Random thoughts #69

Random thoughts #69

Not particularly relevant to anything but the University of North Carolina played TCU. Michael Jordan and Lawrence Taylor are at the game. They probably don’t remember me but I was on the UNC athletics board and spotted for both of them in the weight room. LT was a beast but I could bench more than MJ. In those days it was thought that upper body muscles would inhibit your shot so the basketball players concentrated on the lower body.

I am surprised that the democrats aren’t demanding that ESPN change the name of their show “NFL RedZone.”

If you want to lease an EV, now is the time. A Kia Niro EV (base price $28,435) can be leased for as little as $40 a month! A Kia EV9($56,761) can be had for $189 month. The dealer uses the $7,500 tax credit which expires at the end of September to lower the lease price of the vehicle. For some weird reason the tax credit does not apply to the purchase of an EV made overseas but does apply to leasing the vehicle. Unfortunately my tastes run more toward a Porsche Taycan. Porsche is offering a $22,000 discount on a lease which lowers it to $949 a month with $(,829 due at signing. I think I will stick to my 2007 Mercedes 350 CLK.

What may stop you from leasing that EV is that Motor Trend has released the statistics showing that the deadliest car in America is (to few people’s surprise) Tesla. Kia is number two.

What’s with the workers at all tech companies that think they can picket their own company, set up encampments and deface property? Microsoft, Google and Tesla have been hit by these leftists who protest their companies doing business with Israel. These employees are getting fired. Apparently, they mistook the “campus” of their employer for a college campus and thought it was ok to act up. Someone said that the office is for work. Who knew?

Also what’s with these celebrities “fleeing” Trump’s America for England? First Ellen DeGeneres and her wife buy a house there and say “Everything here is just better – the way animals are treated, people are polite. I just love it here.” Then someone named Robin Wright fled to England saying “I love being in this country. There’s a freedom of self here. People are so kind.” That freedom apparently doesn’t cover freedom of speech.

I guess they don’t know about the UK throwing people in jail for saying or tweeting the “wrong thing.” Over 12,000 Brits are arrested each year over social media posts deemed offensive. This tells me two things. First, do the British really believe in free speech and two, if you know you are going to be arrested and still post, most people would consider you either very brave or very dumb. One of the people arrested said “It was hard to shake off the sense that I was living in a police state.” Hey, but it is a state where Ellen and Robin at least are free from Trump who hasn’t sic-ed his “Justice” Department on anti-Trump postings – yet.

England does not have a First Amendment. In case you have forgotten, here is ours:

First Amendment

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

The UK is even arresting people for praying near abortion centers. Guess they got that one from Joe Biden.

Speaking of stupid, several so-called democrat influencers are still clamoring the pack the court with their kind of people. Recall that this was the rage when Biden was president and that even the liberals on the court said it was a bad idea. It amazes me that the democrats would even utter this while Trump is in the White House and republicans have both the House and the Senate. I had said previously that I was all for court packing – now.

And what happened to Trump’s objections to the EU’s Digital Services Tax and Digital Services Act? Are they still being negotiated? The EU seemed hell bent on keeping them in place regardless of the tariffs. Trump had said that he was willing to lower their tariffs if they scuttled the acts. I have written about the digital services tax The Digital Services Act policies the online environment safer in by policing the tech giants on illegal content, hate speech and child sexual abuse material. Trump calls this censorship and has threatened actions including increased tariffs and even visas revoked against EU officials.

I wrote a piece on the decline of Europe and suggested that we look elsewhere for partners who are vibrant and love freedom. For that I got emails calling me a racist. Well the Wall Street Journal a bit later published a similar piece – “Europe is Losing”. I am sure that they don’t read my blog. I looked at the letters to the editor and found general agreement and no one accusing the Journal of being racist.

https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/europe-is-losing-fe179376