You know, you just can’t win.

MayaWiley 1200x1200.Yesterday on MSNBC’s “Deadline” civil rights attorney Maya Wiley said there was a direct line from some folks referring to Kamala Harris as a DEI hire to Project 2025.

I have to point out that Biden said I’m going to choose a black female for my Vice President.

He didn’t say, I’m going to choose the best person to be my Vice President. He made it about race and gender right from the start. In my book that’s pretty much the definition of a DEI hire.

Project 2025 (I have not read it entirely) appears to be a plan for the next president, (granted it’s skewed conservative and more likely than not, toward Trump and his base,) however it’s a plan for any President to use in their first 180 days in office.

The plan was put together by conservatives in an attempt to help chart a course correction for the country. Any President is welcome to use it. Just because the plan was written by conservatives doesn’t mean that it’s been delivered from the 7th circle of hell direct from Satans hand.

Notice I said a plan. Not a manifesto, not tablets from a mountain, not etched in stone, not the edicts of an emperor enforced under penalty of death. It’s a plan. Plans change, adapt, and are abandoned often once the plan meets reality. (Joe Biden’s 2nd term & Reelection campaign ring a bell?)

Ms Wiley claims that Project 2025 is going to dismantle all the civil rights laws.

I find that claim to be dubious. Although someone like her would say the same thing about my belief that special protection laws should be stricken from the books.


I believe if we lived under the premise that all Citizens are created equal, then by extension all laws apply equally to all Citizens, negating any necessity for special protections.

The law gets a whole lot simpler to obey and enforce if it’s consistent and has none or very few exceptions.

A thief is a thief subject to a penalty for theft regardless of skin color, gender, religion, or sexual orientation. For example: If you steal, and are caught you get 4 years in prison for each $1000 in value.

Simple, enforceable, and easily understood.

When I talk about exceptions I mean to penalties. I believe a Judge should have the ability to sentence a 14 year old first time offender to community service rather than prison or other  incarceration.

In other words I believe there should be the possibility for humanity and mercy not a totally mechanistic justice system. Which is why I believe Judges must be wise, know the law, and incorruptible. At the same time, laws should be few in number and easy to understand.


I digress.

I don’t know what Ms Wiley is talking about, as I said, I haven’t gotten that far into the document.

It’s available, you can download it. The writers of Project 2025 aren’t trying to hide it or be sneaky.

What I find interesting is this.

If there wasn’t a plan of some kind the left would be beating the right over the head about not having a plan. 

Because there is a plan, the left is pulling out all the stops to label the plan as something evil and some of the left is equating Project 2025 to Mein Kampf.

Thus far I haven’t seen evidence to corroborate this equivalence but I’ll keep looking.

Here is a link to The Heritage Foundation, authors of Project 2025

Here is a link to the Project 2025 document entitled Mandate for Leadership The Conservative Promise

Read it for yourself.

Here are links to Democracy Forward’s rebuttal to Project 2025’s Mandate for Leadership

Democracy Forward’s document is called The People’s Guide to Project 2025

Read that for yourself too.

Don’t believe the hyperbole from the talking heads… Or ME! I’m not the brightest bulb in the pack either. 

I beg you to read & research for yourself. Because these days it’s getting really hard to figure out what is true and who is telling the truth.

Ugghh! I don’t want to do anything!

Between the poor air quality from the fires, the blazing heat, poor sleep, and my general crankiness I’m not motivated to do a dang thing!

The dog and I have been taking early morning walks because it’s cool even though the air quality is terrible. So at least his walk has been completed.

It’s the other stuff, the people stuff that I’m unmotivated to deal with.

I should go to the pharmacy, the grocery store, and the post office. But it’s 90° at 10:00 am and you can almost watch the mercury rising like the old Loony Tunes cartoons.

I’m thinking I’m going to say the heck with it for today. I got about 3 hours of sleep last night and all I want to do is lay on the couch and nap.

I don’t want to get in the habit of blowing off the day because I’m afraid I’ll be mistaken for Joe Biden. (Couldn’t resist…)

I’ve had a walk with the dog, a pot of coffee, breakfast, and I am literally nodding off while typing this.

Maybe I’ll wait until after dark to make the pharmacy and grocery store run. That way I can leave the pup outside without too much worry since the temps will be dropping, and I’m not walking around in a blast furnace.

This is from a guy who likes the heat, and has considered moving to Palm Springs. I think in this case it’s the altitude, coupled with smoky air that’s taking the wind out of my sails.

Sleeping is tough because I’ll have the house open and not smell smoke, when I go to bed and there’s a nice breeze, then the wind shifts a little and I wake up with my sinuses wadded up feeling like I’m suffocating.

That isn’t a happy way to wake up, because I’m panicked and it takes a while for me to drop off again. Running the A/C 24 hours a day might be my only option for the next few days.

Why don’t I do that all the time? Because normally we get these nice evening breezes that are really pleasant. Even if they’re a little warm some times of the year it’s easy to sleep.

Honestly, I don’t really like A/C, especially if you have to have it running all the time just to survive. I feel like it isolates you from the world.

