Archive for the ‘culture’ Category

Texas is success and Illinois is failure

Posted: April 20, 2022 by John Ruberry in business, crime, culture, economy, News/opinion, opinion/news, politics
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Blogger in Big Bend Ranch State Park last week

By John Ruberry

After a ten-day vacation I’ve returned home to Illinois, which should be renamed ILL-inois.

Since I was born–let’s just say for the same of humility it was a really long time ago–Illinois and Texas had roughly the same population. The Land of Lincoln had slightly more than 10 million residents then, while the Lone Star State had about half-a-million fewer people. According to the 2020 Census, Texas was the home of 29 million people, with Illinois at just under 13 million. Overall, in the same time period the overall US population soared from 179 million to 329 million. 

Texas has prospered and continues to do so; Illinois has gone from stagnation to decline. The Prairie State has been losing population every year since 2014.

I know of many Illinoisans who have bailed on this state and moved to Texas. The most noted departure was that of Roger Keats, a former Republican state senator and onetime candidate for Crook County–oops I meant Cook County–board president. In his 2011 farewell letter to suckers like my wife and I, who remain here, titled “Goodbye and Good Luck,” Keats wrote, “I am tired of subsidizing crooks.”

Since I was born four Illinois governors, three Democrats and one Republican, have served time in federal prison. No Texas governors have suffered that indignity. Last month, Michael Madigan, who was Illinois’ most powerful politician until he was ousted as Illinois speaker of the House in 2021, was indicted on a whole slew of racketeering charges. Madigan, except for two years in the 1990s, served as House speaker beginning in 1981. From 1998 until 2021 Madigan was also chairman of the Illinois Democratic Party. Overlooked in the rundown of Boss Madigan’s career by journalists after his indictment is this ironic nugget: his predecessor as speaker was George H. Ryan, a Republican, who is one of Illinois’ felon governors. 

While the numbers might be slightly different today, here are more highlights from Keats’ Parthian shot: 

Illinois is ranked 50th for fiscal policy; 47th in job creation; first in unfunded pension liabilities; second largest budget deficit; first in failing schools; first in bonded indebtedness; highest sales tax in the nation; most judges indicted; and five of our last nine elected governors have been indicted. That is more than the other 49 states added together!… “We are moving to Texas where there is no income tax while Illinois’ just went up 67%. Texas’ sales tax is half of ours, which is the highest in the nation. Southern states are supportive of job producers, taxpayers and folks who offer opportunities to their residents. Illinois shakes them down for every penny that can be extorted from them.

While flying into Dallas Fort-Worth Airport I saw numerous suburban subdivisions under construction. I remember those halcyon home building days in Illinois. But the biggest boom I saw was in the oil industry towns of Odessa and Midland on the Permian Basin. Homes, office buildings, and hotels are popping up there like dandelions in spring. Or like Illinois politicians in prison.

Southern Illinois could be a lucrative area for oil fracking. But our state’s Democratic governor, J.B. Pritzker, says he supports “clean energy” and it’s believed he opposes fracking. He’s up for reelection this year. Why aren’t his Republican opponents calling for fracking in Illinois?

No place is perfect, not even Texas. It has its own power grid, heavily dependent on wind power, which works great, until it doesn’t, as was the case after a large ice storm last year. Millions of Texans were without power for several days after that storm. But twice in the last decade, I was without electricity for several days, as were hundreds-of-thousands of others in the northern suburbs of Chicago. Unlike the Texas outages in 2021, this was not a national news story. My provider for electricity is Commonwealth Edison, which has been implicated in the Michael Madigan scandals.

Illinois is misruled by con-artists like Professor Henry Hill, the scoundrel from the play and the movie The Music Man, only our grifters are bereft of Hill’s charm.

We may not end up relocating in Texas, but Mrs. Marathon Pundit and I will leave Illinois. My family roots here reach back to 1850. When my great-great grandfather, another John Ruberry, arrived in Illinois from Ireland, this state was the land of opportunity. Illinois is now the land of corruption, high taxes, and decline. 

Like Keats, my wife and I are sick of subsidizing these crooks.

John Ruberry regularly blogs from Morton Grove, Illinois at Marathon Pundit.

