As I watched another car with New York license plates follow a moving van into our neighborhood the other day I thought, “Oh! Oh! We’re going to soon see something far more dangerous than Covid-19 spreading throughout our state – the contagion of liberalism.” The Chinese couldn’t have cooked up anything more deadly than this in their Wuhan labs.
Look what happened in Georgia last week where two of the most radical leftists in the country – financed by millions in California money and fueled by immigrant voters – were elected to the US Senate turning that once red Republican state as blue as Nancy Pelosi’ s face as she rolled around on the House floor holding her breath, kicking her legs, screaming “Impeachment!”
As Louisiana US Senator John Kennedy said: “These Senate elections in Georgia are the most important in history, but you have nothing to worry about unless you are a taxpayer, a parent, a gun owner, a cop, a person of faith or an unborn baby.”
Nassau County’s population is expected to grow by 36 percent in the next ten years predicted County Manager Taco Pope in a talk to the Men’s Newcomers December 17. Pope said Nassau would be the seventh-fastest growing county in Florida by 2030. Many of the folks coming here are escaping from New York, Michigan, Illinois, and other far left enclaves.
In Texas Governor Greg Abbott issued a warning to let California transplants know how he and his fellow Texans feel: “Remember those high taxes, burdensome regulations and socialistic agenda you advanced in California? We don’t believe in any of that.”
In Idaho, Boise mayoral candidate Wayne Riche proposed building a wall to keep out folks escaping from the “Golden” state.
Folks escaping here from California and New York are the same ones that voted for people like Dianne Feinstein, Nancy Pelosi, Eric Swalwell, Gavin Newsome, Maxine Waters, Adam Schiff, Chuck Schumer, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Andrew Cuomo, Bill de Blasio, and others of that ilk. A few hundred thousand of those asylum fugitives will wreak havoc hereabouts and put the “Sunshine State” in a dark place.
Maybe we can pass a law making it legal to capture and return them. Governors Andrew Cuomo (NY) and Gavin Newsom (CA) said they want their cash cows back so they can continue to milk them, so maybe they’ll offer rewards based on their tax brackets. But if they’re anything like illegal immigrants they’ll probably quickly attempt another escape and head our way again.
***
FEMA Fiasco Continues: News Leader columnist Steve Nicklaus in his “Steve’s Market Place” column last Friday, January 8, wrote that Fernandina Beach City Commissioner Len Kreger voted to go ahead with a more than $6 million marina construction project because City Manager Dale “The Big Spender” Martin presented the project to him saying FEMA would reimburse the city.
It wasn’t just Commissioner Kreger who was misled. The “Big Spender” told all the residents of Fernandina Beach that an armored car stuffed with government cash from FEMA was headed our way. In a November 2, 2018 NCFL Independent article “Big Spender” Martin declared: “All permits have been secured and a revised FEMA estimate of $6.4 million for only the southern attenuator (the original $6.5 million FEMA estimate was for the southern and northern portions) has been completed and wending its way toward final signature.”
“I voted yes because I thought it was a done deal, ”Kreger told Mr. Nicklaus. “Martin presented it like it was a done deal.”
An informed local who knows more than most about such things points out to me that Commissioner Kreger and Commissioners Chip “Capo” Ross, Phil Chapman, and Johnny Miller were all well aware that FEMA was not locked in when they voted 4-1 to incur $6.4 million in new debt by awarding the marina construction contract. Only former Commission Roy Smith voted “no”, and he was rewarded for his prudent decision by being voted out of office by uninformed voters.
My font of information reminds me that the minutes of the commission meeting awarding the contract clearly do not support Kreger’s claim. They show that only Commissioner Smith objected to contracting for $6.4 million saying the funds from FEMA were not assured, making Kreger’s claim ring hollow. As to the mysterious missing document Martin claims to have seen my source, who is close to the issue, told me that for each disaster relief claim, FEMA maintains an official Documents of Record file, which is the sole reference for all claims processing… “if it ain’t there,” he said, “it doesn’t exist.”
The one thing that Commissioner Kreger did say to columnist Nicklaus that rings true is the amount of influence “Capo” Ross exerts over City Manager Martin. “I think Dale listens to him too much”, said Kreger of Ross. “He’s had a lot of influence on Dale.” That may be the understatement of the year, but it’s only mid-January.
If FEMA stands firm, city taxpayers should brace themselves as they’ll face much higher property taxes to pay for the mess created by Martin and covered up by his enforcer and mouthpiece, “Capo” Ross.
