Random Stuff…

First up, an interesting take on the incoming Dem freshmen, from the Victory Girls blog, HERE.

The Camp Fire in northern California continues to claim more lives, HERE. I will be truly surprised if the final total is less than 200… 8000+ homes destroyed, 2000+ businesses destroyed, and over 52000 people homeless or displaced. There is apparently word going around that it may be a month or more before anyone can get back in, other that officials, due to continuing hotspots, gas leaks, and downed power lines.

The closest ‘big’ town is Chico, and they are doing the best they can, but that number of people all descending on them for services, etc. is overwhelming all of their services capacity. Apparently if you can get registered with FEMA, it’s taking two or more days to get a return call. And apparently one of the shelters where folks are staying now has a norovirus running rampant. My prayers go out to them, and to those helping to have patience, on both sides. Anger and aggression aren’t going to do anyone any good, and the LEOs are already on edge.

And this one is really scary, and a couple of counties over. A serial killer who may have killed up to 90 women over forty years, across the nation, HERE.

Then there is the weather… Colder, not warmer… More snow, earlier, HERE. This is for the NE corridor, and it’s raw, not hockey sticked or modeled, it’s ACTUAL data… Sigh

And some strange voting in Maine. I’ve never heard of ‘ranked choice’ before. I didn’t know that was even legal, HERE.

And this isn’t even getting into the Florida, Georgia, and California messes…

Y’all have a good weekend!

Comments

Random Stuff… — 18 Comments

  1. Northern California is a mess. The wildfires through summer and now have been devastating and based on all accounts, were preventable, had California’s conservation policy allowed controlled burns and more enlightened stewardship over the land rather than the “tree-hugger policy”. That doesn’t mean to much to the vast number of displaced people and to the crisis that the several fires have caused. It’s a tragedy of Biblical proportion to those people.

  2. Yep, Paradise will be very difficult to bring back. No place to live – no place to work – no place to buy food. A whole list of ‘No place to’. Sad, very sad. T

    The rock band Eagles had a song about a place called Paradise. A way different cause, but the effect will likely be the same.

  3. Ranked choice voting is legal as long as the state legislature declares it so, unless Congress decides otherwise, or until some court somewhere decides it violates the 14th amendment. Article I Section 4 Clause 1: “The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.”

  4. Yet, CA has open arms to illegal immigrants with all the benefits that true Americans have a difficult time getting. To hell with the citizens, let the caravan in at all cost… if the divert in that direction.

    • California has experienced droughts lasting decades or even a century or more, has essentially no rain from May to October (this year it’s looking like December) and while expanding its population drastically – including those illegals – hasn’t built significant water storage capacity in 50 years or more.

      That doesn’t directly cause fires, but it has pushed residential development into previously sparsely populated parts of the state, often marketed as gracious rural living. The more affluent residents are often kneejerk “environmentalists.” California is now a one party state, with the ruling Dems ranging from pink to Red, generally well leavened by corruption and cronyism. Willie Brown, Kamala Harris’…. political mentor, is a prime example.

      The environmentalists’ impact has been to choke the forests with unharvested dead trees, reduce grazing and strategic brush clearance, and keep PG&E from keeping trees and brush away from its power lines.

      That doesn’t specifically cause fires, but it makes them much worse when they happen. In the name of reducing the state’s carbon footprint by saving the trees (never mind that dead trees don’t use CO2) the stage was set for fires much more devastating to the forest than even clear cutting, let alone good management, would be.

      One of the big fires of recent years dumps more CO2 into the air than all the Teslas and other electric cars in the state can offset. It’s a good thing that CO2 is only one relatively minor factor in climate change, isn’t it?

      Oh, and California has ranked choice voting, too.

      • Re: Water

        California should have invested in desalination of ocean water decades ago.

  5. LL- That it is. My family is directly affected in this one.

    Anon- Point.

    TOS- Thanks, didn’t know that. Sigh…

    CP- THAT is where all the money is going, NOT to the actual citizens.

  6. I have had Californians rail at me for living in “Hurricane Hell” which I have always found interesting considering the fire potential and the earthquake potential not including the drought potential of most of California.

    As to Florida voting, last machine count Gollum got +1 vote, yes, one additional vote, while Scott lost fewer votes than Nelson, so… interesting times. So nice to see the candidates that conceded and then unconceded have to resort to poo-flinging legal arguments to try to steal the election. At least this time the blatant actions by the SOEs of Broward and Palm Beach County will finally resort in state, and possibly federal, action which will finally stop the shenanigans that have been going on long before the 2000 election. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that the forces of Good (to an extent) win over the forces of Darkness, or something like that.

  7. Peter- Well said, and I wasn’t aware that kind of voting was there too, but it makes sense, sadly…

    Ed- Agreed!

    Beans- Thanks for the update!

  8. Ranked-choice voting in California primaries placed two Dims on the ballot and NO Republicans.
    2018 is just practice for stealing 2020 for the Commies (why mince words?).

  9. Just to be clear, California doesn’t have ranked choice voting statewide, but it is used in several California municipalities for municipal elections. For the state and federal offices (and in other municipalities) California has the hideous “jungle primary” which is a different abomination. Several municipalities in other US states have switched to ranked choice voting, but Maine is the first state to adopt it for state and federal races.

  10. Ranked choice isn’t exactly legal in Maine. It’s a case of “Well, we can twist this part of the Maine Constitution to NOT apply to federal elections because it says ‘state’, and it’ll let us get our way…”

  11. I don’t see the problem with “ranked choice” voting.

    Just to be sure that we are talking about the same thing (we call our system “preferential voting”):

    You give the candidate to whom you least object the rank of “1”, then work down your personal list.

    If a majority (50%+1) of people voting (here, voting is compulsory) dislike that candidate the least, he/she wins.

    If not, then the votes for the candidate with the fewest “1” votes are distributed to the others based on their SECOND ranking.

    If nobody has a majority now, then rinse and repeat.

    In essence it is not any different to having a large field of candidates, and holding multiple “run-off” elections if nobody gets 50%+1 votes, but eliminating only the least popular each time.

    As a result, there is no arbitrary cut-off for inclusion in a “run-off” election. Imagine 4 candidates – C1, C2, C3, C4; C1 gets 45%, C2 gets 22.5%, C3 gets 22.4%, C4 gets 10.1%
    Having a run-off between candidates C1 and C2 would be unfair to C3, who isn’t all that much more disliked than C2.
    In our system , since C1 is clearly most popular, but not to 50%+1 voters, we then distribute votes cast for C4 among the other candidates based on “if I can’t have C4, then I prefer xx”.
    If that puts C1 over the line, then C1 wins, if not then votes for C3 are distributed based on their second choice. Since that leaves it as an election between two, one wins (unless the statistically unlikely draw occurs).

  12. Unfortunately, I’m afraid most, if not all, of the “missing” list is going to roll over into the “dead” list.

    And it won’t matter. For liberals, the greater cause is worth any number of casualties.