Escape from the Insanity

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The European Union, Levy's a nine figure fine on Elon
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Musk and X and trouble in Oregon. Business owner Carla
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Chambers will join us.
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It's gonna take a mindset change and hitting the reset
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button pretty hard.
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Plus by parting shot for my penultimate show. So let's
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get started. Hello, my friends, Christmas is just two weeks away.
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Can you believe it? Oh my, you better get shopping yop.
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Welcome to episode one hundred and fifty six of What's
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Bugging Me on the great and growing Ricochet Network. This
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is the penultimate episode of my podcast before we go
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on hiatus. Find a way to return later in January.
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Penultimate is such a great word. It sounds like it
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means the most, the very best ever, But really penultimate
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means only next to last. I've always thought you could
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write a screenplay called The Penultimate Woman. It's about a
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guy who's about to get married, and before he commits
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to be with only one woman for the rest of
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his life, he goes on a search for who will
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be the last other woman he slept with. The Penultimate Woman.
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But it turns out that is kind of the plotline
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of the early Tom Hanks movie bachelor party with the
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cocaine snorting donkey. Check it out sometime. I've been in Portland,
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Oregon all week. It's my second trip in a month,
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recording this for you after midnight, two in the morning,
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Portland time, five in the morning, New York time. I'm
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tired and jet lagged and emotionally drained from all I'm
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learning here, guys and gals, I'm doing research for my
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next book. The working title is Ori a Goners. I'm
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looking at how the well meaning but ridiculously liberal policies
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and politics of Portland and Oregon are strangling growth and
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ruining one of the most livable places on the planet.
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Oregon in Portland in particular, have some of the highest
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tax rates in the country, but they provide some of
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the worst services for that price. Calls to the police
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can go twenty minutes without a response, sometimes an hour
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when it's only a property crime. Fourth grade and eighth
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grade test scores for kids or at the bottom of
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the nation. CNBC surveys continually put Oregon at the bottom
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of rankings for best places to do business. Near the bottom,
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the city has lost something like thirty five thousand jobs
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in the past few years. Dozens of businesses have closed
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or moved away to better pastors. I came here to
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Portland to attend the twenty third Annual Oregon Business Leadership
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Conference on Monday. It's a gathering of top state officials, politicians,
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business leaders, union executives, NGOs, and I gotta tell you man,
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in eight hours of sessions at this conference that I attended,
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only one session for twenty minutes was devoted to the
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concerns of business owners. And business owners are the key
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to growth an investment for any place, and here they
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get treated like Pariah's and Charlatan's. In fact, in the
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B block, you're going to hear from a business hero
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of Oregon, Carla Chambers, co owner of Stallbush Farms and Corvallis, Oregon.
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Our company ships pumpkins and other edgies to customers in
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thirty countries, and Carla had a blunt message for state
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leaders this week. You're gonna love what she has to say.
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This week in Portland, I got the feeling that Oregon's
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leaders they simply aren't scared enough yet they are in denial.
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They fail to realize their state is dying because of
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their own policies. My feeling is that Portland is a
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canary in the coal mine for other blue cities. It's
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what happens when the opposition remains silent, when businesses stand
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down rather than stand up, and Democrats run wild. The
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problem in Oregon is that the Democrats have a supermajority
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in both chambers of the state legislature, a death grip,
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so the Democrats keep getting elected no matter how bad
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their performance. And it's bad. It's bad. I had a
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guy at the conference tell me every other entity in
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the world is judged by results, but in government, you
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judge based on only one thing. Are we getting elected?
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And unfortunately in Oregon, in Portland and elsewhere, the Democrats
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just keep getting elected and those voters keep putting him
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back in office, so that there's no diversity of ideas,
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there's no strong opposition, there's no way to challenge the
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status quo when things go wrong. New York City, my
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hometown for more than forty years, elected Kami Mom Donnie
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Mayor weeks ago. He starts on jan one. While voters
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in Portland, Oregon said, hold my beer. They elected four
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avowed socialist members of the Democrats Socialist of America. That's
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the group that backed Mamdani. Well, they've got four there,
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plus two other liberal allies, half of the twelve member commission.
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Just a bunch of socialists. While I was away from
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New York this week, Kami Mom Donnie made news on
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two fronts. First, he picked a new advisor on the
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justice system, and this is something that they would definitely
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do right here in Portland. This guy knows justice from
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the inside. As it turns out. Here's Sandra Smith and
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Charlie Hurt on Fox News.
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Masun Lennon is a rapper who serves seven years in
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prison for armed robbery in.
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The nineteen nineties.
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So let's bring in Fox and Friends. We can host
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Charlie Hurt. I can't imagine why this sounds like it
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doesn't make sense to us.
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Charlie, your thoughts.
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It's insane, absolutely insane. Armed robbery of taxicab drivers in
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New York City. You would wonder. It does kind of
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make you wonder, does this mean that maybe we can
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arm the taxicab drivers in New York City against thugs
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like this? But that does not seem to be the
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concern of the new administration. But honestly, you know, if
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you step back and you look at sort of the
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bigger picture here. I think what this is, I think
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that zorroon Mom Donnie is concerned about his radical left
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flank because he has spent so much time in the
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last couple of weeks hobnobbing with billionaires trying to raise
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millions of dollars for his transition team. And he famously
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went and met with President Trump at the White House,
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had what appeared to be a pleasant meeting there. And
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I think he's kind of worried, and maybe rightly so,
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that a lot of his radical left wing crazy supporters
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think that he has gotten a sniff of power and
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a sniff of money, and he's going to go try
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to run jump in bed with a bunch of billionaires.
