Don's Tuesday Column

         THE WAY I SEE IT   by Don Polson   Red Bluff Daily News   01/03/2023

Time passes, things change, repeat

The year’s end-to-New Year’s transition is a mostly superficial, subjectively-chosen point for shedding the old while optimistically looking to the future. It’s the proverbial tired old man leaving the scene to make way for the bright, joyous New Year’s baby, full of promising resolutions of change and improvement.

That’s “the ticket,” the story many will cling to like committing to gym workouts and reduced indulgences. If only it were so, rather than the reality of human inertia and comfortable habits, for better or worse, reclaiming their hold on our time and priorities.

As fate would have it, items and stories in the forefront now have their place in the passing parade of once-and-future repeat performances. Nothing is truly new; the future generally flows from the past. “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future,” as Yogi Berra said.

The New Year’s baby, truth be told, arrives pre-loaded with cynicism, confusion, regrets and a full diaper. 2022’s topics, issues and controversies barely hit speed bumps on their way to claiming 2023’s lead stories.

Hypocrisy, irony and duplicitous “gaslighting” continues to define the political struggles imposed upon us by the progressive, socialist left in governmental seats of power; likewise, the news media have morphed into comfortable appendages to those occupying said seats. Each seemingly new development is quickly filtered through the lens of politically correct, “woke” narratives before facts even emerge.

In no particular order: Newly elected N.Y. Republican Rep. George Santos, having embarrassed himself with inflated, fatuous claims during his campaign, nevertheless is found to at least possess the veracity to admit to being a liar. Inflated, fallacious claims have emanated from elected Democrats like Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Al Gore, Ilhan Omar, Dick Blumenthal, Liz Warren or any “D” outside of Jimmy Carter.

The “elephant-in-the-room” is that voters chose to replace a Democrat with Republican Santos, who would probably have been elected without his prevarications. I’m not hopping on the bandwagon calling for him to step down—voters made their choice and must now live with it.

I certainly won’t hold my breath waiting for Democrats to tell Joe Biden to step down over his serial “pants on fire” whoppers: "Biden lied about being the first in his family to go to college, lied about his scholarship, lied about finishing in the top half of his class, lied about having 3 undergrad degrees, and lied about being a professor” (T. Becket Adams, Washington Examiner). His lies are legion and almost perfunctory: his civil rights record, Nelson Mandela interaction, truck-driving, Puerto Rican family influence, and…pick a speech.

It's no coincidence that the news media discontinued their tally of lies by President Trump—most of which amounted to “fact checks” where they selectively chose which facts to believe, and then called disagreements over opinion “proof” of Trump’s lies—once their voted-for-and-supported candidate took office.

Democrats—having destroyed the inviolable privacy of voting with their pandemic-predicated (should be illegal) vote “harvesting,” supplemented with (always illegal) vote “trafficking”—now further erode privacy in service of political persecution by releasing Donald Trump’s tax returns. What brief network clips watched left me scratching my head over exactly what we’re supposed to find objectionable. Bring on Hillary’s and Biden’s returns.

Trump honestly said in a debate that he’s “smart” to use the tax provisions, passed by Dems and Rs, to reduce his liability. Offsetting income with losses is legal and no different than any business/self-employed man or woman itemizing their expenses against sales and commissions to arrive at an amount subject to taxes. Dave Chappelle famously brought the Saturday Night Live audience to laughter over Trump’s simple admission to using the system created by Congress, as do wealthy Democrats like the Clintons.

So, Trump’s charitable donations were close to $3 million from 2017 to 2019, including his presidential salary—which is worse than not getting the salary because the income is counted before the charity is declared. His own tax law hurt him financially when he limited state and local tax deductions.

Partisan AP writers quoted a “law professor” who blubbered about “red flags” and “fishy looking stuff.” Really? Just admit that it landed with a dud like the Mueller Report. Cue sad trombone: wah, wah, wah, wah, wah.

It’s important, however, to not get lost in relatively smaller personal lies when monumental falsehoods abound: Humans using fossil fuels cause climate change; EVs, electric vehicles, are pollution free; It’s possible in a few decades to rely entirely on “renewable energy”;

COVID vaccines provide universal protection against infection, and produce no damaging “adverse reactions” (belied by the VAERS government site); Mask and vaccine mandates, lockdowns, school closures and remote learning caused no harm, and reduced COVID deaths.

More lies: Government spending helps the economy; People receiving government benefits are eager to leave them and become self-sufficient; Endlessly raising the minimum wage won’t destroy businesses and kill the jobs they provide;

Male or female sex is “assigned at birth” leaving children and young people free to decide their “gender”; The “nuclear family” is an artifice, the abandoning of which won’t destroy America. Not the least of “big lies” is that gun control laws reduce killing by criminals, and that self-defense is not an inviolable 2^nd Amendment right.

Happy New Year!