Archive for October, 2019

The End of My Sojourn in CA May Be Near

Posted: October 19, 2019 by julietteochieng in immigration, local, News/opinion, personal, politics, Uncomfortable Truths
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See the source image

Now they’re coming for the writers

by baldilocks

I’ve been saying to any who will listen that the goal of California’s Organized Left (OL) is to drive out the middle class. The OL’s dream population will consist of the rich and the servant class, with the latter being composed mostly of illegal aliens.

Here’s more evidence for my theory.

[Assembly Bill 5], which cracks down on companies — like ride-sharing giants Lyft and Uber — that misclassify would-be employees as independent contractors, has been percolating through the California legislative system for nearly a year. It codifies the 2018 Dynamex decision by the State Supreme Court while carving out some exemptions for specific professions.

But the exemption for freelance journalists — which some have only just learned about via their colleagues, press reports, social networks and/or spirited arguments with the bill’s author on Twitter — contains what some say is a potentially career-ending requirement for a writer to remain a freelancer: If a freelance journalist writes for a magazine, newspaper or other entity whose central mission is to disseminate the news, the law says, that journalist is capped at writing 35 “submissions” per year per “putative employer.” At a time when paid freelance stories can be written for a low end of $25 and high end of $1 per word, some meet that cap in a month just to make ends meet. (…)

Many publications that employ California freelancers aren’t based in the state and it’s not clear how AB 5 will affect them. Still, some are choosing to opt out entirely. Indeed, several freelance writers who spoke to THR say that various out-of-state employers — some with offices in California — have already told them they’re cutting ties with California freelancers. (…)

THR has additionally reviewed several job notices in transcription, blogging and SEO writing that have explicitly stated that California freelancers will not be considered.

Emphasis mine.

I write 104 blog posts a year, at minimum, for this site alone. We disseminate news.

A few months back, I got booted from one of my side hustles – transcription – because I live in CA. I didn’t understand why; now the picture is clear.

Ignore the what the OL says justifications are for the law and let me tell you what it really is.

Freelance writers – even itinerant “street artists” like me – are considered part of the middle class by the OL because we all have the potential of upward mobility and, most importantly, we cannot be controlled by an employer.

So, we have to submit, find a more “acceptable” line of work, or get out. It’s that simple.

By the way, you may have noticed that I didn’t factor the homeless into the OL’s desired population. That’s because they are merely a temporary tool to drive out us icky middle class undesirables.

California Governor Gavin Newsom and CA lawmakers enable the many repugnant practices of the chronically homeless, specifically things which can lead to death. Public defecation and opioid usage are chief among these and the OL hopes that these things will thin the herd once its usefulness has ended.

Ingeniously evil form of “ethnic” cleansing, no?

The law goes into effect on January 1. Time to start planning and praying.

Juliette Akinyi Ochieng has been blogging since 2003 as baldilocks. Her older blog is here.  She published her first novel, Tale of the Tigers: Love is Not a Game in 2012.

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Things that get worse

Posted: October 19, 2019 by ng36b in Uncategorized

We like to think everything is going to get better over time. Mainly due to technological advances, this turns out to be true in most cases. Our phones tend to get better over time, or at least they get faster and have more memory (and get more expensive). We’ve gone from about two types of crap beer to so many microbrews that its becoming uncool to drink light beer. Our cars are safer, our water is better quality, and our appliances are more energy efficient.

Not everything is getting better. There are plenty of things that get worse, mainly due to human beings.

Home Building and the trades. I recently had a home built, and it was an ugly process. One of the most surprising parts was just how hard it was to find people that were willing to work, because most trades are solidly booked.

Locksmith? A week to get one in.
Electrician? Solidly booked, literally bounced from my house to another plus multiple emergency calls every week.
Brick and foundation guy? When I met him, he had five other jobs on the books.

Because of the shortage, we’re going to continue to get homes mostly built to lower, quicker to obtain standards. It’s not going to change until we get more people in the trades to help increase competition.

Wifi and Internet. Most people get internet in a cable modem, and then to an all-in-one wifi access point and router combo unit. The unit acts as a router, switch and wireless access point all in one, doing all three of these things poorly. Especially for bigger homes, the all-in-one sucks.

This is made worse by throughput. I have a small script that checks my internet throughput every hour, and its shocking how poor the connection can be from Cox. You might have a great WiFi device, but its like hooking up a new car to an old set of tires…you just don’t get the right performance.

Free Speech. We have access to tons of information via the Internet, and the exchange of ideas should be relatively free. But its not going to be, and social media is largely to blame. Social media is allowing people to remain in an echo chamber, and despite the increased connectivity, this is going to result in more restrictions on free speech.

Don’t believe me? I shared a Babylon Bee story and had a liberal friend of mine tell me he had never heard of the Babylon Bee. Now, Babylon Bee (a satire news agency) tends to be more conservative, but it’s very well known…unless your Facebook feed is being manipulated to never share conservative viewpoints.

Echo chambers lead to turning people into “others,” which make it far easier to legislate against and even commit violence against. At some point, we’ll have enough free speech restrictions that it will reach a tipping and we’ll snap back, but in the near future, social media is going to make it worse.