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And here's Mom Donnie making a fatal error before our
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very eyes. He is ending the city practice of conducting
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sweeps of homeless encampments to remove them and clean them out.
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This is from New York One.
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Though for a long time progressive critics of this policy
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is basically argued that it is not a success because
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the homeless men and women are not accepting shelter. But
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Mayor Adams defended the policy in a video, saying that
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it is humane to take away their tends to prevent
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them from living on the streets, and he said that
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Mamdannie's plan to do away with this policy would result
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in a quality of life nightmare, leaving.
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People to suffer.
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And the code isn't just neglectful, it's a disgrace.
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Mayor Eric Adams cut this video, suggesting that Mayor elect
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mam Donnie would be abandoning homeless people if he did
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away with a policy that city workers dismantled tents and encampment.
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Mam Donnie said this week the so called homeless sweeps
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will end in his administration. We are going to take
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an approach that understands its mission is connecting those New
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Yorkers to housing, whether it's supportive housing, whether it's rental housing,
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whatever kind of housing it is. Since Adams took office,
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city workers visited eighteen thousand and six hundred and fifty
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three locations with encampments, there were only one hundred and
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fifteen instances of someone accepting shelter.
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And man, old man, New Yorkers are going to be
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so sorry he is doing this here in Portland, the
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homeless camp out anywhere they want pretty much, and county
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provided tents and tarfs. They set up in city parks,
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beneath underpasses, on sidewalks at business interests, then abandoned carts,
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cars and RVs. You see this everywhere Portland has inside
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the city limits. I guess. So we're seven thousand homeless
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people unsheltered they are called and the city and the
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county spend over seven hundred million dollars a year on
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homeless services. That is more than one hundred thousand dollars
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per year per homeless person. We would happen if you
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just gave those people each one hundred thousand bucks instead
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of giving it to the NGOs. And for this, they
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aren't getting these sad people off the street. No, no, no.
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The city and county spent this fortune making sure that
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the homeless are fed and have clean tinfoil for snorting fentanyl,
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and clean crack pipes and clean needles. I talked to
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a guy here who is a homeless opioid addict for
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four years in the early two thousands. November nineteenth was
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his no. November twentieth was his nineteenth year of sobriety.
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God bless him. And this guy told me, you want
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to end homelessness, make it miserable for them, And the
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problem is here in Portland, he says, we try to
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make it comfortable, and homelessness is the crux of inter
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linked problems drug addiction, mental illness, and street crime. All
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of this will get worse in New York under Mom Donnie.
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I bet, but I won't be here to see it,
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as I told you, moving to South Florida and the
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new year, fleeing New York after more than forty years.
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I'll miss it, but I won't miss what it may become.
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So onward. Here's what else is bugging me today. You
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have a listen to the snide, persnickety bureaucrat with the
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European Union.
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Today the Commission has issued a fine of one hundred
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and twenty million euro two X for breaching the Digital
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Services Act. This is the first ever fine under the DSA.
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X has indeed breached its transparency obligation under the DSA.
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This includes x's blue check mark. It deceives users anyone
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can pay to obtain the verified status, and X does
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not meaningfully verify who is behind it. It also includes
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X advertising representatory, which does not work properly, and X
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doesn't provide effective data access for researchers. Today's decision has
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nothing to do with content moderation. It's about transparency provisions
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for citizens here in the European Union.
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So this is an outrage. Elon Musk revealed that EU
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sensors had approached him some months ago and offered a deal,
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no fire, if the X platform would muzzle the views
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that the EU dislikes and not tell the accounts that
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it's doing that too. And this is something that Facebook
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and Instagram and everyone else said yes to, but not
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Elon Musket and X saying this way. You know, the
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what's the censor views? That question why European countries are
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letting in millions of Muslim immigrants who are intent on
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taking over their nations the lily livered liberal fools. Here's
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indie journalist Michael Schellenberger on Fox Business, my own network.
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Yeah, it's a significant escalation. I mean even for somebody
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with the wealth of Elon Musk one hundred and forty
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million euros, a lot of money. The European Union was
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itself spreading misinformation about what was going on. It's said
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that it wasn't content moderation, which is the word they
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use for censorship, that it was about transparency. In fact,
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it's an example of how they used this censorship by proxy,
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where the government picks so called researchers or NGOs always
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on the left to decide what's true and false, and
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then to demand the censorship from the social media platforms
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who must comply with it or face significant finds from
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the government. So they sort of try to get a
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work around free speech protections by pretending that, oh, these
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people that we've assigned to demand censorship are somehow not
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agents of the government in demand that censorship. So it's
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as usual they spread the disinformation and then demand censorship
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on the basis of it. But I think the president
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has to say something here. This has been a political
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issue for a really long time. I mean Vice President
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Vance went to Germany earlier this year and told them
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to back off. I went last year, told them to
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back off. I'm going to go again in a couple
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of weeks. They need to back off. This is really crazy,
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and I think what it has to do ultimately is
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mass migration. Eighty percent of the public in Europe rejects
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this mass migration agenda. The three biggest countries in Europe, England, Britain,
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Germany and France, their heads of state have approval ratings
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between fifteen and twenty five percent. They're very unpopular. And
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that's because this myth that there was no cost to
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this mass migration has just been exploded, particularly by X,
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because it's allowed for people to see the crime and
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the high cost and the damage that's caused by mass migration.