Based on FEMA Freedom of Information Act documents I’ve seen that were secured by local watchdog Common Sense, the city has a better chance of winning the Publisher’s Clearing House Sweepstakes than it does of FEMA coughing up any cash.
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Word Play: The Washington Post published its yearly contest in which readers are asked to supply alternate meanings for various words. My favorites were: Lymph (v.), to walk with a lisp; and Pokémon (n), A Jamaican proctologist.
***
Medieval Madness: If Joe Biden is sincere about uniting the country as he often mumbles, then he should reel in the vengeful, creepy, and unhinged House Harpy, Nancy Pelosi, who wants to impeach, toss out, and publicly draw and quarter President Trump.
Pelosi and her mindless minions with their thirst for political vengeance are doing more to divide America than anything since the Civil War. Her dangerous rhetoric and impeachment is an alarming use of legislative power, and Biden refuses to even address it when asked. Is poor ‘ole Joe connected to reality. He’s certainly not a leader. Pelosi is strengthening the resolve and further enraging Mr. Trump’s 75 million voters and creating a tinderbox that could explode at any time.
The left is right to condemn those who stormed the Capital building in DC. The right also condemned them. But where was the lefts’ and their corporate shills’ condemnation when BLM and Antifa looters, arsonists and anarchists were destroying American cities last year, calling President Trump illegitimate and watching Madonna saying she’d like to blow up the White House? They and their media lackeys called them peaceful protestors, sent them money, and put their logos on sports uniforms.
Biden claimed he would be a healer and would work to end the divisiveness. He’s done the total opposite with his anti-cop racist remarks last Friday claiming that the cops at the Capitol would have treated blacks differently. Apparently he’s unaware it was a white woman the cops shot, and a cop died of injuries, while 50 other cops were injured. He went on to suggest Republicans are Nazis with their claims of fraud in the election. His attack on Trump, and demand that Trump resign just added fuel to the fire. Biden has already made it clear he is an extreme divider, and he has no sense of what he has just done to exacerbate the problem. It’s clear he he’s mentally challenged and does whatever his handlers tell him.
We’re in for a frightening four years of rampant inflation, higher taxes, increased regulations, pricey fuel, and being censored and lied to by the media and far left technology oligarchs dictating what we can read and hear.
This is not democracy in America.
***
Speaking of Social Media Censorship: When Alexander Graham Bell introduced the telephone in 1878 what would have been the reaction if he had decreed that users who leased his phones and service could only use them if they agreed not to discuss certain topics and only used language he found acceptable?
It wasn’t until 1984 that Americans could go out and buy and own a phone. Up to then the telephones installed in a home or business were the property of “Ma Bell”. It wasn’t until William McGowan and his company, MCI Communications, launched a successful 1984 antitrust suit to break up the AT&T monopoly that Americans could go out and buy phones and seek alternatives to AT&T.
What would have been the reaction if “Ma Bell’s” staff overheard customers discussing issues they disagreed with and then had its employees cut off their service and confiscate the phones? In Nazi Germany and the communist Soviet Union phones were tapped and people were encouraged to turn in their neighbors who they heard discussing what they considered anti-government topics. That practice continues today in China, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, and other totalitarian countries.
What’s the difference between that and what the far-left oligarchs at Twitter, Apple, Google, Facebook, etc. with the encouragement and full support of the Democrat party are currently doing? None that I can see. The big tech industry is now officially an extension of the Democrat Party. They don’t even hide their bias anymore.
These same companies that are censoring President Trump’s tweets, are allowing misinformation about conservatives to run rampant on their platforms including death threats. Parler CEO John Matze, says he can’t go home due to the numerous online death threats he’s received. Tweets by Iranian dictator and supreme nut job, Ali Khamenei, calling for death to Americans and saying the Covid-19 vaccines were tainted are also perfectly OK with Big Tech’s far-left ideological geeks. Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, who was poisoned last year allegedly by Vladimir Putin, gets daily Twitter-posted death threats.
The far-left US tech oligarchs have banded together to silence Facebook alternative Parler and collectively boot President Trump from their networks. Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, spent over $400 million in 2020 to fund a Biden victory. That money was provided to organizations such as Center for Tech & Civic Life, Rock the Vote, Dominion Voting Systems, etc., all for the purpose of dictating the outcome of the 2020 election. From there the monies were distributed to various election officials in the battleground states, and then on to such American icons of liberty and justice as ANTIFA, BLM, & the DNC.
Facebook has banned the phrase “Stop the Steal” saying it’s hateful right-wing speech. By doing so didn’t Facebook “steal” our Constitutional right to free speech? Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said banning Trump is just the beginning, that the company is going after many others. The people that run these companies aren’t held accountable for their decisions. They get away with anything they like.
