By allowing ads to appear on this site, you support the local businesses who, in turn, support great journalism.
We’re losing a seat in Congress due to governor and the Democrats
Opinion

May 1-2 would have been the weekend of the Ceres Street Faire. For a second year, there has been no Street Faire. You know why.

When things return to normal – and they will if we demand it – we all should appreciate life a little more. This government lockdown and the psychological lockdown needs to end. Lots of you need to quit being afraid of your own shadows – especially young people who have the least to fear.


* * * * *

At times I see the way the planet is going and just feel like saying, “Stop, I want off.”

But I persist while the masses become duped by a national media that knows they’re gullible.

Lots of folks have already said, “I want out of California. I can’t stand the politics, the homeless, the crowding, the taxes, the Democrats, the you-name-it.” So many have left that California may lose a seat in the House of Representatives, from 53 to 52. According to the San Jose Mercury News, it’s because “population growth has slowed in recent years, with some residents fleeing California’s expensive housing market for places like Texas and Idaho.”

It’s not just about the high cost of living in California. It’s also about fleeing radical political ideologies, Nanny State and high taxes brought on by Democrats.

The states Californians are fleeing to – Idaho, Texas, North Carolina, Florida, Oregon, Montana and Colorado – are picking up more seats. Not surprisingly, states each losing a seat are Illinois, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

Yes, Newsom and his cohorts deserve the blame. Florida is booming because they have a governor who believes in freedom. And the COVID rate there is roughly the same as California.

But if you’re on the Left, you’re in denial about Newsom’s growing unpopularity. On Thursday a left-wing group called the Courage California came out with a panicky sounding statement opposing Newsom’s recall as a right-wing movement. (And I thought it was about his iron-fisted totalitarian policies.) They say the recall is an “anti-justice and anti-immigrant agenda that threatens to set us back 30 years.”

Nice try.

Let me dissect their statement: “We call on all Californians who share the belief that no human is illegal”… (Stop this nonsense. Being a person is not illegal, but trespassing is.) … “every person deserves clean air and water” (there goes their outdated bogus dirty air and water narrative), “no one should go hungry” (you might if you choose not to work or can’t figure out how to show up at the countless soup kitchens across the country), “every worker should earn at least a living wage” (only when they get educated and develop skills that employers are willing to pay higher wages for but burger flipping does not rate as a valuable skill), “and everyone should be able to access affordable and holistic healthcare.” (Obamacare, duh).

They’re panicking, aren’t they?


* * * * *

I’m always astounded when somebody gets up at a public meeting and suggests that somebody shouldn’t be able to develop their property in accordance with zoning – as others have done – because they think we have “enough congestion and problems in Ceres already that we need to take care of.”

As long as people are having babies the world – and that includes Ceres which occupies 0.0012 percent of California’s population – will (guaranteed) see more traffic congestion.

Mr. Singh doesn’t want to use the property for “something else,” Mr. Yeakley.


* * * * *

I saw a meme that made an excellent point:

The KKK believes: “Your skin color tells me all I need to know. Once I know your color, I know exactly what to think of you and how to treat you.”

Woke believes: “Your skin color tells me all I need to know. Once I know your color, I know exactly what to think of you and how to treat you.”

Not a difference between the two.


* * * * *

If I were a parent today, I’d pull my kids out of public schools – like yesterday. Critical race theory is one reason.

The far left liberal Toby Boyd, president of the statewide teachers union which influences your kids’ teachers, came out with a statement on the conviction of former Officer Derek Chauvin, who was accused of “murdering” George Floyd in May 2020. Boyd pontificated on the verdict, making general statements to his belief that we have “institutionalized racism.”

I won’t support any politician or organization like the CTA that calls for the defunding of police.

There are no winners in the George Floyd case. If Floyd hadn’t passed bad money and resisted arrest, he’d probably be alive today (if he hadn’t later died from the Fentanyl he was abusing). The life and family of an officer have been destroyed because of Floyd’s lawless actions that drew police to the location in the first place. Countless lives were lost and businesses burned in the lawless rioting that followed the Floyd death.

I don’t think Derek Chauvin placed his knee on the neck of George Floyd because of racism. I believe Chauvin just had enough of the exhausting struggle just to get Floyd to submit to an arrest. You’ll likely arrive at the same conclusion if you watch the entire bodycam footage of the incident from start to finish on YouTube.

Do I think officers believed that Floyd would die? No way. Do I think they were trying to kill George Floyd? No way. Do I think they were trying to shackle a suspect who was resisting arrest? Yes. Do I think officers showed any racist tendencies? Not once. Do I think Chauvin was unconcerned with Floyd’s wellbeing at a certain point? Yes. You’ll hear on video the officers saying Floyd passed out when he stopped moving.

Boyd asserts how we need to hold those who protect and serve accountable – and nobody disagrees with that – but suggests that “everyone – no matter their race, background or where they live – may one day go about their communities without fearing for their lives or the lives of those they love.” Maybe you should fear contact with police if you’re passing bad money, selling drugs or doing other illegal things in that you’re going to jail.

Bad cops cannot be tolerated. But is there any way that Derek Chauvin got a fair trial in Minnesota? Not likely. The strange thing is that the comment section on YouTube showing the entire Floyd episode is replete with comments supporting the officer. The media purposely edited out video that shows what led to the arrest and death.

