There are people for whom one needs to double-check before reacting since they may have been jocking, then there is Michael Bloomberg.
My positions on Obama and his carousel of Obamian moves are known to readers. What I have yet to mention is my position on Michael Bloomberg. I rate this man a full step below Obama, hands-down.
Bloomberg has got to be far and away the most arrogant and totatalitarian-minded man of power in the US. His most recent outrageous statement was to the effect that, to deal with certain cities that have experienced drops in their populations, the Federal government should “deliberately force” them to accept immigrants and allow them to establish residency.
“There’s no reason why you have to have a common immigration policy for all of America,” Bloomberg said Tuesday. “You could let each state do it differently.”
Note that I have read the first quote several times and still cannot fathom how it segues into the following statement:
“I would argue the federal government should go one step further. They should deliberately force some places that don’t want immigrants to take them, because that’s the only solution for these big, hollowed-out cities where industry has left and is never going to come back unless you get some people to move there,” he added"
Bloomberg also criticized the Obama Administration for one of its only successes - continuing with the deportation of illegal immigrants.
As an aside, I will quote this paragraph from the article. It is interesting that we keep hearing about how we should expand our immigration quotas to import future employees for which we may have the need. Well, people from, for example, The Republic of (South) Korea and Japan, who tend to be highly educated (And interestingly in the hard sciences as opposed to Liberal Arts and Sociology degrees) have a devil of a time getting work visas for the US. We keep being told that we need the unskilled people to do our groundskeeping, restaurant work, etc. I for one do all of my own yard work, snow and leaf removal, lawn cutting, etc., and have no problem paying a little more for my food, whether it be when dining out or at the supermarket if that is the consequence of employing our own citizens in those fields.
"The study, which was underwritten by a company owned by Mexican billionaire Ricardo Salinas, claims that while the rest of the world is snatching up immigrant talent, the U.S. turns it away. In fact, according to the study, Canada “allows its provinces to set different immigration standards to attract the type of employees each region needs,” the New York Post reports. Bloomberg argued that the U.S. should adopt the Canadian strategy."
"The study, which was underwritten by a company owned by Mexican billionaire Ricardo Salinas, claims that while the rest of the world is snatching up immigrant talent, the U.S. turns it away. In fact, according to the study, Canada “allows its provinces to set different immigration standards to attract the type of employees each region needs,” the New York Post reports. Bloomberg argued that the U.S. should adopt the Canadian strategy."
Back to Bloomberg:
I will avoid going on about the fact that everyone, Bloomberg included, is fully aware that the US government was never given the authority to order other states about when it comes to being assigned quotas of any group of people to take in. This is just one of many examples that demonstrate that his mindset is complexly contrary to that which is required of an American public figure.
The man has made a habit of bringing soft totalitarianism to a degree that exceeds anything that we have seen before. Here are a few examples of his controlling policies:
The revised smoking ban, effective last year in New York City, made smoking illegal in New York City's 1,700 parks and on the city's 14 miles of public beaches. It is also now prohibited in pedestrian plazas like Times Square. For the record, I do not smoke. I just find this atrocious. He could not even come up with approved smoking areas outside. Central Park, for example, is 843 acres. That is almost 850 times larger than the property on which my house is located, one that I find to be easily sufficient in size to accommodate smokers.
He has moved to ban salt from restaurants in NYC. Despite the fact that no government was ever created with the intent to regulate the minutiae of people's lives, Bloomberg decided to seize upon table salt. The salt hysteria, which has gone by the wayside in the 80's, reappeared in the late 90's. I wonder how all of those coastal-living Mesolithic communities survived to pass on their genes to those of us alive today since they no doubt ingested a whole bunch of sodium with their clams.
He successfully [sic] banned trans-fats in the City in 2005. I for one prefer mono-unsaturated and saturated (Yes that is correct) fats, but, again, we did not create governments for this type of intrusion
He banned donations of food, that is correct-food, to homeless shelters. Ostensibly, this was due to the fact that City health official could not determined that trans-fat and sodium content of what was being donated. I for one think that food donation bans are part of a broader plan to ensure that ever more people are entirely reliant on the government for their sustenance. When a law/ordinance such as this is passed, it makes lawbreakers out of people that want to help. Pretending to be under the impression that some trans-fats and sodium will do more harm than good to people who otherwise do not have any food is beyond being patently dishonest.
As part of his anti-gun agenda, Bloomberg moved to ban Duracoat paint so that kids could not make their stupidly-colored toy guns (Politics have resulted in toy manufacturers making toy guns in ridiculous colors such as neon yellow) look like guns. Many would be fine with this, but I am not. Some are against any toy guns; again, I have no problem with them. When my kids had their toy guns, they were instructed to play with them in our yard and to refrain from taking them into public areas. Peaceniks should not panic; kids who play with guns, in addition to having fun, are teaching themselves about one of the obligations of every adult, especially men; that of protecting society.
I wouldn’t doubt that there are more of the NYC bans, but it is time to move on to more ominous Bloomberg stuff.