If this doesn’t smack of totalitarian tactics, monopolistic collusion, and RICO racketeering what does? We are in a dangerous place.
George Orwell has arrived.
***
Dear Editor — “#^%$&*@#”: Area resident Steve Leimberg pays big bucks to impose his own views on the public, but he wants to squelch the free speech of anyone holding viewpoints contrary to his, suggesting that such criticism is actually a form of violence and should be banned.
Leimberg voiced his feelings in a frenzied screed to the News Leader’s “Voice of the People” this past Wednesday, January 13 (“A day that will live in infamy”) shrieking that the content of two previous letters to the editor were “….baseless allegations, outright lies, and bizarre fairy tales to deny reality and truth and turn its back on science.” He condemned the News Leader for publishing them. He wrote much more but it’s all so tedious.
In his squealing spittle-flecked tantrum Leimberg took the newspaper to task for printing letters he finds disagreeable, implying that anyone dissenting from his viewpoint is a divisive racist boob, conspiracy-minded fanatic, perhaps clinging to his guns and religion. He demanded the newspaper censor any future contrarian views.
This is the same guy who spent tens of thousands of dollars late last year buying full page ads in the News Leader and Florida Times-Union bashing President Trump and his supporters with unproven accusations. Leimberg prefers a media echo chamber where his own prejudices are fed back to him. I suggest he may enjoy sending any future silliness to the liberal PR hacks who run the Fernandina Apologist (aka The Fernandina Observer), they revel in that kind of stuff.
Leimberg’s letter exposes his and the left’s hypocrisy with their defense of the riots, killings, arson, and looting last summer and is further evidence that they are morally and intellectually bankrupt. He may have taken his clue from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) possibly the dumbest human in the US Congress if not all of DC. Ms. O-C has called for a commission on “media literacy to stop the spewing of misinformation.” She wants the government to censor the media!
Good for the News Leader for running Leimberg’s blather and publicly exposing his hypocrisy.
***
Meanwhile Back At The Ranch: An extraordinarily successful retired Fernandina businessman offered me his thoughts regarding the confusion created whenever Commissioner Dr. Chip “Capo” Ross responds publicly to issues brought before the City Commission.
Examples he cited were “Capo” Ross’s recent opinion piece slavishly published by the online pseudo-media outlet Fernandina Apologist (aka Fernandina Observer) about its unpublished concerns submitted by “Common Sense”, and its defense of closing the beaches to all use for several months during the early stages of the pandemic.
“Tell the city manager not to worry, I’ll explain this to the folks.”
“The good doctor does not seem to understand the role of City Commissioners or the protocol for public communication for same,” concluded the gentleman. “A commission should function much the same as a board of directors for a public company i.e., one of oversight – approval/disapproval of recommendations/ budgets/expenditures and monitoring the performance of management – the CEO primarily – in this case the City Manager,” he explained.
“A good policy is nose in, fingers out. Public communications should be done by the Chairman of the Board/Mayor or in some cases by the CEO/City Manager. But in no case should a board member or city commissioner go rogue on issues that are clearly matters for City Commission discussion and response.”
He cited the following recent unanswered questions:
- Why does Chip Ross assert himself thus creating the impression his response is indeed official?
- Did Ross make any effort to validate the concerns expressed in the letter from Common Sense or to discuss those issues with the writer before responding publicly?
- Did Ross discuss any of his views with his fellow commissioners who also received the letter from Common Sense?
“Clearly it is time for City Commission to adopt a policy regarding public responses – who, when and how best to communicate without creating total confusion for the stakeholders/tax payers/citizens,” he says. “The new City Commission has an opportunity to bring clarity and better communication. I hope the commissioners have the courage to address this issue quickly and directly as it would immediately improve respect for the Commission.”
The individual currently prefers to remain anonymous since he is considering undertaking some local projects and doesn’t want to test the city’s reputation for retaliating against its vocal opponents by holding up permits and charging excessive fees.
***
What’s Up Doc? Jill Biden demanded that people call her Dr. Biden, in deference to her University of Delaware degree in education. Worse is the wife of New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio who demands that people call her Dr. de Blasio because of her honorary degree. Not even Bugs Bunny would ask his age-old “What’s Up Doc?” question when addressing these two gals since both possess degrees less impressive than Dr. Pepper.