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That's why they're going after Elon Musk's.
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X, the Digital Services Act, which really ought to just
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be called the Censorship Act. So Schellenberger, just you know,
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you talked about Trump. Well, sure enough, President Trump did
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weig in all this nasty EU find.
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But no, it's a tough thing. I don't think it's right. No,
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I don't think. I don't see you know how they
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can do that.
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I'm not.
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I'm gonna I'll speak about it later. I'm going to
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get a full report on it. Look, Europe has to
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be very careful. You're doing a lot of things. We
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want to keep Europe Europe. Europe is going in some
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bad directions. It's very bad, very bad for the people.
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We don't want Europe to change so much. You go
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in some very bad directions. That was a big That's
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a good thing.
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Here's a bigger issue here. Europe is losing itself. It's
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being overrun by muscle refugees who literally rape and pillage.
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Here's Trump in an interview with Politico.
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Most European nations, they're they're decaying, the decaying.
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You can imagine some leaders in Europe are a little
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freaked out by what your posture is.
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And Europeans should be freaked out by what they're doing
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to their countries. They're destroying their countries. People I like,
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look the people I like, I get along with it,
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you know that. But they can't let this happen and
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it gets to a point where you can't really correct it.
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There'll be a point, and it's very close to that.
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It will mean that they're no longer going to be
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strong nations. They'll be well, it depends, you know, it depends.
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They'll change their ideology, obviously because the people coming in
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have a totally different ideology. But it's it's going to
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make that much weaker.
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And the thing is, guys, this could happen here too
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if we sit back and let it happen and fail
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to stand up and fight back and make ourselves heard.
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We've got to keep on doing exactly that. And when
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we return, Carla Chambers joins us on organ in Priss.
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I'm Greg Corumbus, joined Jim Garrity of National Review and
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me Each weekday for the Three Martini Lunch Podcast. We'll
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give you the good, bad, and crazy news of the
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day and lots of laughs too. Find us right here
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on the Ricochet Audio Network at ricochet dot com or
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wherever you get your podcasts.
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And now let's talk with Carla Chambers. She is an Oregonian.
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As you know. I've been in Portland at a big
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leadership conference that happened on Monday and Carla was kind
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of one of the featured star speakers. People were talking
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about her comments for the rest of the day afterward.
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She is the co owner of Stallbush Island Farms in Corvallis, Oregon,
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about ninety minutes south of the Portland, and she's been
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on the Board of Agriculture for the state, the Board
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of Forestry, the first woman ever appointed years ago. And
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she joins what's bugging me now? Thank you so much
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for being with us, Carlo with a K and why
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don't we start up? Are you telling us about the
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Leadership conference and your presentation at around nine o'clock on
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Monday morning.
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Well, that was quite a day yesterday. We brought the
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business community together with the political community and really set
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the stage to share with the governor and the elected leaders.
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So we've got some real challenging issues, business challenges that
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have to be addressed. And I would say that, you know,
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Duncan and Wise and the Oregon Business Council set that
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up very well. We presented the problems, but we also
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presented solutions. And now it's a question of will our
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political leaders left.
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Yes, Well, what was it that you said in your
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presentation that found we seem so striking to people I
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talked to Because I missed it. I had to run
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back to my room for a radio interview.
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Alas well, I recently put an opinion piece in The
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Oregonian that was published and the title was to make
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Oregon a magnet for opportunity again, And what I really
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pointed out was our job market is flashing red. I
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served almost twenty years on the Federal Reserve Board on
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Portland and the Head Office Board in San Francisco, and
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you know, so I'm pretty used to numbers and hanging
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around economists, and I could see where our layoffs in
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Oregon were now exceeding what we saw in the owaito
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nine housing recession. And I was on the head office
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board in San Francisco during that recession, so I was
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pretty pretty familiar with those numbers. Oregon has lost over
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to twenty five thousand jobs in the past year, and
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we have seen major employers like Intel, Nike, Ess Tech,
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fred Meyer, Roseberg, forest Products, Geled, wind Wells, Fargo, HP,
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you know, just a whole number of really good Oregon
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based companies, you know, shedding employees here. And I think
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what particularly caught my attention is We've always been a
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manufacturing state, which is essential to our rural economies that
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multiplier impact and forestry and agriculture is so important to
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these rural economies. Yes, and we are now dead last
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according to the Bureau of Labor and Statistics on creating
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manufacturing jobs. So those are pretty flashing red lights. And
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then I went on to you know, share what others
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are saying about our business environment, and the Tax Foundation
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has US is thirty fifth in the nation on tax competitiveness.
