(Much) More of this, please; say, all of them. Updated

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Hartford Democrats want to bring this to our towns; do their constituents?

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welcome to oregon!

Judge blocks Oregon city at center of SCOTUS homelessness ruling from enforcing ban on encampments

Grants Pass must increase capacity at locations the city approved for camping and ensure the sites are physically accessible to people with disabilities

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last summer that there’s no constitutional right to crap on sidewalks or camp in public parks, but Oregon has its own law giving “those experiencing homelessness” that privilege, and that’s what this judge has enforced.

An Oregon judge has issued a preliminary injunction blocking a rural city at the center of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling on homeless encampments from enforcing camping restrictions unless certain conditions are met.

Josephine County Circuit Court Judge Sarah McGlaughlin ruled Friday that the city of Grants Pass must increase capacity at locations the city approved for camping and ensure the sites are physically accessible to people with disabilities.

If the city fails to meet those conditions, the judge's order prohibits the city from citing, arresting or fining people for camping on public property. It also prevents the city from forcing people to leave campsites, from removing campsites that are not clearly abandoned or from prohibiting camping in most city parks.

The lawsuit that ignited the case, filed by Disability Rights Oregon, argued that the city was discriminating against people with disabilities and violating a state law requiring cities' camping regulations to be "objectively reasonable." Five homeless people in Grants Pass were among the plaintiffs.

Grants Pass has struggled for years to handle the homelessness crisis and has become symbolic of the national debate over how to respond to the issue. Many of the city's parks, in particular, saw encampments impacted by drug use and litter.

….

Last summer, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a case brought by the city that communities can ban sleeping outside and fine people who violate the ban, including when there are not enough shelter beds.

The Supreme Court ruling overturned an appeals court decision that camping bans enforced when shelter space is insufficient amounted to cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

Following the high court ruling, Grants Pass banned camping on all city property except sites designated by the City Council, which established two locations for the hundreds of homeless people in an effort to remove them from the parks.

After taking office this year, the new mayor and new council members moved to close the larger of the two sites, which housed roughly 120 tents, the lawsuit said. The smaller site's hours of operation were also reduced to between 5 p.m. and 7 a.m.

….

McGlaughin's order states that the city must increase capacity to what it was before the larger site was closed.

But hey, this is fine:

Tom Stenson, deputy legal director for Disability Rights Oregon, praised the ruling.

"This is not a radical solution. The court is basically saying, 'Go back to the amount of space and places for people who are homeless that you had just three months ago,'" he told The Associated Press.

Nothing radical, it’s just another step on the road of happy destiny.

I’ve written about the Hartford law several times, most recently three days ago, and the town’s governing bodies have also become aware of it, as reported in our local socialist broadside. Stay tuned.

If this is accurate, we're in trouble too deep for a mere quick fix like DOGE to cure

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The full article is entirely persuasive to me, and the fact that Glenn Reynolds, who as a law professor must be familiar with the modern crop of students, chose to post ii on his own site, at least suggests that he doesn’t disagree.

SAD:

The average college student today: How things have changed. “Most of our students are functionally illiterate. This is not a joke. . . . I’m not saying our students just prefer genre books or graphic novels or whatever. No, our average graduate literally could not read a serious adult novel cover-to-cover and understand what they read. They just couldn’t do it. They don’t have the desire to try, the vocabulary to grasp what they read,2 and most certainly not the attention span to finish. . . . Their writing skills are at the 8th-grade level. Spelling is atrocious, grammar is random, and the correct use of apostrophes is cause for celebration. Worse is the resistance to original thought. What I mean is the reflexive submission of the cheapest cliché as novel insight.”

On the upside, they’re ready for careers in journalism.

Plus:

“I can’t assign papers any more because I’ll just get AI back, and there’s nothing I can do to make it stop. Sadly, not writing exacerbates their illiteracy; writing is a muscle and dedicated writing is a workout for the mind as well as the pen.”

And the good news just keeps piling up

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State Department formally shutters USAID after Trump court victory

WASHINGTON — The State Department formally announced Friday it is closing the US Agency for International Development (USAID) after the Trump administration prevailed in a federal court case challenging the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) cost-cutting actions.

