Thursday, July 25, 2013

Detroit: From Model City to Ghost Town

This past week, the city of Detroit, Michigan had
filed for bankruptcy. Now, imagine the magnitude
of this event: think of who files for bankruptcy in
order to get court protection from creditors when
debts cannot be paid off; individuals, businesses
(including large corporations), houses of worship,
even small towns do this when they are hard-pressed
to make good on their financial obligations while not
nearly enough income or assets are on hand to do so.
Well, so can and do large cities, as evidenced by
Detroit, the largest city in our country's history to
take this drastic step.

Detroit was once one of America's model cities for
beauty, vibrancy, industry, and livability. The
American automobile industry fueled the prosperity
of the city; the assembly line was perfected there,
and copied by other manufacturers in other industries
throughout the country and the world. During World
War II Detroit produced planes and tanks that
helped our country to win the war. In the coming
years, Motown Records produced music that
gave joy to many Americans. And many, many jobs
were created from it all, as many other businesses
sprang up, providing still more jobs as well as needed
goods and services for the inhabitants of Detroit.
The city became one of the most populous cities
in the United States, peaking at 1.8 million in
population.

Visit Detroit today, and where there were once
gleaming office building and storefronts along with
bright, cheerful looking apartment buildings you'll
now see decaying husks of these edifices, many
having been abandoned and boarded up. Crime is
rampant, with a wide range of the criminal element
from muggers and looters to gangs roaming the
streets. If accosted by any of them, you almost may
as well not bother to call the police, for the average
response time to a call is about 54 minutes; the
national average is 11. The unemployment rate
in Detroit is 16% (the official rate, that is; like
with that of the country, the actual rate is most
certainly higher). Businesses and individuals have
fled the city steadily over the past few decades.
The public schools are a write-off, what with a
reading proficiency rating of just 7% for Detroit's
eighth graders. And fiscal management? More
like fiscal mismanagement, malfeasance, and
non-feasance! Unaffordable borrowing, state
grant rip-offs, never-ending taxing and spending,
and deferment of public pension contributions
have been the order of the day for too many days.
And Heritage Foundation's Alison Acosta Fraser
and Rachel Glazer tell us that "Detroit's tragic
downward cycle has reached its end." Detroit's
population is now approximately 700,000.
Will the last person to leave the city please turn
out the lights? That is, unless thugs shot them
all out.

The culprit(s) behind all this? The Democrats who
have controlled the city council and mayor's offices
steadily since 1962. Throughout their reign of
error and corruption there have been sweet deals
for public employee unions as well as slipping money
under the table to cronies who backed the mayors
and council members for election. Rather than
spend any revenue for repairing streets and street-
lights, any other infrastructure, or ensuring that the
police could do their jobs with speed and efficiency,
the so-called leaders of Detroit lined their pockets
along with those of their pals. And they have long had
very stringent gun control laws; isn't it funny how
cities that have such laws have more gun crimes than
those that have no gun laws, or at least less strict
gun laws? Your loyal Peasant will have more to say
on this phenomenon in the near future.

The state of Michigan has taken over the budgetary
aspects of Detroit's government, insofar as deciding
what will be spent on what and when. Michigan is
being the parent to Detroit's reckless, irresponsible
child, and it is a sad but necessary measure. Michigan
also passed a bill making the state a right-to-work
state, which will introduce competition and make the
state more business, and therefore more employer,
friendly, which will benefit both businesses and
employees. Michigan also lessened the strength of
public employees' unions, which should help both
the state and local governments reduce the pension
promises that took a huge toll on Detroit's finances
when combined with the city's government's cavalierly
ignoring same pension obligations. By the by,
Michigan's state government is now largely in
Republican hands; the GOP holds majorities in both
legislative chambers and the governor's office.
It is not difficult to see who are the grown-ups and
who are the unruly children in this scenario, and thank
heaven the grown-ups have the upper hand! But
wouldn't you know, the lefties are blaming Detroit's
sad state on the Republicans; never mind that there has
not been a Republican mayor there in over 50 years
and that you can count the number of Republicans
having served on Detroit's city council in all that
while on the fingers of one hand! Don't you love
the way that the left-wingers in and outside of the
Democrat party blame the Republicans for the
messes that these lefty crybabies make?