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Bureau of Labor and Statistics puts US at the bottom
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of the heap on manufacturing job growth. George Mason University
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puts US a seventh highest in regulatory burden, and CNBC
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puts US at forty seventh worst in terms of business
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friendliness and forty third highest in terms of the cost
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of doing business. So this has put Oregon in to
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a position of being one of the least competitive business
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states in the nation. But we're surrounded by very competitive states,
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you know, Arizona, Idaho, Utah, Texas, and so we're it's
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not hard for capital to move these days, as you know,
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and we're seeing it move to where it can you know,
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create value.
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Yeah. From the research I've been doing so far, though,
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it feels like there's a certain part of denial on
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the part of political leaders who there's even some who
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question whether that's really happening, that dream.
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I think there's no question about it. I think we've
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got a number of elected leaders who don't have a
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business experience, and I think they really do believe that
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by higher taxation, you know, they are in regulation, they
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are really helping. And what they don't realize is it's
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counterintuitive and driving capital away from this state, not toward it, Right.
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There's a real division between the urban Portland metro market
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and the rural south and in the east.
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Right, we we are I would say, a rural state
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with five blue dots, but the population in Portland really
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dictates what the rest of the state, you know, lives with.
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Right and there there is a division. It's very real.
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And uh you know, if you if you research that,
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you will see a number of counties have hat that
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was it.
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This poll showed that division where people down there feel
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like Portland, your progressive policies are hurting the entire state.
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And overwhelmingly they feel that down there, like seventy three
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percent of the voters down there feel that about Portland.
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And I think almost even half of Portland voters admit
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that their progressive policies are hurting state. Only fifteen percent
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of Portland voters said, oh, yeah, we should be pursuing
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this really liberal agenda, progressive policies, climate change, LGBTQ plus
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blah blah blah, and on good Sixty percent said no, No,
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jobs and growth, that should be the number one priority.
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I think things are changing out here. I certainly hope so.
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But all of these numbers are really even before some
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of the new tax increases that haven't been absorbed into
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this economy. So this transportation tax, I don't know if
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you're familiar.
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With it, Yes, I know that first it was turned down,
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then she called us special session, and then she intentionally
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held off signing it, so that make it harder to
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raise petition signatures to challenge what she was doing right, right,
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And I.
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Think they need I don't know, like seventy five seventy
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seven thousand signatures to refer that to the voters. And
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it looks to me like they're going to get close
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to two hundred thousand, so that will be referred to
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the voters.
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And yes, that's true, that no tax or.
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That's right, and the polls show that that will go
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down by about eighty percent. And I think that gets
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to the affordability issue. I think it's you know, it's
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to the point we have so many new taxes going
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on out here that even you know, the most progressive
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voters can't afford this. And so I do think things
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are turning. You know, we've got a cat tax that
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has been very, very damaging. It's taxing businesses not making
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a profit. We've got one of.
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Them, revenue the taxes that's rue. Yeah, and any business
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over one million dollars in annual south, so it's really sweeping.
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Then we have a death tax of sixteen point ninety percent,
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one of the remaining few in the nation. Now we've
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got a minimum wage among the highest in the nation,
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you know. For and she's added an overtime and pushed
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an overtime.
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Rather just a new overtime thing in agriculture, is it.
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Yeah, in agricultures that to forty hours a week. And
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of course agriculture is not going to be able to
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afford that, which this is going to be hurtful, more
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hurtful to employees because they'll be forced to have two
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jobs or a job and a half.
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Right, because they'll get their hours cut back, right, more money. See,
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it's the opposite of what government intends, the opposite income.
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It's counterintuitive, you know. But we've got a Paid Leave Act,
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We've got you know, a whole new page of reporting
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on HR we put it. I opened up my Northwest
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Natural Gas bill for November. There's a brand new state
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tax of six point five since per cairn. That's a
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thirty seven percent increase. And yet Oregon is one of
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the lowest emission states in the nation. We're in the
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top seven, but number two through seven are virtually tied.
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And yet we have one of the most expensive state
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programs in the nation.
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It doesn't one thing lead to the other, isn't because
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we spent so much money on enforcement we have low emissions.
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Yeah, So I would say, you know, one thing we
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just really tried to do yesterday was to point out
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all these taxes and all these new taxes are really
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putting us set the very bottom of competitiveness for god growth.
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So what we're doing isn't working, you know. That's the
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point we tried to make. Talked about all the businesses
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that have left Oregon and industries you know where Dutch
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Brothers moved their headquarters to Arizona. Yes, Routewear just moved
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to Texas. If you look at Oregon companies and Pacific Northwest,
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you ask about timber, you will see that billions of
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dollars of investment have landed in North Carolina, South Carolina
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and the South from money that was made in the
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Pacific Northwest and in Oregon. These are Oregon based companies,
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Oregon State University land grant graduates. We now have ad
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companies moving to Idaho. Pacific Foods closed a large tualtan
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plant and moved that production out of state of food
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processing plant. And then I mentioned, you know, all the
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high tech and manufacturing layoffs. In Vidia is a graduate,
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Jenson Long is a graduate of Oregon State University. Yes,
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he's not expanding in Oregon, and I can't blame him
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for it, but where his new plants are going? And
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we know him well, he's building a supercomputer for Oregon
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State University. We think remarkably highly of this person. But
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it just comes to the economics and numbers. Oregon is
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a state that is eighty one percent dependent on personal
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income taxes. So this kind of private sector weakness is
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especially dangerous to a state like Oregon. At some point,
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you know, our elected officials have got to realize this
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is a danger zone. This is not working.