***
“Giddy Up” Joe: Late last year when Fox News reporter Peter Doocy hollered out a question about the scandal swirling around Hunter Biden, I’m sure President-elect Joe Biden’s minders had prepared a handful of snappy responses for him. But the only thing that Joe could manage to sputter was, “You’re a one-horse pony.”
I assume he meant to say a “one-trick pony,” but it’s not always wise to make assumptions about what the man has in mind. Or if he has a mind. Remember last year in New Hampshire when Biden called Yulee college student, Madison Moore, a “lying dog-faced pony soldier”?
***
US Treasury’s “Going Out Of Business Clearance”: Congress says the “stimulus” cash ($600 and possibly an additional $1,400) it’s doling out is to aid folks struggling financially are due to layoffs, business closings, bankruptcies, etc.
Hard up government employees.
Really? Then why are local, state, and federal employees receiving tax payer-funded checks? I’ve not heard of a single government employee at any level that’s been laid off due to the pandemic. Have you? In fact, right here in Fernandina Beach, our bloated local city government is actually hiring. City Manager Dale Martin just brought on a utility director to replace the retired John “Pay To Play” Mandrick. Apparently qualifications and prior experience don’t matter because the new guy has never run a utility. Flushing a toilet and turning a faucet on and off appear to be his only qualifications.
Government employees whether they’re in Fernandina Beach, Nassau County, Tallahassee, or Washington, DC are paid with our tax dollars and now they’re getting tax payer-funded checks, despite the fact that all they’ve done is make the pandemic situation worse with their idiotic decrees, shutdowns, rules, regulations, fines, and double talk.
We need a “Stimulus” to stimulate folks to get these bureaucratic buffoons out of office and promote an outcry against these worthless administrators that greedily pocket our tax money while providing nothing but regulatory roadblocks and misguided legislation to stifle productivity, prosperity, and our Constitutional rights.
***
Things I Wish I’d Said: “Americans are thinking there are some good members of Congress but can’t figure out what they’re good for. Others are thinking, how did these morons make it through the birth canal.” – Senator John Kennedy (R) Louisiana
Didn’t you just love it when my Blue Lives Matter Patriots beat a policeman with the American Flag? Nothing like those unpatriotic libtards who actually knelt respectfully on one knee to protest racial inequality!
P.S. Can you send me your Twitter password so I can send a tweet?
Dave:
Why would you think the new city utility director would need to have experience managing a utility? The real question is how experienced is he/she at running a shakedown. Pay to Play’s shoes will be tough to fill.
Dave, there is an old saying which is appropriate to today’s political climate: Shirt Sleeves to Shirt Sleeves in three generations. The generation three removed from me (I’m 75 years of age) converted a mostly agrarian country into a powerhouse industrial and financial nation. They did not look to government to solve their problems or create a utopian society. Rather they looked to the government to protect the nation when necessary and to follow the ideals laid out in the Constitution.
One goal they shared was a desire their children would do better than they did. Unfortunately to accommodate that desire, seemingly more and more power was ceded to the government with the Federal Government getting the lion’s share. For instance, compare the enumerated powers in the Constitution to our Godzilla federal bureaucracy. Note most of that expansion happened in the last 75 years.
We have three branches of government. Perhaps on paper but over riding those three branches is a bureaucracy which has its own inertia. The federal government is entrenched within a 30 mile radius of the capitol. The cadre of fellow travelers there looks at themselves as apart and above the common folk in the hinterlands. It is like a different nation. Perhaps it should be declared a nation state similar to the Vatican. We need face the fact the states are now colonies awaiting the edits to come. If DC becomes a state, we will be lucky to have shirt sleeves left.
Wow, first time reading this diatribe. We’re from PA and love it here. We go to church, believe in god and treat everyone here with respect. I feel sorry for those with such close minded viewpoints and disdain for those with different beliefs. Pretty sure it’s not what Americans are supposed to do. I don’t ask people to call me doctor, but earning one while being a school principal was the most difficult thing I have ever accomplished. I am proud of it, but don’t feel privileged in any way like our soon departing mob boss of a president
Dave, do you still believe that the election was really rigged and that Trump actually won by a giant landslide?
Emboldened by Georgia, they’ll be coming after all of us in the southern red states too… per AOC: “Southern States Are Not Red States, They’re Suppressed States,” Must Be Liberated To “Heal” USA…
“That’s what we got to do. We got to organize. And I think what we saw in Georgia is a really good example with black women leading the way, with multiracial and multicultural organizations leading the way, um, they proved that southern states are not red states,” she claimed. “They are suppressed states. Which means the only way that our country is going to heal is through the actual liberation of southern states, the actual liberation of the poor, the actual liberation of working people—from economic, social, and racial oppression. That’s the only way. That’s the only way.”
