The November issue of The Last Word is pub-a-rooooooooooooooo!
This ish talks about my BASIC gerrymandering software, a substitute teacher's trash talk, getting worthless trinkets as a reward in 4th grade, a kid eating a candy bar in math class, an idiot who used a drone to harass homeless people, and more!
So point your pooper here...
https://www.scribd.com/document/785665158/The-Last-Word-11-2024
If that doesn't work, stink on over here...
We've crossed yet another threshold of fascism! Imagine that!
There's a right-wing effort afoot in Kentucky to limit cities from regulating short-term rentals like those offered through Airbnb. Some cities wisely prohibit owners from using properties they don't live in as short-term rentals - as it artificially drives up housing costs. Short-term rentals not only promote gentrification but also constipate neighborhoods by effectively turning them into commercial districts. Surrounding residents end up being forced to have their shit and eat it too. These existing neighbors end up paying more for a lower quality of life.
But it's not even known what legislators are behind the latest effort. Apparently, it isn't legislators at all. A new piece from WKYT-TV in Lexington says of Airbnb, "The short-term rental company introduced two bills."
Since when can corporations introduce bills? I don't remember ever voting for a corporation. At least not on purpose. I did vote a straight Democratic ticket when I was 18, but I didn't know yet that the party was actually a Fortune 500 company.
Meanwhile, in Berea, Airbnb was recently sued because only one of the 16 short-term rentals in the city was paying taxes like everyone else.
Starting on January 1, medical cannabis will finally be legal in Kentucky - after being hamstrung for decades. Each municipality will be responsible for zoning regulations governing cannabis-related businesses.
But counties in our area have decided to just ignore the new laws and ban medical cannabis anyway.
Yet some local cities are taking exception to that. A few have decided to remain dry, a few have opted to legalize medical cannabis despite what the county says, and a few have decided to bring the issue to the people by letting voters vote on it.
Bellevue is among the cities that will have a referendum on November 5 on whether to approve medical cannabis. One article says that other local cities where voters will vote on it include Alexandria, Crestview Hills, Elsmere, Florence, Independence, and Southgate.
It's about damn time our cities and the rest of our state legalize - which seems to have happened everywhere else by 2000.
I've submitted a beautiful post to the "Greater Cincinnati Politics" group on Facebook that sums up the greed and incompetence of 3CDC, the unelected secret society that stage-manages policies governing much of Cincinnati. I don't expect the moderators to approve my post, because I'm making so much sense, but I'm reprinting it below.
(Begin post.)
Local political leaders should be doing something about 3CDC, which is taking 18 months to remodel the convention center - forcing the convention center to close all the while. This has forced the Cavalcade of Customs, the Cincinnati Auto Expo, and other events to cancel completely. This is costing the city and the whole area zillions of dollars in revenues from visitors to these events.
Who elected 3CDC? I don't know anyone who voted for them. 3CDC just decides to insert itself into every matter of public interest. They're as bad as the lockdown neocons at every level of government.
I'm a man of the people, and we shouldn't have to tolerate 3CDC's serial misrule and totalitarianism.
(End post.)
In short, 3CDC has launched an 18-month remodeling project for the convention center. How can a project like this take that long? This has forced annual events like the Cavalcade of Customs to cancel - costing the local economy dearly.
It's bad for recreation and jobs, and it encourages other economically costly projects in the future.
This was after the city already lost almost the entire early '20s to lockdown-related cancellations. But at least the Cavalcade of Customs was never canceled then, and in fact appeared practically normal (except for the 3 or so people who wore masks). Still, the city probably teetered on the brink of bankruptcy because of all the cancellations of events both inside and outside the convention center.
I fully expect my post to be rejected. If it is approved, I fully expect to be assailed by right-wing Republicans and right-wing Democrats equally. But it needed to be said. I've been in smaller rooms with bigger people, and I won't be bullied.
You might say this is a ballot measure where both sides deserve to lose, but we have to defend the country's principles, so we're voting no.
