Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
We have normalized and protected incompetence. We stopped championing excellence and became skeptical of it as an elitist thing. We have cultivated a culture of entitlement that drives achievement lower and reward expectation higher. We have allowed people to bolster their profiles via grievance vs via competence. We have trained a generation in playing the DEI game, to the point of creating a trans identification fad that is only just now slowing down. In short, we have taken a community minded, Protestant work-ethic based, patriotic culture and sold it out for consumerism and stupidity. But it’s not my fault because I am oppressed and traumatized by the way you guys look at me.
AI is only going to accelerate that phenomenon. It pretends to be additive, but in reality, it is not particularly groundbreaking. It aggregates existing data quickly without much in the way of discerning that which is needed. AI does not, cannot, will not, invent, create, design or discover anything really critical. It can only summarize what has gone on before, and what’s worse, it will invent that which is not there. It hallucinates.
Dems will continue to run against Trump in the foreseeable future. It’s all they have.
My worry is that they will latch onto “Tax the Rich” as their core focal point. It was the only talking point that moved the needle for Harris, and she abandoned it — my guess is in response to the billionaires who funded her campaign.
Momdani and AOC don’t have those concerns, nor does Sanders. If they figure out that robbing Peter to pay Paul is their sole resonant talking point, they will ride the politics of envy until they drop.
“I’ve raised at least $50 million for the left,” recalls Evan Barker at The Free Press, but “on Tuesday, I voted for Donald Trump.”
How my party lost me, Dems must return to normalcy and other commentary | New York Post
But “the final straw was Oprah Winfrey’s tone-deaf speech” at the Dem convention: “A larger than life Hollywood billionaire” who “said nothing that spoke to the Americans who had once constituted the Democratic base.”
So, the incredible advantages for existing homeowners include:
- Property values may drop.
- Much taller, denser buildings than today with loss of views, sunlight and privacy and avoidance of setbacks, step-backs and open-space rules.
- Much weaker local control and neighborhood influence.
- No public approval process, no subjective design review, no broad discretionary decision, CEQA is bypassed, as is CEQA lawsuits.
- Single family homes are protected by anti-displacement rules, but usually for rent-controlled multifamily housing. It doesn’t protect single family homes or duplexes not under rent control.
- Density increase will be dramatic. Bill does not allow for added funding for parking, roads, schools, parks, sewers, water, policing or emergency services, or mitigation for parking, traffic congestion, noise or neighborhood services.
- Cities are explicitly restricted from imposing additional fees or inclusionary requirements because a project uses this law.
- So you’ll get more congestion, tougher parking crowding in schools, crowding in public facilities.
- Parking pressure that spills over into adjacent neighborhoods. I have that little happy, happy, joy-joy right now. Increased competition for curb parking, more circulation, more park and ride behavior.
- It allows cities to exclude some sites through a transit-oriented development alternative plan. So. some neighborhoods will become “dumping grounds” for density.
- It allows transit agencies to override local zoning on their own land.
- Very complex interaction of CA TOD rules, Local TOD alternative plans, MPO-created TOD maps with “rebuttal presumption of validity”, HCD oversight and potential attorney general enforcement.
- Potential for gentrification or other demographic shifts.
- Does not guarantee shadow studies, sun access protections, light or noise pollution abatement.
- Somewhat ironically, more traffic and more congestion. More service trucks, more late-night activity, more noise, more rooftop decks, less backyard privacy.
- Greater fire and safety risks.
- Homeowners can’t “opt out” through democracy, even if a majority of local voters wish to exempt themselves.
- Delayed/inevitable changes in unincorporated county areas.
- This is to affect all light rail stops, train stops, intersections of bus stops, major bus stops.
- Best bonus of all, property taxes — might increase. Awesome.
Senate Bill 79 – known as the Abundant and Affordable Homes Near Transit Act – supersedes local zoning rules to allow developers to create more housing around transit hubs. Last month, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed it into law.
It takes effect on July 1, 2026. It affects the counties of Santa Clara, San Mateo, San Francisco, Alameda, Los Angeles, Orange, San Diego, Riverside. All the high-density counties.
Why is this happening? Matt Lewwis, a spokesperson for California YIMBY (one of SB79’s sponsors) says “If your home is close to a transit stop, you’re getting exclusive access to a publicly funded amenity that needs to be accessible to more people,” he said. “The only way to get that access is building more houses by transit stops.” In other words, you don’t have any say and the fact that you were there first is literally immaterial.
