Granted, I’m a week late on this, but under the circumstances (namely me deciding to write about something else), I hope you’ll forgive me. And if not, well…I’ll pout.
Anyway, California is usually at the forefront of a lot of things, namely really bad ideas. Recently, San Francisco proposed a lump sum payment of $5 million to eligible blacks for reparations, among other proposals. Additionally, the state’s Reparation Task Force submitted a report to the California Legislature that Governor Gavin Newsom is expected to implement if the legislature doesn’t act.
As a result, I am stating for the record I now self-identify as a black resident of San Francisco. Please respect my privacy during my transition.
Seriously, reparations is a controversial subject to say the least, which means it’s perfect for your favorite blogger who writes a weekly series by this specific title to cover. Take that, “Leftist Lexicon Word of the Week” written by Jerry Funklemeyer!
reparations
What the Left thinks it means – monetary compensation given to blacks due to America’s slave history
What it really means – another way for white Leftists to blow through more of our money so they can feel good about themselves
The Civil War/War Between the States/War of Northern Aggression/The War the Movie “Glory” Was Based On was one of the most difficult and bloody times of our nation’s relatively young history. From 1861 to 1865, this country was more fractured than Jackie Chan’s body after doing his own stunts. But once the Union prevailed, the question was what to do next. Back then, they didn’t have Leftists to provide their sage advice about misogyny and trans rights in the former Confederacy, so it came down to a meeting between William T. Sherman and black ministers to create an attempt at reparations: 40 acres. (Mule, sold separately.)
And that attempt got scuttled by President Andrew Johnson, leaving the matter unresolved until recently.
There have been calls for reparations in recent history, but the idea really took off in 2020 thanks to the Democratic Primaries where there were…four black candidates out of 27. Five if you count Elizabeth Warren. And of those black candidates, none got the nomination, and only one (Kamala Harris) got to the White House as Puddin’ Head Joe’s Vice-President. Not too shabby for someone who I almost tied in the Iowa Caucuses and I didn’t even run.
Out of that and the shootings of blacks that occurred in 2019-2020, the idea of reparations gained new steam, which prompted California to create the aforementioned Reparations Task Force.
So, now that we’re back in the present, let’s start shitting on the reparations idea, shall we?
As a concept, reparations aren’t that hard to understand. We wronged an entire race of people by enslaving them and treating them worse than Ike treated Tina, so we want to try to balance the scales somehow. Admirable goal, but the logistical equivalent of an M.C. Escher drawing.
The biggest hurdle to the idea of reparations is the fact none of the people who are demanding it today were ever slaves. And it’s not like we can fire up the TARDIS, go back to 1865, drop off $5 million, and tell the slaves to invest heavily in Apple in 100+ years. Although time can be a big ball of wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff, it’s still bound by fixed events that can be tracked. And with the passage of time comes the birth of generation after generation that are removed from slavery altogether, save by bloodline.
But does bloodline alone create a solid enough link to award $5 million? That creates another speed bump to payday: what about those who either didn’t own slaves or fought for the Union in the Civil War? If bloodline is enough to give away money, it should also be good enough to exempt people from being forced to contribute to this monetary transfer. I have two relatives who fought for the Union (who, by the way, fought at least in part to end slavery). Yet, I get the feeling I would be expected to open my wallet and give generously to the Give Non-Slaves $5 Million Because Fuck You That’s Why Foundation.
And don’t get me started on their telethons!
Then, there’s the question of mixed-race children. Back in the day, white slaveowners knocked boots with slaves, which resulted in the genes of both races coming together to form a new life. Would the families of such a sexual union have to pay up or receive reparations? Or maybe they would just get $2.5 million? Or would the white half have to pay the black half $5 million?
Regardless, the fact we can even ask some of these questions without the pro-reparations side coming up with answers is not a good sign. But wait, there’s more!
Dropping $5 million into anyone’s lap is going to be significant, and it opens up any number of opportunities. And if it’s bundled in hundred dollar bills, it’s going to make the males in the audience sing tenor for a few years. For most people, though, it’s life-changing money, but only if it’s used intelligently. This is where human nature comes into play. If we get any amount of money from $2 on a scratch-off ticket to millions of dollars, our first instinct is to spend it. If this sum comes with few strings attached, though, we can get pretty reckless with it because in our minds it’s “free money.”
But just as any breadwinner today can tell you, money can run out fast if you’re not careful. Or if you vote for Puddin’ Head Joe, which is pretty much the same thing as not being careful.
When we don’t know or care how we get the money, we have less of an incentive to be smart with it. And, no, this isn’t a racial thing, but rather a human thing. Economists have studied this phenomenon for decades and it always ends the same way: the further we are away from earning money, the easier it gets to spend. Hence, the reason so many big lottery winners end up blowing their winnings and winding up right back where they started.
Guess what I think will happen to the reparations money if it gets approved.
And it’s not like there isn’t precedent with this. Remember Hurricane Katrina (which, oddly or appropriately enough, was the last time Kanye West was relevant)? Well, some inventive (and ultimately dishonest) people found a way to turn tragedy into a windfall to the tune of an estimated $2 billion. Between recipients of the aid spending the money on non-essential items, including vacations and porn, and others getting relief funds for people who didn’t exist, Katrina proved to be a disaster of a natural disaster response.
