Posts Tagged ‘Da Magnificent Seven’

To combat food deserts in Illinois, shoplifters need to be prosecuted–Pritzker responds with retail tax rebates instead

Posted: August 23, 2023 by John Ruberry in business, crime, News/opinion, opinion/news, politics
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By John Ruberry

Imagine if instead of serving as the governor of Illinois, Democrat J.B. Pritzker is an Uber driver. And Pritzker’s car is loaded with problems. The check engine, oil pressure, ABS, and TPMS warning lights are on. 

What would be Pritzker’s fix? 

Uber J.B. would simply ignore the problems by having his car professionally detailed, so his vehicle looks good, then he’d place electrical tape over the locations on the dashboard where each warning light is flashing. 

Pritzker governs America’s sixth most populous state the same way–by ignoring the metaphorical warning lights facing the Land of Lincoln. Here at Da Tech Guy for years I’ve been railing Illinois’ big three problems–which are intertwined–and they are a massively underfunded public pension system, widespread government corruption, and declining population. 

Now there is a fourth one, rampant theft and violent crime. Illinois’ largest city, Chicago, is still suffering from the highest murder rates since the 1990s. Carjackings are skyrocketing–in 2013 there were 344 reporting carjackings, last year the total was 1,674. Because so many shoplifting incidents aren’t reported, I don’t trust any theft figures. But the anecdotal evidence is alarming–shoplifting is soaring. 

For years, liberals have, often blaming “corporate greed,” decried the many food deserts in big cities–and rural areas too. A food desert, if you are unfamiliar with the term, is an area without a nearby supermarket selling inexpensive groceries. Chicago, after some pushback from left-wing alderman because it is non-union, didn’t see its first Walmart open until 2006. Eventually there were eight Walmarts in Chicago, but shortly after the election of a far-left Democrat, Brandon Johnson, as mayor, Walmart announced it was closing four of those big box stores. In the press release explaining the reason for the shuttering of those Chicago stores, Walmart revealed “that collectively our Chicago stores have not been profitable since we opened the first one nearly 17 years ago – these stores lose tens of millions of dollars a year, and their annual losses nearly doubled in just the last five years.” 

Back to Pritzker.

Last week, the governor announced the $20 million Illinois Grocery Initiative to reverse the growth of food deserts, which includes tax rebates and unnamed incentives. 

Also last week, multiple media outlets reported that Home Depot, Target, and yes, Walmart, have decried the drastic rise of “shrink,” that is, shoplifting, at its stores. Walmart’s CEO, John Furner, pointed his finger in the right direction about “shrink.” 

“It’ll take communities stepping up and enforcing the law to be able to – to bring this issue under control,” Furner said.

While local law enforcement is not the responsibility of Illinois’ governor, Pritzker has never condemned Kim Foxx, the Soros-funded so-called prosecutor in Cook County. Her social worker approach to law enforcement–which Brandon Johnson also favors–is partly responsible for Chicago’s crime wave.

As for Pritzker, thru his ridiculously misnamed SAFE-T Act, the abolishment of cash bail–little or no bail is the current de facto practice of Foxx–will take effect statewide in less than a month. 

Here’s my fix for the food desert problem: Hire more cops, have them arrest shoplifters and the criminals who fence their swag, prosecute them in a fair trial, and imprison them if found guilty for a few years. Such a surefire strategy will not only to protect the public and retailers, but it will serve as a deterrent to people considering a life of crime. 

Simple and easy.

Illinois’ mainstream media needs to get on board and accurately report on food deserts. In a New York Times-length study by the Chicago Sun-Times and Chicago’s NPR affiliate from earlier this month, only one sentence mentioned the real problem, albeit gently. “Grocery operators have pointed to crime and homelessness as reasons they’ve needed to invest more in security, driving up costs,” they reported, “according to Amanda Lai, a Chicago director of food industry practice for the consulting firm McMillan Doolittle.”

Yep, one sentence.

Meanwhile, with the warning lights flashing, J.B. Pritzker continues to drive Illinois into the ground, while pissing away $20 million to fight food deserts. In the short term there is no hope for a repeal of the SAFE-T Act, but that’s part of the cure that Illinois needs.

As Ronald Reagan said, “Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.”

John Ruberry regularly blogs at Marathon Pundit.

Public Schools align with Satan

Posted: August 19, 2023 by navygrade36bureaucrat in local issues, local stuff, Uncomfortable Truths
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Satan has two interesting strategies to spread his influence among humanity. The first involves pretending that he doesn’t exist. There are many people that laugh at the idea of Satan existing at all, and who instead argue that its “bad humans” that account for the evil in the world. These people don’t even like using the word “evil” because it implies there is a “good,” and they instead argue that actions are judged based on human standards at the time, instead of any sort of absolute judgement.

