FLASH! Due to the coronavirus disaster, Palm Springs secretly hired the aged Boss Hogg from Hazzard County to refill the city coffers with loot.

This decadent desert city is heavily dependent on visitors for its tax revenue. With the plunge in city tax collections, Boss Hogg implemented a HUGE fine for violating any city diktat regarding the coronavirus. “Up to” $5,000 for the first offense. $10K and $25K maximums for the 2nd and 3rd offenses respectively. https://www.desertsun.com/story/news/health/2020/04/07/palm-springs-imposing-fines-violations-local-emergency-order/2967170001

But let’s not exaggerate the magnitude of this new city revenue source. The maximum fine won’t be levied on every law breaker.

Thanks to the Internet, a corrupt judge (all judges are totally dependent on government revenue) can run a quick credit check on the riffraff standing before him awaiting sentencing. The fine will be adjusted down to the maximum level the poor saps can pay — to avoid refilling the local jail after the county sheriff let most of the REAL criminals out because of the infection… Read More

I think I have had enough of this “shelter in place” stuff. I practice social distancing as a way of life, I’m not a social guy. I know that sounds weird for a recovering politician, but it’s true. I not all that into hanging out with people on the natural. But, when the government orders me? My rebellious side kicks in, and I just want to shake everybody’s hand.

This whole virus thing could have been handled better. The problem is in New York and New Jersey. Infections per thousand (which is how the real impact of the disease should be measured), California has one of the lowest disease rates (25,000 cases out of 36 million people), .7 people/thousand (Compare with New York’s 10 people/thousand and New Jersey at 7 people/thousand). That isn’t because of the “shelter in place” order in California either. Texas, which does not have the order, has a lower infection rate per thousand (.5 people/thousand). So requiring us all to stay in place is absolutely unnecessary (except maybe in New York and New Jersey), and maximizes the economic harm we all must suffer from this incredibly bad government response to the… Read More

Warning: This column is highly partisan and intended to offend some offenders.

Since this country’s conversation switched from impeachment to coronavirus, some people think they are still back in the good old days. While people are dying from a highly-contagious disease and millions are thrown out of work to extinguish said virus, some folks just can’t control themselves. It was cute and quaint when everyone knew your efforts were going to fail and we had more jobs than we had people to fill them. The reality has changed and you need to get with it for the American people or just shut your mouths.

That doesn’t mean that our government is not above constructive criticism. I read it every day. There will be mistakes made and there will be mid-course corrections necessary, but your constant hectoring comments are despicable. The armchair quarterbacks with zero life experience constantly attacking the people attempting to accomplish something to save the lives and financial well-being of our fellow citizens is downright Un-American. As I tweeted out in the beginning, if you are an elected official there is really only one thing to say… Read More

As we wallow away our days during the pandemic of 2020, we all find ways to keep our sanity and, for some of us, our ever-present ebullient spirit. I had an experience that directed my thoughts to what would really make me happy. I want to be at a Springsteen concert.

Knowing that not everyone is a lover of the “other” Bruce, please stick with me here. I guarantee it will be worth it.

I was watching a Netflix DVD entitled Blinded by the Light. I put it on my queue months ago; it finally rose to the top and shipped to my house. It is the relatively true story of a Pakistani young man in the 1980’s trying to find his way in a small town outside of London to adapt to the modern world. This was a world where his father wanted to drag him back to the old customs and few of the locals accepted him or his kind. This teenager then found Bruce.

He devotes a large amount of his time developing his writing skills and expanding his appreciation of how Springsteen speaks to him and his struggles. The rest of the story I will leave you to see for yourself, but it got me to thinking.

In these miserably… Read More

Covid-19 didn’t kill our economy. Government policies, however well intentioned, did. In just a few weeks, they derailed the most prosperous and promising economy of our lifetimes and put us in imminent danger of permanently destroying millions of American jobs.

The CARES Act will much more than double the current deficit, which is already unprecedented and unsustainable. It threatens to destabilize the fiscal structure of our federal government, suppress future economic growth and create fiscal pressures that will take decades to unravel.

But in order to deal with the future problems this bill creates, we must first deal with the immediate crisis by arresting the damage caused by recent actions that have laid waste to our prosperity and plunged our nation into a sudden and deep recession.

The government has created a liquidity crisis for both employers and families. Employers’ revenues have plunged, giving them the Hobson’s choice of firing employees, selling assets in a fire sale or defaulting. Jobs temporarily lost will quickly become jobs permanently lost. They need ready access to capital, and the core of this bill does so. Families face a… Read More

Prelude: When I wrote this column I did not expect to have gun stores fighting to stay open especially in areas where public officials like to restrict gun owner rights. Who would have thought that pot shops would be deemed essential and gun shops not? At a time when public officials are releasing criminals so they can unload any concern for COVID-19 surrounding them, they restrict the rights of law abiding citizens who want to protect themselves and their families by acquiring a gun while the authorities pretend the police will protect all of us.

No one wants a crazy person to have a gun except for maybe the crazy person. People of all political persuasions agree on that point. Red flag laws have begun to spread throughout the states to keep guns out of the hands of unstable people. The question is whether they go too far and overshoot (no pun intended) their goal.

I have previously described the fact that anyone walking into a building, arena, mall or any other space for large group gatherings and starts shooting at strangers is the definition of a person that is severely mentally ill. With the increased frequency… Read More

Here’s a wonky study comparing the education results of states — a different study that merits a serious look. It uses REAL criteria, not typical left wing assumptions that dominate most such “surveys.”

The results will disturb most progressives. And the MSM. Which is why you’ve likely heard nothing about this study.

For instance, the common assumption made by most such surveys is that the primary factor in the quality of education is the amount of money SPENT on education. As this study details, there is in reality no significant correlation between spending and education RESULTS.

For results, the study concentrated on“thestudents’ performance on the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP), a battery of standardized tests sometimes called ‘The Nation’s Report Card.’ These tests are given to fourth and eighth graders as well as some high school… Read More

The anguish in people’s voices as they call our office every day is heart-breaking. Many are wondering how they can pay their bills, whether their job will still exist in a week, whether their retirement savings have been decimated or whether they’ll lose the shop they’ve spent their lifetimes and life savings to build.

Immediate financial relief is of paramount importance to staunch the damage done to the millions of American workers and businesses pushed to insolvency by forced closures and a panic that has emptied grocery shelves across the country. How that relief is extended will determine whether we save or destroy what just one month ago was one of the most promising economic expansions in our nation’s history.

Businesses must have immediate access to capital to keep their assets intact and their employees’ jobs preserved. The answer that has worked for centuries is to make capital easily available through low-cost emergency loans so businesses can stay intact. The Federal Reserve is doing that by throwing open the discount window and Congress needs to guarantee emergency loans to all businesses to stay afloat until the crisis passes.

For… Read More