Bloomberg is rabidly anti-gun. He would have the police and the military being the only ones authorized to posses firearms if he were in charge (And he did seriously test the waters for the Presidency). Since criminals do not abide by his City's draconian gun laws, often relying on guns being brought in illegally in the City, he embarked on a campaign against firearms dealers in 27 states, including 7 in Virginia. He was behind lawsuits that accused the dealers of selling guns to people who had no intention of keeping them (straw purchasers). The best was when he took it upon himself to hire private investigators in an undercover operation to go to States that did not have restrictive firearms laws, including Arizona and Virginia, to demonstrate that one could easily buy a gun in another sate with the intention to bring it to New York. Not only is this unethical and a terrible waste of taxpayers money, but it is also illegal. Most states, and we must include the US Code, provide criminal penalties for purposely purchasing a firearms with the intention of turning it over to someone else. Since Bloomberg wanted the guns purchased and brought to him (or his lackeys), then he should have been prosecuted. He was not.
He also went from actively supporting term limits for those holding public office until he was the one that would be affected by the restriction. He pushed for an amendment to the term limit law. Once the bill was passed, he dutifully signed it into law. His justification? New York City needed him to shepherd the city though the financial crisis. Note that this followed his failure to garner any appreciable support for a Presidential candidacy. Having failed in that endeavor, he affected to believe that only he had the ability to lead the city. So, true to the style of those such as Oliver Cromwell, Fidel Castro, Lenin, and others who insisted that they were just so terribly competent and that no one else was good enough for the job, he won a third term for himself.
All of this brings me to something that I gleaned from the days when he was drumming up support for a run at the Presidency. As is common with someone in his case, he gave several interviews in which he would have a chance to tell his life story and have that publicized by the Media. That's not a bad thing in and of itself. What got my goat was a tidbit from one of the artcles.
He stated that, as a boy, he was inspired by the book Johnny Tremain. Many of us have not read this book as anything that makes us aware of our history is either purposely glossed over or demonized by Academia. This story is about a boy who grew up in the days when our protests against British misrule were bringing us ever closer to war and thus independence. It is an incredible and uplifting story.
My problem with this is a simple one. If the actions of the Whigs (American Patriots) were undertaken with the understanding that we should not be oppressed and over-regulated in our daily lives by a government, and the story of a boy who is caught up in these events inspired him, how does Bloomberg think that he can reconcile the two? We are faced with to diametrically opposed concepts; the story of a patriot who desires freedom that inspired boy Bloomberg, and the controlling politician man Bloomberg. I never caught any statement reflecting Bloomberg's volte-face on the idea of Liberty. He just pretends that the two can be paired together without any conflict.
I would compare it to an event from my life. As a boy, I was very inspired by watching the movies, especially that of Disney's, about the defense of the Alamo* in the Texas War for Independence. For the purpose of this post, I will refrain from any arguments in support of or against the motivations or virtue of the Texians (That's what they referred to themselves as back then). I will only add that, although I now have a much clearer understanding of this event, and thus have an appreciation for the motivations on each side, I still do not take the weak Leftist position that the Mexicans were the victims in the conflict.
My point is simple; if I, through years of research on the above noted war, came to the conclusion that the Texians were wrong, I would not cite my boyhood admiration for the men of the Alamo unless it was to clarify that I no longer held to that position and that I now regret the outcome of that conflict and our later war with Mexico.
Bloomberg, in telling us that he was in fact inspired by Johnny Tremain, while at the same time advocating more and more governmental control in people's lives, exposes himself as a hypocrite and a liar in a way that no one else could. He should be more ashamed about his supposed appreciation for our Revolutionary Patriots than anything else that he has done.
*On the one occasion when I toured the Alamo, I did ask if I could see the basement.
Anyone who responds with an answer for that reference will be recognized.
I will avoid going on about the fact that everyone, Bloomberg included, is fully aware that the US government was never given the authority to order other states about when it comes to being assigned quotas of any group of people to take in. This is just one of many examples that demonstrate that his mindset is complexly contrary to that which is required of an American public figure.
The man has made a habit of bringing soft totalitarianism to a degree that exceeds anything that we have seen before. Here are a few examples of his controlling policies:
The revised smoking ban, effective last year in New York City, made smoking illegal in New York City's 1,700 parks and on the city's 14 miles of public beaches. It is also now prohibited in pedestrian plazas like Times Square. For the record, I do not smoke. I just find this atrocious. He could not even come up with approved smoking areas outside. Central Park, for example, is 843 acres. That is almost 850 times larger than the property on which my house is located, one that I find to be easily sufficient in size to accommodate smokers.
He has moved to ban salt from restaurants in NYC. Despite the fact that no government was ever created with the intent to regulate the minutiae of people's lives, Bloomberg decided to seize upon table salt. The salt hysteria, which has gone by the wayside in the 80's, reappeared in the late 90's. I wonder how all of those coastal-living Mesolithic communities survived to pass on their genes to those of us alive today since they no doubt ingested a whole bunch of sodium with their clams.