“Foreign assistance done right can advance our national interests, protect our borders, and strengthen our partnerships with key allies. Unfortunately, USAID strayed from its original mission long ago. As a result, the gains were too few and the costs were too high,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement.

Ex-DOGE official Jeremy Lewin announced USAID’s shuttering in an internal memo earlier Friday — and said the State Department “intends to assume responsibility for many” of the agency’s functions and programs, according to ABC News.

With an annual budget of roughly $40 billion, USAID was responsible for funding critical health care and foreign aid programs but had also been criticized by Republican lawmakers for years for footing the bill for left-wing programs.

House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Brian Mast (R-Fla.) had called out several USAID grants last month — including $2.5 million for electric vehicles in Vietnam, $47,000 for “a transgender opera in Colombia” and $32,000 for the production of a Peruvian “transgender comic book,” the Daily Mail first reported.

Per the State Department memo, USAID may now rehire some employees to “assume the responsible administration of USAID’s remaining life-saving and strategic aid programming” while “all non-statutory positions at USAID will be eliminated.”

“This transfer will significantly enhance efficiency, accountability, uniformity, and strategic impact in delivering foreign assistance programs — allowing our nation and President to speak with one voice in foreign affairs,” the memo stated.

“It will also obviate the need for USAID to continue operating as an independent establishment.”

It’s likely the move, coupled with the circuit court’s dismissal of the temporary restraining order against DOGE, will result in further legal challenges.

With 677 active lower court federal judges lurking in courtrooms around the country and billions of dollars available to file delaying lawsuits, the Post’s prediction of “further legal challenges” to DOGE is certain to come true, but any victory in this war is always welcome.

Here's a cheery start to the weekend

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(with apologies to dan hicks)

Brazen ‘migrant influencer’ who flashed cash, urged other illegals to squat in US homes deported to Venezuela

Leonel Moreno, who encouraged illegal migrants to “invade abandoned houses” in sick TikToks, was sent back to the narco state this week, after President Trump resumed deportation flights to the country. ….

Moreno crossed the Texas border illegally in April 2022 and was quickly released into the US.

The Venezuelan border crosser, however, failed to appear for his required check-ins with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), leading the feds to arrest him in Gahanna, Ohio, in March 2024.

An immigration judge ordered Moreno’s deportation last October, but Venezuela refused to accept any deportation flights at the time.

Once President Trump returned to the White House and commenced his mass deportation campaign, Venezuela began allowing the US deportation flights to land again.

Moreno was moved to an ICE detention center in Conroe, Texas, on Feb. 26 to prepare for his deportation.

Moreno caused outrage while living in the US illegally for his viral TikTok videos, where he bragged about the handouts migrants could receive from the US government and encouraged other Venezuelan migrants to “invade abandoned houses.”

Moreno used his massive social media following to brag about government handouts.

“I didn’t cross the Rio Grande to work like a slave,” Moreno said in one clip while waving around $100 bills.

Unfortunately, the good news is tempered by the bad:

Moreno also said he used his 1-year-old baby, a US citizen, to boost his social media presence and boasted that he and his wife didn’t pay anything for their daughter’s birth thanks to “Papa Biden.”

At least we’ll have a nine or ten year respite before Moreno’s spawn begins his own criminal career, but shucks, couldn’t we have persuaded this “good husband, good father” to take his sponges collection with him?

While in jail, Moreno spoke to The Post and wailed about being a victim of unjust “persecution.”

“I came here to the United States because of persecution in my country … But they’re doing the same thing to me in the United States — persecuting me,” Moreno moaned.

“It’s all misinformation in the media about me. They’re defaming me. They’re misrepresenting me in the news … I am a good father, a good husband, a good son, a good person, humble, respectful to people who respect me,” he added.

Late afternoon real estate reports

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That mausoleum look so appreciated in conyers farm

10 Hurlingham Drive, $7.950 million, asked for $8. Thirteen acres, 1990 house, improved. 140 days on market. Pictures have been pulled from the Internet, but I’m including two from the MLS listing. It’s about what you’d expect at this price range.