If Jill Biden was a man not a woman, and while raising a family and teaching, earned his doctorate would you make fun of him for wanting to be called Dr Biden? Or would you show him the respect he deserves. That was a petty shot Dave, no matter what party she belongs to.
Read her Doctorial Thesis before you defend her……it is a joke!
“…Pelosi is strengthening the resolve and further enraging Mr. Trump’s 75 million voters and creating a tinderbox that could explode at any time.”
Talk about inciting a tinderbox, your comments are not sage words, but more of the same crap that Trump has been spewing for years, not just on January 6th, and obviously, YOU LOVE HIS WORDS. All the terrorists who stormed the Capitol waving their Trump flags were clearly Trump supporters, or would you deny that? What is so ironic and hypocritical, is that the ones who waved the “Thin Blue Line” flags were also a party to the violence, and the horrible killing of law enforcement personnel.
It is pretty feeble and lame to only state: “The left is right to condemn those who stormed the Capital building in DC. The right also condemned them.” Then to move on without even mentioning the deaths of the police officer at the hand of the “protesters” a/k/a terrorists. You and the extreme right are so venomous and blinded by the election loss, that now, all common sense is out the door. You talk about Biden’s inability to deal with the situation, and yet Trump only now has walked back some of his incendiary rhetoric as an after thought. Trump is still the President, but he is “standing back and standing by “signaling to his supporters that further violence is acceptable by inference from his supporters. Trump is doing noting to douse the flames he most certainly started over the last four years, culminating in his “let’s march on the Capitol, and I’ll be there with you” (which was utter BS, as it turned out, but he lies better than a doorstep rug anyway).
For once Dave, even I think you have gone too far with your words, AND EVEN WORSE, with YOUR LACK OF WORDS condemning the overall violence and the killing of a police officer is abhorrent. Its always easy to pander to like-minded ilk, its truly hard to stand up for what right, if it goes against those like-minded ilk.
You have a responsibility, but means of your blog to do the right thing. The question is…will you?
It is so abhorrent to hear the left point
their finger at the right for the well
earned accusation of voting misdeeds.
For Four years they accused Trump of
Russian collusion calling him every vile
name imaginable.I hate to think what’s
in store for us till 2022 midterms.All those
that are celebrating Biden’s win be very
careful what you wish for.In a socialist
country only the Elites are protected from
the high taxes shortages on many goods
and services.They can’t shelter all of you
for certain.The truth will come out of the
Capitol invasion last week and it will be
a well planned operation by BLM and
Antifa that infiltrated Trumps supporters.
Would not be shocked if Pelosi and her
gang had a hand in the planning.
Looks like “The Swamp” showed what happens to people that aren’t politicians.
Here’s a great quote for you from Will Rogers
“I can remember way back when a liberal was generous with his own money”
The inmates have taken over the asylum.
Sad. Dave.
Leimberg’s hypocrisy and duplicity is documented: his full-page September 9, 2020 NewsLeader “Political Ad” stated “Decency, Not Divisiveness is the Way Forward”. Typical Progressive, do as I say blather. The local sycophants who join in are fearless in professing their support of his position as evidenced by listing their names within his multiple “join us in voting for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris” ads like the one published in the October 21, 2020 NewsLeader.
During the campaign, while Biden told us little about his governing plan, he did propose raising taxes on those making more than $400,000 a year. Tax increases are always a windfall for those who practice “estate and tax planning”, the great euphemism for “how to avoid paying taxes”. As a professed “industry expert” in this area, Leimberg stands to benefit.
Thank you. Just thank you. It is apparent that a new news outlet is necessary to inform without opinion , but you have to have access to people who will read or listen. I mourn the loss of printed fair accounts. My subscription to the rag published for the county with only articles concerning local Amelia Islanders is soon to expire. Good, I don’t need to hear another word about commissioners and golf courses and marinas repeated ad nauseum. Neither do I need to be angry. Keep steam-rolling!
Good morning Dave;
I agree that the throttling of free speech by the technocracy is probably illegal. But, liberals have little regard for the Constitution or for anything that they don’t like.
The Capital breach itself looked to be a setup to make Trump impeachable. I saw nothing in his speech that advocated violence, yet they lie about it until the masses believe it.
The left is so afraid of him that they wat to assure that he, or anyone that dare oppose their Nazi power is ruined forever. The message is: If you oppose the Dems, you too will become ruined.
The Democrat party is now modern day Nazis true to the core.
Sickening.