I suspect that he is not alone in having had enough. And it will be the same for many other cities run by Democrats.
36 thoughts on “Goodbye, DC”
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I suspect that he is not alone in having had enough. And it will be the same for many other cities run by Democrats.
Comments are closed.
People: just leave me alone. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.
On the other hand, if he lived in New York and Potomac City that much, will he leave his politics behind, too. Or like so many others before him, will he vote for the same people (or ones just like them) who turned the place he escaped from into a shit hole? I see no indication of that sort of awareness in this essay. That his neighbors vote the way the do for a reason, and he shouldn’t be trying to change that.
Leave them alone as much as you want to be left alone.
Yes, it doesn’t look like he has become less apathetic, shown any awareness of the ideology that pushed him out, and still looks like he would “do his part”.
Most of us just want to be left alone. What happens when we are forced to pay attention to what is going on?
That is a great comment, Raoul. Just look at places like Colorado and even Arizona. People flee CA, but just turn around and put the same type of folks in charge in their ‘new’ place to live. Then they wonder why the troubles follow them.
Dunno if I should have the sads that a lobbyist left DC, isn’t that part of draining the swamp? I suspect he won’t go far and I’m sure a different lobbyist will be more than happy to pay him more for his house than he originally did.
Raoul I’m guessing he didn’t vote for it , he just upset that a majority of his distant neighbors did and will continue to. Not that Washington DC have a stellar voting record for mayor.
Until it became the Sex, Drugs and Rock ‘n’ Roll wing of the Progressive Democrats, the Libertarians had the philosophy of “I don’t want to tell you what to do, and expect the same from you.”
That’s what’s missing from so many of these self-indulgent essays on people escaping what they helped create. They wanted to tell people what to do, or put in charge people who liked to tell others what to do. They seem to have never realized that those people would eventually get around to telling everyone what to do, including our author here. They are finally realizing, too late, that they weren’t immune to these petty tyrants. Only now do they really want to be left alone.
I will give the guy some credit– nowhere does he have the obligatory “Orange Man Bad” disclaimer that so many of these essays include by the third paragraph.
Conservatives need to adopt an anti-big city plank. Giant “hive” cities sooner or later metastasize to take over an entire state by out voting the small cities. When (if) immigration is finally brought under control the present reduction of population will allow the break up of the big cities into small ones separated by miles of parkland.
Why do you want to regulate density? It lets you supply human capital, waste disposal, energy, information connectivity cheaper per capita and allows competition for services where rural often those services are controlled by monopolies. Yes have a certain point of the waste heat and pollution overwhelms the local environment to remove it but as long as we a free country, at certain points people would move out and self regulate that. The areas of high density also frees up land for farming and food production and other high land usage productivity.
San Fransisco has been the anti big city with it regulations limiting residence size and miles of a bay between it and the next big city. I would surmise it has all the issues that you complaining about. Now maybe it doesn’t control California quite like LA but don’t think their be much difference between a LA controlled California vs San Fransisco one.
Yes, the problem with cities isn’t that they are cities. The problem is the people who run them. They wont always be Democrat.
One of the long term trends in the USA is a lack of tolerance for corruption. This is a bad sign for Democrats running big cities. Democrats have a long, over a hundred years, and we’ll documented history of systemic corruption. It is one of the reasons Marxism is ascending in their party.
Marxism isn’t ascending just because there has been a core group of Marxists acting as the soul of the party for much of the last century or because Marxists are attracted to corrupt organizations but because Democrat leaders have been irresponsible and incapable of addressing issues their voters think are important. Is there any issue that Democrats think is important that has been quantifiably improved by their policies?
That helps create and army of Progressive Marxists and it has only got worse as they rigged their last two Presidential primaries. But while this has pushed many Democrats into wanting progressive marxist revolution rather than use incrementalism, it has also pushed a lot of the normies away from the party.
Time will tell what happens. Cities wont be run by Democrats forever but Progressive Marxists aren’t known for allowing people civil liberties or acting in good faith, so maybe they wont allow the populace to vote their way out.
Wodun there a marxist under every bush with you , could practically write the same thing about Republicans from a Radical leftest point of view and replacing marxist with name whatever leftest boogeyman except maybe Libertarian though that everyone boogeyman at the moment.
Here is something that democrats made better. Also if democrat run cities are such failures why is NY 8% of the United States GDP with 6% of the population? Why is first republican state without Natural resources(Alaska/North Dakota Oil Rich) 13th by GDP per Capita. Maybe if the republicans want to lead again instead of putting stakes into culture war bullshyte issues and do something about economy stupid. Though if they did they probably would lose .
