Brainsnacks…Kapernick, Cash, Comey, College Diversity Nonsense Edition

A few Brainsnacks for a Sunday morning:

1. Colon Kapernick is perfectly named as he’s full of shit.

2. On January 17th your U.S. government sent an airplane loaded with $400 million in laundered money to Iran. They claim it was not a ransom for released hostages, saying the cash was necessary because they did not have a banking relationship with Iran through which to send the money. On the 19th (two days later) they sent Iran 13 identical payments each one cent less than $100,000,000.00 through an unnamed central bank for a total payment of $1.3 billion. Just by coincidence, the hundred million number is the threshold which requires Congressional approval. Draw your own conclusions.

3. Does scrubbing your email server with a high-tech program capable of even thwarting FBI forensics finally constitute the “intent” James Comey said wasn’t there? Why would one use such a program to delete supposedly innocent emails about “yoga” and “grandchildren?”

4. SUNY (State University of New York) is offering a course for its resident advisers entitled “Stop White People 2016.” The stated purpose is “help others take the next step in understanding diversity, privilege, and the society we function within.” The course says it will offer RA’s  “tools” to respond to “uneducated people” with “good’ arguments.” Of course you know who those “uneducated people” are.

5. Is it possible to have a viable welfare state? Yes. Is it possible to have a viable country with open borders? Maybe. Is it possible to have a viable welfare state with open borders? Absolutely not.

 

 

 

Two Too Late

Two stories are in the news today that should evoke the same response from average everyday Americans…… “Sorry, too late now.”

The first story has to do with Target and their stance on transgender bathrooms. If you remember, they instituted their transgender bathroom policy in April. The people weighed in with their opinion. Since then their stock price has dropped severely, resulting in a loss in value of the company reaching as much as $11 billion. The losses have recently moderated a bit to only near $10 billion. Yesterday they reported sales down roughly 10% and foot traffic down for the first time in a year and a half. At the same time they announced that now they are spending $20 million to install single-stall restrooms to accommodate however many of the one-third of one percent of their customers who are transgender and want to use the opposite bathroom of their physical gender. Amazing how a loss of $10 billion or so and a slap down from their customers can change things.

Sorry Target. Too late. I suggest that those of us who have learned to “aim away from the Target” continue to do so until they go away. Any corporation (or any entity for that matter) that shows that it is willing to ignore the safety of children to send a political message needs to receive a return message….. good and hard.

The second story has to do with the Clinton Crime Foundation. The largest slush fund in the history of the world announced yesterday that they promise not to accept donations from foreign entities if Hillary is elected. They must think the American people are a special kind of stupid. Hello? Her influence has already been bought. Foreign interests and corporations already own her. Swearing off future “donations” has absolutely no effect on the debt she already owes to them.

Sorry Hillary. Not buying it. It’s too late. You have already been purchased and you can’t undo that by saying you won’t be bought again in the future. That would be like Bernie Madoff saying he promises not to scam investors in the future if they’ll just give him more money.

“You can’t unring a bell.” (David Foster Wallace)

The National Ministry of Rainbows

 

   Today’s job report which said 255,000 jobs were created was said by the NY Times to “reframe the economic outlook.” NBC reported that the report “crushed estimates” and “blew past expectations.” Of course ABC, CBS, CNN, and the rest of the liberals’ Ministry of Truth chimed in with universal puppies and rainbows. Of course, CNN, NBC, and the NY Times most likely had to clear their stories with the Clinton campaign before release as they did during the Democrat Convention. (No, that’s not a joke; they actually did).

A realistic look tells a slightly different story. The overall 255,000 jobs number is a large improvement over both the previous month and over expectations which is good. This number helps to raise the average monthly jobs number for 2016 to 186,000 per month. On the other hand, that number was 228,000 for 2015, 251,000 for 2014, and 193,000 for 2013. You have to go all the way back to 2012 to get a worse number. The bottom line is the trend is still down. Significantly down.

When you break down the splits between public and private sector jobs the picture turns significantly darker. Private sector job creation in this report showed very little improvement. The three-month average for private sector job creation is now 158,000 as opposed to 169,000 for the six months prior to that. In 2015 and 2014 those monthly averages were 221,000 and 240,000 respectively. Trend = down. Once again, most of those jobs were “service” jobs. If you want to wait tables or tend bar this is a great market for you.

What does all of this mean in plain language. It means that overall job creation last month was up but almost entirely due to public sector (government) growth. Private sector (real businesses that offer real products and services) job creation is still flat-lined and both public and private sector job creation is still heading south. Put this together with the recent GDP report that said growth was going to come in at less than 2% and you have an Obama economy.

Call me cynical, but could it be that the word is out among government agencies to hire as many people as you can to “juice” the numbers for the election season?

And one final question regarding all of those new government employees……… What do tens of thousands of government workers produce exactly?

TOH to the Wall Street Journal for the numbers.