PATRICIANS: ONE. PLEBEIANS: ZERO

California is said to lead the way when it comes to cultural upheavals. At least that used to be the case before Governors Grey Davis and Ahnold turned the place into a socialist paradise driving industry to Nevada and driving taxpayers to distraction.

It’s bad enough that English has been relegated to a secondary language out on the Left Coast, supplanted by Espanol. It’s bad enough that the “Nation of Aztlan” has designs on “reclaiming” California, and most of our Southwest for Mexico. It’s bad enough that California is home to that bastion of Leftist “thought,” Hollywood, where actors and actresses, directors and producers believe fame is synonymous with political wisdom.

Now it’s been revealed that lawmakers out in sunny Cal aren’t satisfied with bilking the public with taxes. They also swindle them at the gas pump: http://autos.aol.com/article/news/_a/gas-cards-give-lawmakers-free-ride/20080926105309990001?ncid=AOLCOMMautodynlsec0004&icid=200100397×1210215986x1200620707.

While the driving plebes have to dig deeper and deeper to cough up gas money, the new patricians, the aristocratic class–aka, lawmakers–get a free ride, literally, with state-supplied gasoline credit cards. Ostensibly to be used for state business driving only, there are neither checks nor balances to deal with, although the guy in charge of the program says, “I trust them.”

Trusting politicians? What more could we ask for?

To perk up the gas perk, the state of California also gives its pols a free car so they have something to put the gas into.

Since California is the only state in the union to be so generous with taxpayer money, when you next bitch at the pump just be happy you live in one of Obama’s other 56 states.

(http://genelalorcom/)

RACE AS A TOPIC OF DISCUSSION

My grandfather often repeated the old saw that people should never discuss religion or politics since those topics often resulted in endless conflict with never a chance of resolution.

That advice goes back a good while since I’m a gramps myself now. I’ve never abided by it anyway since both religion and politics are sources of excellent discussion.

The advice is passe’ today but if politics and religion were still off-limits in 2008, another more volatile subject would have to be added to the injunction, namely, race.

To mention a person’s race either directly or indirectly today can raise more hackles than politics or religion combined. In fact, to say virtually anything about a Black candidate for public office in America, even if the reference were to his or her hobbies, printer paper, or favorite beverage, runs the risk of charges of racism nowadays.

Comments about Whites or Asians carry no such risk, for some reason.

Yet, volatile or not, and moreso now that we have the first serious Black candidate for president, discussion of race has become a top discussion topic mainly because Senator Obama and many Blacks mention it so often.

Obama himself initially brought up his race, (recall his line about not having a face that’s featured on our currency when he also, casually, mentioned that he’s Black), for a reason, not to discount his race but rather to accent it and suggest that Whites who voted against him were out and out racists.

A perfect stranger at a Fourth of July party I attended, having imbibed a few adult beverages, sat near the entrance to the backyard and asked everyone who passed through the gate, “Are you voting for Obama?” If the new arrivals said, “No,” he then said, “Well, you’re a racist!”

Funny or not, Mr. Adult Beverage was making a valid point, Obama’s point, that if Whites don’t vote for him then we’re racists, a transparent appeal to White Guilt...

(Read the rest of this article @ http://genelalor.com/.)

RACE AS A TOPIC OF DISCUSSION

My grandfather often repeated the old saw that people should never discuss religion or politics since those topics often resulted in endless conflict with never a chance of resolution.

That advice goes back a good while since I’m a gramps myself now. I’ve never abided by it anyway since both religion and politics are sources of excellent discussion.

The advice is passe’ today but if politics and religion were still off-limits in 2008, another more volatile subject would have to be added to the injunction, namely, race.

To mention a person’s race either directly or indirectly today can raise more hackles than politics or religion combined. In fact, to say virtually anything about a Black candidate for public office in America, even if the reference were to his or her hobbies, printer paper, or favorite beverage, runs the risk of charges of racism nowadays.

Comments about Whites or Asians carry no such risk, for some reason.

Yet, volatile or not, and moreso now that we have the first serious Black candidate for president, discussion of race has become a top discussion topic mainly because Senator Obama and many Blacks mention it so often.

Obama himself initially brought up his race, (recall his line about not having a face that’s featured on our currency when he also, casually, mentioned that he’s Black), for a reason, not to discount his race but rather to accent it and suggest that Whites who voted against him were out and out racists.

A perfect stranger at a Fourth of July party I attended, having imbibed a few adult beverages, sat near the entrance to the backyard and asked everyone who passed through the gate, “Are you voting for Obama?” If the new arrivals said, “No,” he then said, “Well, you’re a racist!”

Funny or not, Mr. Adult Beverage was making a valid point, Obama’s point, that if Whites don’t vote for him then we’re racists, a transparent appeal to White Guilt...

(Read the rest of this article @ http://genelalor.com/.)