447
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Right.
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Are they scared enough yet?
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I don't think so. I think, you know, I think
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the governor talked about business competitiveness and friendliness, but I
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think she's going to have to say she said she
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wanted to be in the top ten percent.
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Top ten.
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Yeah, well to get in the top ten to fifteen percent,
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I'll even give her. An additional five is that's going
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to take a substantial decrease an efficiency in state government,
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and it's going to take a mindset change and hitting
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the reset button pretty hard. And I think we've got
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some really good ideas. I don't know if you've heard,
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you know, the presentation on the Southern Lilama Innovation Corridor.
461
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Yes, they did.
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I was on a team. We went back and we
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looked at the North Carolina Research Triangle and great ideas back.
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You know.
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Actually, Oregon State University, Oregon State is I'm on the
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board of trustees. We are the only university four year
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university in the nation that has had twenty eight years
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of consecutive growth. We're the largest university in Oregon, twenty
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thirty eight thousand four indured students and OSU and U
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of all were good at spinoffs. We're good at new
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business spin offs and creating new businesses. If this governor
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could just focus on a business environment where we can
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succeed and where we can keep those businesses, if she
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really thinks hard about that top ten goal of hers, Yeah,
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and she's going to have to have taxes and regulation
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that go along with that, which means you know, really right,
477
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sizing government, making government more efficient, and downsizing costs and overhead.
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The unions aren't ever going to let that happen, are they.
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That's right.
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I mean, I'm shocked. I'm shocked. I had Kevin Looper
481
00:30:49.799 --> 00:30:52.559
tell me three weeks ago. Oh, yes, of course the
482
00:30:52.640 --> 00:30:55.960
unions are powerful. He said. The SEIU just this week
483
00:30:56.240 --> 00:31:00.720
handed the state's fiscal twenty six years twenty twenty six
484
00:31:00.759 --> 00:31:03.759
budget to the governor's office that here's your budget, and
485
00:31:03.839 --> 00:31:06.359
they said, her office is filled with former union officials.
486
00:31:06.359 --> 00:31:12.839
And then a guy today, John de Lorenzo, Yeah, tells
487
00:31:12.880 --> 00:31:17.640
me that when a new state legislator, a Democrat, is elected,
488
00:31:18.799 --> 00:31:21.480
the union walks in his first day in office and say,
489
00:31:21.480 --> 00:31:24.440
here's your new chief chief of staff and it's a
490
00:31:24.640 --> 00:31:28.960
union person. And I said, but why can't they just
491
00:31:29.000 --> 00:31:30.920
say no, screw you, I'm not doing that. He said,
492
00:31:30.960 --> 00:31:33.920
you don't dare because and he gave me the names
493
00:31:33.920 --> 00:31:35.519
of three or four No, you know what, this is
494
00:31:35.559 --> 00:31:39.480
the owner of Wilam at week. Three or four politicians
495
00:31:39.920 --> 00:31:42.960
names he gave me that were basically their careers ruined
496
00:31:43.000 --> 00:31:45.559
by the unions because they voted against the unions one
497
00:31:45.640 --> 00:31:46.880
time on one little thing.
498
00:31:47.960 --> 00:31:53.839
Yeah, I believe that's true. And you know this, things
499
00:31:53.880 --> 00:31:57.440
get bad enough for the people and maybe the people
500
00:31:57.480 --> 00:32:01.160
make different choices, you know, maybe the voters fix this.
501
00:32:02.160 --> 00:32:05.640
And I think business has been through you know, we've
502
00:32:05.680 --> 00:32:09.720
been through an inflation shock, we've been through high interest rates,
503
00:32:10.200 --> 00:32:14.880
We've been through covin, we've been through tariffs some plus
504
00:32:14.920 --> 00:32:20.079
some minus. And right now state government is our next
505
00:32:20.079 --> 00:32:24.920
big threat. But at some point, at some point, maybe
506
00:32:24.920 --> 00:32:26.200
the voters help us fix this.
507
00:32:27.119 --> 00:32:28.000
Yeah.
508
00:32:28.039 --> 00:32:31.000
And part of what my book that I'm writing and
509
00:32:31.039 --> 00:32:33.799
researching as we speak, or at Honors I hope to
510
00:32:33.799 --> 00:32:37.640
call it, is aimed at trying to replicate that moment
511
00:32:37.680 --> 00:32:41.160
in the movie Ghost where the ghost Patrick Swayzy is
512
00:32:41.160 --> 00:32:42.880
trying to get a message to his girlfriend to me
513
00:32:43.000 --> 00:32:45.440
more through Whoopy, and she says, be quiet, and then
514
00:32:45.599 --> 00:32:48.920
finally she turns Whoopy does to me and she says, Molly,
515
00:32:48.960 --> 00:32:54.160
you in danger, girl. I walk my book. You've got
516
00:32:54.160 --> 00:32:57.640
to wake up Org Honors and have him say, come on,
517
00:32:57.720 --> 00:32:59.519
we've got to do something. We've got to do something differently.
