California Sees Their Gun Law Modeled After Texas’ Abortion Law Shot Down By Judge

By William Teach December 21, 2022 – 6:45 am

If the pro-2nd Amendment groups were smart, they’d try to get a ballot initiative that restricts the type of firearms that employees of the state can carry. No “assault rifles”, no magazines above 10 rounds, safe secure, all sorts of this nonsense. This would definitely apply to all law enforcement who provide protection to elected officials and appointed officials

Judge strikes down California gun law modeled on Texas abortion measure

A federal judge has blocked a California gun law that emulated a controversial Texas abortion measure — and which was intended to provoke a court fight.

The injunction from Judge Roger Benitez sets California’s law, which enables private citizens to sue manufacturers of illegal guns, on a potential path to the U.S. Supreme Court. That could set up a test of both laws — an outcome that California Gov. Gavin Newsom has sought.

“I want to thank Judge Benitez. We have been saying all along that Texas’ anti-abortion law is outrageous. Judge Benitez just confirmed it is also unconstitutional,” Newsom said in a statement Monday. “The provision in California’s law that he struck down is a replica of what Texas did, and his explanation of why this part of SB 1327 unfairly blocks access to the courts applies equally to Texas’ SB 8.”

Oh, such a burn, Gavin. Different states, bub, and abortion doesn’t appear in the federal Constitution or the Texas Constitution. Guns do. Abortion does appear in California’s Constitution. Guns do not, but, the 2nd Amendment applies to all U.S. states and territories.

Benitez also underscored the ties between the two laws in his ruling, citing Newsom’s condemnations of the Texas measure that deputizes citizens to sue abortion providers as evidence that the California gun law is unconstitutional.

“‘It is cynical.’ ‘It is an abomination.’ ‘It is outrageous and objectionable.’ ‘There is no dispute that it raises serious constitutional questions,’” Benitez wrote at the start of his ruling, quoting Newsom on the Texas law as evidence that “by implication,” the same is true of California’s law.

Gavin achieved a nice little legal self-own, failing to note that Texas and California are two different states.

In striking down the assault weapons ban, Benitez compared AR-15 rifles to Swiss Army Knives — drawing a furious response from Newsom, who excoriated the judge as a “wholly-owned subsidiary of the gun lobby and the National Rifle Association.”

Yet, Gavin is protected by those same weapons, many of which are fully automatic and illegal for most citizens to own.

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People’s Republik Of NY Passes Sweeping ‘Climate Change’ Plan Or Something

By William Teach December 20, 2022 – 2:48 pm

Well, hey, a majority of you New Yorkers voted for this, so, suck it up. No complaining

New York passes sweeping plan to reduce emissions and ‘lead the way on solving climate change’

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul is now empowered to enact a suite of climate policies that could drastically reduce emissions in the coming decades and place new mandates on individuals and businesses.

A climate plan approved Monday paves the way for New York to enact a “cap and invest” program similar to California’s long-established cap-and-trade system that would limit emissions and require polluters to purchase allowances to spew greenhouse gasses. It calls for electrifying nearly everything — from buildings to vehicles with a mix of mandates and incentives.

And she certainly won’t go well beyond what the law mandates, right?

But, she’s special, so, it’s OK

The Climate Action Council, which is dominated by administration officials, voted 19 to 3 to finalize the plan Monday with detailed recommendations of how to meet the state’s statutory mandate of cutting emissions 40 percent from 1990 levels by 2030 and 85 percent by 2050, with the remaining offset to reach net zero emissions.

The steep cuts will require electrifying millions of homes, businesses, trucks and cars, investing in energy efficiency improvements and successfully siting and building thousands of megawatts of new renewable energy projects.

Unanswered questions remain, however: how much will the transition cost a typical household; will the state Legislature embrace statutory measures required to make some components a reality; will Hochul embrace a price hike on gas and heating fuels and what electricity source will replace the gas power plants that currently dominate New York’s grid.

Answer: you know it will cost the typical NY household a lot, but, the Powers That Be will gaslight/refuse to acknowledge the costs. Yes, she will do things that raise the cost of gas and heating fuels. They can’t replace the gas power plants.

That includes implementing the “cap and invest” program — more commonly known as cap-and-trade — that would place a statewide limit on emissions, in line with achievement of the state’s statutory reductions and require fuel wholesalers and others to buy a declining number of allowances to emit. The limits would raise billions in revenue to fund various incentives, grants and investments also outlined in the plan.

Like the failed one in California?

New construction and major renovations will not be allowed to use fossil fuels in 2025 for smaller buildings and 2027 for larger buildings, based on the plan’s recommendations. That is expected to be implemented by the state’s codes council, although some environmental groups are pressing for a faster timeline and enshrining the requirements in state law to ensure they go forward.