The workers in Detroit will be aided by the higher wage-
growth and superior compensation than what their
counterparts in non-right-to-work states have, and that
will make for a repaired tax base, Vincent Vernuccio of
the Mackinac Center avers. But in the meantime, this
once great and proud city lies on its deathbed, awaiting
either a miracle of epic proportions or the arrival of
the Grim Reaper. And if the latter occurs, the coroner
could state as the cause of death an overdose of
liberalism.


MEM







Thursday, July 18, 2013

Victory for the Unborn in Texas; the Left Loses Again

A bill came up for a vote recently in the Texas legislature
that would curtail a woman's ability to obtain an abortion
if she is beyong 20 weeks pregnant. What followed has
been a true Texas tornado; not of the weather variety
but a political one.

In the first round of the fight in Texas to protect the
lives of unborn babies, the abortion supporters won
with the help of a ten hour filibuster by state Senator
Wendy Davis (D). An unruly crowd of pro-abortion
demonstartors backed Davis to the hilt as the Demo-
crat contingent in the Texas senate, mostly pro-abortion
themselves, succeeded in blocking the bill which the
Texas House passed in June. This bill was drafted
because at this stage of a pregnancy, an unborn baby
can feel pain --- excrutiating pain in particular.
Science and medicine both have shown this to be so,
but it was not enough to sway the abortion backers
present; they would have none of it. The mob of
hecklers for abortion at all stages of pregnancy
outnumebred the peace-keeping officers on duty
in the senate chamber, and they pressed their advantage.
And to ensure their success, some of those in the
unruly assemblage snuck jars of urine and feces
into the chamber, hoping to throw their gross missles
at senators they disagree with on the bill and on
abortion in general. Classy!

But Governor Rick Perry (R) faced down this
travesty. Vowing to sign the measure into law, Perry
called a second special session to give this legislation
a fair hearing in the state Senate, and when it came
up for a vote, it passed. Gov. Perry also made sure
that there would be adequate security on hand to
dissuade any further threatening behavior by an
unruly mob in the chamber that might prevent the
senators from voting freely.

The abortion boosters were not deterred by this,
mind. They escalated their bedlam in the days that
followed by, among other things, sending hateful
messages via Facebook and e-mail to state Sen.
Donna Campbell and her daughter wishing rape
upon both; chanting "Hail Satan" in attempting to
drown out the pro-life supporters gathered in the
Texas capitol singing "Amazing Grace"(!); could
the abortion enthusiasts have been calling on their
source of inspiration for strength? And they
brought along small children, looking to be about
five or six years old by the accounts of people
witnessing this spectacle, pressing them into
carrying signs with slogans such as "Every child
a wanted child" and "If I wanted the government
in my womb, I'd f*** a senator!" Charming!
Let's hope that those dragooned kids had no idea
of what the messages on those signs meant!
Some other youngsters, along with some women,
carried signs with the image of a coat hanger
with a slash through the hanger. Your faithful
Peasant thought that were laws against the
exploitation of children!