SB79 author Scott Wiener says his bill favors people over buildings when you prefer low zoning density. You’re basically racist if you’re against his bill.
Los Angeles desperately needs new housing. So why are its politicians still fighting SB79?
Now the Wall Street billionaires are fighting back by backing Elise Stefanik, a Republican in the New York state governor’s race.
Wall Street billionaires plot to cripple Mamdani over dinner at White House
Henry Kravis, Stephen Schwarzman, David Solomon, Jamie Dimon, Adena Friedman, Larry Fink, Jeffrey Speecher.
Newsom is the best positioned Democratic presidential candidate for 2028. Just ask Politico:
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/11/15/gavin-newsom-interview-2028-frontrunner-00652362
This is a chart showing (a) how interest payments as a percentage of Federal revenue have grown over time and (b) how the growth of that percentage has accelerated.
Meaning we’re in vast fiscal trouble. There are too many needs, real and perceived, that the politicians want to fund, so they keep borrowing against the future. It’s going to crash at some point, and it’s already raised inflation to ridiculous heights.
Fiscal Year Interest Payments as % of Federal Revenue ~ 1991 ~ 8 % (interest cost reached high mark then) Peterson Foundation+2AAF+2 ~ 2008 ~ 9.6 % (interest payments ≈ $242 billion out of tax revenue ≈ $2.5 trillion) Wikipedia+1 ~ 2024-25 ~ 18–19 % (interest payments projected to be ~19% of revenues) AAF+2Trading Economics+2 And here comes Katie Wilson to fix all of it. It is uncharitable to say, but she looks like a low-watt bulb to me, same as Mamdani.
Meet the socialist Mamdani-style mayor just elected to run West Coast’s 5th largest city
GR, your wealth tax concept is about to get a real-world test.
A ballot initiative in California is being proposed by the healthcare workers union. A one-time, 5% tax on California’s 255 billionaires, solely on their wealth over $1 billion. Supporters say it could raise $100 billion and offset looming cuts to Medicaid.
Not surprisingly, Gavin Newsom is against it. Newsom’s team is launching a PAC called “Stop the Squeeze,” correctly terming it a “can of worms sliding down a slippery slope (two cliches at once, must be good) by taxing cars, houses, wheelbarrows and everything else.”
San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan is against it for the best reason (I think) stating that “I don’t know that people fully appreciate the vulnerability we face as a state when it comes to our revenue sources.” True that. 1/3rd of CA revenue comes from the Top 1%.
The California Campaign to Introduce a First-of-Its-Kind Billionaire’s Tax – WSJ
I take it back. Climate change is so critically important to Newsom that he acted as stand-in for the American president at the recent international climate leadership event, jetting down to Brazil which is 5,000 miles away from California.
Newsom sells out the US at latest hypocritical climate conference
California Republican Governor candidate is no fan of Newsom and cites the fact that half of California’s oil comes from environmentally fragile Amazon rain forests, including those in Brazil. He believes Newsom is a virtue-signaling climate hypocrite:
Wendy’s closing 300 stores. They closed 240 last year.
Wendy’s to close hundreds of US stores in bid to halt falling profit
Here’s the results of the Princeton gerrymandering project by state, color-coded:
Here are the 50 states. First three columns lists percentage of registered voters by party. For those states that do not register by party, I did percentage of voters in last election (except Michigan). Next three columns are percentage of congressional representation by party. It is sorted by seventh column (disparity between registered Democratic voters and the percentage of congressional participants, so if Oklahoma has 38% registered Democrats and 0% Democrats in Congress, it is represented as +38%, favoring Republicans.