So, in the more upstate areas they’ll have to rely on what when it’s cold and snow? I see a lot of wood burning heaters being installed, which means more trees getting cut down.

For transportation, it recommends lawmakers take steps to enact a revenue-neutral “feebate” program to increase the costs of buying gas cars and incentivize electric vehicle purchases; higher registration fees for higher emissions vehicles; a per-mile vehicle fee to accommodate the eventual reduction in revenue from the gas tax; and strengthen “smart growth” laws to avoid state funding that promotes sprawl.

So, artificially increasing the cost for the working and middle class? Great plan.

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If All You See…

By William Teach December 20, 2022 – 1:00 pm

…are horrible cookies which make people fat which is bad for climate change, but, make sure you don’t engage in fatphobia, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Powerline, with a post on the 12 steps to serfdom.

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Supreme Court Temporarily Stops End Of Title 42

By William Teach December 20, 2022 – 10:30 am

The point of having to apply for asylum outside the U.S. really should remain in place permanently, rather than allowing them in when most will not qualify, but, it will take years to adjudicate, and a good chunk will simply disappear into the U.S.

Supreme court blocks Biden from lifting Covid-era border restrictions

The US supreme court on Monday said Covid-era restrictions at the US-Mexico border that were set to end on Wednesday should stay in place, at least temporarily, as a Republican legal challenge moves forward.

The development came just as the White House had been attempting to prepare for an increase in the number of migrant crossings, even as some border cities were struggling to cope with undocumented people arriving and being obliged to sleep on the streets in freezing weather, especially El Paso in west Texas in recent months.

John Roberts, the chief justice of the court, on Monday, at the request of Republican officials in 19 states, blocked the Biden administration from ending a pandemic-era policy of rapidly expelling most migrants apprehended or turning themselves in at the US-Mexico border .

The Republican officials led by the attorneys general in Arizona and Louisiana asked the supreme court to act after a federal appeals court on Friday declined to put on hold a judge’s ruling last month that invalidated an emergency order known as Title 42. The policy was set to expire Wednesday.

A group of Republican-led states sought to overturn last month’s ruling by intervening in a case originally brought by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on behalf of migrants denied entry under the Title 42 public health rule.

The supreme court gave the parties in the legal dispute until Tuesday at 5pm ET to respond.

This has given many of the pro-illegal alien activists a serious case of heartburn. Of course, a goodly chunk of them never have to actually deal with the fallout of their policies.

Title 42’s originally-stated aim was to slow the spread of Covid-19 and was issued in March 2020 under Donald Trump, the Republican former US president, which proved to be an effective anti-immigration tool in line with his swath of hardline policies.

And it helped.

The rule has ended up being kept it in place by the Biden administration, amid policy and legal wrangling in Washington, and despite the protests of pressure groups that Title 42 is not an appropriate health measure and has caused widespread humanitarian hardship along the border for migrants fleeing dangerous and desperate circumstances.

No reason Brandon couldn’t extend it, right?

Amid signals that the White House continues to prioritize a message of securing the border and reducing irregular immigration, Jean-Pierre noted that migrants entering unlawfully could still be removed via other means even if eventually Title 42 goes away.

But, the Brandon admin has not been using most of those tools. Deportations are way down.

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Your Fault: A Climate Crisis Weather Nightmare Before Christmas

By William Teach December 20, 2022 – 7:15 am

You were warned not too buy all those presents and to go vegan

The weather nightmare before Christmas

Tens of millions of Americans will find themselves recalibrating – and in some cases canceling – holiday plans over the next week, as an exceptionally intense Arctic front plows across most of the eastern two-thirds of the United States during the run-up to Christmas Day.

Below-freezing air will push to the Gulf Coast by Christmas weekend, with readings likely to dip below zero Fahrenheit from Oklahoma to Ohio late this week. On top of this, a “bomb” cyclone (one that deepens by at least 24 millibars in 24 hours) will race from the Central Plains to the Great Lakes on Friday and Saturday, December 23-24. Fierce winds and heavy snow are expected to produce widespread blizzard conditions and shut down transportation over portions of the Great Lakes and Midwest on one of the year’s busiest travel weekends.

Heavy rains and high winds will buffet the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast before the front arrives, most likely bringing a burst of cold and a quick shot of snow around Saturday (Christmas Eve).

Sounds like a good time to travel, eh?

