campaign conspired to commit political rape, calling Meg Whitman, his female political opponent, a “whore.” And he got N.O.W.’s political endorsement for doing so. The liberal beauty mask is so off the wrinkled, geriatric, age-spotted National Organization of Whores (yes, only a woman could write that so I just did).
Yet for all the mild hand-wringing over whether the “w-word” should have been used, no one in the Make-Believe Media is even questioning N.O.W.’s endorsement much less mocking the utter hypocrisy of it all. A women’s organization rewarding a politician for calling a woman a whore and no one notices. They’re all too busy with damage control for Brown’s campaign.
Stephanie Schriock, the leader of the prominent pro-abortion group Emily’s List, ever so gently criticized Brown in a remarkably tepid and muted way, concluding that, “It’s unfortunate to hear it in any place.”
“It’s inappropriate; it’s just wrong,” said Stephanie Schriock, the leader of EMILY’S List, a Democratic group dedicated to electing pro-choice women, on C-SPAN’s “Newsmakers.” Such words “just shouldn’t be used anywhere by anyone, period. It is just not what our democracy is about. It’s unfortunate to hear it in any place.”
Unfortunate?!? “Unfortunate” is when it rains on your newly washed car or you break a nail. How about “vile” or “despicable” or “reprehensible”? Get a thesaurus, Ms. Schriock.
Taking a look at the big media picture, and especially among our brethren, on the Right such as Fox and Breitbart, it might seem that the biggest story of the year is the Tea Party movement. It’s supposed to be indicative of a deep-seated anger among voters, a sign that people are all but ready to stage a Second American Revolution to take their country back.
As such, the Tea Party is being met with some confusion from those in the political center and outright hatred from bastions of the Left. So, as a reporter with 14 years of experience at both major dailies such as the Chicago Tribune and big weeklies in Chicago and Los Angeles, I’m here to declare that the real story of change in America in 2010 isn’t coming from Barack and the Democrats on the left, nor from the tea party movement on the Right.
You might have heard of the Bell scandals. They are tales of public officials who ran arrogantly roughshod over every single principle of good and decent government, whose porcine finance leader as a literal pig feeding at the public trough to the tune of around $1.5 million per year counting salary and perks. His salary alone, for handling the monies of a tiny working-class enclave, was nearly double that of the U.S. President. (more…)
Californians are left with a deeply unsatisfying choice for the U.S. Senate this year. The incumbent, Democrat Barbara Boxer, has failed to distinguish herself during her 18 years in office. There is no reason to believe that another six-year term would bring anything but more of the same uninspired representation.
Naturally, the San Francisco Chronicle doesn’t like Carly Fiorina either. That, however, can be filed under “Reaction, Knee Jerk.” This is the newspaper that’s long been considered by Democrats as nothing more than a satellite campaign office. The import of its declining to endorse Boxer, especially in this election, cannot be understated. The editorial says as much.
It is extremely rare that this editorial page would offer no recommendation on any race, particularly one of this importance. This is one necessary exception.
Rarely, if ever, has so much been at stake for progressives in America. They got the president they wanted. They got a powerful Speaker of the House from one of the most progressive districts in the country. And they got what they thought was going to be a decades-long mandate. Twenty months later, it’s all disintegrating. (more…)
Charles and David Koch are among the most committed and influential free-market champions in America today. According to an editorial in the New York Times, the Koch brothers have invested about a million dollars to try to save California from self-destruction, courtesy of the nation’s most ludicrous energy program: AB-32. That’s a noble effort on the part of Kansas petroleum magnates, even though debt-ridden, job-starved California seems determined to follow Spain’s disastrous path leading toward an unattainable green-energy nirvana.
Naturally the Times doesn’t quite see it that way, assuring readers that the Koch brothers are a dangerous part of sinister, right-wing forces who have aligned to kill California’s bright green future. The Times describes the provisions of AB-32 accurately, although they treat the fantastical goals contained in the bill as though they could be met with a wave of the hand:
The 2006 law, known as AB 32, is aimed at reducing California’s emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to 1990 levels by 2020 and by 80 percent at midcentury. To reach these targets, state agencies are drawing up regulations that would affect businesses and consumers across the board — requiring even cleaner cars, more energy-efficient buildings and appliances, and power plants that use alternative energy sources like wind instead of older fossil fuels.
More regulations, more government control of private industry, more unreliable, expensive wind power: what could possibly go wrong? (more…)
In the greatest party-affiliation cover-up since the media tried to portray Gary Condit as a Republican, the media are refusing to mention the party affiliation of the thieving government officials in Bell, Calif.
There have been hundreds of news stories about Bell city officials’ jaw-dropping salaries. In this poor city on the outskirts of Los Angeles, where the per capita annual income is $24,800 a year, the city manager, Robert Rizzo, had a salary of $787,637.
