Archive for September 22, 2024

Five Fast Thoughts Under the Fedora Tigers Roaring, Beverly Hills = Detroit, Dem Narrative Fail, Minimum Wage Remains Zero

Posted: September 22, 2024 by datechguy in under the fedora

One of the reasons why I think that Baseball is the greatest game ever invented is that the unexpected is constantly happening and you can’t run out a clock to win.

A month ago the Detroit Tigers were pretty much out of the playoff race, now with only a dozen games left they go into today 1/2 game out of the final wild card and if the scores of their current game and the Redsox Twins game 1 holds they will hold the final wild card spot alone with six games to go, at least until game 2 of the Sox/Twins double header.

You could have made a fortune betting on the Tigers doing that. Of course hopefully we won’t find out that some mafia guy did make such a bet 40 days ago.

BTW as I was typing this the Orioles scored to tie their game with Detroit. Like I said baseball you never know in baseball.

The Tigers sudden winning ways are bad news for the Twins and perhaps bad news for the Orioles and Yanks as you never want to face a team that’s red hot, but it’s even worse news for the hapless Chicago White Sox.

As I noted a while back the pale hose need to get to 41 wins to avoid being the worst team in history since the formation of the American League. As of today they are 36-119 meaning they need to win 5 of their final seven games to avoid infamy.

A month ago they had one hope while today’s game vs the Padres was against a team in the thick of the playoff battle their final six games were against teams completely out of it.

Alas this is no longer the case. While the Angels remain as out of it as you can get their final three are against a Detroit team that will need every win they can get to pass the twins and hold off the Mariners.

Only the Twins and Mariners regret this situation as much.

I’m old enough to remember when Beverly Hills was a place that was pretty safe and Axel Foley of Detroit would be out of place there.

Apparently not anymore

I guess the Lego cops joke from the new movie wouldn’t work anymore.

Hey I guess the Hollywood Left is getting what they voted for.

You know the problem with left’s narratives is that when confronted with reality they don’t stand up.

A great example of this is shown in this exchange with Megyn Kelly on a panel talking about “convictions” in civil cases.

How many people hearing that first argument on a CNN or MSNBC without pushback bought it?

I suspect a few leftists at least.

Finally there are plenty of casualties in California’s war on business employees at Chipotle are now one more

Chipotle has introduced two robots that can take over tasks normally done by its workerThe ‘autocado’ can peel, stone and cut an avocado for guacamole in 26 seconds.

Meanwhile, a ‘digital makeline’ portions up salads and bowls based on orders on the app.

The machines are part of an automation drive that Chipotle bosses hope will cut down the number of workers needed – slashing rising labor costs. 

So, it is no surprise they are being put to use first in two of the Mexican chain’s restaurants in California, the company announced on Monday. 

Recent legislation raised the minimum wage for fast food workers to $20-an-hour in the state. 

And these changes won’t be limited to California once economy of scale brings the prices of these machines down.

You can’t repeal the laws of economics

Chicago’s leftist mayor cancelling gunshot detection contract because he’s beholden to his ideology

Posted: September 22, 2024 by John Ruberry in crime, News/opinion, opinion/news, politics
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Chicago’s mayor, Brandon Johnson

By John Ruberry

Chicago, in Brandon Johnson, has a leftist idealogue as its mayor. Not surprisingly, he’s failing. 

Take away his far-left beliefs, “Branjo” is a big empty suit, one tailored by his former employer, the radical Chicago Teachers Union.

As I discussed last week, Johnson was a backer of the Defund the Police movement, until after he made it to the runoff round of last year’s mayoral election.

Johnson’s approval rating is 25 percent. Crime was the biggest issue of the 2023 campaign. While murders are down slightly, the crime numbers remain horrible. People don’t feel safe, despite the minimalizing of lawbreaking by Chicago’s weak-kneed media.

Despite 33 of Chicago’s 50 alderpersons voting to continue the city’s contract with ShotSpotter, a gunfire detection system deployed in high-crime areas, Branjo is putting ShotSpotter on mute. 

While there are critics of ShotSpotter on the left and right, the general belief of people possessing open minds–meaning people aren’t extreme left-wingers–is that ShotSpotter works. A University of Chicago Crime Lab study said that there is a “3-in-4 chance that the technology saves about 85 lives per year.”

Besides those 33 alderpersons, Chicago’s two major daily newspapers, the Chicago Sun-Times and the Chicago Tribune–both liberal publications–favor keeping ShotSpotter. As does Johnson’s pick for police superintendant, Larry Snelling.

Branjo has never explained why, other than fulfilling a campaign promise, his reasons for dumping ShotSpotter. Last week, Chicago’s man-child mayor dismissed ShotSpotter as “walkie-talkies on a stick.”

ShotSpotter, until Sunday night that is, is deployed in 12 of Chicago’s 22 police districts. The problem for Johnson and his far-left cop-hating base is that those districts are minority-majority. However, most of the alderpersons representing those areas voted to keep in ShotSpotter in place. The core of the support for cancelling ShotSpotter in the City Council are alderpersons–some of them are openly socialist–from progressive white wards on the North Side who put Johnson over the top in last year’s election.

This afternoon on X, Silvana Tabares, who represents a Southwest Side ward. bashed Johnson’s shortsightedness.

Experts and community member all know ShotSpotter provides a vital tool for first responders to render aid to victims of gun violence.

Beginning tonight, every gunshot victim bleeding in the streets of our city will be a worth sacrifice in the eyes of our mayor for his radical agenda.

Every single one.

Here are some headlines about ShotSpotter from CWB Chicago in just the last three days:

Branjo’s inner circle is comprised of fellow leftists. Earlier this month, on the Fran
Spielman Show podcast, a moderate downtown alderperson, Brian Hopkins, ripped the mayor.

“When you’re a democratic socialist who has some very extreme, left-wing views, that closes off a lot of opportunities to grow relationships with centrists or even moderate Republicans,” Hopkins said. “The city is suffering from that.”

A couple of, well, normal people were part of Johnson’s core staff early in his administration. Rich Guidice, the mayor’s first chief of staff, resigned his spring and he was replaced by a left-wing radical, Cristina Pacione-Zayas. Earlier this month, an office reshuffling ended up with an experienced and respected intergovernmental affairs officer, Sydney Holman resigning. Now in charge of lobbying the City Council and state legislators for Branjo is another extremist, Kennedy Bartley, who called police officers “f*cking pigs” in a 2021 podcast.

Chicagoans are only 16 months into Johnson’s four-year term as mayor.

As Barack Obama once said, “Elections have consequences.”

More murder victims will be one of those.

John Ruberry regularly blogs at Marathon Pundit.