Be Prepared

For promises broken. 

Not like they haven't been already, but if you read the Blue Bag Rag you noticed Mother Mayor getting front page ink to let you know what's coming, even though they've already crossed more lines than Trump. We no longer have the city manager reporting to council. No, no. Not his idea of fun? Beneath him? Regardless, the city charter calls for the city manager, and the city manager alone, to show up. In fact, the city charter has no notion of a "department" of city manager and one of the few things council can actually do to rein in this madness is to eliminate that "department." Immediately.

Without delving into the dick-pic fiasco, the city police department is objectively inferior to what we had as unincorporated DeKalb. Well, if one of your key performance indicators is "cops show up in our neighborhoods to enforce laws" but maybe that's not your KPI. Is yours PR stunts like coffee with a cop? Really? 

Then there's the bloat. Mapping all the bureaucratic entities this city has spun up would be a full time job and it is one of the many jobs the city isn't going to do. Because that kind of transparency is unflattering.

So Mother Mayor has been sent out to grease the already slippery slope. Who's pulling those strings? In any event they are about to run, not walk, away from every founding principle, every promise made. All to gorge themselves on greed. Will enough ever be enough?

Proxy Voting

Proxy. This word gets tossed around quite a bit, and not just lately. Back in the early days of the civil rights movement ZIP codes were (and still are) closely associated with demographics. It was common for insurers and lenders to change rates or even refuse to serve certain ZIP codes, claiming they were not discriminating based on race.

But it sure looked like they were.

So some laws were passed. These laws removed intent from discrimination...it no longer mattered whether you intended to discriminate if the outcome was indistinguishable from intentional discrimination. If it looks like intentional discrimination then it was. And it wasn't just ZIP codes, insurers and bankers, it was employers inferring from names or colleges the race of an applicant with that affecting the hiring process. Recently there have been accusations that higher ed has been using these same proxy indicators to favor demographics they prefer. 

There are other proxies, codewords, for race. Urban is a euphemism for Black, despite the fact that a lot of non-Blacks live in cities, but should there be a dramatic increase in Whites, that is decried as gentrification. So...maybe? Products can also be proxies. Remember Colt 45 Malt Liquor? Cadillac cars? Or...how about this: fried chicken. 

Maybe the recent council votes were not about traffic and drive thru congestion. In both cases these were fried chicken emporiums. Were all the requirements placed on the applicants just a way of saying no? For reasons having nothing to do with traffic or walkability? Remember, if it looks like racism, it is racism. 

Hillbilly Fan

The Cuckoo Nut Telegraph is humming with news that some dumb donkey elected official added some ludicrous requirement to the Zaxby's proposal: they had to install a sign saying idling was limited to thirty seconds. This is not stupid on the surface, it is stupid throughout. What about electric cars that the dumb donkeys want us all driving? Do they even idle? And most modern cars automatically shut the engine off when the car stops. So...right...yeah, that pretty woman in the Maserati...who's gonna tell her not to keep her motor running? 

Then there is enforcement. This is private property and even if it weren't the DPD is notorious for NOT enforcing traffic laws. [scroll down] Were they planning to fine Zaxby's if they did not enforce it, and who was going to check that they did? 

And who brought this stupidity to the party? That would be none other than The Ice Cream Man, who allegedly tried to inflict similar stupidity on the Life South project. You have to wonder if he really does have 78's by Hank Snow. 

But is it just stupidity, for stupidity's sake? To be sure, politics and stupid are siamese twins, but there is another explanation that makes stupidity a tool rather than a motivation. 

Meanness. 

The all consuming meanness of a bully. An angry bully. Is this the dark tetrad taken from the online world into real life? A bully delighting in torturing victims? This is a distinct possibility as the vote indicates that even when the victim cried uncle, the bully just laughed.  And this will continue as no one else on council will lift a finger to stop it, and, after all, you voted for this. Are you happy now?

Sideways

No, not the dog, may he continue to Rest In Peace, but about the traffic lights at Roberts and Chamblee-Dunwoody.

See? These are sideways rather than the traditional drop downs previously installed. Why the change?

Rumor has it that the city (that would be bureaucrats that run this show) were concerned that the drop downs were too low and might hit the top of trucks as they zoom thru this intersection. This is a reasonable concern because trucks routinely speed thru this intersection. Frequently.

You may already know, or can see from the picture, this is a no-truck-zone. You can infer that this means the city (that would be bureaucrats that run this show) has no intention of enforcing the truck restriction and is in fact catering to the needs of trucks violating the law. 

Isn't there a law against helping people violate the law?

They won't enforce that one either.

