Washington State's Ministry of Misinformation

The Left is Like Rust.  It Never Sleeps! 

By Rich Kozlovich 

No matter how well you may write, or how great your evidence or logic may be, there are just some things that just don't have the impact of a good cartoon. 

On March 7, 2023 Milt Harris published this article, Nazi Attorney General Bob Ferguson Wants Conservatives Jailed For Voicing Opinions saying:

Ferguson is a product of being able to run amok in a super liberal environment. His self-righteousness is nauseating. In his woke world, someone with a difference of opinion should be silenced, forced into counseling, or jailed.

We already saw just such an effort by the Biden administration to create a "Ministry of Truth" (The actual name is the Disinformation Governance Board.  The truthful name would be the Ministry of Propaganda, Censorship, and Coercion) under the auspices of Home Land Security, another government entity that's not only been a abject failure as it's now been weaponized against Americans by the Obama and Biden administrations, it needs to be dumped into the ash heap of history, and Secretary Mayorkas is the perfect example of why that needs to happen. 

On May 06, 2022 Matt Vespa wrote about this saying:

This disinformation secret police the Department of Homeland Security is establishing is beyond outrageous. It won’t overreach they said. Really? The government literally has no standing here—no credibility.  Everything in DC has been weaponized to attack the enemies of the political class. Every agency with law enforcement capabilities or the ability to jail people has been used to go after conservatives for the past decade or so. It started with Obama. It’s coming back to finish the job with Biden. The IRS and DOJ are compromised. They’re long gone. Now, the DHS is next.

One of the things they wanted to "crack down on" was anything that questioned vaccines, masks, and especially voter fraud.  And who did they pick to be in charge of this Ministry of Misinformation?  Nina Jankowicz, the queen of misinformation and bizarre behavior.  As Louisiana Senator John Kennedy stated to Secretary Mayorkas:

"I am in awe of Miss Jankowicz.  I have watched her with slack jawed astonishment.  Who picked her?" 

Monica Showalter has a piece that's up to date regarding the current activities of the Czarina of misinformation, and it demonstrates how America dodged a bullet when she and the new agency went down in flames. as she's now trying to raise funds to sue Fox News for saying mean things about her.

Vespa went on in another piece asking:  Will You Be Shocked If the DHS' Disinformation Task Force Becomes a Violent Left-Wing Fantasy?  That's what this is all about in both the United States, and Canada.  How insane is it getting in Canada?  Don't kill me, Canada! "Our neighbor to the north is enthusiastically signing death warrants for its most vulnerable citizens." 

• Trudeau's government calls for euthanasia program to 'treat' children with naysaying parents

And Trudeau isn't alone in his insanity.  "A Yale professor of economics suggested that older people in Japan should die by mass suicide."

First, if passed, this will be challenged and will be labeled as an unconstitutional effort to thwart free speech, and even the ninth circuit would have to find this unconstitutional.  It's often been said, if you listen carefully, people will tell you what they're going to do.  Notice the effort this commission would be charged to accomplish:

"collecting data on incidents of domestic violent information."  

And since the left is notorious for redefining the English language to suit themselves.  How about articles this  pandemic is a fraud,  masks are worthless, vaccinations aren't vaccinations and are causing serious long term health consequences, including making people more susceptible to these coronaviruses.  That the "survival rate is estimated at between 97% and 99.75%."   Would that be construed as "domestic violent information?"  You bet it would, because while all truthful and provable, it's not part of the leftist narrative.

I think we can reasonably call this effort by Washington State's Attorney General for what it is.  An enemies list compiled by government to tyrannize the citizens of America into silence, compliance, and obedience to whatever leftist agenda is the narrative of the moment, and each narrative will become more draconian until communism is imposed on America. 

Electric Substations Under Attack in America

By Milt Harris ——Bio and Archives--December 28, 2022

This smells of another sleight of hand distraction by the left. Deceit courses continuously through their veins and they will stop at nothing to falsely implicate others so they can continue their reign of subjugation

In November, five electric substations were attacked in the Pacific Northwest. In mid-November two substations in Cowlitz County, Washington were vandalized. On Thanksgiving morning a substation in Clackamas County, Oregon was damaged, and then two more were attacked in the Puget Sound area later in the month. Electric substations are definitely an Achilles heel for the U.S. 