518
00:32:59.559 --> 00:33:01.960
Here you can and keep doing the same thing over
519
00:33:02.000 --> 00:33:02.759
and over again.
520
00:33:03.319 --> 00:33:06.240
That's right, that's right. Well, and I think you know,
521
00:33:06.359 --> 00:33:09.200
the inflation that we've all lived through. It's interesting to
522
00:33:09.240 --> 00:33:12.960
me to watching the national news and the national political scene,
523
00:33:13.000 --> 00:33:15.480
and it seems like we're having a really hard time
524
00:33:15.599 --> 00:33:20.480
defining affordability and in and correlating that to the inflation
525
00:33:20.599 --> 00:33:24.559
shock we've been through. Right, if you go back nineteen
526
00:33:24.680 --> 00:33:29.839
ninety to twenty twenty, we averaged about two percent inflation
527
00:33:29.920 --> 00:33:33.680
a year for thirty years. Sure, then you look at
528
00:33:33.720 --> 00:33:38.279
twenty one through twenty five, we're going to hit about
529
00:33:38.319 --> 00:33:42.400
twenty four point five percent inflation in five years.
530
00:33:42.480 --> 00:33:45.880
A cumulative added year plus year plus year plus year, yeah.
531
00:33:46.000 --> 00:33:53.279
Yep, or roughly five percent. That is about one hundred
532
00:33:53.279 --> 00:33:55.799
and thirty five percent over the FEDS target rate.
533
00:33:56.359 --> 00:33:56.680
Yees.
534
00:33:57.160 --> 00:34:02.400
That is a huge inflationary period in our history. And
535
00:34:02.640 --> 00:34:05.279
I think that is going to sort out some of
536
00:34:05.319 --> 00:34:12.000
these political craziness issues because people just can't afford any more.
537
00:34:12.800 --> 00:34:15.199
And that's what we're seeing, in my opinion, with the
538
00:34:15.239 --> 00:34:19.400
transportation tax. Yes, we want our roads plowed, and we
539
00:34:19.440 --> 00:34:24.760
want good roads and roads repaired, but we can't afford
540
00:34:24.840 --> 00:34:30.400
a four point five billion dollar solution with taxes embedded everywhere.
541
00:34:30.480 --> 00:34:33.360
And I think the voters are really speaking out and
542
00:34:33.400 --> 00:34:36.840
so I think it will be up to our business
543
00:34:37.000 --> 00:34:40.480
leaders to put the right you know, to put the
544
00:34:40.599 --> 00:34:44.119
right actions in front of the voters so that the
545
00:34:44.199 --> 00:34:45.559
voters can help us correct this.
546
00:34:46.679 --> 00:34:50.480
I've had several sources, the second one today describe the
547
00:34:50.519 --> 00:34:54.360
business community as a bunch of whimps. They've dan Levy says,
548
00:34:54.400 --> 00:35:00.639
they've traded acquiescence for access of someone else. Said, they
549
00:35:00.800 --> 00:35:03.679
are so happy to have a seat at the table,
550
00:35:03.719 --> 00:35:07.159
even if they're the ones who are on the menu. Yeah.
551
00:35:07.199 --> 00:35:10.159
Well, I think it's you know, you can there can
552
00:35:10.239 --> 00:35:12.800
be damage done, so you've got to you know, you've
553
00:35:12.800 --> 00:35:17.119
got to be strong enough to stand up to it.
554
00:35:17.679 --> 00:35:19.360
Are more willing to do that, do you think?
555
00:35:19.679 --> 00:35:23.960
And I think, well, I think you know, we certainly
556
00:35:23.960 --> 00:35:28.079
did yesterday. And there's nothing I'm telling you that I
557
00:35:28.119 --> 00:35:32.320
didn't share yesterday from the footing them. And my sense
558
00:35:32.480 --> 00:35:34.280
is at some point we've got to get to the
559
00:35:34.360 --> 00:35:37.840
truth and really understand where we are. You know, if
560
00:35:37.840 --> 00:35:40.400
you're an engineer, you don't start fixing the bridge before
561
00:35:40.440 --> 00:35:45.400
you understand the problem. Right, So I think that this
562
00:35:45.559 --> 00:35:47.760
is pretty important that we understand where we're at.
563
00:35:48.400 --> 00:35:51.440
Right. I want to thank you for coming on what's
564
00:35:51.440 --> 00:35:55.559
bugging me and giving us those startling stats, and I
565
00:35:55.639 --> 00:35:58.199
wish you well and I hope we can work together
566
00:35:58.559 --> 00:36:01.159
on waking people up. So thanks so much, and have
567
00:36:01.199 --> 00:36:02.119
a wonderful evening.
568
00:36:02.519 --> 00:36:03.559
Thank you very much.
569
00:36:18.199 --> 00:36:18.519
Hello.
