The Mogadishu District?

 This came up today, and it's one of those stories to make you wonder about things.

The acting Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security (Ken Cuccinelli) made this comment over last week (after events of the 6th).

In some interview on Fox News....the journalist was interviewing Ken and wanted to hype that the 25k National Guardsmen were way more than currently servicing in Iraq and Afghanistan.  

Ken kinda agreed with her, then said it was basically the equal of a Army division.  Most former Army guys would let you know that when you start talking about a division....that's usually an invasion force and it's meant for real serious business. It's not a force for door-guard duty.  

Then he came to this odd piece of information about the request for Guardsmen.....House Speaker Pelosi wanted him to make sure they were armed with "crew-manned machine guns".  

I paused over that.

Typically, that kinda means that folks are in APC's or HUMVEEs.....with 50-cal guns, M249 guns, M-60s, or MG-338s.  For plain raw killing power, with three or four HUMVEEs set up like this....you could take down a thousand unarmed protesters real quick.

Did Pelosi even know what "crew-manned machine guns" were?  I have my doubts, and it was probably on some 3x5 inch index card that she was reading off, or she saw it on some war documentary.

Sounding like a Mogadishu-scenario?  Well....yeah.  Or maybe some Iraqi 'Green-Zone'.  

What's likely to come in the months ahead?  I think Pelosi will somehow get the President to authorize the Capital Police to have APCs, small armored vehicles, and a reactionary Capital Guard force of a thousand men available. 

In simple terms....this will look like some banana republic in South America and tourists will be scared of the landscape in DC.

How did Ken react to the request?  Nothing else was asked, and he kinda skipped the rest of this discussion.  Based on what I've seen in video action from the 20th....the Guardsmen had M-16s only.  

You just get the impression that things in DC are not that sane or safe, and the last place you ought to allow your kid or school group to 'tour'.....is the DC area.  

Who was QAnon Really?

 What QAnon reminds me of?

Back in the 1930s....the Ovaltine company invented this 'secret-ring society', where cryptic messages were passed around about Ovaltine (via radio) and you needed the decoding booklet to know that the message really was all about, and the secret ring.

You felt kinda important...even at nine years old....having the ring...listening to the secret message, and then decoding it.  

Here in this case (2016 to 2020) it simply went up 100 notches to the modern technology level, and the QAnon head group was probably three or four retired CIA officers working for some Biden-team lobby group...pretending to hand out secret messages in supporting the Trump agenda.

All fake?  No....just not the type of 'brand' or 'message' that most people would hook onto and feel as truthful.

Discussing VMT

 This came up in the week and it's worth a moment to pause over.

The new guy as Transportation Secretary....Pete Buttigieg....was being asked questions before his confirmation, and he came to the topic of a Biden idea....a 1-trillion infrastructure project (basically roads and bridges across the nation).

On one side....most everyone is agreeable to replacing or renovating a ton of bridges in the nation (more than 200k).  On the other side, no one can explain where this trillion will come from.

So Buttigieg stood there and said that he wants to create a vehicle miles traveled (VMT) program.  As you renewed your registration and got inspected....they would average out the miles and say you owe X-amount (probably figured to your registration fee for the tags, and be federally 'grabbed').

How much would this add up to?  Well....if you traveled 100 miles a day to your place of work....the general estimate would be around 1.7 cents per mile.  So you'd owe $1.70 (per day).  A week?  Adding up to $6.35.  A month?  Around $26.  But that's strictly for work-and-driving.  Then you add in the grocery shopping, your doctor visits, the veterinarian visits, the flea-market visits on Saturday, the pick-up of your pizza, visits to your cousin Earl, night-time rendezvous visits to the Piggly Wiggly cashier-lady who plays the banjo while indecently dressed, and visits to the farm-store for dog-food.  So your monthly tax is going to around $50-to-$70.  

Go figure per year, it'll amount to around $600 minimum and approaching $1000 for fifty-percent of folks.  

So there are three basic problems here.

1.  Would the 1.7-cent scheme stay there, or increase?  I'm of the mind that it'd go within four years to 2-cents and be hooked up to some type environmental policy that never makes sense except to 5th-grade kids.  At the 8-year point, it'd probably go to 2.4-cents per mile.

2.  How many folks would cheat and have the speedometer rigged up?  Ten-percent?  Twenty-percent?  Forty-percent?  I know some mechanically-minded folks in the Netherlands who can rig a speedometer system to any number you desire.  If you wanted to show only 100 miles per year driven....they'd rig it up to say that.  

3.  Why the big push?  Well....in ten to fifteen years....a fair number of cars in America will be electric, and the gas-tax business which pays for the roads and bridges....will be screwed-up entirely.  So arguing against the VMT is nearly impossible at this point.  

Just something to ponder upon.

The Landscape Shift

 There on Wednesday....poll-guru Frank Luntz attempted to run a focus group chat after President Joe Biden gave his unity-speech.  

His effort was geniune....at least he attempted to make this group of roughly a dozen folks an even split.

Control?  I would suggest (having watched clips of this)....five minutes into it....he was losing control, and by the 15th minute....things were going in a crappy way.