On November 5, something called Amendment 2 will be on the ballot in Kentucky. If it passes, it would amend the Kentucky Constitution to allow public money to be given to private schools.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was right when he said many of our public schools are "criminal enterprises." But the solution isn't to give money to private schools that may be just as bad - or in my experience, even worse. It's a fact that our so-called public schools and political "leaders" have abandoned the Kentucky Constitution's obligation to provide "common schools." In practice, common schools do not exist in Kentucky. It's clear our school and political officials care very little about education. They see private schools as more of a business competitor. But principles must come into play here.
One of the main principles we're standing on in opposing Amendment 2 is the fact that many private schools are religious institutions, and using taxpayer funds to sponsor them would run afoul of existing provisions in the federal and state constitutions against government sponsorship of religion. Furthermore, public money is for public schools. I know it's true that public schools refuse to do their job, but the solution is to find ways to make sure they do it. You might think that's asking too much, but we pay taxes, so we have a right to expect common schools to be operated and maintained.
Will Amendment 2 pass? Before 2020, measures like this almost always failed when put before voters. (It failed in California even after the Los Angeles Times ran a loopy op-ed supporting the measure that railed against "communist indoctrination.") But the past 4½ years have done more to destroy the reputation of our public schools than all the years before. Prussia originated common schools 250 years ago, but there has never been such a steep decline in our schools as we've seen since 2020. I didn't think our schools could possibly get any worse, but they managed to defy all expectations. There is no bottom.
I will vote against Amendment 2, but if it passes, our public schools are going to have to wallow in the consequences, after they refused to do their job.
To make August even more biptacular than it was, I went on a small local Roads Scholaring and amassed 14 photos, this time focusing on Covington.
They're ready to be pept, so point your pooper here...
Back in August, I went on a fact-finding mission in Pittsburgh - paying particular attention to the amazingness in nearby McKeesport.
This event yielded 288 Roads Scholaring photos, and they're gonna fly around and bite your face off in public (as a wise man would say).
So peep, weep, and oggle-beep...
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24a.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24b.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24c.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24d.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24e.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24f.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24g.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24h.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24i.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24j.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24k.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/pit24l.html
It's bad enough that the company that owns the shuttered Three Mile Island nuclear plant is going to restart the plant. It's bad enough that locals won't be allowed to use the energy it generates, as the entire thing will be used to power Microsoft's artificial intelligence projects.
But now the company is demanding a $1.6 billion federal bailout - so the taxpayers will again be left holding the bag.
Meanwhile, families who were affected by Hurricane Helene will be receiving only a few hundred dollars each - much like those affected by the Maui wildfire. The government always has a bottomless vat of money for corporate bailouts and illegal foreign wars, but none for disaster relief or Social Security.
The approach of October means the October issue of The Last Word is here!
This scoopy edition discusses my Minnesota trip, gentrification of comic books, NKU violating confidentiality laws, helicopter governing, blowing bubble gum bubbles with game pieces inside, and more!
So point your pooper here...
https://www.scribd.com/document/773893365/The-Last-Word-10-2024
If that doesn't work, glide on over here...
Today, I received an important e-mail saying that a woman spilled an entire 2-pound container of blueberries all over the floor in the checkout lane at Kroger. They were wosted. Either that, or they were sent to the store in Bellevue.
The e-mail also said that several celebrity look-alikes were sighted on a cruise. They included Walter Cronkite, Jared Polis, and Rosemary Clooney.
Hard to believe anyone thinks this might be politically advantageous or legally sound, but there's some strange people out there.
As Kroger attempts to merge with Albertsons, this anticompetitve move is cheered by the elitist media, but you'd think elected officials would be more politically savvy than to support it. Yet a group of 12 Republican state attorneys general - including Ohio's Dave Yost - have filed a court brief claiming the FTC's antitrust powers are unconstitutional.
As with other recent weird legal theories, the legal logic of this is completely incomprehensible. But if this brief succeeds in court, government antitrust powers - which are already used much too little - will be essentially gutted altogether.
Even some Republicans have supported antitrust efforts in the past few years. Sometimes it was for reasons you might think are questionable, but broadly speaking, I would have supported these breakups, because competition is vital. Yost himself has even overseen some antitrust suits. But the new brief by the Republican attorneys general would stymie all of these breakups.