While this strategy works well, it pushes Satan to stay hidden and out of site. It’s far better to operate in the open, and that seems to be the current strategy. But why would rational human beings allow the literal Prince of Darkness, who promises to enslave men and women, to openly influence them?

Easy. Satan becomes cool. He stands for libertarian ideals of free and open speech. Heck, he even has an “X” account. He even manages to get applause in Chesapeake, VA, where school board members voted to continue to allow the club to meet on school grounds. From our parish’s FlockNote:

Unfortunately, the school board voted 7-1 (with one member absent) to allow all non-exempt clubs to include the After School Satan Club to use Chesapeake Public Schools facilities. There were 40 speakers that were signed up to speak, and only five spoke against the After School Satan Club and prohibiting facility use. Most of the speakers and the attendees represented the Good News Club (the Bible club), a wrestling club, and other various clubs such as a soccer club and the girl scouts. There were also about 10 Satanists present, with several of them speaking. There were only four Catholics present by my count, and all spoke out against the After School Satan Club and non-exempt clubs using school facilities. At the end of the meeting, the room was full of applause for the board’s decision to allow non-exempt clubs to meet.

The rosary rally had good attendance, despite the heat, with around 30 people showing up to pray. Four Satanists showed up as a counter-protest at the end of our rally, and there was no interaction between the groups. Thank you to everyone who showed up and those who were unable to make it that were praying from afar. Even thought the vote did not go as we had hoped, I know our prayers are not wasted.

On a positive note, I asked Rose Bastet (the leader of the After School Satan Club and a Satanic minister) if the After School Satan Club planned to meet on the third Thursday of the month as they did during the last school year. I said that we wanted to continue praying the rosary. She said that the school district was giving them a lot of trouble, and she wasn’t sure if they were going to meet at this time. She didn’t go into detail as to what that meant exactly. The attitude of the Satanists was completely reversed from the last time the school board allowed them to meet several months ago. Several months ago they were overjoyed and cheerful at the decision. After this meeting, they did not seem happy.

The only board member who voted to get rid of all non-exempt clubs to include the After School Satan Club was Samuel Boone. The member who was absent was Brittany Walker. The members who voted to allow the clubs to meet with no changes in the policy were: Angela Swygert, Thomas Mercer, Amanda Dean, Michael Lamonea, John McCormick, Norman Pool, and Kim Scott. 

Amanda Dean tried to get a reclassification of what a non-exempt club was as she seemed to be surprised that the wrestling club would be impacted. She and Samuel Boone were the only two members who voted to reclassify, with the other members voting to not reclassify as they were wary of legal repercussions. Amanda Dean has been the most outspoken board member about getting the After School Satan Club out of schools so her vote to ultimately allow the clubs was surprising. Perhaps she voted the way she did due to the hostile crowd or realizing that the only option on the table would get rid of more clubs than she had previously realized.

Stay tuned for further details on this situation. We will plan to have rosary rallies in the future should we determine when the After School Satan Club is meeting. It is especially disheartening that the people of this city erupted into applause when all the clubs were able to meet. We need to continue to pray, do penance, and acts of reparation as it seems clear that things like wrestling are more important to the residents of this city than keeping Satan out of the public sphere.

Interestingly enough, if you go to the Facility Use rules for Chesapeake Public School, you can find this restriction:

The described use would conflict with a policy, procedure, or the mission of Chesapeake Public Schools.

Not sure when the mission of public schools aligned with Satan, but apparently they aren’t in “conflict” with the school? That doesn’t bode well for any of us going forward.

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. Pray for America and for Chesapeake today, we certainly need it.

Rethinking support for Ukraine

Posted: August 15, 2023 by chrisharper in Uncategorized
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By Christopher Harper

With the Biden administration proposing another $24 billion to support Ukraine’s military, I think it may be time to reassess my enthusiastic backing of the fight against Russia.

The United States is by far the largest donor to Ukraine. Congress has already approved $113 billion in military, economic, humanitarian, and other aid for Ukraine, including around $70 billion for security, intelligence, and additional war-fighting costs. An estimated 90 percent of that total has already been spent or designated to be spent.

In the past year, overall support for Ukraine has waned. According to a poll released by CNN last week, fifty-five percent of Americans now oppose more aid to Ukraine. The party breakdown is stark—71 percent of Republicans oppose additional assistance, while 62 percent of Democrats favor it.

Vladimir Putin is a bad guy. His invasion of Ukraine, which began in 2014 with the seizure of Crimea and the subsequent attacks a year ago, is anathema to world peace and security.

But is the wholesale support of Ukraine worth the cost and the potential downside of exhausting the ability of the United States to keep its military ready to fight against other threats, such as China?

The Heritage Foundation has put together a rather convincing case against continuing aid to Ukraine at its current levels.

In a recent opinion piece, Kevin Roberts, the president of the foundation, wrote the following:

–“It is simply untenable for Americans to bear the vast majority of the burden among our allies in standing up to threatening states.”