He successfully [sic] banned trans-fats in the City in 2005. I for one prefer mono-unsaturated and saturated (Yes that is correct) fats, but, again, we did not create governments for this type of intrusion
He banned donations of food, that is correct-food, to homeless shelters. Ostensibly, this was due to the fact that City health official could not determined that trans-fat and sodium content of what was being donated. I for one think that food donation bans are part of a broader plan to ensure that ever more people are entirely reliant on the government for their sustenance. When a law/ordinance such as this is passed, it makes lawbreakers out of people that want to help. Pretending to be under the impression that some trans-fats and sodium will do more harm than good to people who otherwise do not have any food is beyond being patently dishonest.
As part of his anti-gun agenda, Bloomberg moved to ban Duracoat paint so that kids could not make their stupidly-colored toy guns (Politics have resulted in toy manufacturers making toy guns in ridiculous colors such as neon yellow) look like guns. Many would be fine with this, but I am not. Some are against any toy guns; again, I have no problem with them. When my kids had their toy guns, they were instructed to play with them in our yard and to refrain from taking them into public areas. Peaceniks should not panic; kids who play with guns, in addition to having fun, are teaching themselves about one of the obligations of every adult, especially men; that of protecting society.
I wouldn’t doubt that there are more of the NYC bans, but it is time to move on to more ominous Bloomberg stuff.
Bloomberg is rabidly anti-gun. He would have the police and the military being the only ones authorized to posses firearms if he were in charge (And he did seriously test the waters for the Presidency). Since criminals do not abide by his City's draconian gun laws, often relying on guns being brought in illegally in the City, he embarked on a campaign against firearms dealers in 27 states, including 7 in Virginia. He was behind lawsuits that accused the dealers of selling guns to people who had no intention of keeping them (straw purchasers). The best was when he took it upon himself to hire private investigators in an undercover operation to go to States that did not have restrictive firearms laws, including Arizona and Virginia, to demonstrate that one could easily buy a gun in another sate with the intention to bring it to New York. Not only is this unethical and a terrible waste of taxpayers money, but it is also illegal. Most states, and we must include the US Code, provide criminal penalties for purposely purchasing a firearms with the intention of turning it over to someone else. Since Bloomberg wanted the guns purchased and brought to him (or his lackeys), then he should have been prosecuted. He was not.
He also went from actively supporting term limits for those holding public office until he was the one that would be affected by the restriction. He pushed for an amendment to the term limit law. Once the bill was passed, he dutifully signed it into law. His justification? New York City needed him to shepherd the city though the financial crisis. Note that this followed his failure to garner any appreciable support for a Presidential candidacy. Having failed in that endeavor, he affected to believe that only he had the ability to lead the city. So, true to the style of those such as Oliver Cromwell, Fidel Castro, Lenin, and others who insisted that they were just so terribly competent and that no one else was good enough for the job, he won a third term for himself.
All of this brings me to something that I gleaned from the days when he was drumming up support for a run at the Presidency. As is common with someone in his case, he gave several interviews in which he would have a chance to tell his life story and have that publicized by the Media. That's not a bad thing in and of itself. What got my goat was a tidbit from one of the artcles.
He stated that, as a boy, he was inspired by the book Johnny Tremain. Many of us have not read this book as anything that makes us aware of our history is either purposely glossed over or demonized by Academia. This story is about a boy who grew up in the days when our protests against British misrule were bringing us ever closer to war and thus independence. It is an incredible and uplifting story.
My problem with this is a simple one. If the actions of the Whigs (American Patriots) were undertaken with the understanding that we should not be oppressed and over-regulated in our daily lives by a government, and the story of a boy who is caught up in these events inspired him, how does Bloomberg think that he can reconcile the two? We are faced with to diametrically opposed concepts; the story of a patriot who desires freedom that inspired boy Bloomberg, and the controlling politician man Bloomberg. I never caught any statement reflecting Bloomberg's volte-face on the idea of Liberty. He just pretends that the two can be paired together without any conflict.
I would compare it to an event from my life. As a boy, I was very inspired by watching the movies, especially that of Disney's, about the defense of the Alamo* in the Texas War for Independence. For the purpose of this post, I will refrain from any arguments in support of or against the motivations or virtue of the Texians (That's what they referred to themselves as back then). I will only add that, although I now have a much clearer understanding of this event, and thus have an appreciation for the motivations on each side, I still do not take the weak Leftist position that the Mexicans were the victims in the conflict.
My point is simple; if I, through years of research on the above noted war, came to the conclusion that the Texians were wrong, I would not cite my boyhood admiration for the men of the Alamo unless it was to clarify that I no longer held to that position and that I now regret the outcome of that conflict and our later war with Mexico.
Bloomberg, in telling us that he was in fact inspired by Johnny Tremain, while at the same time advocating more and more governmental control in people's lives, exposes himself as a hypocrite and a liar in a way that no one else could. He should be more ashamed about his supposed appreciation for our Revolutionary Patriots than anything else that he has done.
*On the one occasion when I toured the Alamo, I did ask if I could see the basement.
Anyone who responds with an answer for that reference will be recognized.
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