The Princeton Gerrymandering project is listed in the last column; Good, Fair (some bias), OK (average), Bad (poor). Last two states, not enough data:
State Reg Dem% Reg Repub% Reg Other% Cong Dem% Cong Repub%$ Cong Other% Diff PGP WV 34% 44% 22% 0% 100% 0% 34% Good KY 46% 49% 5% 13% 88% 0% 34% Good NE 28% 45% 27% 0% 100% 0% 28% Good SD 28% 50% 22% 0% 100% 0% 28% Good MT 26% 45% 29% 0% 100% 0% 26% Good ID 24% 93% -17% 0% 100% 0% 24% Good WY 20% 64% 16% 0% 100% 0% 20% Good MO 34% 47% 19% 20% 80% 0% 14% Good AL 36% 55% 9% 22% 78% 0% 14% Good IN 25% 31% 44% 18% 82% 0% 7% Good VA 52% 30% 18% 54% 46% 0% -2% Good AZ 29% 35% 35% 45% 55% 0% -16% Good NY 53% 25% 22% 75% 25% 0% -22% Good MN 34% 38% 28% 60% 40% 0% -26% Good CO 30% 27% 43% 60% 40% 0% -30% Good WA 52% 28% 20% 83% 17% 0% -31% Good MD 53% 23% 24% 90% 10% 0% -37% Good NJ 38% 21% 41% 79% 21% 0% -41% Good DE 48% 28% 24% 100% 0% 0% -52% Good MI 0% 0% 0% 53% 47% 0% -53% Good RI 43% 12% 45% 100% 0% 0% -57% Good MA 35% 10% 55% 100% 0% 0% -65% Good CT 30% 16% 54% 100% 0% 0% -70% Good IA 33% 35% 32% 0% 100% 0% 33% Fair PA 45% 39% 16% 42% 58% 0% 3% Fair ME 36% 29% 35% 50% 25% 25% -14% Fair CA 48% 24% 28% 83% 17% 0% -35% Fair NH 25% 23% 52% 100% 0% 0% -75% Fair OK 38% 52% 10% 0% 100% 0% 38% OK AR 15% 25% 60% 0% 100% 0% 15% OK AL 12% 24% 63% 0% 100% 0% 12% OK MS 24% 29% 47% 17% 83% 0% 7% OK SC 41% 49% 10% 11% 89% 0% 30% Bad ND 29% 43% 28% 0% 100% 0% 29% Bad LA 41% 47% 11% 25% 75% 0% 16% Bad TX 47% 38% 15% 33% 68% 0% 15% Bad UT 13% 60% 27% 0% 100% 0% 13% Bad FL 38% 41% 21% 27% 73% 0% 12% Bad NC 36% 28% 37% 25% 75% 0% 11% Bad KS 26% 47% 26% 17% 83% 0% 10% Bad TN 18% 34% 48% 9% 91% 0% 9% Bad OH 31% 31% 38% 29% 71% 0% 2% Bad WI 31% 37% 32% 30% 70% 0% 1% Bad GA 43% 27% 30% 44% 56% 0% -1% Bad IL 38% 28% 34% 84% 16% 0% -46% Bad NV 37% 36% 27% 83% 17% 0% -46% Bad OR 33% 26% 41% 88% 13% 0% -54% Bad NM 45% 31% 24% 100% 0% 0% -55% Bad VT 53% 20% 27% 67% 0% 33% -14% ??? HI 38% 14% 48% 100% 0% 0% -62% ??? 35.0% 35.3% 29.6% Let’s throw in the 2020 Illinois hyperpartisan redistricting. Illinois lost two seats in the census. Illinois has a long history of both parties abusing the process when they control the state legislature. But the congressional map drawn by Democrats after the 2020 Census is a modern masterpiece of the craft. It successfully transformed the state’s congressional delegation from 13 Democrats and 5 Republicans to 14 Democrats and just 3 Republicans.
Very impressive. As part of the redistricting, they specifically organized it to include two very large Hispanic populations, so the district is referred to as “the earmuffs” for its resemblance:
And that was the issue with Texas. It’s why the courts (not Trump) forced it to undo its original gerrymandered map, because it was taking race into account, and the USSC says that is not acceptable.
BTW, California is already gerrymandered in favor of Democrats. California registered Democrats as a percentage of overall registered voters: 44.8%. Current percentage of CA-Democrats in House of Representatives (45/54) 83.3%.
In other words, Democrats already have nearly twice their registered representation in Congress. But that’s not enough for Gerrymanderer-in-chief, Gavin Newsom. By redrawing the maps, Republicans will lose five seats, giving Democrats (50/54) 92.6% of the congressional representation in a state that has 25.41% registered Republicans.
Pretty impressive. It’s rare to see a politician that slimy, that oleaginous, whose rank hypocrisy is stratospheric compared to the average hypocritical politician. But he’s doubling down and literally taking his act on the road to encourage other Democratic politicians to gerrymander.