The move to gut antitrust law is mirrored by Project 2025, a policy document that consists mostly of right-wing ideas that have bobbed along for the past 45 years. Project 2025 has one good idea, which is to abolish the Department of Homeland Security. The rest of it stinks.
This comes after a recent FTC report said Kroger, Walmart, and Amazon have been taking advantage of supply chain disruptions to jack up prices. It started during COVID-19 and has continued ever since. Grocery price gouging is real. It's gone on since before then and has only gotten worse. Grocery prices have increased 25% in 4 years.
Antitrust enforcement is one of the most basic charges of government. And it's in danger.
Yesterday, I went to Ploptoberfest in Cincinnati, and it's not quite what it used to be.
The good news is that they had a new space for it this year along the riverfront, which is far bigger than past years. It's certainly better than the years when they crammed it onto 2nd Street, though that era did produce a highlight in 2021 when people beered on the streetcar. Unfortunately, beverage choices this year were horrendous if you wanted to skip the beer because you had to drive home. They were hard to find too. I was about ready to pass out because of it.
Also, I was grimacing in agony for a while because of a medical condition.
This may be the last festival for me. I've become too weak to walk around at events like this.
Now, the ploppings. I went into one of the portable restrooms and noticed there were two ploppables plopped. Not for the first time, a metal lid to a pickle jar had been plopped. That's gonna do a number on their cleaning equipment! In the same dumper, someone had plopped a plastic water bottle (like for bottled water from the store).
The only celebrity look-alikes I saw were Judy Graubart and Dan Hill. Must have been '70s day!
This is the sort of story that makes you wish you never opened the newspaper this morning.
The Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania was the site of the worst nuclear disaster in American history - and one of the worst in the world. An NIH report said that "total mortality was significantly elevated" after the 1979 meltdown, and a spike in birth defects was found in the area. The plant even had to pay a multimillion-dollar legal settlement.
The media has lately been engaged in a campaign of historical negationism to downplay the disaster, but nobody is fooled (idiots excepted). When the media isn't cheering foreign wars or demanding new COVID lockdowns or more cuts to Social Security, everything else it puts out sounds like a press release written by the nuclear power racket.
But now Constellation Energy has announced plans to restart Three Mile Island. All the energy generated by it will be sold to Microsoft - solely to power its artificial intelligence operations. Nobody who lives in the area will be able to use the power it generates - but their lives will be endangered again by the plant being nearby. The plant is scheduled to be restarted in 2028.
Instead of green energy, America is moving backwards towards filthy, dangerous energy that was in vogue over a half-century ago.
All of this is so Microsoft can run more AI. AI of course is the thing that comes up at the top of every Google search which I skip over because it's so full of inaccurate information. It's almost as inaccurate as the media's right-wing pro-nuke propaganda.
Back in 2013, the right-wing Florida Times-Union of Jacksonville ran an editorial charging that the Social Security disability program was being abused fluently. They demanded changes, dammit! They said that unless the government cracked down hard on disabled Americans, the program's reserves would run out by 2016.
Well, how did that prediction turn out?
Bullies make threats, and this is a good example.
The media gaslights the public by constantly claiming Social Security is the "third rail" of politics, which nobody wants to touch - yet it's always the first thing they touch.
Last night, I had a dream where we ate at a restaurant that was absolutely filthy.
A customer ordered iced tea, so a waiter put an ice cube in a cup of tea with his bare hands.
I walked out of the restaurant after seeing such a disgusting spectacle, but a family member stayed behind.
Indeed I did.
Also, people beered in violation of the all-encompassing Allowed Cloud. In fact, my shirt got beer spilled all over it when someone knocked over a folding chair that had a cup of beer on it.
The Last Word has issues - 599 of them!
The September ish is out, and it's our back-to-school issue! This edition talks about my Pittsburgh trip, Kentucky keeping track of "behavior events" in school restrooms, a local city that gives special parking privileges to a wealthy neighborhood, the myth of Reese's Pieces bubble gum, and more!
So point your pooper here...
https://www.scribd.com/document/763996494/The-Last-Word-9-2024
If that doesn't work, fart on over here...