How did the marxist/democrats rig this last primary election? The marxist guy got trounced once it got out of the silly states where the democrats are in the wilderness. Letting Iowa and New Hampshire decide a democrat would be like letting NYC, DC, Boston, LA and SF decide a republican at the moment . The normies came out and rejected the marxist.
is NY 8% of the United States GDP with 6% of the population?
Inertia? I dont know where you get your figures, but what was that in 2000, 1980 and 1960? Has it gone up, down or stayed the same? Is that per capita or in absolute terms?
Now do the same for Michigan or Ohio, as well as Georgia and Colorado and Texas. (Or compare the freakshow states– California and Florida.)
I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that New York’s percentage has been going down consistently the last half century. A single datapoint tossed out like this is meaningless and and example of why statistics have earned the reputation of being worse than “damned lies”.
The ones pushing all the culture war bullshyte issues are your heroic retarded Democrats. It’s a measure of how twisted your thought processes are that you’d blame Republicans for that.
Don’t forget to kneel. Tear down some statues, while you’re at it. That’ll solve the problems perpetuated by decades of Democrat corruption and misrule in cities.
Biden’s “platform” is a grab-bag of Marxist stupidity from the most insane idiots in his profoundly-ignorant party. That’s what happens when you let Communist handlers take over and run a gibbering senile man’s “campaign”.
Now get back to kneeling. Your enlightened Democrat masters say that makes everything better.
Their not my master Waterhouse , more tired of the Republican bull shyte , sitting senators getting in food fights with the NBA a owner, Reporters, Terrible NFL quaterbacks, Movie stars, and purveyors of delicious fried chicken sandwiches. I ‘m not even getting into the Presidents , please name a Democrat senator that was calling for people to kneel? Or for protestors to tear down statues? Representatives do not count all sides have their crazies once you get low enough.
Guessing best you find is maybe something from sheep boy but he never even won the general state wide election.
I suspect all the marxist crap that Biden plank has to placate the marxist will fall to the wayside. Like all the small limited government and balanced budget that republicans fill there’s with once they win the president. Speaking of which how the debt? For some reason I doubt that be paid down or stabilized by time Trump is out of office.
“Wodun there a marxist under every bush with you”
Democrats always deny the presence of Marxists in their party despite the core of the Democrat party being Marxist. Progressive Marxists control the party and at any Democrat event, you will have a witches brew of other Marxists groups that help fund, organize, and people the event. They push Marxist social and economic policies all while denying they are Marxist.
“Their not my master Waterhouse ”
They may not be your master but they control your party. All Democrats need to do to show they reject Marxism is to kick out the Progressive Marxists, and the host of other Marxist groups, from their party and refuse to allow them to participate in Democrat activities.
Since Democrats refuse to boot the Progressive Marxists from the party, no rational human being can say that the Democrat party doesn’t endorse Marxism.
As for rigging elections, Democrats have a history of that going back some 150 years. Ask Bernie supporters if they think the primary was rigged against him once or twice. Just google it. There are a lot of articles out there about how the DNC tilted the scales against Bernie.
Go watch some Yuri Bezmenov videos. Here is one to start with https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1EA2ohrt5Q
I’d send you to this one, but it was removed for, “Violating hate speech guidelines.” Looks like Progressive Marxists have started targeting defectors from the USSR for telling the truth about the roots of their ideology. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1EA2ohrt5Q
Not my Party.
No my party is the one that got over run by those who think the stars and bars are just swell. Who great grand pappys were for federal forces to force states to return run away “property” back to their owners in other states before calling for “States rights” after losing a election. Now adays seem to rinse and repeat want states rights when out of power but once in tramples all over it.
Closest thing to my party now is a few governors , 1 senator and 1 congressman. Though the congressman probably wouldn’t get along too well with the others.
As far as my defense of the democrats , I’m more just pouring cold water on your rhetoric. Pointing out facts to counter your bashing democrat run enclaves which have high GDP per capita than the “well run” republican areas you prefer.
Wonder why that is maybe the democrats funding of education produces more productive workers? But listening to you, Rand and a comedian or the former friend of Vlad that be impossible they are just funding indoctrination not making productive workers. Funny how Yuri talking about the soviets Communism taking over in a few years when instead guessing his former student Vlad has taken over Russia.