Hurlingham was on the market for 140 days — Old Greenwich often does better. For instance, 12 Bryon Road, which was listed for $4.995 million in February was gone in a flash and closed today at $5.575.

12 Bryon Road

On the other hand, 25 West Way, in Lucas Point, was listed 170 days ago at $15 million and it only went pending today. It’s possible that there are fewer buyers in this price range, what with so many rich celebrities having fled the country for true democracies like Britain. Still, there turned out to be at least one multimillionaire left in town, and that’s reassuring.

25 West Way

England says goodbye to all that, forever

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Just Stop Oil Just Stopped Oil in Great Britain

David Strom

Political violence wins again. Just Stop Oil just stopped oil in the UK. 

“In just two years, the zealots at Just Stop Oil won their fight to stop new oil and gas drilling in the UK. Admittedly, they had a head start on achieving that goal due to decades of propaganda doing their work, but the group is rightly proud of their role in stopping new oil and gas production. They made the final push, and the final push was apparently enough.”

“Just Stop Oil’s initial demand to end new oil and gas is now government policy, making us one of the most successful civil resistance campaigns in recent history. We’ve kept over 4.4 billion barrels of oil in the ground and the courts have ruled new oil and gas licences unlawful.

…. “This is not the end of civil resistance. Governments everywhere are retreating from doing what is needed to protect us from the consequences of unchecked fossil fuel burning. As we head towards 2°C of global heating by the 2030s, the science is clear: billions of people will have to move or die and the global economy is going to collapse. This is unavoidable. We have been betrayed by a morally bankrupt political class.

“As corporations and billionaires corrupt political systems across the world, we need a different approach. We are creating a new strategy, to face this reality and to carry our responsibilities at this time. Nothing short of a revolution is going to protect us from the coming storms.

“Of course, any sane person would be repelled by Britain's decision to destroy its economic health for absolutely zero gains. Great Britain's contributions to greenhouse gas accumulations are minuscule--far less than 1% of the world's production, and even if the world were hurtling towards global collapse due to rapid warming, this decision would have precisely zero impact. China will just build another few coal plants, positioning itself to adapt to changing environmental circumstances, while Britons become poorer, freeze to death, and swelter in their homes and workplaces.”

Just Stop Oil originally pushed for the government to end new oil and gas exploration in Britain. The Labour government shared that policy goal and implemented it after they won the election last year. The group on Thursday claimed this made it "one of the most successful civil resistance campaigns in recent history."

Strom:

…. Europeans and all NetZeroans have a long history of making choices the opposite of what is wise. They follow the John Kerry rule of farming: unless you eliminate it, people will starve! 

The Europeans have followed Kerry's advice and are rapidly shutting down agricultural production in their countries. 

Really. They are buying up farms using coercion and permanently taking the land out of food production. Soylent Green, anyone?

I don't know how much the climate is changing, and the reality is that nobody else does either. I don't know whether and to what extent human beings are changing it, and neither does anybody else. We can't even figure out basic nutrition with any certainty, and we can experiment on human bodies all we want with control groups, tiny changes in consumption, supplements, and all sorts of experiments. The idea that we have a grasp on something as complicated as the Earth's climate is absurd, especially with no control groups. 

What we can figure out is the trajectory of emissions because the trends are clear, and that trend is upward, and no amount of tweaks by Western governments can change that fact because China, India, and the developing world are pumping out the CO2. Marginally changing the UK's emission will have zero impact on climate, and a massive impact on Britain's ability to adapt to whatever changes are coming. Poor countries do not spend money on the environment. Ever. 

Less than 1%.

The success of Just Stop Oil and NetZero is yet another example of feez over facts. Great Britain just shut down all steel production because it is no longer economical. So it will import steel from less efficient countries, ship it to their shores, increase carbon emissions, and become poorer. 

That is Just Stop Oil's success. That is NetZero--increasing carbon emissions but sending it overseas and out of sight. Is it any wonder that our adversaries and oil-producing countries funnel money into this scam? 