The growing fascism in America is enough to turn your brain into bubble glop.
Thirty years ago, it was generally understood that holding workers to noncompete clauses after they no longer worked at the workplace where they signed it was illegal. Then - despite little or no new laws on the matter - it was assumed by many to be legal unless your state had a specific law against it. But now, unelected judges won't even allow laws that prohibit noncompetes.
Not long ago, the Biden administration - in a rare moment of clarity - issued a nationwide regulation against noncompetes. But now U.S. District Judge Ada Brown has thrown out this rule. The reasoning for this ruling by the judge - a Trump appointee who was confirmed to her post in a bipartisan lovefest - is impossible to follow.
The case against the regulation was lodged by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce - a secret society that supported totalitarian COVID measures and has praised some of the vilest overseas dictatorships in modern times.
Our rulers no longer have the capability to carry out the duties of their office, and rarely even have the desire to do it.
The greed never ceases.
Recently, it was announced that 4 new episodes of 'The Simpsons' this season will not be seen on broadcast TV and will instead be shown only on Disney+ - a subscription streaming service nobody has.
Granted, 'The Simpsons' ain't what it used to be. I was enamored of it for its first 25 years. But I stopped watching it when it got agonizingly dumb. That was around the time of the episode about Maggie whistling and the appearances of the guy who always shook his face and said, "You're fiiiiiiiiiirrrrred!" But can't a guy catch a fresh Simps without having to pay for what used to be free?
Much of what's going on here is that entertainment is afflicted by the same problem that afflicts other industries. It's become a giant corporate empire. Disney+ is part of Disney Streaming, which is part of Disney Entertainment, which is part of the Walt Disney Company. 'The Simpsons' is under 4 levels of corporate bureaucracy. Disney also now owns Pixar, Marvel, the 'Star Wars' franchise, Hulu, and more.
At minimum - the absolute very minimum - you'd think Disney+ being co-owned with Hulu would violate antitrust regulations. For a single company to own so many other brands and franchises would also seem to be an antitrust violation. But everyone knows that antitrust enforcement is a four-letter word these days. The federal government has an antitrust division - but hardly ever uses it. The government will throw people in jail for not practicing social distancing on a beach, but it won't enforce even minimal antitrust rules.
Corporations - in any industry, not just entertainment - have no constitutional right to exist at all. But they are treated as if they have more rights than people do.
One of the basic charges of the FCC is to make sure broadcasters act in the "public interest, convenience, and necessity." I think it's time for the FCC to step in and make sure TV and radio remain as free as ever. Not like I expect much from the FCC either, because it spends more time raiding pirate stations that don't hurt anyone than breaking up the monopolies that already afflict broadcasting. The FCC rubber-stamps companies buying too many stations, which would have violated old ownership caps. It even allows companies to own more than one TV network, which itself violates antitrust rules.
One of the priorities of our leaders should be to break up big corporations in every industry. What's happening to 'The Simpsons' is just a tiny piece of the corporate tyranny that has enveloped society.
The Democrats are a party of right-wing crooks and tyrants, and their corrupt machine in New York state only proves it more.
Early this week, New York Supreme Court Justice Christina Ryba struck Robert F. Kennedy Jr. from the presidential ballot in that state after a lawsuit filed by a Democratic superPAC. The thing about superPAC's is that they weren't even permitted until the far-right Citizens United ruling. The realignment of the 2020s has led the Democrats to abandon a proposed constitutional amendment to remedy this ruling, as the party has become fueled primarily by superPAC's.
This superPAC could be using the money it raised to promote Democratic candidates on their own merits. The problem with that is that the Democrats no longer have any merits. So instead they use this money to file frivolous lawsuits to knock opponents of the ballot. This dough was raised not from the Democrats' old working-class base but from millionaire professionals who have taken over the party because the Republicans in 2020 weren't authoritarian enough for them. Think the laptop underpantsers and a few academics.