Though I like this video better in a more general sense. Hmm takes 15- to 20 years to indoctrinate a enemy I wonder who has been in power and has been well trained in these practices from a adversarial country the last 20 years? Just like a good Judo practitioners he changed the direction of the attack after finding too much resistance in one direction. Oh hey here is someone writing about the modern disinformation.
“But they will not address the fundamental vulnerability which Russia successfully exploited, which is the increasing social and political fissures in society and the resulting erosion of social trust in the U.S. over the past decades.”
I liked that last link. It supports a lot of what I have been saying about Russia. What it fails to do is note that it isn’t just Russia creating societal fissures. We have one party that views the existence of the USA as illegitimate. They have long hated the legal system.
The destruction of social institutions and replacing them with Progressive Marxist groups is intentional. Using the government to persecute dissidents and spy on Presidential campaigns was done in part to turn Republicans against the government, to destroy their faith in it.
People of different backgrounds getting together to be social is a great idea. But that doesn’t deal with the animating ideology of the Democrats. We had these social interactions but what has been causing them to stop are the Progressive Marxists taking over these groups and institutions. They aren’t interested in talking or live and let live. They want to impose their will on the populace whether that is a knitting group. the Boy Scouts, video games, literature, social media, grocery stores, transportation, sports, career government jobs, education, and every other facet of society.
What did the communists use to light their houses before candles?
Electricity.
As the op-ed notes, a lot of people were willing to put up with bad policy as long as they got to live their lives. This has been incrementally changing. As a “libertarian”, you should know that economic activity isn’t created by the government.
Wodun writes:
“One of the long term trends in the USA is a lack of tolerance for corruption.”
Boy I hope you’re right because the corruption has been rampant. I suspect it’s always been there. As an example, the history of the FBI in Boston is not one that covers the FBI with glory. Web search on H. Paul Rico and Zip Connaly will illuminate.
We like to think that because Washington didn’t want to be a king, that our society lacked corruption but our country used to be much more corrupt that it is today (IMO). Perhaps some types of corruption have grown as the federal budget has grown?
I could be wrong, but I think we have less corruption than in the past. That isn’t to say we have none or that it isn’t a problem though.
Well according to this we got worst recently.
Then we got stories like these along with a assortment of grifters.
The wikipedia link to perceptions of corruption isn’t useful without looking at the USA from 150 years ago and even then, the map shows the USA as one of the least corrupt countries in the world.
Saying we are less corrupt than we were isn’t saying there is zero corruption. ProPublica is far left and likes to focus on far left causes. You would have more ammunition if you found a site listing off left wing corruption and it would probably be closer to reality than the fever dreams of the Progressive Marxists at ProPublica.
8% number you can find in one of my links above with all 50 states from 2019 (Hint: Republican hyperlink).
historical well here ya Go for at least recent history
https://www.deptofnumbers.com/gdp/new-york/
in 2000 Per capitta gdp NY was 120% of US per capita, 2016 it was 128% of the US per capita. So either the rest of the us was less productive or NY got more productive and increased in population by 4% while also increasing per capita GDP. Must be very poorly managed and lots of corruption to get these figures.
Do you think it may have had to do with getting massive state budgets that people got to deduct from their federal taxes? Oh, gee, Trump ended that and now the high income people are fleeing those states in droves, which will further collapse their tax revenues.
NYC being one of the major financial capitals of the world has a lot to do with it and Democrats didn’t build that.
I read all of these comments tossing hyperbolic rhetoric around like it’s a food fight in here. Staking out tribal positions as if one side or the other of the Demican/Republocrat, left/right, Marxist/not-Marxist, socialist/not-socialist, whatever/not-whatever divide has any kind of superiority as a citizen.
In my view both sides are as egregiously guilty as the other, just shaded differently. Those on one side try to get you to do what they want/say by coercion, by using the power of legislation to try to get the citizenry to comply. Those on the other side try to get you to do what they want/say by bullying, belittling and patronizing those who can’t see the error of their ways.
Neither side appeals to me. On the gripping hand, those who try to look at the bigger picture and develop a trans- or extra-partisan framework for addressing the societal ills we face are of much more interest to me. The very folks marginalized by the nature of modern politics.
In my view both sides are as egregiously guilty as the other, just shaded differently.
So which is which? Which one is doing the “bullying, belittling and patronizing” and which one is using “coercion, by using the power of legislation”? Give examples of what you consider those things to be. For example, what is the equivalent on the other side to rioting, arson and looting that the Progressives have been doing to their own cities this past month?