Drive-Thru City

What, do they just not like chicken joints? Two times in a row council has slapped down requests for drive-thru lanes for fast food restaurants. The last was a bit of a bitch-slap as the anti-drive-thru folks threw up a bunch of hurdles all of which the applicant cleared. 

And then the answer was still no.

Everyone knows the mayor has always had it in for drive-thru lanes, and god only knows what she thinks of Chipotle's digital pick-up lane as without an ordering box it is technically not a drive-thru. We also have an ice cream lovin' bicycle nazi on council so there we have two hard "noes" to any drive-thru and two unshakable "yesses" to  paving interstate lanes in your front yard.

These folks are dictators, pure and simple. They don't care what you want, what your preferences are, because in their world it only matters what they think is "right." They're going to do what they want to and frankly, screw you. 

And that's what will make this a drive-thru city, with the irony being folks are going to drive-thru on their way to convenience, which happens to be a Raising Cane's or a Zaxby's. With a drive-thru. 

Shocking Turn Of Events

It seems like years, but it was only months ago, that thru regulation and diktat federal bureaucrats were driving consumers to electric vehicles. It smacked a bit of the forced pandemic programs and perhaps successful implementation of those diktats suggested that agendas could be imposed centrally, forcefully. 

The political winds changed and all the Washington Wind Socks pointed a different direction. Suddenly the EV market had to stand on its own merits. It is collapsing. Despite several years of state and federal subsidies, EVs are simply not market ready, perhaps because all these subsidies encouraged individuals to purchase, at the same time discouraging manufacturers from reducing cost/price, anticipating subsidy increases to match price increases. It has happened before, and may well again. In the near future. 

What is interesting is that the Blue Bellies who felt the bureaucratic state's role is to constrain consumer choice, herding them towards implementing the Blue Belly Agenda gave no concern to obvious consequences, particularly the impact on electric generation and grid capacity. Higher residential bills to pay for new generating capacity? No worries...EVs are worth it. Really? Fragile grid? Straw...meet camel. Deal with it. 

And then came...server farms. These are not EVs. Some would say these data centers draw electricity 7x24. Indeed. They do. But we have about 300 million registered vehicles in the US. If these were all EVs, as the Blue Bellies want, each would draw around 75Kwh over a 4 hour period, and if they were all scheduled to even out the draw, it would represent 3.75 terraWatts, on average, 7x24. Enough to power 3.1 billion housing units in the US, where there are currently 148 million units. Perspective. While new data centers will use more electricity, they are a base load, while EVs will provide very uneven loads, thus straining the system. Either one, or both, will drive expansion of generating capacity. And we're talking dramatic expansion. 

What is interesting is that the Blue Bellies are avid, outspoken supporters of the one, and equally outspoken in opposition to the other. Will we ever find out the real reason for this?

SSD

Remember those? Dunwoody spent a bucket-load of money on server hardware, including adoption of Solid State Drives, notably more expensive than their spinning platter competitors. 

So what happened?

Well, now we hear that the city migrated most systems to the cloud, cited as one of the reasons they won an award. An award of suspicious value coming from what by all appearances is a lobbying organization, but that doesn't mean the cloud comment is untrue. But it raises a few questions. Did they decommission these [expensive] servers? If not, what are they being used for? If so, is this just another example of our spend-thrift government run amok?

So while they pat themselves on the back we're left to wonder if we will ever see fiscal responsibility return to city hall.

Laugh Or Cry

When administrative governments want to do something, it doesn't matter what, that they know their subjects will not approve, they do two things. First they hire consultants to tell their subjects, from an outside "expert" perspective that what the government wants is better than what these subjects might prefer. Then, as if by magic, some organization will pop up that hands out "awards" to governments who follow the herd, as if any award means they are doing the right thing, even when they are not. 

Dunwoody recently garnered kudos from  the Center for Digital Government calling out Flock drones and the "Real-Time Crime Center." It is the Flock technology that is of particular interest. Throughout the country. 

Flock cameras caught on because it allowed Blue Belly governments, who got spanked on their "defund the police" have found they can use this technology to diminish the police. Are Dunwoody police enforcing traffic laws in your neighborhood? If it cannot be done by technology, particularly cameras, it isn't going to happen. Blue Bellies like it that way. Some complain about a surveillance state invoking images from Orwell's 1984. This is dismissed with the wave of a hand. 

Then it got interesting. It was just fine when the targets of surveillance technology was regular Americans for the purpose of keeping them in line. And generating revenue with next-to-no effort. Cha-ching. Come to find out, Flock shares data with the feds, which was fine with local Blue Bellies when the feds were adequately blue too. That changed. CBP (who already had covert cameras of their own) and ICE tapped into the Flock system to do their job which includes controlling the border and giving free foreign vacations to interlopers. Blue Bellies are livid and are pulling Flock cameras. 