To make this work....Zoom was employed, which meant people sat comfortably in their homes or apartments and gave their commentary from long distances.

Shouting?  Yes....without any doubt.

Facts and counter-facts going around and disrupting the conversation?  Yes.

Just my impression....maybe at the 15th minute, it was all just a bungled-up mess.  

Explaining what has happened?  It's rather simple.

In the 1980s....a Republican and Democrat could sit at a table....pick up six topics and generally discuss the matter, with the difference of opinion amounting twelve inches for the landscape.  We really weren't that far apart on the six topics.

In the 2000-era....the same two could meet....pick up six topics and find that on half of them, we were pretty far apart.  The landscape?  Instead of a 12-inch situation....the landscape was now three-feet.  

In the 2016-period....the same two could meet....with none of the six topics being marginally agreeable.  The landscape?  It's close to twenty-feet.

Today, the two could meet....working with twenty topics, and find nothing agreeable.  That landscape problem?  It's now closer to sixty-feet.

What I expect in 2024....same two meeting?  A hundred topics with not a single one being agreeable.  The landscape approaching.....nearly 1,000 feet apart.

The Biden unity speech?  Maybe it would have worked in the 1990s timeframe....but we've advanced way past that point.  

If You Open Impeachment Wide Enough

 Yesterday, a Republican Senator (Cornyn, Texas) spoke and suggested that since a sitting-President was being pursued for impeachment.....there was no reason in two years (suggesting the Republicans would recover in the House, and the Senate)....to pursue past Democratic Presidents for issues.

Even dead Presidents?  Well...he didn't suggest that, but I noticed in social media that even that question came up and no one saw a legal stumbling block to say they were living or dead.

Now, an average guy sitting there would pause over this suggestion.

Yes, we could actually draw up paperwork and go after President Jackson, President Roosevelt (both Teddy and Franklyn), and even President Obama.  In fact, you could repeat this act every year.....going after virtually every single President.

The odds of this happening in 2022?  I'd say less than 10-percent...mostly because I see a 5-Senator advance with the Democrats.  

The problem for the Democrats.....we all got kinda used to this continued use of impeachment now.  It really wouldn't take much to start this retaliation business.  In fact, you could ease Senators, House members, and federal judges into this mess very easily....removing three or four each year, just for entertainment.   

It's a messy affair but we don't seem to have any limits anymore.  

State Chatter

 I had a chat with a retired guy in the states today....over the idea that DC will submit the paperwork to be a state.

He brought several subjects which I hadn't really considered.

First, states are run by governors.  In this case, a normal territory (past history) would convene and have an election.  The governor of the territory would be elected by the citizens.  The idea that the mayor of DC would just get the job?  No...that probably won't sell.

Second, after you have this election, you end up with a Governor, Lt-Governor, AG, and a list of a dozen state officials.  Each requires a staff (bulkier than what the mayor's office and officials had before).  Figure at least 500 new and extra employees than existed before.

Third, there's not a single place in the western world that is run by someone who is Governor-Mayor.  So in the end....a new mayor will be selected, or some 'manager' will be appointed.

Fourth, how do you handle the state legislature?  The city council?  Currently 12, with the mayor as number 13.  Would that mean that the city council disappears and become a legislature? Would both exist?

Fifth, a new state-house to be built?  Figure 300-million minimum.

Sixth, state police to exist along side city police?  Unknown.

In the end, I could see another 1,000 civil employees existing in this mini-state.

But now we come to the big question.....DC now gets 30-percent of its budget from the federal government.  With the enlarged 'machine'....their budget would likely grow by 50-percent minimum.  Who pays this?

Taxes going up on city residents?  Property taxing doubling or tripling?  Toll tax likely coming to the city to pay for its 'machine'?  

When you go to Georgetown residents and explain this....they will ask how they really benefit from this situation?  The poverty folks on the SE?  Will they be able to afford living there after the 'machine' arrives?  

The possibility that the House/Senate carve off federal property from the state's control?  It wouldn't shock me.....lessening the state by one-third.  

Maybe this is all acceptable but you look upon a tiny state that would be like half-the-size of Atlanta, and a lot of people would ask stupid questions.  Maybe all mega-cities should be classified as states?

How This Impeachment Will Go

 1.  Papers funneled into the Senate and accepted.

2.  Two to four days wasted on Senate Democrats presenting case.

3.  Trump and his entire legal staff refuse to show....saying a non-President cannot be impeached.  

4.  Around six Republicans will trash Trump left and right.

5.  Around the 7th day, they vote, and 59 is the final vote....NOT enough to win.

6.  Around this 7th day....someone happens to ask about security problems and note that approximately 100k people have gathered on the outskirts of the city....outside of the National Guard presence, and apparently intend to hinder the exit of the lawmakers in their vehicles home.  

Over the next five days, the mostly peaceful demonstration continues, and some law-makers quietly exit the DC region.....saying they won't be back for at least three weeks.  

7.  The six Republicans?  They will be primaried in the next election and lose in a massive way.  

(I should hint....I suspect one Republican will attempt to enter into the records the entire contents of the accusations against President Biden, and the Ukraine business.)