Every weather event now plays out in an atmosphere affected by the addition of greenhouse gases from human activity (mainly the burning of fossil fuels). This doesn’t necessarily mean that every type of weather event will become more extreme or more frequent as a result of human-caused climate change. Like weather itself, the effects of climate change can be variegated, affecting some regions and some types of dangerous weather more than others. (snip)

One intriguing line of research emerged from a series of surprisingly intense winter storms in the U.S. and Europe, as well as a surprising drop in average winter temperatures over Siberia. A scientific debate has now raged for more than a decade on whether the amplified atmospheric warming and increased sea ice loss found over the Arctic might be leading to more-extreme winter weather events in midlatitudes, even if winters as a whole are trending less fearsome over the long term.

As laid out in a series of papers, the core thesis is that the warming Arctic could be making the polar jet stream — and the stratospheric polar vortex it encircles — more unstable and variable. In turn, this could foster vortex displacement events where the polar vortex splits in two, or stretches, thus pushing frigid surface air unusually far south into the midlatitudes. The splitting and stretching could also be influenced by reverberations as the jet stream interacts with enhanced snowfall and high pressure over Siberia during the autumn months.

Sigh.

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NJ Passes Major Gun Legislation

By William Teach December 20, 2022 – 7:00 am

Of course, this only effects the law abiding, rather than the criminal element who doesn’t care about the vast amount of laws on guns

New Jersey lawmakers pass gun carry legislation after ruling

New Jersey lawmakers gave final approval Monday to legislation overhauling rules to get a firearm carry permit after this summer’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling expanded gun rights.

The Democrat-led Senate passed the measure in what is scheduled to be the last voting session of the year, sending the legislation to Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy. In an emailed statement, Murphy spokesperon Tyler Jones said the governor would “swiftly” sign the bill.

“Since day one of his administration, Governor Murphy has been vocal about his support for stronger gun safety laws in the state of New Jersey,” Jones said.

Is it good legislation if it was passed on strictly party lines, with one Democrat in the Senate voting against it?

The legislation scraps New Jersey’s current requirement that those seeking a permit to carry a firearm show “justifiable need” and be of “good character” to reflect the Supreme Court’s June ruling.

That’s the only part that is good

Other changes in the legislation include disqualifications for those who have been confined over their mental health, people who have had restraining orders as any “fugitive from justice.”

Didn’t they already have that?

The measure calls for the end of a paper permitting system that used quadruplicate documents to register applicants. It also would establish a yet-to-be created online gun sales portal.

So everything would be in the system down to the tiniest detail

It increases from three to four the number of endorsements from non-family members in order to get a permit. They would also have to be interviewed by law enforcement officials as well.

Huh what? Pretty sure that isn’t in the Constitution, or the NJ Constitution.

The measure also boosts training requirements, calling for online, in-person classroom and target-shooting instruction. And it would require permit carriers to carry liability insurance.

I’m not necessarily against training requirements, especially for those who are going to have open and/or concealed carry. Or, hell, for just keeping it at home. Liability insurance, though, is going to be a big, big problem, as you know it is going to be really expensive. For one thing, there really aren’t many who offer it. Having the insurance doesn’t really save lives. And it is an unconstitutional tax on an enumerated Right.

And none of this will reduce shootings and murders by criminals, who pretty much do not get any sort of permit. This will be going back to court the minute Murphy signs the legislation. It might fly if there were serious penalties applied to the actual criminals who illegally own guns and use them, but, NJ is soft on those people.

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Warmist Moonbats To Sing Climate Crisis (scam) Christmas Carols

By William Teach December 19, 2022 – 3:00 pm

They really just can’t help themselves, can they? No matter what’s happening, they have to bring their cult into it. But, hey, that’s rather an extension of what the far left does overall: everything must be considered in terms of their politics. They can never give it a break

Campaigners to sing climate change Christmas carols outside MP’s office

Environmental campaigners will be in Witney tomorrow (December 20) to sing Christmas carols with a bit of a twist.

The famous festive songs have been adapted to have climate change-related lyrics.

It is the latest attempt by a group called Robert Courts Watch to press the MP to do more on climate issues.

Robert Courts Watch was launched in July to ‘inform constituents’ about the MP’s record on environmental matters ‘and any discrepancies between what he says and he votes in the House of Commons’.

The group have been holding an Advent vigil, between 12.30 and 1pm, every Tuesday in Advent, opposite the Conservative constituency office in Witney High Street.

Good grief, what a bunch of wankers. It’s going to be 49F in Witney Tuesday.

At the vigil on December 20 it is hoped there will be a large enough group to sing some adapted hymns and carols.

Mr Kerr said: “This is a part of our efforts to move Mr Courts towards better climate understanding and action.

“Climate change is an existential issue, which our Government is not addressing with sufficient urgency.