Perhaps we should view this rabble in an analytical
manner, as they are clearly in the minority among
Americans on the issue of abortion; a national poll
taken in May shows a clear majority of Americans
desiring to make either all or most abortions illegal,
with 48% of Americans calling themselves "pro-
life" as opposed to 45% taking the "pro-choice"
label. Maybe the hell raisers at the Texas Capitol
are aware of this and this fact makes them desperate.
You know what they say about desperate people!
Besides, many Americans have been sickened and
angered by the accounts of late-term abortionist
Kermit Gosnell and his house of horrors in
Philadelphia; he has been tried in court and could
receive the death penalty for killing some babies that
he couldn't manage to kill while they were still in
the womb, as well as causing the death of one of
the women whose baby he was aborting. He'll at
least receive life in prison without parole, and that
would be enough for your horrified Peasant, as I
have stated in this blog that I am opposed to
capital punishment. At least this butcher won't be
able to destroy any more babies or women.
But to the creeps that gathered in Austin Gosnell
probably is a hero, as is a similar butcher closer
to home in Houston who made the news recently.

In all seriousness, though, the left-wingers carry on
like this as a matter of course. Remember their antics
in Madison over Gov. Walker's quashing of public
employee unions' ability to treat Wisconsin's taxpayers
as their own piggy banks? And their bedlam in Lansing
when Michigan's governor signed the bill that made
Michigan a Right To Work state, thereby clamping
down on all unions' ability to demand that workers
join their ranks in order to hold certain jobs? Maybe
these thuggish louts are merely desperate,
what with the country's populace rejecting their brand
of politics and the steep price to be paid for
implementing their favored policies in both money and
liberty, they are using the one thing that they have left:
threatening behavior. The only card left in their hand
that they now have to play is the bully card.

However, this card didn't get them what they wanted
on abortions after 20 weeks in Texas; it failed them
in trying to scrap Act 10 in Wisconsin; it did them no
good whatsoever in Michigan for preventing that state
from embracing Right To Work. They should know
by now that totalitarianism doesn't work, the people
reject it, and totalitarian tactics won't make it any
easier to bring about totalitarian governance. But let
them continue to behave like rabid degenerates;
they are only making it easier to defeat them, their
favored candidates and their favored legislation,
for the more people see them for what they are,
the less that they will want to have anything to do
with them. Hearts and minds are never won with
coercion.


MEM













Thursday, July 11, 2013

A Humorous Take on the Obama Scandals

A friend and avid follower of The Peasant sent these
howlingly funny jokes by Tonight Show host Jay Leno
aimed at President Obama on Leno's show.
I am sharing them here for your enjoyment, my grand
readers, for a light-hearted offering. Enjoy!


" I was going to start off tonight with an Obama joke,
but I don't want to get audited by the IRS."

On NSA surveillance: "We wanted a president who
listens to all Americans -- now we have one."

On a new IRS commissioner: "He's called 'acting
commissioner' because he has to act like the scandal
doesn't involve the White House."

On closing the Guantanamo prison for terrorists:
"If he really wants to close it, turn it into a
government-funded solar power company. The doors
will be shut in a month."

Considering the Benghazi, Associated Press, and IRS
scandals: "Remember in the old days when President
Obama's biggest embarrassment was Joe Biden?"

On Obama saying he didn't know about the IRS scandal:
"He was too busy not knowing anything about Benghazi
to not know anything about the IRS."

"The White House has a new slogan about Benghazi:
Hope and change the subject."

"It's casual Friday, which means that at the White House,
they're casually going through everybody's phone calls
and records."

"It's not looking good for President Obama. Today his
teleprompter took the fifth."

"Fox News has changed its slogan from 'Fair and Balanced'
to 'See, I told you so!' "

"These White House scandals are not going away anytime
soon. People in Kenya are now saying he's 100 percent
American. That's how bad it's gotten."

On Obama's commencement address: "He told the young
graduates their future is bright unless, of course, they
want jobs."

On a Chicago man who set a record for riding a Ferris
wheel: "The only other way to go around and around in
a circle that many times is to read the official report on
Benghazi."

On White House claims of ignorance on the scandals:
"They took 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' out of the Pentagon
and moved it into the White House."


Jay Leno is one of your favorite Peasant's favorite
comedians of all time, and President Obama is a
veritable gift of humor that keeps on giving! What
a fantastic comical combination!


MEM