570
00:36:18.639 --> 00:36:21.400
I'm James Lonwicks, and I'm at the diner you know,
571
00:36:21.800 --> 00:36:25.320
classic American diner chrome long boomerang pattern for my co
572
00:36:25.320 --> 00:36:28.199
account of these little jukeboxes. We love these, and you
573
00:36:28.199 --> 00:36:30.599
can join me here every Saturday where we talk about
574
00:36:30.599 --> 00:36:32.719
whatever happens to spring into my mind at the moment.
575
00:36:32.800 --> 00:36:35.400
There's no predicting where it will go, except that it'll
576
00:36:35.400 --> 00:36:37.639
be done in about thirty minutes. Join me, won't you,
577
00:36:37.880 --> 00:36:40.559
Every Saturday for the Ricochet Audio.
578
00:36:40.199 --> 00:36:44.199
Network Ricochet Join the conversation.
579
00:36:51.599 --> 00:36:55.079
And now for my parting shot and leaving New York.
580
00:36:55.920 --> 00:36:58.920
I've got only a few weeks left in Brooklyn, where
581
00:36:58.960 --> 00:37:03.119
I've lived since nineteen eighty two. That is a lifetime.
582
00:37:03.400 --> 00:37:06.320
Just about. As I told you, I'm leaving because of
583
00:37:06.400 --> 00:37:10.719
Mom rather than Mom Donnie. She needs our help. But
584
00:37:10.800 --> 00:37:13.719
I can see where Mom Donnie is going, and it's
585
00:37:13.760 --> 00:37:19.159
going to get ugly. The socialist Muslim Manchurian candidate and
586
00:37:19.199 --> 00:37:22.320
the silly liberals who elected him because he promised them
587
00:37:22.519 --> 00:37:26.800
free stuff. Are making the same mistakes that the leaders
588
00:37:26.800 --> 00:37:30.159
and their voters in Portland, Oregon made on the same
589
00:37:30.239 --> 00:37:35.000
fronts on homelessness and being too lenient about it, on
590
00:37:35.079 --> 00:37:38.760
crime and letting thugs loose because somehow their criminal careers
591
00:37:39.079 --> 00:37:42.280
are the fault of society rather than their own choices,
592
00:37:43.679 --> 00:37:46.400
decisions on high taxes, and wanting to sock it to
593
00:37:46.440 --> 00:37:49.280
the rich, and it turns out the rich can move elsewhere.
594
00:37:49.440 --> 00:37:52.960
Portland is losing a billion dollars in income every year
595
00:37:53.000 --> 00:37:57.199
by some estimates, New York's losses will be even higher.
596
00:37:57.960 --> 00:38:00.800
So this alleviates some of the sadness I might have
597
00:38:00.880 --> 00:38:05.159
it leaving New York. It's just that this departure will
598
00:38:05.199 --> 00:38:10.719
mean unplugging from some of the longest relationships in my life.
599
00:38:10.800 --> 00:38:14.960
I've been seeing my dentist since around nineteen ninety in
600
00:38:15.039 --> 00:38:18.079
South Florida. I will have to find a new one.
601
00:38:18.199 --> 00:38:20.639
I've used the same dry cleaner for over thirty years,
602
00:38:20.960 --> 00:38:23.840
and the same butcher shop stop its on Court Street,
603
00:38:24.880 --> 00:38:28.719
the same key food for all that time, and friends
604
00:38:28.760 --> 00:38:31.239
I have known for more than twenty years, and neighbors
605
00:38:31.239 --> 00:38:35.719
whose names I never knew, but I saw them day
606
00:38:35.760 --> 00:38:38.440
in and day out. For decades, I watched their children
607
00:38:38.480 --> 00:38:42.559
go up. They watched my daughter do the same. Now
608
00:38:42.599 --> 00:38:45.079
all of that will be gone. I have to start
609
00:38:45.119 --> 00:38:49.039
from scratch. They say change is good, but most of
610
00:38:49.119 --> 00:38:52.440
us hate change. I fall into that category. I am
611
00:38:52.760 --> 00:38:56.360
frankly kind of dreading this escape from New York. But
612
00:38:56.400 --> 00:39:00.000
as I've told you before, we cannot change the challenge
613
00:39:00.119 --> 00:39:02.280
is that befall us in life. So it is up
614
00:39:02.320 --> 00:39:06.280
to us to change how we view those challenges. And
615
00:39:06.360 --> 00:39:09.239
so I'm focusing on some things I won't miss about
616
00:39:09.280 --> 00:39:12.000
New York City. Here are a few of them. I'll
617
00:39:12.039 --> 00:39:14.320
be glad to be off the subway, happy to no
618
00:39:14.400 --> 00:39:17.039
longer hung the back wall to make sure nobody pushes
619
00:39:17.079 --> 00:39:19.679
me onto the tracks. That's happened I don't know a
620
00:39:19.719 --> 00:39:22.039
dozen or more times in the last two years, more
621
00:39:22.079 --> 00:39:25.960
than the previous decade. I'll be happy to no longer
622
00:39:26.480 --> 00:39:29.519
go to the J Street stop on the F train, where,
623
00:39:29.840 --> 00:39:31.880
just a few weeks ago, a man in his fifties
624
00:39:31.960 --> 00:39:34.719
was beaten to death at four o'clock in the afternoon.