Sorry, but this “pox on both houses”, above it all pose doesn’t work any more. Pick a side.
You’re not my mommy, you don’t get to tell me what to do. Trying to bully me does not aid your cause in my regard.
And I have chosen, and my choice is neither rancid party. Like the bumper sticker says: “Why settle for the lesser evil – Vote Cthulhu”, although I have been trying to find either a “Any Functioning Adult 2020” or “Literally Anyone Else 2020” bumper sticker.
I choose the freedom that my father and grandfathers fought to protect through service in the military. I choose the Constitution that recognizes my rights as a free man free to pursue the free life that I see fit to freely pursue, and your life as you see fit to pursue it. I choose to make my community a better place through my direct action (q.v. Moon Day in Dallas), rather than pay taxes for some bureaucratic drone to try to do it. (And yes, I do voluntarily pay my compulsory taxes…). I choose liberty, with all the rights -AND RESPONSIBILITIES- that go with that.
I’m not going to give that up to comply with your diktat to “choose a side”,
Why couldn’t you just provide a few examples? From what I am reading you say, you seem to think you are doing your part to support the constitution through voluntary tax payments, but brother, neither side abides by the constitution anymore. I see no evidence of responsibility from your comments here.
If you read the tax code, it indicates that the taxes you pay are voluntary. I was pointing out the irony of being considered as voluntarily paying what are in reality, if not name, compulsory taxes. Plus I wouldn’t want the spooks monitoring the interwebs to think I might be having issues with the IRS.
It’s not just the Constitution that everyone is ignoring. It’s pretty much all of the rules and regulations and policies everywhere. My landlord just imposed a $10 a month fee for rent payment by check (vs. online, which I refuse for the security of my financial information) which is not in my lease agreement, but it is now their corporate policy. If I don’t pay it, they will tell any apartment complex that I try to move to that I don’t timely pay my rent, even though I 100% abide by the lease. There are really no good ways to resolve it other than moving, which process has begun, and it’s an accumulation of those kinds of frustrations which are one of the underlying factors in the current airing of grievances. Corporations, Feds, Po Po, whomever, folks are kind of sick and tired of being dicked over at every turn. It also helps explain why useful idiots are so easily induced into doing stupid things by agents provocateurs. I made it a point of informing my nephews and their friends of how to identify them so they can stay clear.
Make no mistake, though. If the situation warrants it, I will be at the door of my business armed and ready to protect what I am responsible for. Same thing for my home. I am resolute in that regard.
If the situation warrants it, I will be at the door of my business armed and ready to protect what I am responsible for.
Armed with what? You do realize one side is a little more touchy about doing it with things that have triggers than the other side right? And protecting from what? Rioting, arson and looting?
“And I have chosen, and my choice is neither rancid party.”
Right now, all we have are two viable parties. Our duty is to pick the one that will do the least amount of damage while working to reform the country. Maybe twenty years ago, we could get away with saying it doesn’t matter who you vote for but not now.
I’ve got some news for you. Ignoring everything and hoping to be left alone until the mob shows up at your doorstep isn’t a good strategy because by then it is too late and if you follow what is going on, the mob is already burning down businesses and showing up at people’s homes with the sanction of elected officials and support of law enforcement.
I don’t know about this. When the protests in LA started getting close to the city limits of Beverly Hills the mayor of BH called the governor of California directly and had the National Guard deployed directly to Beverly Hills without the Mayor of LA, LA County or LAPD having anything to say about it. Same thing happened in West Hollywood and probably would have happened in Redondo Beach, Manhattan Beach, Hermosa etc. I didn’t hear any progressives complain about this.
A few days after the initial protests Beverly Hills did a big song and dance about how “woke” the city compared to Los Angeles and successfully let the protests through town without any trouble which further increased the city’s “woke” credentials.
Things are different in the PNW. Don’t think that it can’t happen to your city. This is a nationwide movement and they will get away with what they can and will continue incremental changes where they can’t get away with outright power snatches.
Doing the “woke song and dance” should be telling you that they largely agree with the Progressive Marxists and will implement their policies.
It is the Heckler’s Veto except that the Heckler and the Authority are all on the same side. They use the “protesters” to make demands and then the politicians say they have no choice but to give into the demands. The reality is the politicians and the “protesters” wanted the same thing the whole time and engineered the theater to give them cover.