That’s about twice what the president of the United States makes. (To be fair, Rizzo was doing a better job.)
Rizzo was the highest-paid government employee in the entire country, not counting Maxine Waters’ husband — pending further revelations. With benefits, his total annual compensation, according to the Los Angeles Times, came to $1.5 million a year. (more…)
The great Joel Kotkin, peerless observer and chronicler of the nation’s urban and municipal woes, takes on the Golden State and wonders: what the hell happened to what was once the nation’s greatest state. The answer will not surprise you:
California has long been a destination for those seeking a better place to live. For most of its history, the state enacted sensible policies that created one of the wealthiest and most innovative economies in human history. California realized the American dream but better, fostering a huge middle class that, for the most part, owned their homes, sent their kids to public schools, and found meaningful work connected to the state’s amazingly diverse, innovative economy.
Recently, though, the dream has been evaporating. Between 2003 and 2007, California state and local government spending grew 31 percent, even as the state’s population grew just 5 percent. The overall tax burden as a percentage of state income, once middling among the states, has risen to the sixth-highest in the nation, says the Tax Foundation. Since 1990, according to an analysis by California Lutheran University, the state’s share of overall U.S. employment has dropped a remarkable 10 percent…
What went so wrong? The answer lies in a change in the nature of progressive politics in California. During the second half of the twentieth century, the state shifted from an older progressivism, which emphasized infrastructure investment and business growth, to a newer version, which views the private sector much the way the Huns viewed a city—as something to be sacked and plundered. The result is two separate California realities: a lucrative one for the wealthy and for government workers, who are largely insulated from economic decline; and a grim one for the private-sector middle and working classes, who are fleeing the state.
The “Cry Wolf” leader Professor Peter Dreier has a clear right to solicit all the biased, agenda-driven, fraudulent “research” he desires under the First Amendment of the Constitution he and his pals have so little regard for. But his antics may not pass muster under another set of guidelines that he – and his institution – operate under.
Occidental College, Professor Dreier’s employer, expressly promises the students, whose parents fork over a cool $55,655 a year for the privilege of attending, that they will not be subject to any political litmus test as they participate in the school’s academics between bong hits and sessions of binge drinking:
Students are entitled to an atmosphere conducive to learning and to even-handed treatment in all aspects of the teacher-student relationship. Faculty members may not refuse to enroll or teach students because of their beliefs or the possible uses to which they may put the knowledge to be gained in a course. The student should not be forced by the authority inherent in the instructional role to make particular personal choices as to political action or his or her own part in society. Evaluation of students and the award of credit must be based on academic performance professionally judged and not on matters irrelevant to that performance, whether personality, sex, race, religion, degree of political activism, or personal beliefs. (Occidental College Faculty Handbook, p. 2)
Of course, here a professor – in his capacity as an Occidental professor while using his Occidental email account – is expressly soliciting research work to support his personal political beliefs. Sure, he’s not technically granting or denying credit based on his students’ political views. He’s just exercising some of the informal “authority inherent in the instructional role.” And it’s abundantly clear – even if he doesn’t say it outright – that a student who disagrees with Professor Dreier’s politics best keep on walking. (more…)
Proposition 14, falsely dubbed an “open” primary, has found support among some prominent California newspapers. The Sacramento Bee says it will be a “win for democracy.” The San Francisco Chronicle says it will “create real competition.” The San Jose Mercury News says it will result in “a broader electorate choosing more results-oriented representatives.“ Those papers could not be more wrong – and that is why the Green Party, the Libertarian Party, the Peace and Freedom Party, the Democrat Party and the Republican Party all strongly oppose Prop. 14.
Our current system features a primary process in which all political parties, major and minor, participate. The nominees of those parties then square off in November throughout the state along with write-in candidates. Prop 14, which is being pushed by some of the proponents of the failed 2009 Prop. 1A tax increase, would end that system in favor of a “Top Two” primary. Under Prop. 14, all of the parties and candidates are forced into a single primary in June (when far less voters participate as opposed to the fall) and then only the top two vote-getters square off in the fall – where no one else would have a voice, write-in or otherwise.
1. Equality of Opportunity Not Outcome. At the outset, it is worth noting that Prop. 14 proponents openly hope it will produce a certain kind of candidates – so-called “moderates” – without any accurate, historical proof or data that it will. In other words, they openly are attempting to socially engineer election outcomes. Quite frankly, our Founding Fathers believed in equality of opportunities, not outcomes. They would have never sanctioned a election system designed to produce a certain type of thinker or politician – however fashionable it may be to claim they are necessary at any moment in time. No person who believes in the American experiment with liberty could possibly back a scheme whose purpose is to produce a specific type of candidate or politician. (more…)
Last Thursday, I attended a sizable Tea Party demonstration being held at the post office in Thousand Oaks, Calif. Tea Parties in this location have become routine in the last couple years. My father, who works as a technician at one of the nearby dealerships, walked down to the event with several of his coworkers during their lunch hour — all of them are supporters of the event and its message, but wished to serve merely in the capacity of observers.