The Single Best Argument for Abortion and Birth Control I Have Heard in Years…

Posted: April 19, 2022 by datechguy in culture, media
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…is Taylor Lorentz claiming to have PTSD from being a Washington Post Journalist during a visit to MSNBC:

I mean yeah, police, firemen, soldiers, nurses and the people of Ukraine might have to deal with death, destruction and life and death on a daily basis, but that’s NOTHING compared to the nasty feedback she gets from doing things like Doxing the “libs of tic tock” account person who has the audacity to take videos that people deliberately put on a public worldwide forum and post them on a public worldwide forum.

I mean can you imagine how the children of such a woman would be prepared for life? Can you imagine them being able to cope with anything with such a person as their primary role model?

Granted abortion is murder and Birth Control is a sin and every person is made in the image of God (including Ms Lorenz) and with God all things are possible but if I was the left and wanted to try to persuade people that Abortion should be an option I’d put her on the posters saying: “Do you really want people like this raising children?”

All kidding aside Ms. Lorenz reminds me of something else.

Could you imagine the reaction if a male reporter claimed PTSD over online feedback?

Our “betters” keep telling us that women are men are equal yet we keep hearing stories about how hard women have it or their inability to cope.

So which is it elites? Are woman just as strong, tough and competent as men or are in need of special protection? Choose one.

(In fairness to our elites as they can’t define “woman” or “man” this question might be too much for them.

Closing thought: Totally unrelated headline via Citizen’s free press & NPR

It’s time to screen all kids for anxiety, physicians’ task force recommends

“Disinformation” conference proves Trump is right, the media is the enemy of the people

Posted: April 10, 2022 by John Ruberry in Always look at the bright side of Trump, culture, media, News/opinion, opinion/news
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By John Ruberry

Last year, in his farewell column, longtime Chicago journalist Phil Kadner spoke of his praises, and he indeed deserved his own pats on the back. Kadner mostly covered the generally overlooked, but corrupt, south suburbs of Chicago. I grew up there, they are a rat-hole of graft.

A creature of the left, who called for President Trump’s impeachment in 2019, Kadner discussed in that final column, his anger after Trump said the media was “the enemy of the people.”

Is Kadner an enemy of the people? No.

But with a few exceptions, most of the media is. 

The latest example of why that is true took place at the University of Chicago, which hosted along with the Atlantic, the Disinformation and the Erosion of Democracy conference. A quick look at the speakers at the event betrays what kind of conference it was, there were no conservative panelists. Only the self-appointed “cool kids” are allowed in the tree house.

Ah, but there were at least a couple of conservatives there, including freshman U of C student Daniel Schmidt, who challenged one of the speakers, the Atlantic’s Anne Applebaum. Schmidt blew the whistle on her for dismissing the importance of the Hunter Biden laptop revelations in 2020, which at the time Applebaum wrote that it “barely registers” with her.

Her response? “My problem with Hunter Biden’s laptop I think is totally irrelevant.” Applebaum continued, “I mean it’s not whether it’s disinformation or, I mean, I didn’t think the Hunter Biden’s business relationships have anything to do with who should be president of the United States, so I don’t find it to be interesting, that would be my problem with that as a main news story.”

Ah, now here is an enemy of the people to be sure, Anna Applebaum.

Hunter Biden, if not Joe Biden, because of what has been discovered on that laptop, can rightly be called as I’ve remarked before, the head of a Chicago-style influence peddling ring. 

It’s arguable that the Biden family has sold out America to our enemies, particularly China. 

The Clown Prince of Disinformation is CNN’s Brian Stelter, the host of the laughably misnamed Reliable Sources. He spoke on the next day at the conference. And it was the turn of another University of Chicago freshman, Christopher Phillips, who said of Stelter’s network, “They push the Russian collusion hoax, they push the Jussie Smollett hoax, they smear Justice [Brett] Kavanaugh as a rapist, and they also smeared Nick Sandmann as a white supremacist,” Phillips told Stelter. “And yes, they dismissed the Hunter Biden laptop affair as pure Russian disinformation.” 

Phillips continued, “With mainstream corporate journalists becoming little more than apologists and cheerleaders for the [Biden] regime, is it time to finally declare that the canon of journalistic ethics is dead or no longer operative?”

