The Tesla Mess Was Right In Front of Us All Along

Musk says he's cracking under the stress of the Tesla job...

...and the SpaceX job,

and the Boring Co. job,

and, previously, the SolarCity job.

Your CEO must have only 1 job.

THIS IS BAD GOVERNANCE and the Tesla Board of Directors is at fault.  It's 101, so obvious. 

Silicon Valley has a habit, a culture, of flouting governance norms in the name of supporting "founder" personalities (see Dorsey, Jack) and it's wrong.  Shareholders deserve what they get.

The End of the Cult of Musk?

Ambien?

"No one reviewed my tweet"...?

Utter, rank garbage.  This is not the behavior of a CEO and the Board should remove Musk.  They should have done so awhile ago, but Tesla has a supine BoD for a reason, because Tesla is the plaything of a charlatan and their role is to preserve that.

I've said it so many times before, Musk is a charlatan.  Years from now we'll look back on him no differently from Ken Lay or Elizabeth Holmes.  And Tesla will owned by GM, Ford (or Saudi Arabia).

Ah Yes, That Quaint Little Beach Town

How and why did this rank propaganda get unleashed?

Inside the affordable beach town where the Miss America pageant takes place

"Affordable beach town"???

WTF.  Try...'sleazy, decrepit, bankrupt, union-run/pillaged, gambling' center.

Recently Appointed Nobody Sues POTUS

What?  Only a month or so on the job and she's suing the President of the United States...

Seems pretty bold to me.  Do you think that was why she was selected???  Hmm...

Trump to Canada: Vote This Putz Out

Yes, tactically it's very ugly, and it may well backfire...

...but what Trump is doing here is to encourage Canadians to vote Trudeau out of office next year.  That's why Trump's made a mockery of Trudeau's silly gender-focused G-7 summit and attacked the PM personally. 

Meddling in elections, say you?  Maybe (it's done all the time), but think of it this way...Trump is merely nudging Canadians to do what they kinda wanna do already.  Trudeau isn't all that popular.  Ontarians just elected Doug Ford, not just a political competitor to Trudeau's Libs, but more or less the antithesis of Trudeau.

The Loonie is in no great shape, so US-made goods are more expensive for Canadians.  Is it really worth it just to have a leader with boy-band looks to represent Canada on the world stage?  I doubt most Canadians think so. 

It can't be any fun to be insulted by the likes of Trump if your Canadian, but the raw truth is this...Canadians elected Trudeau in a fit of Obama envy.  Before they realized that Obama was an empty putz, it was too late.  But if you wanted an Obama-like leader then you have to suffer the pain of being walked all over, much like we here in the US did at the hands of people like Putin, Assad and others.

What the Fuck Is Justin Trudeau Talking About?

First off, the guy doesn't even have his numbers in the ballpark...

“What’s the U.S. debt approaching now, is it a trillion dollars?” he said, though it was unclear if he was referring to the debt or deficit.

Well, he said "debt" so we should assume he means debt.  No, our debt, sadly, isn't a trillion dollars. Way more than that actually.  At least a factor of 10, Prime Minister Heartthrob.

I understand where this is coming from, he's dizzy after coming off such a bad week.  He boxed himself into a corner and was forced to do what a huge chunk of his supporters would consider heresy - he spent $4.5 billion of Canadian taxpayer dollars to buy...an OIL PIPELINE!!   He has done the Obama-thing in hitting the sour spot, wherein you please no one - his hipster green supporters have to be aghast and fiscally-minded right-leaning folks are probably not thrilled with the use of federal dollars.

All this and more has been driving the value of the Loonie down against the USD, so all things made-in-America are now more expensive for everyday Canadians.  This is the backdrop to his ostensibly tough stance on trade, a $16 billion dollar-for-dollar retaliatory tariff package.  Um, someone ought to tell his Heartthrobness that a country of 330 million peeps can absorb $16 billion easier than a country of 30 million souls.  Canadians will now have to pay $16 billion in tariffs on certain goods AND with a weaker currency...take THAT Americans!

So, he's a little disoriented.  So what does an empty lefty do to regain ballast...talk gender/race stuff.

Trudeau is set to stress gender measures when G-7 leaders meet on June 8 and 9. “This is an argument, and a very compelling argument, that you create better success, better growth for our countries and our world when we include women,” he said.

Maybe if Saudi Arabia or Iran were part of the G-7 then we'd have something here, but the G-7 is already the choir on this gender stuff (hint: Germany and the UK are run by women), but preach he will.