–“Our concentration on Ukraine has undermined our ability to address the worsening military situation in Asia, especially around Taiwan.”

–“However just and noble Ukraine’s cause is, continuing to focus on it at the expense of confronting and deterring China is not wise, moral, or conservative.”

Roberts makes a variety of good points. I take away three important ones. First, U.S. foreign policy must focus mainly on China’s economic and military threat rather than Russia’s. Second, the United States must take a strategic approach toward Ukraine rather than depleting American military stockpiles. Third, Russia poses a more significant threat to Europe than the United States, so NATO countries should assume a substantial burden of the cost. See https://www.heritage.org/asia/commentary/the-correct-conservative-approach-ukraine-shifts-the-focus-china#

I’m not arguing that we should cut off Ukraine. We just need to figure out a better strategy there and an even better one in dealing with China.

Chicago Mayor Johnson upset about reporter calling last week’s riot a “mob action” even though it was a mob action

Posted: August 6, 2023 by John Ruberry in crime, News/opinion, opinion/news, politics
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By John Ruberry

While he hasn’t yet devolved to the level of Joe Biden or Kamala Harris, Brandon Johnson, the new leftist mayor of Chicago, certainly says some stupid things. 

Worse, for Johnson that is, his moronic statements add arrows to the quivers of his critics, particularly snarky ones like the writers a the Hey Jackass site, and yes, people like me.

Last week, 300-400 youths attacked a South Loop 7-Eleven in Chicago and looted it. Sadly, the thugs were beaten with clubs by employees–that was in Stockton, California. 

Maybe next time for Chicago.

But 40 of the creeps were arrested, they were aged from 12 to 20. Yep, 12-years-old. Well, as it’s still summer vacation time in Chicago, at least Sunday wasn’t what my parents called a school night. 

Speaking of schools, Johnson was the mayoral candidate of the far-left Chicago Teachers Union. He went from being a CTU teacher, to a CTU organizer, then on to being elected a Cook County commissioner. In that last post, Johnson still collected a $100,000 annual salary from the CTU.

The Chicago Teachers Union is a longtime apologist for the failures of Chicago’s youths, partly because they bear some responsibility for those failures, because Chicago’s schools educate children quite poorly.

Chicago is in for a bumpy ride.

Last week, while being questioned about the convenience store riot, oops, make that “large gathering,” Johnson scolded a reporter for calling the mayhem “mob action,” even though it is a legal term in state law.

“Respectfully, these large gatherings — these large gatherings — hang on a second. I promise you we have time to talk,” Johnson replied. He added, “It’s important that we speak of these dynamics in an appropriate way. This is not to obfuscate what has actually taken place. We have to be very careful when we use language to describe certain behavior. There’s history in this city. I mean, to refer to children as, like, ‘baby Al Capones’ is not appropriate.”

After the next youth riot, which the rioters call “teen takeovers,” I will probably use a headline here, or on my own blog, along the lines of “Baby Al Capones involved in yet another Chicago mob action.” Thanks for the material, Mr. Mayor! Keep ’em coming!

I’ve lived my whole life in the Chicago area, and the term “baby Al Capones” is a new one for me. As it is for Fraternal Order of Police President John Catanzara, who said in a YouTube video:

Nobody is renaming anybody little mini-Al Capones. But they certainly, in many cases, had the same, terrorizing effect that Al Capone had 100 years ago with these teen takeovers, where they think they can do whatever they want with no repercussions, no parental supervision and no accountability — specifically apparent by the mayor’s office in City Hall, who wants to excuse all of this bad behavior because Chicago has a past. So that means: Do whatever the hell you want apparently.

Indeed, it does. 

Johnson has also called the teen takeovers “trends.” You know, a trend, like a new style of clothing. 

Do you have your “riot chic” duds yet? Don’t toss out your COVID masks! They’re back in style!

In the last Chicago riot, a much larger one which happened in April, two weeks after Johnson’s victory over a law-and-order moderate Democrat in a runoff election, Johnson said, “It is not constructive to demonize youth who have otherwise been starved of opportunities in their own communities.”

Hey teens! If you don’t want to be demonized, don’t act demonically. 

Johnson dismissed the riot, where at least two people were brutally beaten, by saying that sometimes kids make “silly decisions.”

The mayor, who is expected to name a new police commissioner this week, campaigned on a “holistic” approach to fighting crime.

The first attempt at holistic crimefighting in Chicago was tried over Memorial Day weekend with the introduction of yellow-donned civilian “peacekeepers.” But one of them, an ex-con, joined in as a mob, uh, make that “large gathering,” beat and robbed a man. 

After the violent attack, the accused removed his yellow peacekeeper vest, his version, I guess, of giving two weeks’ notice.

Let’s go Brandon!

John Ruberry regularly blogs at Marathon Pundit.

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