Kennedy is appealing Ryba's decision, but it's important to look at what Ryba wrote in her ruling. For one thing, the Democrats' argument was that Kennedy is not actually a New York resident, so he should not appear on the New York ballot. What??? You don't need to be a resident of a particular state to run for President. Besides, Kennedy is clearly a New Yorker, as he votes and pays taxes in New York and has New York hunting and driver's licenses. If he lived in California, he wouldn't be able to have Nicole Shanahan as his running mate. George W. Bush and Dick Cheney sharing the same state didn't matter, because they were never required to follow rules like everyone else.
Ryba complained that Kennedy's home isn't a "bona fide and legitimate residence, but merely a 'sham' address" and that his claim to live in his own home is "highly improbable, if not preposterous."
A judge said that??? Can you imagine Harry Blackmun or Earl Warren writing a ruling that made such obviously partisan claims and said an argument like Kennedy's was a "sham" and "preposterous"? Is this a court or a sitcom?
But if you're a senator, you do have to live in the state you represent. If Kennedy is not a New York resident, how was Hillary Clinton able to claim New York residency? Clinton was actually still First Lady when she was sworn in as senator, so it's hard to see how she was a New Yorker.
This isn't the only ruling by Ryba that has no legal ground. In 2022, she threw out an Albany ordinance that protected tenants from illegal evictions. Landlords may evict tenants for cause - e.g., if tenants create a nuisance or refuse to pay rent. Albany's ordinance only barred evictions that lacked cause. Prohibiting these evictions strengthened contractual obligations and protected housing. Ryba's decision against Albany's law threatened the protections that existed not only in Albany but also elsewhere in New York state.
(This isn't the only bad court ruling regarding housing in New York state in recent years. Last year, a court ruled a co-op can evict without cause the unmarried partner of a deceased shareholder - even if they were in a long-term relationship. This runs roughshod over common law and other legal concepts.)
It turns out that several years ago, Ryba was fired as an appellate division lawyer because of "ethical missteps."
Our entire political process has become an "ethical misstep" - especially since superPAC's have been allowed to steal elections.
I knew there had to be a reason the media is so enamored of Tim Walz.
Walz is portrayed as some big teddy bear who really didn't maliciously overstep his authority during COVID like governors of more populated states like Gavin Newsom, Mike DeWine, and Kathy Hochul did. But that's far from the truth.
It turns out that a woman who ran a wine and coffee bistro in Albert Lea was actually jailed for violating Walz's COVID orders. The business followed Minnesota's shutdown orders at first, but refused to close during the later orders that began in November 2020. That was while big box retailers and other huge chains were allowed to remain open.
Let me repeat: This was under new orders issued in November 2020 - not March.
Outrageously, the state was still pursuing the case against the bistro owner even in December 2021, and she was sentenced to 90 days in jail and a $1,000 fine. She missed Christmas and the birth of a grandchild.
And a small business was ruined - while big corporations only got richer.
It also turns out that Walz ordered police to shoot people with paintball guns just for being on their front porch during his stay-at-home order. Entire squads of police patrolled neighborhoods to carry out this assault.
Until now, these stories were never even reported anywhere that we could find them, unlike the lockdowns in general.
The man who gave us "Mind your own damn business!" wouldn't mind his own damn business. And he shows no remorse. He still insists he was right.
Tim Walz is a thin-skinned fascist, a gangster-like figure who is part of a banana republic. The revelations about Walz aren't even the only major story about our overlords' fascism to emerge in recent days, so you may want to keep an eye on this blog.
I still amass local Roads Scholaring photos, and I've gotten 10 more from my immediate area over the past couple months. Read 'em and bip...
Today I received an important e-mail about little kids acting up in stores.
Last week, a boy who was about 3 years old loudly imitated Cookie Monster in the cookie aisle at Kroger.
This morning, a youngster - possibly the same one - was in the balloon section at Meijer. He popped a balloon and let at least one other balloon float to the ceiling where it will never be retrieved.
Today, I was walking down Fairfield, and a man piling laundry into his car ripped an LAP bunker blast.
August wouldn't be August if we didn't publish the August ish of The Last Word! And if it didn't rain constantly. Wait, that's every month.
This ish talks about the recent increase in online censorship inspired by Murthy v. Missouri, a shoplifter who chewed bubble gum, signs that mislabel public roads as private, people filling bubble gum with Pepsi, and more! It's not sold in any store!