What is the other side doing in terms of coercion? Well Mike Griffin’s obvious and stupid corruption and trying to get Congress to mandate buying a particular rocket engine. Richard Shelby trying to ensure certain government contracts ONLY go to certain companies based in his state who cannot even perform what is asked of them. To put it another if given the choice between Richard Shelby or Ted Lieu I will pick Ted Lieu any day and I don’t agree with Ted Lieu on many things and I don’t necessarily think all of his positions are even beneficial to his constituents(such as on healthcare)
Here is the problem with analogy stated. Boeing’s space division famously left Downey, CA in 1999 due to corruption and “high costs” and moved to “Conservative” Houston and Huntsville. Yet this same Boeing space division now no longer located in Downey can’t seem to produce any products that work see: Starliner and SLS. Yet SpaceX located just a few minutes away from Downey in another high cost corrupt California city, Hawthorne is having success after success after success. (I don’t want to say all of Boeing’s problems are related to leaving Downey but at least some are in a very problematic company)
Second even on this blog there are many who might complain about the high costs and corruption of areas like the South Bay of Los Angeles County but still continue to live there.
Boeing’s problems don’t come from “leaving Downey,” because they were barely ever there. That was still Rockwell, despite the purchase three years earlier. And they didn’t leave because of “corruption.” They left because they were pressured by NASA to move their high-cost CA human spaceflight activities to Houston, Huntsville, and the Cape, if they wanted to continue the Shuttle and ISS contracts. Boeing’s problems were created by HQ leaving Seattle for Chicago. And note that SpaceX is in fact moving things to Texas, and has given up on doing Starship at the Port of LA.
And I don’t know what you mean by the “corruption” of the South Bay. It does have high costs, if you don’t own a home, but it’s not Los Angeles. As long as I’m going to live in CA at all, I’ll prefer one of the nicer locations like Manhattan Beach.
I guess my points in response are no order of importance:
1. The South Bay(Manhattan Beach, Redondo Beach, Hermosa, El Segundo etc) vote reliable Democrat at the national and increasingly state level. Yes there are some GOP officials left but they survive by dissociating from Trumpism. That is why I implied that the South Bay was “corrupt” for voting D.
2. Almost all cities in LA county have their own idiosyncratic culture and history even though they almost all of them now vote Democrat. Places like Vernon and City of Commerce/Industry(with almost no residents are pretty unique not just in CA but the entire country.
3. There are well documented reasons why for example Beverly Hills fiercely resisted annexation by the City of LA which most Democrats and Republicans would rather not talk about. A big one is for decades the upper class whites in BH like Will Rogers hated the “blue collar urban ethnic” LAPD and wanted their “own” police force they could “control.” In an early foreshadowing off Trumpish they were actually harshly attacked by the early 20th press barons like W Randolph Hearst for “looking down” at the blue collar white working class population of City of LA. I suspect you could extrapolate this rationale to a whole bunch of upper class cities like the “Beach Cities,” Malibu, Santa Monica, etc.
4. The City of LA is uniquely problematic in many ways and probably should be broken up. Yet most Trump people I talk to think Trump is going to somehow bring back this golden age when the city of LA could be governed by a blue collar socially conservative white majority that strongly supports the LAPD centered in the San Fernando Valley(These people hate that Compton and Inglewood aren’t part of the LAPD). I would put at least one factor as to SpaceX pulling out of San Pedro to the fact they got a taste of dealing with LA City Hall and the found it quite hostile to the people they normally dealt with in Hawthorne and El Segundo. It is well known in the shipping industry that Port of LA is far more pro union and anti business than the Port of Long Beach.
5. My sense is Starship at this point is going to be technically hard to build anywhere other than at the launch site. Even if they did ship from San Pedro the would have to lay down the prototypes horizontal with structual impact we don’t know about. I have yet to see a picture of Starship lying horizontally.
6. Brownsville is the “black sheep” of Texas politics that actually looks more like a of the poorer parts off LA County than the rest of Texas(SpaceX is actually right at home in Brownsville) Unfortunately this enables the usual suspects in TX politics to continue shoveling SLS pork to Boeing in Houston(i.e. Brownsville isn’t the “real” Texas).
7. Boeing moving from Seattle to Chicago is still one of the nuttier decisions in all of business history. In fact by almost any account Chicago is one of the most business unfriendly places in America.
8. The GOP made a big historic mistake in incorporating LBJism-Stennisism into the party by letting people like Shelby come in. They would have been far better to work from the 1950s Eisenhower base they had in places like FL and VA and instead playing the same pork barrel games that the Dems used to play in the “Deep South”