Demonstrators were present on all four corners of the intersection, and my father and his two coworkers remained on the side of the street opposite the bulk of the activities. Again, they were constrained by a short lunch break and basically just wanted to check out the action without getting too involved.
After several minutes of observing some of their other friends on the congested side of the street, a local news station called KEYT approached my father and his friends and asked his opinion on the matter. In the off-camera portion of the interview, my father was very clear about his pro-Tea Party position. The reporter then asked if he could tape a segment with him, and my father agreed and reiterated his comments. He also pointed out his friends on the other side of the street to the reporter and recommended they also be filmed (and in fact, they did this and ended up leading into his segment with a short clip of these Pro-Tea Party friends — I was also standing with those friends on the other side of the street at the time).
To my knowledge, there was no opposition rally present — and if there was, certainly not to the extend that it would be seen as such. In fact, for an an event amassing somewhere between 400 and 1,000 people (about four to five times larger than a similar event a year ago), I was actually somewhat surprised that the were as many Pro people as there were, and found the lack of seemingly any opposition quite refreshing. (more…)
On Friday, reporter Jessica Yellin got a chance to sit in as host of CNN’s show, Campbell Brown. Yellin wasted no time in bringing her partisan political views front and center for the CNN audience to witness firsthand as she brought on for a one-on-one interview the man running for Governor of California – Jerry Brown.
In a live performance from the California Democratic Convention in Yellin’s hometown of Los Angeles, Yellin shockingly interviewed Brown and never once told the viewers that Jerry Brown is running for Governor of her home state or that he was sitting at the California Democratic Convention in the town where she grew up.
In a cozy chat, Yellin introduced Brown to CNN as “California’s top law enforcement official” — immediately positioning him as someone more interested in issues than politics even though Brown is in the middle of a hot campaign for Governor. Yellin threw Brown multiple softball questions, with not a single follow-up question to Brown’s long diatribes and no interruptions to Brown’s soliloquies. Yellin, who is known for her liberal political views, even trumpeted the Brown campaign’s messages about his presumed Republican opponent, Meg Whitman. (more…)
And so they’re scared. Scared as we should all be, if the truth be known. The truth would have to be TOLD first, of course, and as usual the MSM is missing a great story. What is coming? Long lines at the “medical collective?”
Yeah, that, but now that the administration has proven it can make us eat a law that nobody wants, they’re going to pull another dead rabbit out of the hat, and even the people who haven’t been paying attention feel it coming.
Amnesty.
Not for people who’ve sent angry emails to their congressman.
For illegal immigrants.
It’s already started. Obama needs to replace the millions of voters who are angry at the way the Health Bill was passed. The quickest way is an amnesty program that would make an estimated 35 million illegal immigrants instant democrat voters.
For the regular U.S. citizen who lives on or near the Southern Border with Mexico, this is not just the fodder for Sunday morning news shows and talk radio. This is something they live with. Chuckie Schumer says 15,000 people cross the border illegally every day. That number is only going to increase as the possibility of a new Amnesty grows brighter – every time the Obama Administration announces it is abandoning the “virtual fence” and cutting funding for Border Patrol and INS operations, or Los Angeles immigrant rights’ groups file lawsuits forcing requests that police “ease up” on nationality checks on arrested suspects, the message is clear:
President Obama just opened some U.S. offshore areas for offshore oil drilling. But don’t hold your breath for a 2010 “Offshore Drilling Rush!” by the oil companies like the 1893 “Oklahoma Land Rush” by the Sooners.
… keeping the Pacific Coast and Alaska, as well as the most promising resources off the Gulf of Mexico, under lock and key makes no sense.” — House Minority Leader John Boehner.
Lest we forget, that California Pacific Coast is hard-core Nancy Pelosi country. No sooner had President Bush lifted the executive ban on oil exploration in the outer Continental Shelf back in summer of 2008 than Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi put the kibosh on its prospects.
“(In California) we learned the hard way that oil and water do not mix on our coast,” she said back in 1996. Ms Pelosi was referring, of course, to the famous Santa Barbara oil spill of 1969, an event that serves as the Alamo of the anti-drilling cause.
Webster’s defines a “provincial” as: “a person of local or restricted interests or outlook.” This is not a term the MSM generally uses for a San Franciscan millionaire feminist legislator who owns vineyards and a French-monikered resort. Then what else to call Nancy Pelosi (and most of her wealthy constituents)? (more…)
Here's something that no one is talking about concerning tonight's primaries: In my homestate of Missouri Prop C, the first legislative challenge to Obamacare exempting Missourians from Obamacare penalities, passed by 3-1 in every single county except Kansas City and St. Louis City. Rick Santorum took every...
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