…. In the 19th century, the Ottoman Empire was the "sick man of Europe"--a declining civilization that collapsed, leaving a mess we are still dealing with more than a century later. Pretty much every problem we face in the the Middle East is a result of that collapse. 

What will the collapse of Europe leave behind? Nothing pretty. 

Also by Strom — he’s having a busy day:

Western Governments Choosing Between Two Paths: Suicide or Renewal

British Steel has announced plans to close its two blast furnaces in Scunthorpe, making Britain the only G7 country unable to manufacture its own steel.

Britain used to be an industrial powerhouse. It is no exaggeration to say that there might not have been an industrial revolution without the leadership of that country, and it certainly is true that the technological revolution would have been slower without Britain leading the way. 

World War I led to the transfer of industrial leadership from Britain to the United States, and World War II cemented our lead over the rest of the world, although other countries like Japan and now China have become dominant players as well. Germany, until recently and because of NetZero policies, was a major competitor as well. 

Britain, and to a great extent Europe, are now also-rans. 

Strom:

Blame it all on Donald Trump, you want, but steel production has been on a long decline because, well, the British government wanted it to be. It was a policy choice they made. Steel, concrete, and all the major building blocks of an industrial society require inexpensive, abundant, and reliable energy, and the current regime that dominates the transnational elite hates cheap, reliable, and abundant energy. Even high-tech industries require massive amounts of energy, which is why Europe will continue to fall behind in computer services, network technology, and artificial intelligence. 

The NetZero/transnational elite future is one of stagnation and eventual societal suicide. Not only will the economy continue to decline, but the mass influx of undereducated, undersocialized, and over-ideological migrants is destabilizing once-great nations. ….

Reality bites man

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David Stom: Watch Jon Stewart's Mind Blown By Ezra Klein Describing How Government Really Works

…. Ezra Klein, who very much wants to reverse the decline has noticed that liberals suck at doing what they say, and while he still believes (for some reason) that liberals actually want to accomplish things like connect rural homes to the internet, he has noticed that over $44 billion in federal funds have connected not a one. 

So he looked into why, and the story is exactly as you and I expected and shocking to the people who believed Democrats wanted to accomplish the stated goal. 

Watch the entire video and weep. And laugh. 

You can duplicate this experiment with any liberal program to "accomplish" some goal. Eradicating homelessness--how many "10-year-plans" to eliminate it, and how many billions of dollars spent, to increase the number of homeless people? How about "affordable housing?" Same thing. Housing more expensive than ever, but a lot of people have gotten wealthy or wealthier "fixing" the problem. 

Jon Stewart screams 'OMFG' and is rendered speechless after hearing all 14 steps to apply for 'Build Back Better' funding: 

Ezra Klein: "We have to issue the notice funding opportunity within 180 days that's step one. 

Step Two: States who want to participate must submit a letter of intent. After they do that, they can submit a request for up to $5 million in planning grants.

Then the NTIA Step Four has to review and approve an award again. States who want to participate must submit that letter of intent.

Step three: "They can request up to $5 million in planning grants. Just planning, just planning.

Step four : "The requests are reviewed, approved and awarded by the NTIA." States must submit a five year action plan.  All 56 had passed through at least step 5, it took more than 3 years. 

[Step 6] Then the FCC, must publish the broadband data maps before NTIA allocates funds. So having done the no vote. So the letters of intent, the the the request for planning grants, then the review approval and awarding of the planning grants, then the five year action plans in between that the federal government has to put forward a map saying where it thinks we need rural broadband subsidies. And then, of course, the states need an opportunity to challenge the map for accuracy.  

step seven So then the NTIAhas to use the FCC maps to make allocation decisions. It's hard even to talk about this, man. 

Step eight is states must submit an initial proposal to the NTIA." 

Jon Stewart: "But then what was the five year plan and what the fuck did they apply for?" 

Ezra Klein: "Step nine NTIA must review and approve each state's again initial proposal. By my read, we have had at least two initial proposals here, but that's a different issue. 

Step ten. States must publish their own map and allow internal challenges to their own map.