Electric substations are definitely an Achilles heel for the U.S................So, the left that burns cities in protest, loots stores, tears down statues, murders unborn children, hates religion and attacks anyone or anything that disagrees with them aren’t suspects.  No, according to Homeland Security it has to be conservatives from the right that have no penchant for this type of behavior.......

This smells of another sleight of hand distraction by the left. Deceit courses continuously through their veins and they will stop at nothing to falsely implicate others so they can continue their reign of subjugation.............To Read More

My Take - The media blames the right saying:

 “The trope of attacking power infrastructure, of hitting the electrical grid, critical infrastructure, is an old tenet of the American right wing.”

Which is mind boggling.  Over the decades it's been the environmental misfits who've burned down buildings, driven spikes into trees causing lumber jacks to be maimed and even killed, and for decades  the news has been rampant with these kinds of leftist domestic terror tactics.  Yet it's the "right" that has a history of "attacking power infrastructure, of hitting the electrical grid, critical infrastructure"?  Really?  I wonder why the author didn't name one? 

 

 

State Supreme Court Adopts Critical Race Theory to Undermine Due Process

Hans Bader | November 4, 2022

Journalists often suggest that conservatives have no reason to object to critical race theory because it is just an abstract idea found in universities.  The Associated Press has called it an "obscure academic discussion point on the left" that conservatives have somehow turned into a "political rallying cry."

But critical race theory has spread far in society, to the point that a progressive state supreme court now uses it to set aside jury verdicts.

The Washington Supreme Court ruled on October 20 that lawyers for a white woman had presumptively engaged in a racist dog-whistle when they vigorously championed their client's case, by highlighting the fact that the other side's witnesses seemed to be colluding, and emphasizing the plaintiff's combative and confrontational behavior.

Under the court's ruling, vigorously exercising your due process rights can be deemed a racist dog-whistle that will lead to a new trial, when the opposing litigant is black, and objects to the outcome. This ruling effectively gives black plaintiffs a racial advantage in lawsuits against whites..........To Read More....

Bill Filed In Washington Would Authorize ‘Strike Force’ To ‘Involuntarily Detain’ Unvaccinated Families – Zoom Meeting on Proposed Agenda on Jan. 12, ’22 …UPDATE: WA Releases Statement

The Washington State Board of Health may soon amend state law to authorize the involuntary detainment of residents as young as 5 years old in Covid-19 “internment camps” for failing to comply with the state’s experimental vaccine mandate.

 By Alicia Powe January 8, 2022   

(Editor's Note: Please note there are 6542 Comments.  I don't think I've ever seen this many, which is, at least to me, a clear indicator all this has really touched a nerve, and it's going to hit the fan with the American people soon.  RK)

WAC 246-100-040, a proposed revision to include Covid protocol under the state’s Communicable and Certain Other Diseases act, outlines “Procedures for isolation or quarantine.” The measure would allow local health officers “at his or her sole discretion” to “issue an emergency detention order causing a person or group of persons to be immediately detained for purposes of isolation or quarantine.”

Health officers are required to provide documentation proving unvaccinated residents subject to detention have denied “requests for medical examination, testing, treatment, counseling, vaccination, decontamination of persons or animals, isolation, quarantine and inspection and closure of facilities” prior to involuntarily confinement in quarantine facilities, the resolution states..........To Read More....

Washington State’s Tax Revolt

Local municipalities balk at a new state levy they fear will hurt their economy.

Steven Malanga August 16, 2021 @ City Journal

Tax revolts are usually led by citizens, sometimes banding together into taxpayer groups. But in Washington State, the latest tax revolt is being engineered by cities and towns objecting to the Democratic-led state legislature’s attempt to impose a capital gains tax. Local officials fear that the new levy, which faces a court challenge, would be a prelude to a state income tax that could hamper economic growth and opportunity. Right now, the Evergreen State is one of only seven states without an income tax and one of just nine without taxes on capital gains.

