Archive for December, 2019

Meanwhile back in the Senate…

Posted: December 18, 2019 by datechguy in Uncategorized

If you want to understand the reality of impeachment you can’t do better than these two tweets.

Here is a report from NYC as Nancy Pelosi lemmings prepare to dive into the ocean:

https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

Meanwhile back in US Senate…

https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

Reality always triumphs.

Tribe and the Left Give the Impeachment Game Away

Posted: December 18, 2019 by datechguy in Always look at the bright side of Trump, politics

Sheldon Cooper: WHEATON!

The Big Bang Theory The Creepy Candy Coating Corollary  2009

Yesterday the left was all a-twitter about the idea of voting for impeachment today but not sending their case to the jury (the senate) until Mitch McConnell agrees to call the witnesses demanded by majority leader Chuck Schumer. No less a luminary than Lawrence Tribe suggested this course of action.

Now in fairness I think this move if it’s used is going to make very little difference in public opinion but assuming there are still a few people who have not made up their minds or members of the Democrat party old enough or sane enough to be subject to logic and reason, this threatened move gives away the game because it poses a very simple question.

If these witnesses are so important and their evidence so vital why not call them in the house and go through the process (already begun in the Supreme Court) to compel them to testify BEFORE members of the HOUSE vote on the articles of impeachment?

After all if these witness are so critical to the case against the President then surely the members of the house need this critical evidence before voting don’t they?

But no, it can not be, after all every day that impeachment is still on the plate of the house of representatives is a day where the risk of losing votes on impeachment increases, particularly when the dates for state primaries pass,and even worse every delay in the house increases that new exculpatory witnesses might come forward or that pressure to call GOP witness that have been demanded might increase or even indictments of those involved in the entire Russia Scandal hoax might take place.

And think of the public image, we have been told that impeachment is vital VITAL for the good of the country in fact it’s SO vital that we have to vote on it today…but not so vital that we need to send it to the senate right now.

The bottom line is this: Democrats went forward on impeachment because their radical/twitter base demands it, they understand it’s a loser and are looking for any trick to mitigate or spin it as a winner. This is them playing the Will Wheaton playing the “MeMaw” option in a game of Mystic Warriors of Ka’ah.

Alas for the left Mitch McConnell is not the sucker that Sheldon Cooper is and I suspect they will discover neither are the American people.

My Vox Problem

Posted: December 17, 2019 by julietteochieng in economy, local, News/opinion, politics, Uncomfortable Truths
Tags: , , , , ,

So much for freedom of the press in CA

by baldilocks

The urge is to laugh. But I’m not laughing.

Hundreds of freelance writers at Vox Media, primarily those covering sports for the SB Nation site, will lose their jobs in the coming months as the company prepares for a California law to go into effect that will force companies to reclassify contractors [freelancers] in the state as employees.

“This is a bittersweet note of thanks to our California independent contractors,” John Ness, executive director of SB Nation, wrote in a post on Monday. “In 2020, we will move California’s team blogs from our established system with hundreds of contractors to a new one run by a team of new SB Nation employees.”

The law in question is California Assembly Bill 5.

Back in September, Vox thought AB5 was a good thing.

Pushing AB 5 through the legislature is perhaps one of the most significant labor wins in decades, if only because the labor movement has had very few victories in the past 40 years. But it’s particularly significant because of California’s position as one of the world’s largest economies and its outsized influence in national politics. If any state can start to reverse the trend of shrinking labor unions, it’s California. (…)

However, hundreds of thousands of workers — possibly millions — will see an immediate impact on their working conditions after the switch.

Emphasis mine and that last statement is certainly correct.

On January 1, 2020, it will severely limit all of my gigs. In short, AB5 limits me to 35 pieces of freelance work per year for an individual recipient.

This includes my blogging here at DaTechGuy Blog.

Most of you know that I live in Los Angeles. Back in 2013, Peter invited to me to be one of his Da Magnificent Seven. Initially, each of us contributed one blog post per week, but, a few years back, we upped the number to two  a week which, of course, means that I post here 104 times per year.

You can figure out the impact. By the way, Peter — who lives in Massachusetts — is an awesome boss and a great guy.

I told you about California’s new law – and its purpose – weeks ago.

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. (…)

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.

Problem laid out.

In my next DMS blog post — this Saturday — I will tell you what my options are.

HERE ARE THE OPTIONS:  Why I Stayed in California.

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.

Follow Juliette on Facebook, Twitter, MeWe, Patreon and Social Quodverum.

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Update DTG: Thanks Juliette for your kind words and thanks Glenn for the Instalanche. Hi folks, the template might be the same but the host is different so I hope you’re loading faster and without issue. While you’re here don’t forget to check out Juliette’s other pieces and

Hope to see you again soon

Shut down the FISA court

Posted: December 17, 2019 by chrisharper in crime, Uncomfortable Truths
Tags: ,

By Christopher Harper

It’s time to get rid of the secret court created under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, better known as FISA.

The approval of warrants to investigate the Trump campaign is the latest abuse of the court, which was created in 1978 to limit spying.

A FISA warrant is one of the most aggressive searches, authorizing the FBI “to conduct, simultaneous telephone, microphone, cell phone, email, and computer surveillance of the U.S. person target’s home, workplace, and vehicles,” as well as “physical searches of the target’s residence, office, vehicles, computer, safe deposit box, and U.S. mails,” as a FISA court decision noted. 

Even more important, the FISA court is extremely deferential, allowing about 99 percent of all warrant requests.

But there’s more. The FISA court has a long history of abuse. 

James Bovard, the author of Attention Deficit Democracy, provided some of the details:

–In 2002, the FISA court revealed that FBI agents made false or misleading claims in 75 cases.

–In 2005, FISA Chief Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly proposed requiring FBI agents to swear to the accuracy of the information they presented. That never happened because it could have “slowed such investigations drastically,” the Washington Post reported. FBI agents continued to exploit FISA secrecy to lie to the judges.

–In 2017, a FISA court decision included a 10-page litany of FBI violations, which “ranged from illegally sharing raw intelligence with unauthorized third parties to accessing intercepted attorney-client privileged communications without proper oversight.”

–Earlier this year, a secret FISA court ruling was released documenting the FBI’s illegal searches of vast numbers of Americans’ emails.

Keep in mind, the FISA court is closed to the public and the press, unlike almost every other court in the country. Therefore, there is virtually no oversight of the FISA court. 

The critics of the FISA court come from both sides of the political spectrum. Maybe there’s hope that this egregious example of injustice can be shut down.

Although many conservatives think the FISA court is useful in fighting terrorism, I think its abuses far outweigh its benefits.

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