Don's Tuesday Column

THE WAY I SEE IT   by Don Polson    Bluff Daily News   12/12/2023

Gav-idiocy, Covidiocy, part deux

Governor Newsom, a would-be national Chief Executive, provides targets on a weekly basis. One gem from his debate with Florida’s Gov. DeSantis was the go-to excuse for California’s highest-in-nation gas prices: “gouging” by oil companies.

“Low information” political lemmings are predisposed to accuse the free market of that which derives from government regulation. However, California’s oil and gas industry is not obligated to “sit down and shut up” when made a scapegoat for prices driven inexorably higher by foolhardy, unnecessary restrictions and demands emanating, not from the free market, but from the “Emerald City,” Sacramento.

Using the law as a cudgel serving the leftist behemoth in that biggest-consumer-of-taxes-in-the-nation, our governmental “superiors” just can’t stop trying to point the finger of causality at “Big Oil.” A recent law requires oil companies to inform customers about “how much money they’re making off Californians on their websites; oil companies are now hitting back by posting QR codes at the pump where customers can learn how much they’re paying in taxes and fees.” (Redstate.com)

The pump price here in Tehama County shouldn’t deceive you into thinking it’s not that bad. A.A.A., long-time automotive advocate, has a chart for that, showing (as of 12/10) the national average price per gallon at $3.158, while California’s average is $4.716; that’s 50 percent higher (https://gasprices.aaa.com//state=CA).

Tehama, Shasta and Glenn counties occupy the lowest price range: $4.24 to $4.46. As of Sunday, Tehama County’s average of $4.29 is bested statewide only by Yuba County’s $4.24. Much of our state’s urban population is paying close to $5 per gallon; rural Mono County tops out at $5.943.

The US Oil & Gas Association wasn’t finished dishing on Gavin “hair gel” Newsom. They provided a breakdown of the petrochemicals and polymers that make hair gel possible. The old standard, Brylcreem, had mineral oil and beeswax; Pomade-type ingredients were lard, petroleum jelly, beeswax or lanolin. The Vitalis hair tonic that our dad saturated our hair with every Sunday for church had a list of chemicals unpronounceable by me.

The “Supreme Court dismissed a disability ‘tester’ lawsuit—a civil rights ‘tester’ had sued a hotel claiming it failed to post accessibility information online but never planned to visit the hotel” (Theepochtimes.com).

I will never forget the seminar Taco Bell Corporation provided managers around the time the Americans with Disability Act (ADA) was being legislated. Their legal people explained that the law was designed without specific requirements for case-by-case application; rather, it was intentionally written to allow standards to be established via litigation by disabled persons suing businesses of every sort for “access,” based on plaintiffs’ “needs.”

We collectively shook our heads at the “catch 22.” Businesses wouldn’t know what was required until an aggrieved “disabled” person applied a subjective standard, found a willing attorney, and dragged said business into court, subjecting the owner to legal fees on top of costs of “accommodation.”

You may think that was settled and taken for granted by the 2020s, 30 years after the ADA passed in 1990, but the Supreme Court had to put a stop to the flagrant abuse of the law against hotels by “fee seeking,” disingenuous plaintiffs and their lawyers.

Readers may recall how one such disabled plaintiff dragged the basement-housed model train display in Gerber through a legal wringer, before a local judge applied common sense and the principle that the train display was “grandfathered” into compliance requiring no further litigation, as I recall.

Such common sense and community standards will not, I fear, protect local retailers of national chains, from the latest gender nonsense to come down from on high. Will Walmart, Marshalls and Ross be forced to devote precious floor space to so-called “gender neutral” sections?

“Under Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom's (D-CA.) new bill, retailers in the state must create gender-neutral toy sections for children or risk being fined hundreds of dollars” (Townhall.com). “You’re joking,” you say, but regulators on a divine mission have no sense of humor when it comes to the latest boutique “woke” cause being forced down the throats of businesses that fine-tune floor and shelf space for maximum profits.

By the way, in 2013 Newsom was recorded bemoaning California’s high tax rates; he acknowledged knowing people that have left the state over those high tax rates. Will Gavin’s Dems look to slash spending, or raise taxes, over our state’s nearly $70 billion deficit? Silly question.

This week’s “Covidiocy” includes: “Some COVID Vaccines Produce ‘Unintended Immune Response’ in Recipients: Study—The COVID vaccines were fundamentally faulty, revealed researchers, as they reworked the synthetic mRNAs to prevent further harmful responses;” and “Higher Incidence of COVID-19 Found Among Consistent Mask-Wearers: Study—Some mask wearers were found to have up to 40 percent higher incidence of infection, contradicting earlier studies and opposing the narrative of mask mandates.” (both at Theepochtimes.com)

Coincidentally, “CDC Warns It's Time to Fire Up Those Masks Again, America!” by Mike Miller (Redstate.com). A British writer: “Corruption, corruption everywhere – how the Covid debacle made the scales fall from my eyes” by Liz Hodgkinson. Links at Donpolson.blogspot.com.