“Mr Courts is party to this inadequate approach.”

It would be a nice start for journalists to ask Warmists like Mr. Kerr what they are doing in their own lives.

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If All You See…

By William Teach December 19, 2022 – 1:00 pm

…is horrible heat snow which will get worse as the world warms, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is The O.K. Corral, with a post on a guy who really, really likes soccer.

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Note On Down Times

By William Teach December 19, 2022 – 10:44 am

I’m sure you have noticed this site going up and down at times. Months and months ago I implemented several measures to attempt to alleviate the huge number of spam bots, hackers, and other bad actors. Not sure why they think getting into my little blog is necessary. And there were a lot. Sometimes 20K an hour from all over the world. Installed Wordfence, Badbot, and an SEO plugin (it has a measure to deal with bad actors). Initiated Cloudfar. Have a plugin that moves the admin login page. Removed the ability to login from the main site. Took out a bunch of sidebar widgets (unfortunately, I wacked one with my favorite posts). Deleted a bunch of unused plugins.

That helped, but only so much. Sometimes the server gets overloaded. Sometimes it’s only about 1/3rd, and still goes offline, have to restart it, but, I don’t know every time it happens. Sometimes it takes a while to figure out.

I wacked a couple more plugins last night that were active. One was really old, hadn’t been updated in quite some time. They might have been a problem, because, at least for the moment, things seem to be working better. Time will tell.

I appreciate your patience, folks, I really do.

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Excitable PRC Senator Padilla: Republicans Have No Plan For The End Of Title 42

By William Teach December 19, 2022 – 10:30 am

We’ve always had a plan: implement every measure possible to stop illegal immigration. Stop incentivizing people to come to the nation illegally/showing up at the border demanding asylum (which most do not qualify for, but, it can take upwards of 5 years to run it through the courts, and many just do not show up). Deport those who are caught immediately.

Republicans talk of ‘chaos’ at the border without Title 42 but don’t have better plan: Padilla

California Sen. Alex Padilla on Sunday pushed back against what he called “Republican rhetoric” around the expected expiration of Title 42, a pandemic-era policy which allows the expulsion of migrants on public health grounds.

“Here’s the biggest frustration for all the Republicans rhetoric about chaos at the border: No. 1, they have yet to come forward with a plan of how to better handle this scenario,” Padilla, a Democrat who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee’s immigration, citizenship and border safety subcommittee and the first Latino to represent California in the chamber, told ABC “This Week” co-anchor Martha Raddatz.

“No. 2, they have not been willing to commit the additional resources that the departments and agencies say that they need to handle this big influx,” Padilla said.

Huh what? The GOP is the party that has been trying to put more resources on the border, to hire more Customs and Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. Democrats are the ones wanting to cut their funding. Protesting them. Stopping construction of the border wall.

On “This Week,” Padilla admitted that the rollback will be a challenge and hinges in part on the funding and operations of the departments that oversee immigration at the southern border. He also directed some blame at former President Donald Trump, claiming Trump’s administration underfunded immigration agencies.

Trump derangement syndrome. Trump doesn’t fund anything. Congress does. Anyhow, Padilla sort of has a plan

Padilla told Raddatz on Sunday that “we do need to invest more in border safety and security.” But, he said, “we’ve got to do it in a smart way” in contrast with Republican calls to focus on erecting massive, continuous physical barriers. “The years we lost to the ‘build the wall’ debate was foolish,” he said.

What is a smart way? Raddatz didn’t press for answers. It really is simple: border barriers in high entry areas, lots of agents monitoring the border, and, it should be that if you’re caught you’re put back across the border immediately. If you are caught in the U.S. anywhere, no matter how long you’ve been here, you are deported immediately. This includes all the ones who overstay their visas.

“We know that whether it’s migrants — whether it’s you know, whatever the Republicans are afraid of, contraband, etc. — comes primarily through ports of entry. And so that’s got to be the first and foremost focus on border safety dollars,” Padilla said.

Funding was increased. And, hence the need for Title 42.

He has authored a number of immigration reform measures and has led efforts to try to get an immigration fix into an omnibus spending bill that Congress is currently considering.

On “This Week,” Padilla said that immigration policy should continue to be discussed by lawmakers.

“An individual, a family, coming to the border seeking asylum today is very different than the millions of immigrants who are in the United States already and have been here for years. Yes, in many cases undocumented, but working, paying taxes, raising families, contributing to the success of our economy, working in essential jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic,” Padilla said. “They deserve better than to live in fear of deportation.”

Yeah, his idea is that if they’re here, let them stay. Which incentivizes more to come illegally. They’re supporting bad behavior.

Meanwhile

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