Meanwhile, every business leader across Canada is lamenting the loss of competitiveness and the resurgence of a reputation for ineptitude but the Prime Minister is going to trot out the standard platitudes when Canada takes center stage for a few days by hosting the G-7.  It won't be an embarrassment on par with this, but it'll be embarrassing nonetheless.

To all my Canadian friends and associates:  "I feel for ya', eh."

I Warned You About Elon Musk

There have been red flags about Elon Musk aplenty.  I warned a few times.

This latest is no surprise. 

Remember, all Tesla has proven is that they can build a very expensive car that appeals to very rich people.  All the rest is speculative. 

My prediction:  Tesla craters and is owned by GM or Ford or some entity like that 5 years from now.

The Future Hits a Pothole

Well, the tech-Utopia that our elitist Silicon Valley maestros intended to bring has hit a pothole...Facebook has been co-opted in the peasant revolt that is the Trump presidency, and self-driving cars are running over people, killing them.

Whoops. 

But the future is coming...um, er, stay tuned.  In the meantime, tweet or something...

Presto! NY Times Turns Story About White-Owned Land Theft into Story About Anti-Muslim Bias

Absolutely nowhere in this NYTimes article does it mention that a) white South African farmers are under the threat of violence, that murders of farmers have been on the rise, b) the government's call for expropriation of land is identical to what occurred in Zimbabwe and resulted in widespread violence and numerous murders of white farmers and farm workers, black and white alike. 

You want the real skinny, you have to go somewhere else, like here.

Nope, no context at all.  But they did manage to smear the Aussies over what the Crimes feels is anti-Muslim bias.  Well done NYT.

On a final note, after the violent expropriation of white-owned farmland in Zimbabwe, agricultural production in what was once the "bread-basket" of southern Africa plunged and famine swept across the country.  Likewise, the key export crop, tobacco, which Zimbabwe was the sixth largest producer of in the world, fell to 20% of its 'pre-reform' levels.  Ironically, many white farmers, to avoid the violence, simply fled across the borders to Zambia, Mozambique or Malawi and contributed to agricultural booms there.

Well done, Ramaphosa.

Idiot President Steals Globalists' Stage Right Before Their Eyes

Remember folks...Trump is an idiot.

Nonetheless, out of sheer happenstance (because he's an idiot, remember), Trump has managed to steal the limelight and suck all the oxygen out of the world's premiere globalist gabfest and turn it into a commercial for doing business in America.  Scott Adams call your office.

Years ago I recall headlines such as "The Committee to Save the World" in regards to Davos, and many other such fawning coverage of this gathering of eminences, as if we should all bow down before it. 

I can't think of anything more delightful than Trump taking this insufferable, self-important confab and essentially stealing it from all the assorted elitist dickheads who typically attend.  All the headlines prior to were dread and fraught anticipation about Trump's attendance and all the headlines during are what he'll say, and all the headlines after will be "what just happened?"

He stole the thing, it's gone. Bwahahahahha and all that.  Not bad for an idiot.

Prediction:  In a year, Davos will have lost alot of luster among global elites.  If Trump can waltzed in and mess it up, what's the point.  There will be much less hype and excitement next year after Davos has been stained by Trump.  Genius.

Shelby Steele Says the Unsayable in re Race Relations

This Shelby Steele article is pure genius.  It has more wisdom on race relations in America today than a decade's worth of NY Times yammering.

Here are key excerpts with my translations and/or observations I've made here over the years.

We blacks have lived in a bubble since the 1960s because whites have been deferential for fear of being seen as racist. ...  It causes whites to retreat into deference and blacks to become nothing more than victims.

Yup, if the rules are stupid and/or stacked so that everything is racist, well, we're not gonna engage.  No engagement means no progress.

 What is remarkable about this response is that it may foretell a new fearlessness in white America—a new willingness in whites (and blacks outside the victim-focused identity) to say to blacks what they really think and feel, to judge blacks fairly by standards that are universal. 

This is both so sad and too long in coming.  You can't demand to be taken seriously and also be treated like children as well...pick one.  If this is true, which i doubt it is, blacks should welcome this...being treated fairly and honestly, despite a difficult message, is the sign of acceptance.

 To a degree, black America’s self-esteem is invested in the illusion that we live under a cloud of continuing injustice.

This is an incendiary claim and rubs a raw wound, but it has much truth to it.   There is alot of black failure out there - broken families and all that, but also in collective performance.  I've pointed this out before - Baltimore, Newark, Detroit...places where blacks run the show have deep deep problems and lag the nation in livability by a wide margin.  When you mismanage whole cities and doom whole generations of kids to poorly educated status, well...better look for the BIG excuse.