The average American is not racist and neither is the average police officer. It’s time that the Left and the national media quit trying to convince us that we are and that they are.

Boyd has an agenda: getting us to call on senators to support the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which bans chokeholds and no knock warrants for drugs.

Democrat Rep. Karen Bass asks: “how many more people have to die?” Well, Karen, as long as people do crimes and drugs and resist arrest all at once, there’s a good chance it will continue. The left has used him as a symbol of a liberal ideology that has fueled hatred of authority.

As his image is painted on murals on inner city walls as a martyr, we must be honest that George Floyd was a criminal who unwisely decided not to cooperate with police who are only paid to enforce laws we all must live by – and he died because of it. In one sense, George Floyd is a victim of the leftist ideology in this country and that is that minorities cannot get ahead economically without the help of politicians eager to break their necks to rescue them (for votes of course). Floyd was a product of generations of the welfare state. Derek Chauvin, too, is also a victim of the Left – he has been painted as a racist who enjoyed killing black folks. It’s the same left that wants to neuter law and order, go soft on criminals with their restorative justice approach. The same left that doesn’t think anyone should face the natural consequences for breaking the law and if that means fighting an arrest kicking and screaming and vilifying police then so be it.

The real problem in the black community is not racist white cops – it is that the majority of black fathers are AWOL.

Family breakdown is extremely important if we care about a child’s social mobility – the average child does best with married parents, and, more specifically, with their biological father residing in the home. Yet America’s poor children have relatively few involved or present fathers.

From 1890 to 1950, black women had a higher marriage rate than white women. In 1950, just nine percent of black children lived without their father. By 1960, the black marriage rate had declined but remained close to the white marriage rate. In the 1960s in steps LBJ with his Great Society welfare state, financially penalizing men for supporting their families. By the mid-1980s, black fatherlessness skyrocketed. Today, only 38.7 percent of black children have a father in the home. The rate of black out-of-wedlock births went from 24.5% in 1964 to 70.7% by 1994, roughly where it stands today.

In 2008, President Barack Obama said during his Father’s Day speech that “more than half of all black children live in single-parent households… children who grow up without a father are five times more likely to live in poverty and commit crime; nine times more likely to drop out of schools and 20 times more likely to end up in prison. They are more likely to have behavioral problems, or run away from home or become teenage parents themselves. And the foundations of our community are weaker because of it.”


* * * * *

Remember how the Democrats went berserk when Donald Trump’s letter and signature went out to taxpayers under White House “stationery” to announce COVID-19 stimulus payments? A May 3, 2020 op-ed published in The Chicago Sun Times written by Trump hater Lynn Sweet opined: “President Donald Trump hijacked what should have been a routine IRS confirmation letter into a taxpayer-paid election-year messaging tool sent to millions of potential voters in Illinois and across the nation.” She went on to say “Trump wants to give the impression he deserves the entire credit for federal money people are getting as a result of the COVID-19 economic meltdown, as if Democratic and Republican leaders in Congress were oblivious to the disaster.” She also wrote: “With Trump the top scammer when it comes to grabbing all the credit.”

Well, well, well. Seems Biden sent out a very similar letter with his signature on it and, crickets from the Left.

Such utter hypocrisy. No Chicago Sun Times editorial condemning Biden for doing the same thing.


* * * * *

But wait, there’s more hypocrisy I’ve noted in recent weeks.

Since the Left set interpreted Trump’s call for people to stage a protest at the Capitol was essentially an order to storm inside the capitol as an “insurrection” earned Trump removal from office, why is there no similar outrage over Maxine “Reclaiming My Time” Waters? Did she not stand in a street crowd in Brooklyn Center, Minn., and say, “I hope we get a verdict that says guilty, guilty, guilty – and if we don’t, we cannot go away. We’ve got to stay on the street. We get more active, we’ve got to get more confrontational. We’ve got to make sure that they know that we mean business.” Sounds like inciting violence to me. It was also disregarded the judicial process.

So if Trump deserved impeachment for allegedly inciting a riot – the media used the term “insurrection” ad nauseam –why isn’t there a full-throttled waste-no-time push to remove the 82-year-old from her 15th term in Congress? Where was the media outcry for her incendiary remarks? We know why, of course, because there are serious double standards. It was all about taking out the Orange Man.


* * * * *

Did you notice how everyone attending Biden’s speech last week before Congress was wearing a mask? This brings on a question in my mind. If vaccines are effective, why the need to wear any mask? Seems to me that the assemblage could have seized on an opportunity to make a statement, “We can get rid of these mask mandates now that we’re safe because of the vaccines. Ya’ll get yours too and burn your masks.” They didn’t do that because I don’t believe they trust their own advice. They also love controlling people.


* * * * *

Sen. Marco Rubio pointed out more hypocrisy on the Left. He noted that when Democrats sought to impeach Trump “ for the second time after he was out of office, they put 100 senators in the same room, sitting just inches apart for hours at a time, over five or six days.” But when Biden gave his speech last week to Congress, only 200 invitations were put out. Rubio noted: “Apparently, COVID was not an issue then. But now, of course, for something like this, we can’t have that many people in the room sitting next to each other. So it’s kind of silly season here. But that’s all right. It’ll be on TV.”


This column is the opinion of Jeff Benziger, and does not necessarily represent the opinion of The Ceres Courier or 209 Multimedia Corporation. How do you feel about this? Let Jeff know at jeffb@cerescourier.com