Step 11 the NTIA must review and improve the challenge results and the final map. So the NCAA has put forward a map. 

Step 12 states must run a competitive sub granting process." 

Jon Stewart: "Oh, my fucking God. At step 12. After all this has been done!?" 

Ezra Klein: "Step 13 States must submit a final proposal. This all all the proposals weren't enough to NTIA. Now that goes to three of 56. 

Step 14 the NTIA must review and approve the state's final proposal. And that is three of the 56 jurisdictions. And states are there." 

Jon Stewart: "I'm speechless."

Jon just learned why "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help'"

Strom:

You and I figured this out a long time ago because we are not allied with the grifters. We see through their lies and see the grift. And, to be sure, that isn't primarily because we are smarter than the people doing the grift, or those who still believe the grifters. It is because we figured out they were grifters. We started with a different fact base--the Pravda Media is filled with propaganda outlets in on the grift--and are mostly immune to the lies and hoaxes.

Truck drivers, plumbers, electricians, business owners, and most people who work in the real world have figured out that they are the marks and walk past the con men. It was the best and the brightest who gave their money to Bernie Madoff. 

Klein is only scratching the surface, and he likely doesn't understand that all the complications are the point, not the obstacle to success. What do you think all the bureaucrats do all day--the one that DOGE is firing and that all the Democrats are working day and night to save? 

Other than voting Democrat, that is. 

Then there are the consultants, the lobbyists, the people who skim off the top, the contractors, and all the other beneficiaries. Booz Allen, Halliburton, and all the rest. Who keeps McKinsey in business, other than USAID? The academia to government to consulting firm to lobbyist to...merry go round is the point of the system. High-paying jobs for overeducated, useless people whom we overproduce at an astounding rate. 

Every single one of those people in rural America could be hooked up to high speed, reliable internet tomorrow by buying and subsidizing Starlink terminals. You could even buy mobile terminals for tractors and have a ton of money left over. Just do a bulk purchase and be done with it. 

But then how will the cable and phone companies get their cut? What will bureaucrats do? 

What Klein and Stewart see as inefficiency is the point of the system. The government is a massive employment system for overeducated economic and social parasites whose job it is to make productive employees subsidize them. If Russia is a gas station with a military, the government has become a den of con artists with a more powerful military. 

Related:

GOODER AND HARDER, CALIFORNIA: 

75 Days After the Palisades Fire, Only Four Building Permits Have Been Issued.

The Pacific Palisades fire burned more than 6,800 structures, both homes and businesses. Clearly, the rebuilding process is going to take a while for many families even if insurance covers the losses. What should not take a long time are permits for people who lost everything to get started. Indeed, Mayor Karen Bass vowed to streamline the process and made a big show when the first permit was issued.

The first permit was issued March 5, less than two months after the Palisades fire destroyed or seriously damaged more than 6,000 homes in Pacific Palisades and surrounding areas.

“We want this to be happening on your lot, too,” said Mayor Karen Bass at a news conference in the Palisades on Friday.

Bass and L.A. County leaders have pledged to streamline permitting procedures for property owners who want to rebuild.

The home which got the first approval was mostly intact and just needed repairs. The second approval went to a home that had been completely rebuilt a year before the fire. The owner just resubmitted the same blueprints for a rebuild. None of these approvals should have taken a week. They were no brainers.

And yet, more than two months after the Palisades Fire was put out, only four permits for rebuilding have been issued.

Cos Cob price cut

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53 Valleywood Road, from $1.925 million to $1.7. That’s a large cut, and a smart one, because if a house in this price range isn’t attracting multiple offers in its first days — this one was originally listed just 19 days ago — it’s been priced way too high.

I notice that there was a broker open house here on Tuesday; if the agent was smart, and this one is a very experienced one, she’ll get feedback from her peers at those events and, most important, listen. That’s what appears to have happened here. (One of the more useful outcomes of such an open house can be using that feedback to convince a client that the original price, adopted at the owner’s insistence, was too high: “the universal opinion of the agents who came all said the price should be closer to X”).