Another Round to Trump

Hey, I'm gonna be an amateur Scott Adams for a day and dissect what Trump is doing.  So here goes...

Trump is using a well-known and excellent tactic to deal with his political enemies and detractors that goes like this...

1) pursue a posture or policy stance that goes under- or unarticulated;
2) allow it to receive enormous criticism from all quarters, detractors as well as supporters, who think they detect the logic in it but are bewildered at the lack of promotion and who start to second guess;
3) after everyone has positioned themselves farther out on the limb (political enemies being farthest out on that limb);
4) saw off that limb..watch enemies fall to ground and hurt themselves

Trump baited anyone and everyone to question his sanity only to have this hit the news today...

“I have no concerns about his cognitive ability,” Dr. Ronny Jackson told reporters on Tuesday.

Jackson told reporters Trump scored 30/30 on the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, which according to its website is a “cognitive screening test designed to assist Health Professionals in the detection of mild cognitive impairment...”

Whoops, all that raving about his cognitive ability looks dumb...another round to Trump.

C'mon, Really. Is Haiti NOT a Shithole?

Trump's vulgarity is sort of a divine palliative intervention to our accumulated nuttiness...in other words, he was sent to us to say the things that we have bullied ourselves out of saying...

I mean really...is Haiti NOT a shithole? 

Seriously, regardless of the color of the skin of its inhabitants, I think it is fairly inarguable that it is a shithole. 

In all seriousness, Trump's question is inelegantly phrased and somewhat off the mark, but it is closer to the fundamental question of immigration policy than anything I've heard from anybody yet.  And that question is "Does the USA have the right to decide who can come to this country or does any person, of any circumstance, have the right to come here regardless of what our laws say?"

We either do or do not, as a sovereign nation, have choices in regards to who comes here.  Then it is a question of how we make those choices.  All I hear from the left, is no, we do not have choices, everybody and anybody can come, and if you don't like it, you're a racist.

A Boatload of Crap from Bloomberg News

In re the tax reform and the GOP's capping of the SALT deduction...

Republican Senate and House negotiators in Washington agreed last week on a $10,000 cap on state and local tax deductions, or SALT. In high-tax states, that’s bad news. Personal taxes are poised to rise for 13 percent of New Yorkers and 11 percent of California and New Jersey residents, according to an analysis by left-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, conducted after the bill’s final details were announced.... tax experts are already formulating ways to stop the feds from grabbing more take-home pay from Californians, New Yorkers and New Jerseyans while folks across America buy boats with the money they save.

Screw yourself Bloomberg News.  Let's talk about boats...but first this...

In high tax states like New York and New Jersey, politicians have handed the state finances over the government employees' unions who have raped their respective states with unconscionable feather-bedding, resulting in escalating fiscal distress.  Connecticut and it's capital, Hartford, are circling the fiscal drain. New Jersey can't find the cash to fund those insane union pension obligations.  New York is only getting by due to the insanely miraculous economic engine that is New York City.  Without its global appeal as a place of business and tourist playground, New York state is bankrupt every which way to Sunday.

Government employees routinely game the rules to accumulate overtime and sick days (often not even really worked) so that over a 15-20 year career they can get a one-time payout in addition to their pension.  Cops, firemen, sanitation workers and teachers, if they play the game right, can retire with a $100,000+ pension and a mid-six figure lump some payout, cheekily referred to by those in the know as...wait for it...a "boat check." 

Your average cop or fireman from up north takes that check, buys a boat, moves to somewhere like South Carolina where that fat pension goes alot farther.  You could fill a small bankrupt city (like Hartford!) with all the public employee retirees kickin' back and living the good life somewhere in NC, SC, GA, Fla.

CNBC Kinda Right About Dem Mal-Practice Over Tax Reform

As usual CNBC doesn't quite get it, but they sure come close...

It looks like the Republican tax reform bill is now a lock to pass in Congress and get signed into law, handing the GOP its first major legislative victory.

...

But the other big story here is how the Democrats dropped the ball and failed their own base by failing to stop the bill.

I'm not sure Dems could have blocked this thing, they were likely relying on - a good bet actually - the GOP's inability to herd the cats and enforce party discipline the way the Dems do.  But a good plan doesn't mean assured success.  The GOP surprised everybody by both acting fast and coming together. 