But the Katrina failure was more federal, right? Nothing like that could happen on the state level, right? Wellllll…not really. Our good friends on the Left Coast racked up an estimated $20 billion in fraud related to the pandemic. Leftists bad with money? Why that’s…pretty normal, really.
Now, why would I bring up Katrina and COVID in a discussion about reparations? To underscore a point that will taint the idea: governments, especially large ones, don’t keep good tabs on who is getting the money. It’s more of a rubber-stamp process. Granted, the reparations initiative in San Francisco comes with some conditions, but I’m not sure the state government that racked up ten times the Katrina fraud is capable of making sure the conditions are met.
But then again, it’s not meant to be effective or efficient except in one area: easing the guilt white Leftists feel over slavery. And they’re willing to spend as much of your money as possible to make sure they feel better no matter how long it takes! When you consider the amount of guilt a Leftist could prevent brownouts in California if it could be converted into electricity, let’s just say you might as well give the government access to your bank accounts. I mean, if China doesn’t already have it, thanks to TikTok.
It’s at this point I need to remind the white Leftists…none of you fuckknuckles were alive during slavery. You can feel bad about what happened generations ago, but to make it a central part of your life is a bit extreme and at this point silly. Kinda like the Young Turks, but less comedic. You cannot change the past, nor can you expect any amount of money to ever make it right because there will always be people willing to prey on your guilt to get more money out of you. As long as the greedy and dishonest among us see Leftist largess as free money, the spigot will never turn completely off and there will be fraud aplenty.
The thing is the Left has made it amazingly easy to game the system, thanks to the rhetoric they’ve already presented as true. And eagle-eyed readers already know how. Remember, the Left maintains how you self-identify is as real as how you are. Rachel Dolezal and Shawn King both identify as black in spite of being whiter than a medical isolation room run by Mormon IBM executives. Yet, they were/are considered to be authentic voices on the black experience in America.
Well, shit. If they can do it, so can I. And I can think of 5 million reasons to do it!
And California can’t say shit about it. Well, they can, but they’ll look like hypocritical assholes doing it. So, win-win!
Tag: civil war
Irreconcilable Differences
It was bound to happen, kids. Marjorie Taylor Greene said something that almost made my head explode with the sheer stupidity of it. Recently she came out and said we need a “national divorce” between red and blue states. As much fun as it would be to have America turned into a sitcom trope, I think this is a bad idea. Why?
For one, because the idea started from a 2004 meme.
But more importantly, because it’s going to lead to civil war, no matter what MTG says. Right now, ideological rifts are wider than Steven Tyler’s mouth at a dental appointment. People on the Left and the Right wake up and choose violence, hatred, and half-witted squawking points from their shit-flingers of choice.
At the core of this strife is a fundamental difference, not just of ideas, but of reality itself. Take gender, for example. Right now, Leftists believe there are more genders than Baskin Robbins has ice cream flavors (dining tip: avoid the Gender Fluid Fudge Ripple), while the Right believes there are only two. Now, I’m not a biologist or a Supreme Court nominee for that matter, but if we’re going to fight over something that hasn’t become an issue until the past few years and isn’t rooted in the age-old conflict of reality versus feefees, something tells me splitting up the country will end badly.
Just think about the sheer logistics of such an enterprise. Although there are clear red and blue states, there are a number of purple states, such as my home state of Iowa. Sometimes, we vote for Democrats, and other times we vote for Republicans. Where exactly would we fit? Would it turn into a custody battle between California and Texas where we spend two weekends a month with one state and the other two weekends with the other? And what if one state lets us stay up past our bedtimes and buys us all the toys, games, and gadgets we want in an attempt to appear to be the “cool state”? Then, there would be getting used to our new “step-states” and trying to fit in.
These are the kind of questions people gung ho for a national divorce haven’t considered yet, if they’ve considered them at all.
The sad part is, having said all that, I don’t see any way out of it. There are too many differences for us to try to work on as a nation, and when we can’t even agree on how many genders there are, it’s pretty much destined to fail. There is no reimagined version of the Yalta Conference coming soon to a TV screen near you. America is, to put it bluntly, stuck in a swamp of our own creation. And I’m not talking about Washington, DC.
And don’t expect our national leaders to lend a hand. Not only do they get off on us being at each other’s throats like a Nosferatu fistfight, but the strife helps them get away with more underhanded shit. The wallet-busting multi-trillion dollar Omnibus Spending Bill from a few weeks ago proved that. And as long as the Left and the Right continue to let us bicker, the wheels of the country get further and further sucked into the marsh, making it harder for us to get out.
So, what do we do? First off, we should reject the idea of a national divorce, no matter who agrees with it, because the eventual conclusion of such an idea will be bloody, messy, and possibly fracture the country even more than it already is. Besides, we’ve already done this. Remember that little thing the kids like to call the Civil War/War Between the States/War of Northern Aggression/That Thing We Have Totally Forgotten About or Never Learned in the First Place Because Racism? Yeah, Gettysburg is gonna look like a Buddhist picnic compared ot what we have in store.
Beyond that…I got nothing. No, wait, I do have something: look past the differences we have and look for the similarities. At the end of the day, we’re all Americans (unless you’re reading this in a different country…but I can put in a good word for you and make sure you get the Honorary American tour package). It doesn’t matter if you’re a Trump-loving Republican named Roy or a non-binary genderfluid person named Magnolia with more pronouns than college majors, there are still some things that can bring us all together.
You know, like thinking Michael Bay should never make another movie ever?