This post represents the views of the author and not those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Navy, or any other government agency.

A Primer on Freedom of Speech & Association for both sides in the NBA / LeBron Business

Posted: October 19, 2019 by datechguy in business, nba, Sports
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Let me explain how freedom of speech works for all those angry on either side of the NBA/Lebron/China busines

Freedom of association means The NBA has the freedom to associate and/or do business with whoever they wish, including China

Freedom of speech means that players and or executives on their own time have the right to associate with whom they wish, but freedom of speech and associations means the NBA has the right when players and executives are on the clock or using league resources to limit their speech in ways that they wish (unless a contract specifies otherwise)

Freedom of speech might be also means that potential fans and customers of the NBA can publicly approve or disapprove of said decisions either by public expression or with their pocketbooks.

So here is what that means:

the Rockets GM had every right to tweet out what he did.

The NBA had every right if they decided it was in their interest to object to him doing so and then change their position when the heat was on.

The players have every right to say something, say nothing or equivocate on the China issue.

HOWEVER free speech also means that the fans, the media and everyone else has the right to publicly object, act protest and ridicule the NBA for those choices and act accordingly.

The bottom line is freedom of speech means freedom to speak or not to speak, to associate with someone or some group or not, to do business with a person, a group or even a country or not and to object to these choices or not.

This freedom exists even if we don’t like what they’ve done.

I like that the GM of the Rockets spoke up for Hongkong, I don’t like the NBA’s initial reaction nor the players reactions on this. I don’t like or respect LeBron’s reaction (although I’m sure most of the rest of the league is happy for him to take the heat so they don’t). However it’s their right to act how they wish according to law and it’s my right to react accordingly.

That’s freedom of speech!

The Two Real stories in this piece about Biologists and life

Posted: October 18, 2019 by datechguy in abortion, Uncomfortable Truths
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It doesn’t matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn’t matter how smart you are. If it doesn’t agree with experiment, it’s wrong.

Richard Feynman

At Quillette Steve Jacobs has a post about a survey he did of thousands of biologists when doing a paper on balancing fetal and abortion rights. To the press this was the most newsworthy result from that paper

members of the media were mostly interested in my finding that 96% of the 5,577 biologists who responded to me affirmed the view that a human life begins at fertilization.


It was the reporting of this view—that human zygotes, embryos, and fetuses are biological humans—that created such a strong backlash. 

You can argue that this is a pretty good headline but I think the bigger headline is the following cross reference:

As the usable responses began to come in, I found that 5,337 biologists (96%) affirmed that a human’s life begins at fertilization, with 240 (4%) rejecting that view. The majority of the sample identified as liberal (89%), pro-choice (85%) and non-religious (63%). In the case of Americans who expressed party preference, the majority identified as Democrats (92%).

Now frankly the idea that Human, zygotes, embryos and fetues or as I would call them “unborn children” are well HUMAN is so obvious that the concept that 4% of trained biologists, even from a group that is 92% democrat, 89% liberal and 85% pro-abortion and 63% non religious wouldn’t say they are speaks volumes about that 4% but the bigger story is the responses he got from those who objected to the question. They sounded like this:

“Is this a studied fund by Trump and ku klux klan?”
“Sure hope YOU aren’t a f^%$#ing christian!!”
“This is some stupid right to life thing…YUCK I believe in RIGHT TO CHOICE!!!!!!!”
“The actual purpose of this ‘survey’ became very clear. I will do my best to disseminate this info to make sure that none of my naïve colleagues fall into this trap.”
“Sorry this looks like its more a religious survey to be used to misinterpret by radicals to advertise about the beginning of life and not a survey about what faculty know about biology. Your advisor can contact me.”
“I did respond to and fill in the survey, but am concerned about the tenor of the questions. It seemed like a thinly-disguised effort to make biologists take a stand on issues that could be used to advocate for or against abortion.”
“The relevant biological issues are obvious and have nothing to do with when life begins. That is a nonsense position created by the antiabortion fanatics. You have accepted the premise of a fanatic group of lunatics. The relevant issues are the health cost carrying an embryo to term can impose on a woman’s body, the cost they impose on having future children, and the cost that raising a child imposes on a woman’s financial status.”

Remember the people he surveyed were trained scientists, biologists, who are supposedly taught to go where the data takes them rather than where their political opinions do, and he’s getting responses like this?

This leads of some obvious and disturbing questions:

  • Would you hire such people to do any work on any scientific item that requires objective fact or actual data that might contradict with this personal opinions?
  • Would you trust any study which is supposed to present objective fact or data to make decisions on?
  • Would you want your city, county state or federal government to fund any research by such people or made any decision based on the input of such folks?

I wouldn’t.

Now you might say that this is only a small percentage of the number of people who are in this position but remember this isn’t a sample of the general population, this is a sample of biologists, people who have been highly educated and supposedly trained in the scientific method. These are people to whom facts and data are supposed to be sacrosanct.

Or to put it another way, imagine if you knew that same percentage of a football team’s offensive was willing to blow the play for political or personal gain. Would you still bet on that team?

That’s the real news out of this study and if you are getting such results on abortion there is no reason to believe that you wouldn’t get such results on any other subject that such people’s politics are dear to them.

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