625
00:39:35.480 --> 00:39:38.960
It could have been me. I also won't miss the
626
00:39:40.000 --> 00:39:44.239
Krets on the subway, who play loud music on boomboxes
627
00:39:44.280 --> 00:39:48.119
instead of using headphones, and others who wear huge backpacks
628
00:39:48.159 --> 00:39:50.880
and crowd out the rest of us. And the pole
629
00:39:50.960 --> 00:39:53.360
huggers who won't share space for me to get a grip,
630
00:39:53.840 --> 00:39:57.719
and the acrobats doing backflips and almost kicking passengers in
631
00:39:57.800 --> 00:40:02.480
the head so they can raise a few bucks in tips.
632
00:40:02.679 --> 00:40:06.360
And the beggars, so many beggars when you just want
633
00:40:06.360 --> 00:40:10.159
to be left alone. I'll miss going into Manhattan in
634
00:40:10.199 --> 00:40:13.280
the early morning every Sunday to go on news Max's
635
00:40:13.400 --> 00:40:17.840
Wake Up America Weekend, but I won't miss what that required,
636
00:40:18.000 --> 00:40:21.000
having to step around homeless Americans on the street and
637
00:40:21.119 --> 00:40:24.000
having to share a crowded subway with a car load
638
00:40:24.079 --> 00:40:29.119
of likely illegal aliens. I also will be happy to
639
00:40:29.159 --> 00:40:32.159
be free of Brooklyn's high rents. We just bought a
640
00:40:32.199 --> 00:40:35.960
condo down there in South Florida, and the mortgage payment
641
00:40:36.119 --> 00:40:39.480
is over one thousand bucks less per month than what
642
00:40:39.559 --> 00:40:43.000
I was wasting on rent in New York, forty percent cheaper,
643
00:40:43.679 --> 00:40:47.920
even though the floor space in Florida is sixty percent larger.
644
00:40:48.840 --> 00:40:50.760
And man oh Man, I won't miss living in a
645
00:40:50.920 --> 00:40:54.800
stupidly liberal city where most policy choices are between wrong
646
00:40:55.159 --> 00:40:59.400
and worse, Just like in Portland, Oregon, We're coming to
647
00:40:59.440 --> 00:41:03.400
you from now and the bitterly cold winters in New York.
648
00:41:03.599 --> 00:41:06.719
I'll be so happy to leave those behind. In forty
649
00:41:06.719 --> 00:41:10.880
plus years, I never have embraced the cold because it's
650
00:41:10.960 --> 00:41:14.719
just too damn cold. And I won't miss the militant
651
00:41:14.800 --> 00:41:18.280
Muslims who want to take over the once great city
652
00:41:18.320 --> 00:41:21.320
of New York. Nor will I miss the white Libs
653
00:41:21.800 --> 00:41:25.360
who will let the Muslims mount this, takeover a million
654
00:41:25.480 --> 00:41:28.760
Muslims in New York and counting. There's something really wrong
655
00:41:28.800 --> 00:41:32.440
with this, And yet I will miss New York a lot.
656
00:41:32.840 --> 00:41:34.960
It is a big part of my brand, if I
657
00:41:35.000 --> 00:41:37.719
have one. It is a city where bluntness is a
658
00:41:37.760 --> 00:41:40.840
feature rather than a flaw, where you can look people
659
00:41:40.880 --> 00:41:44.239
in the face and tell them what's bugging you. On
660
00:41:44.280 --> 00:41:46.400
my first day in New York, at a job interview
661
00:41:46.599 --> 00:41:50.079
at the Wall Street Journal, I took a walk out
662
00:41:50.119 --> 00:41:52.719
on the street on a gorgeous, busy spring day, and
663
00:41:52.760 --> 00:41:56.639
the streets were teeming with energy people running everywhere two
664
00:41:56.760 --> 00:42:01.159
important things that they had to do. And soon as
665
00:42:01.199 --> 00:42:04.199
I saw this, I realized that I finally had found
666
00:42:04.199 --> 00:42:08.679
a place to match my metabolism. It was exhilarating, but
667
00:42:08.760 --> 00:42:11.440
also it could be draining, exhausting. It can be hard
668
00:42:11.480 --> 00:42:13.639
to live in the Big Apple, which is another thing
669
00:42:13.679 --> 00:42:17.280
I won't miss after leaving. For me, it is time
670
00:42:17.320 --> 00:42:21.840
for a simpler and less hectic life. Wish me luck
671
00:42:24.119 --> 00:42:26.079
and that's a wrap for episode one hundred and fifty
672
00:42:26.119 --> 00:42:29.199
six of What's Bugging Me On the Ricochet Network. Subscribe
673
00:42:29.239 --> 00:42:32.679
to The Rick and join the Right Conversation. One show
674
00:42:32.719 --> 00:42:35.519
to go Yo before we go on hiatus until January.
675
00:42:35.679 --> 00:42:38.880
In the meantime, having glorious weekend, get your Christmas shopping
676
00:42:39.000 --> 00:42:50.519
done and enjoy the gift of giving Ricochet, Join the
677
00:42:50.519 --> 00:42:51.119
Conversation