Ponder that for a moment. 

So, the Blue Bellies are all in with surveillance of their subjects for imposing their will on their subjects, but should the feds step in to impose their legal mandate on folks here without any legal authorization whatsoever, the Blue Bellies are livid. What are they saying? That their priority is to oppress the regular American while protecting folks who should be somewhere other than here. How dystopian is that?

George Orwell, a complex man of contradictions, was an atheist who attended Anglican Church and is buried in an Anglican churchyard. So one has to wonder, is he laughing in hell or crying in heaven?

Where's The Logic?

Our Navy has been shooting little fish in a big barrel, which some take issue with, but what has inflamed the antithisadministrationalists is a recent double-tap incident, where the target was not sunk with the first blast, so a follow up was used to send the vessel to Davy Jone's Locker. What seems to have some folks upset is that the first blast capsized the vessel, with a couple of crew members clinging to the hull when the second blow was delivered. 

Their outrage drips with insincerity.

Were the crew clinging to the capsized vessel any less a threat than they were when the boat was upright and they were on deck? Of course not, and if you think otherwise you are either an idiot, or suffering from TDS, or both. 

Think. Just think. 

Were the crew's surface-to-air missiles lost in the first blast? Of course not. Why? Because they didn't have any. How about their 50 caliber machine guns? Same here. Can't lose what you don't have. Torpedoes...yeah that's the story. No it isn't. This was not a torpedo boat. 

The fact is this crew presented every bit as much a military threat to the US after the boat was capsized as they did before: nada. 

So if you're on the side of "we shouldn't do that" logic dictates that the second strike is no more contemptible than the first, as the crew never presented an imminent military threat. 

If you're on the other side of the equation you might argue that any drugs they might transport, and there has been no evidence presented, these drugs represent weapons of mass destruction and transporting them is a terrorist act. After all we do have a war on terror. You might even reflect back on the English giving Native Americans smallpox infected blankets as you conveniently ignore that these drugs would be for paying customers. As in "market demand." The English were very open about their intent to kill the Natives, but killing addicts is just bad business. 

Not matter which side you favor, the second strike is no more an issue than the first. If you support the military action, then sinking the boats and killing the crew is justified regardless of the number of missile strikes required. Anything less is illogical. If you fall on the other side of the issue, then the second strike is no worse than the first, or perhaps it is better to say that the first strike is no better than the second, and you should be just as incensed at a one-shot kill. Anything less is illogical. 

How about we spend less time with hyperbolic partisan rhetoric and exercise a few brain cells.

What Is It Good For?

War, that is.

America's current relationship with war started after WWII, the last time the constitution was respected and war was declared. Since then, "war" has been redefined and very war-like activities and control of military actions have been delegated, by congress, to the executive branch. Over several recent administrations we've seen the executive branch taking military action without prior congressional approval and increasingly without notification. Arguably, America's use of military force has been more brazen of late, but this is a difference in degree rather than kind. 

Ever since the advent of the all-volunteer military, society's relationship with "war" has been transformed. After a few generations without a credible threat of a draft, many segments of our society, particularly the "elites" have little or no personal experience with the military, or even near adjacency. There are lots of folks, not just Gronk, who cannot get USAA insurance. Men no longer burn draft cards nor women their bras (wasn't America great back then?) and our use of the very word, war, has been transformed. Diluted. Eviscerated. 

We apply "war" to damn near anything, without having body counts recited every evening on the evening news...Goodnight Chet. We've had a war on terror, which did involve "kinetic actions" but more dangerous is applying the term "war" to non-military situations. We've had a "war on poverty." A "war on hunger." And when "just say no" fell flat and "your brain on drugs" reminded folks of a post-party WaHo breakfast, we now have a "war on drugs." 

Is anyone really surprised that the combination of concentrating power in the executive branch and the hyperbolic rhetoric around this "war" resulted in military action? Really?

Now we're confronted with deja vu, An Operational Necessity, the book, not the mission concept in OpNavInst 3710.7Q. The recent engagement in the Caribbean faintly resembles the situation in the book, with some key differences. There is no declared war. Only one participant is bringing military power to bear, though the French freighter was unarmed. In the war, the real war, the attackers were brought to justice, such as it was when the defeated faced the victorious, with the Germans fairing poorly. 

Today there will be no Nuremberg. No trials. But going forward maybe we should be a bit more careful when conflating the merely important with the truly life-threatening.