Five Washington communities—Spokane, Yakima, Spokane Valley, Granger, and Battle Ground—have passed resolutions in recent weeks pledging to outlaw income taxes at the local level if the state adopts income or capital gains taxes. More jurisdictions are promising to follow suit. Local officials are intent on sending the state a message. “Small businesses are the backbone of our local, regional, state, and national economy and it is imperative that the city not put unnecessary hurdles in the way of their success,” Battle Ground’s resolution declared. “Citizens want good government that is fiscally responsible,” Republican state representative Chris Corry argued at a hearing in Yakima. “Putting an income tax ban locally shows a commitment to being fiscally responsible.”

Washington lacks an income tax thanks to a 1932 state Supreme Court ruling that interpreted the state constitution as prohibiting the levy. Over the years, voters have rejected ten attempts to amend the constitution to institute an income tax. The last vote was in 2010, when nearly 65 percent of voters gave a thumbs-down to a ballot initiative heavily supported by the state’s public-sector unions and Bill Gates Sr. (Then-Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos helped lead the opposition.) 

Undeterred by these failures, Washington Democrats narrowly approved the tax on capital gains in a straight party vote this past May, arguing that it is not an income tax, though capital gains taxes are typically levied as part of an income-tax system. Citizens and groups have already filed lawsuits against the tax; arguments in the case are scheduled to be heard later this month.

The tax, amounting to a 7 percent levy on capital gains from the sale of stocks, bonds, and other types of investments where the profit exceeds $250,000, is projected to raise $415 million annually. Critics argue that it is both unconstitutional and unnecessary. Like many states, Washington’s tax revenues have bounced back robustly from last year’s economic lockdowns, and the state government, as well as localities and school districts, received about $10 billion from the Biden administration’s stimulus bill. Earlier this year, Washington legislators passed a two-year budget that increases spending by 12 percent. “With strong revenue projections and operating budgets already leaping—up to around $59 billion in 2021-23 from $32 billion just a decade ago—it’s difficult to justify a brand-new tax,” the Seattle Times complained in an editorial.

Opponents also say that the lack of an income tax has long given Washington a competitive economic advantage. They point out that the state’s economic-development agency touts the tax-friendly environment in ads to out-of-state businesses. Washington has among the lowest tax bites of states governed entirely by Democrats. A 2018 study by the Federation of Tax Administrators ranked it 26th among states in taxes as a percentage of personal income. “We are an economic powerhouse,” former state treasurer Duane Davidson, a Republican, has observed in arguing against the new levy.

Backers of the capital gains tax, however, argue that wealthy residents have a “moral imperative” to pay more, regardless of the state’s strong fiscal position. “We are asking the wealthiest Washingtonians to share in the responsibility of funding the needs of our communities and putting money back in the pockets of low-income families,” Seattle state representative Noel Frame said. The new levy makes Washington the third Democratic-governed state seeking to raise taxes amid an unexpectedly strong rebound in revenue. Earlier this year, New York raised taxes by $4.3 billion, and Democrats in Massachusetts have put a referendum on the ballot to amend the state constitution so that they can pass a $2 billion tax increase. By contrast, 11 states, mostly Republican-governed, have cut taxes in the wake of the lockdown rebound.

States typically raise taxes most aggressively after economic slowdowns that reduce government revenues. After the 2008 recession, they boosted taxes collectively by $29 billion in 2009, the largest one-year increase in state taxes up to that point. A new generation of progressive Democratic state leaders is now intent on raising taxes during times of plentiful government resources. They’ve framed the debate as a moral crusade, arguing that it’s righteous to require those who have earned more to pay more.

That begs the question: Just how much more will these legislators ask for the next time government revenues take a hit? The sky’s the limit, it seems. Taxpayers beware.

Steven Malanga is the senior editor of City Journal and the George M. Yeager Fellow at the Manhattan Institute.

Photo: wh1600/iStock

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