Stelter quipped, “Too bad, it’s time for lunch,” but then gave a meandering reply that didn’t address any of Phillips’ points.

The Disinformation and the Erosion of Democracy conference was reminiscent of a bad Hollywood thriller, where the protagonist is finally able to report his findings of an anti-government conspiracy after escaping captivity, only to learn that those he trusts in the government are part of that nefarious plot too. 

I believe there are two possibilities in regard to what has gone wrong with the mainstream media, and neither are good. The first is that the most members of the fake-news media are indeed propagandists for the left and the Democrat Party. The second is that they’ve deluded themselves into believing that they are indeed truthful providers of information, reminiscent of when legendary New York Yankees slugger Mickey Mantle, while downing booze during breakfast, remarked to a reporter with a straight face that he’s not an alcoholic. 

Mantle died of liver cancer, despite receiving a liver transplant, and alcoholism very likely contributed to his death.

Where will the mainstream media end up?

Right now, the media, most of it, is indeed the enemy of the people.

John Ruberry regularly blogs at Marathon Pundit.

Twelve Chris Rock Will Smith Thought and My Standing Orders Story

Posted: March 28, 2022 by datechguy in culture
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After watching the video of the Chris Rock Joke and Will Smith’s response I’ve several things to say.

  1. When I was a kid jokes about people’s wives and mothers were considered completely off limits and any such joke would constitute “fighting words” particularly in the presence of a husband and/or son.
  2. When I heard Rock’s joke I thought it was pretty tame and was unsure if it rose to the level of a smack in the face until my wife informed me of Smith’s wife’s disease that caused her to lose her hair. Given that fact I’d say such a joke about a man’s wife made publicly in his presence required a response.
  3. Even without the disease it would be up to Smith and not me to decide if Rock’s words rose to the level of a punch in the face.
  4. If this was not told in a public place with Smith present it would not have required a public punch in the mouth Smith could have spoken to him privately and demanded an apology, and if it didn’t’ come THEN he could whack him.
  5. I very much liked the fact that Smith walked up slowly and calmly before smacking him and then slowly and calmly returned to his seat. That was exactly the right way to do it.
  6. I must say I give a lot of credit to Chris Rock for his reaction he took the punch and carried on. didn’t miss a beat. He did the deed, paid the price and continued about his business.
  7. Even with a tame joke if that had been a joke about my mother and my father was present the only way he wouldn’t have gotten to Rock would be because me and my brothers might have gotten to him first.
  8. My wife told me that several million women across the country swooned when they saw Smith call on Rock to “keep my wife’s name out of your fucking mouth.” and even more when he threw the punch. She’s right. Woman like the idea of their man standing up for them even if they might not admit it.
  9. Congresswoman Ayanna Presley of the squad tweeted out support for Smith’s actions and then deleted it. It figures. She finally tweets something I agree with and then deletes it.
  10. I’ll wager Smith gets a ton of fan mail over this, but will be condemned by a the “right” people because his actions reinforce masculinity and the role of men, something our cultural betters despise.
  11. Of course in fairness to our cultural betters since they can’t define “woman” they would have no idea what to do anyway.
  12. Finally The folks who produce the Oscars must have been in rapture. It’s the most attention the show has gotten in decades.

This of course brought to mind a story involving my wife and my youngest son.

I taught my boys to avoid fights, I further told them than if in a situation where they might get in a fight and it’s impossible to get out of it to make sure they didn’t throw the first punch.

There was however one caveat to that rule. If the person in question was saying something about either their mother or their grandmother, they not only had permission to throw the first punch but they had standing orders, provided the person was not armed, to do so.

This exact situation arose about twenty years ago. My wife was a school nurse at the time and my son attended the school she worked at. On the playground somebody said something about his mother and he smacked him.

Of course he got into trouble and I was called in to talk to the vice principal. I told him in no uncertain terms that he was acting my standing orders and that while I understood that the school had to enforce their rules and had no objection to any discipline they had to apply to my son that my standing orders to him remained in force and he would be commended by me for his actions.

So my son got detention and principal thanked me for my time, but as I was reaching the door he said quietly to me that he hoped his son would do the same thing in the same situation.

A postscript. Nobody ever talked any smack about his mother in his presence again.

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