So point your bippus here...
https://www.scribd.com/document/754704082/The-Last-Word-8-2024
If that doesn't work, dance on over here...
Sanitation District #1 of Northern Kentucky - SD1, or as I call it, SBD1 - strikes again!
Dozens of residents of a condo complex in Southgate are being forced to relocate because a sewer excavation project by SBD1 created slippage in a nearby hillside. Cracks have appeared in the condos, and a building has even separated from the ground.
The excavation itself was to serve new luxury developments that are being built all over. So people are threatened not only by a landslide but also unchecked gentrification that is artificially jacking up housing costs.
Some residents though have not relocated, because none of them have received any financial assistance to do so. SBD1 has so far been unwilling to pay for the damage.
This is the same SBD1 that was involved in months-long infrastructure closures in Bellevue that contributed to many Bellevue residents losing their shirts. These prolonged closures were also accompanied by the digging of deep holes in sidewalks that endangered pedestrians and animals. That was after this agency was stacked with political patronage appointees.
These appointees are of course allied with the groups that have politicized pretty much the entire Kentucky "education" system - that is to say the pro-lockdown Charles Koch Foundation. As always, follow the money.
You may know that back in May, I went on a family trip to St. Augustine!
That event yielded 168 photos for my Roads Scholaring collection, and you're gonna read 'em and peep...
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/sa24a.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/sa24b.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/sa24c.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/sa24d.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/sa24e.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/sa24f.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/sa24g.html
There are 2 issues that are so important that I've begun to base my vote almost entirely on them. One issue is Social Security. The other is accountability for the atrocities during COVID lockdowns. At this point, I care far less about a candidate's stances on other issues. One issue that comes close is gentrification, but that comes up at the local level a lot more than in national politics.
These issues come up in conversation, but a few naysayers keep asking why I still want accountability for events from 3 or 4 years ago. For one thing, COVID mandates haven't completely ended. For another, saying I should let it slide would be like if your Social Security is cut and you don't try to get it back.
But there's a more important question I've never once gotten an answer for. Why should we have had such severe mandates at any time since 2020, considering we got along fine without them before?
Gotcha on that!
Why aren't we using the same standards to define child abuse now as we did before 2020? The standards began backsliding in 2020, making the world more dangerous for children.
Do you really think there'd be as much support for COVID mandates as there was if the media hadn't egged it on? Be honest. Gotcha on that too!
How many stay-at-home orders were ever enacted to fight disease outbreaks before 2020? Other than among medical workers performing surgery or dentistry, how many mask mandates were there before 2020? How many amusement parks and schools demanded people wear masks before 2020? How many medical offices demanded masks on patients? Wouldn't a daycare be charged with child abuse if they put a mask on a 2-year-old before 2020? If I was a prosecutor, and if this happened in my county, I would prosecute to the fullest extent of the law.
You don't put masks on 2-year-olds. Ever!
When were schools ever shut down for a whole year or two over a disease outbreak before 2020? I can understand closing schools for a few days, and once in a great while - a long, long, long while - that used to happen. But 2 years?
Why should we have permanent mandates now, when we never had them before 2020? Gotcha on that too! Imagine that!
Getting coherent answers would rule.
This is very rare, but we have to correct something we posted yesterday.
It appears as if the U.S. Senate election in Maryland actually has more than 2 candidates. Ballotpedia says that in addition to the living disasters in the Republican and Democratic parties, there's also a Green, a Libertarian, and an independent. We were unaware of this, because of a post in another forum.
Thank heavens Marylanders may have a choice, but don't expect the media to let any of these other 3 candidates win.
In March, we told you about Susan Zhuang, a right-wing Democrat on New York City Council. She abused city e-mail accounts to raise funds for a nonprofit tied to the Chinese Communist Party, and she also organized a far-right rally against a proposed homeless shelter.
Zhuang was at another such protest today. And she was arrested for biting a police patrol chief. She faces numerous charges including felony assault, resisting arrest, and obstruction of governmental administration. Zhuang was among 9 people arrested for their conduct at the event.
Another day in the life of a right-wing uniparty acolyte.
Posts
All Comments