That’s one of the things I like so much about living here. The house can be open at least during the day, most of the year. Even in Winter it’s not uncommon for the outside temps to be around 60°F so you can leave the sliders cracked open a bit for the fresh, albeit cool air. If it’s a sunny day, having the shades up, allows the sun to warm the house so the furnace is idle until nightfall.

It’s only in the deepest Winter that the house is closed all the time. Think maybe 2 to 2.5 months. It’s a nice way to live.

There are places in the Midwest and on the East Coast where the same kind of living is possible. Maybe there will be a few more bugs, but that’s what screens are for.

Yep, it’s nap time…

Getting harder to hold thoughts in my head…

I’m going to have to visit one of these!

E86decc8ed22352241aff2f896bf5cb8 1200 80.I caught this article;

 Grocery Stores Selling Ammunition Out of Vending Machines in Alabama and Oklahoma

I decided that I’m going to have to make a point of stopping next time I’m through the area.

I play a video game called Borderlands. In the game there are vending machines from which you can buy Ammo or weapons.

I never thought I’d see anything like it in real life. Yet, here we are. The contrast between California’s restrictive background checks to buy ammunition versus going to a vending machine in Alabama or Oklahoma is mind boggling.

I get excited walking into a Bass Pro outside California, where I’m able to comparison shop brands and prices. Then pick up several boxes of Ammo off the shelf put them in a cart and make my purchase without anyone batting an eye. 

The thought of a vending machine is damn near orgasmic.

I thought perhaps it was some kind of parody article but it’s the real deal.

Along the same lines, I saw a picture of a store someplace that I’d also like to visit. From the picture it looked like you could buy a carton of Marlboro Reds, a doughnut, cup of coffee, a Sixpack, rifle, and ammo at the same time.

I’d probably have to take a private moment just inside the front door.

Even as a kid in the Deep South you had to go to the gun store for guns and ammo, the liquor store for booze, and the grocery store for other things. When I got to California and found that you could buy booze at just about anyplace, even some pharmacies, and it didn’t matter if it was Sunday or not I thought it was truly progressive.

Walking into a store where literally everything could be purchased at once would blow my mind. Although there was a time when Sears Catalogues would sell you everything under the sun.

Being out of California and not being able to buy liquor in the grocery store is weird but I’ll take that over the regulations and taxes extant in California.

I’m not saying California is terrible and other places are perfect. It’s not that binary. I think it’s more a matter of choosing an acceptable level of taxes and regulations versus services rendered by the state for those fees and taxes, versus personal choice about restrictions or limitations on your personal freedoms.

Kind of like an HOA. Sure, you may love the house. But do you really want to deal with the HOA fining you because your grass is 1 millimeter too low, or the grease spot left on the street in front of your home by the garbage truck on a Tuesday, you didn’t get to cleaning up until Saturday? Do you want to be fined because you parked your boat in your drive way for one day packing up for a family trip?

Some HOAs are out of control and because you signed on, when you bought your beautiful house you’ve got to put up with it. 

Traditionally I have hated HOAs with passion and vigor, recently I’ve revised my opinion of HOAs due to my neighborhood. I still hate HOAs but I’ll admit they might be useful.

In contemplating moving, I have opened my search criteria to include HOAs whose fees are reasonable and for whom their responsibilities are limited to common areas. This slight change has opened up neighborhoods that I would previously have passed up even if the housing prices were bargain basement.

So for those of you who think I’m never learning or changing here’s an example.

All that being said, I wonder what other freedoms Oklahoma and Alabama have that I might not have in California. I wonder what their tax structures and employment is like. 

I’ve been looking at places that are kind to retirees. Places that have low or no taxes, who don’t regulate or tax the hell out of everything, and last but not least someplace where my car registration doesn’t cost $600 a freaking year.

(Ya know, my car is a 2019. The registration was right at $600 when I got it, and it’s still about $600 although the vehicle itself isn’t worth what it was when I got it. California charges registration fees based on value not weight. Makes sense if you think about it. Why charge a fee that assumes the individual should pay for their portion of wear & tear on the public roads. California can take more charging based on value of nice cars, and still not maintain the roads. I say that as someone whose been here a long time and remember smooth gleaming ribbons of freeways in good repair, instead of what we have today where a kidney belt might be advised.)

I’d also like lower medical insurance costs.  I’ve had no, none, zero, nada, major medical issues and am in good health. I’m not obese (okay, I could lose a few pounds) so I’d really like to know why medical insurance costs 1.5 X my mortgage payment.

That’s before even using it. I know the Doctors have to maintain their country club memberships, pay for their yachts, make alimony payments on their previous 2 wives, pay for their whore/mistress on the side and keep their current wife in diamonds and furs but come on. 

If you force people to choose between a roof and health insurance I’m betting most choose a roof over their heads.

I don’t think ammo vending machines are a good enough reason to move to a particular state. I do think a state having ammo vending machines is reason enough to look at other aspects of the state to see if it’s a place I might be happy and can afford to live in.

At the very least, Ammo tourism might be fun. I’d love to have a picture of me buying rounds from one of these things.