Where CNBC gets it right is that the Dems have expended their energy in an orgy of nuttiness and "hot-button" issues that only touch a small minority of Americans' hot buttons (hard core Dems).  Yes, vituperating about sexual assault, wearing pussyhats, and tilting at impeachment windmills are NOT talking intelligently about tax policy and economic vitality.  Still, even then, it's not clear that Americans would have responded to their message if Dems had not taken their eyes off the ball.

People's 401Ks are exploding in value, companies are hiring, and economic optimism is getting up off the floor after eight years of Obama.  Walk into any small business across America, it's so obvious they feel it's due to Trump...and if Trump is saying this tax reform will deliver more of the same, folks are gonna believe Trump.  All the more so because the media says it won't.

Manchurian Candidate Update...

Here's what I said back in 2015...it seemed rather conspiratorial back then...

Call me a conspiracy theorist, but given the magnitude of how this shifts the balance of power in the Middle East, combined with Valerie Jarrett's background/influence and the fact that there was an ocean of untraceable credit card donations to Obama's election campaign (they actively turned off monitoring software, lest you forget), I'm inclined to believe a Manchurian Candidate plot more and more.

But recent revelations are proving me a tad prescient and perhaps not all that conspiratorial ...

On Sunday night, Politico sent an email previewing an another investigative article alleging that the Obama administration had “derailed an ambitious law enforcement campaign targeting drug trafficking by the Iranian-backed, Bashar al-Assad-allied, Justice Department-designated terrorist organization Hezbollah, even as it was funneling cocaine into the United States.”

This email dramatically underplays the outlet’s reporting. While it looks like the Obama administration neutralized efforts to stop a terrorist group from funding its operations through criminal enterprises in the United States — which should be a major scandal itself — according to Josh Meyer’s source-heavy reporting, it also decided to let a top Hezbollah operative named Ali Fayad, who had not only been indicted in U.S. courts for planning to kill American government employees but whom agents believed reported to Russian President Vladimir Putin as a key supplier of weapons to Syria and Iraq, to skate free.

I anticipate history will unfold revealing the Obama administration to be one of the most scandal-plagued in American history...and much of the trajectory to be in the favor of foreign powers...somewhat akin to treasonous acts.  But hey, at least we had a black guy as President...

Confirmed: Bike Shares Are Quintessential Lefty Idiocy

I have long maintained that "bike share" programs are the apotheosis of leftyism, as they are:
1)  monstrously wasteful
2)  a meaningless, symbolic gesture, not anything close to a real solution
3)  aimed at a problem that doesn't exist

When I lived in NYC, the Citi Bike program was so clearly asinine (Citibank marketing people told me, the known losses we're considered "advertising spend").  Now, I've in a small city run be lefties who copycat every last dumb idea of bigger cities, and we have LimeBike.  It too is asinine.

So, I take this to be massive vindication.

Bratty Antifa Assholes Whine and Rage, While Real America Does This...

Prediction:  There is going to be so such toxic masculinity on the Gulf Coast of Texas, the air will be uninhabitable for lefty twit gals for decades.  Silver lining in the devastation that is Harvey.

W&M Alum On the Football Announcer Crisis: "Not Our Fault"

Wow, the College of Knowledge can't catch a break.  We were way ahead of our time in taking a zero-tolerance policy towards vile, hateful, racist, bigoted, nasty, yucky things and people.

First, we banned Lou Holtz for saying that our football team had too many Marys and not enough Williams.  "Sexist pig!  Go coach at some inferior school in some rinky-dink town in the midwest," we said.

Then we abolished this pernicious, vile, execrable symbol of hate from our official school imagery.

But now, ESPN goes and schedules a guy named ROBERT LEE to broadcast our football game against some school somewhere west of us on I-64...

OH, THE HUMANITY  !!!!   HAVE THEY NO DECENCY  !!! 

ROBE...I CAN'T EVEN BRING MYSELF TO SAY THE WORDS...

Ah wait...Whew...Crisis Averted.  Life can resume.  Deep Breath.

Call It the "ESPN Rule"

In order to avoid triggering fellow Americans with insurmountably painful thoughts of racist brutality, I hereby propose we banish men with the following names from any and all public role:
- Dan Adams
- John Adams
- William Adams
- Ed Alexander
- Henry Allen
- William Allen
- George Anderson
- James Anderson
- Joseph Anderson
- Richard Anderson
- Robert Anderson
- Sam Anderson
- James Archer
- Frank Armstrong
- Laurence Baker
- William Baldwin (never show Backdraft again!)
- William Barksdale
- John Barry

...oh shit, you get the picture ...