Author: photog

Guest Contributor – Ed Brault – 17JUL2025 – The Workers’ Paradise

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Burlington, Vermont, experienced a mini-version of this when the increasingly socialist city government raised property taxes on businesses to the point that all the grocery stores moved out. In response to the “food-desert” crisis, the city tried to lure food stores back, but the restrictions and requirements for what products had to be stocked, how much had to be “organic”, etc, resulted in only one taker, a “Whole-Foods” type grocery, with prices way too expensive for the low-income neighborhoods it was supposed to service.
Reductions in the Police Dept have resulted in some areas of the city becoming no-go zones, and the once-prosperous Church Street shopping district has lost its major anchor stores, and is overrun with panhandlers and homeless.
(Thanks, Bernie!)

Mamdani; Wake-Up Call or Extinction Event

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I was reading an article, Rise of Zohran Mamdani has Wall Street giving up on Gotham about how the CEOs of some of the largest financial corporations in New York (and by extension in the world) were invited to meet with Zohran Mamdani by the influential NYC Partnership.

“The list of New York City-based CEOs that declined the Partnership’s invitation includes Jamie Dimon, the nation’s top banker and chief of JP Morgan, the nation’s largest bank; Steve Schwarzman, the CEO of private equity powerhouse Blackstone; Brian Moynihan, the head of Bank of America, the nation’s second largest bank; Larry Fink, the CEO of Blackrock, the world’s largest asset manager; and David Solomon, the CEO of investment banking giant Goldman Sachs.

Most publicly pleaded “scheduling conflicts.”

But “what is this guy going to tell us that we don’t already know?” is how someone close to Solomon described the situation.”

At the end of the article the writer sums up why the big banks don’t need to make nice with the upcoming communist mayor of New York.

“And that gets us to why there were so many no shows Tuesday: the city’s business community doesn’t have to stay.

If you follow these big firms, as I do, you know they employ hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers — but fewer and fewer in recent years.

The harsh COVID lockdowns here gave them the excuse to move operations to places with lower taxes and regulations, mainly Florida and Texas, but also Utah and even Tennessee.

Mamdani will be another reason for the big banks to finally say goodbye to Gotham.”

And that brings me back to my title question; how much damage will Mamdani do?  Will four years of communism spark a repeat of how the David Dinkins administration ushered in the Giuliani renaissance or will it result in something similar to what happened to Detroit?

Now history doesn’t repeat itself but if I were asked to guess which of these two historical examples will be closer to the result of a Mamdani administration I’d say without much hesitation Detroit.  Now don’t get me wrong, New York City is remarkably different from Detroit but the ingredients for a staggering decline in the economic vitality of New York City are all on view to see.

Mamdani wants to re-ignite the welfare state as it’s never been imagined before.  He even wants the city to open grocery stores to battle the high cost of eggs.  The cost of such a program is frightening to even consider.  Add in the waste and incompetence of all city run enterprises and catastrophic failure is almost an immediate certainty for this awful idea.

Then there’s Mamdani’s plan to neuter the NYPD and make them some kind of hall monitors for the city’s gang members.  Basically, he will replay the 2020 George Floyd riots on an endless loop for his four years in office.

And finally, he’s on record as saying billionaires shouldn’t exist so imagine how he plans to usher in his redistribution of wealth in the Big Apple.

Probably the first nail in the coffin for the city will be the job losses when the big banks and other financial institutions head down to Texas, I’m guessing the losses will be staggering.  It will turn downtown Manhattan into a ghost town.  After that the tanking of commercial and residential real estate in Manhattan will evaporate trillions of dollars of value.  And the shockwaves from these disasters will echo through the outer boroughs and the suburbs where the financial sector workers lived.  It will be very ugly for the whole region.

And yet, it’s the best result in the long run.  Crashing the largest city in the country will be an object lesson for every woke moron who ever decided that democracy means voting for endless free stuff and eliminating the police is the solution to crime.

Okay New York.  Vote in Mamdani.  Prove just how suicidally stupid you really are.

One Step Closer to Firing Books and Capon

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That bill that would defund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and by extension NPR and PBS has moved past a big hurdle on the Senate floor.  So the fear at the NY Times is palpable.

This Is Why America Needs Public Media

Good!

“Republicans complain, not always wrongly, that public media reflects left-leaning assumptions and biases. And they can fairly tell NPR and PBS to do a better job of reflecting the citizenry that is subsidizing them. Yet the “national” part of NPR (or National Public Radio, as it used to call itself) that chafes conservatives may well be just fine without federal funds. Only about 2 percent of its budget comes directly from the federal government, and it may have an easier time raising money from its many dedicated listeners if Congress punishes it.”

They can’t make up their minds.  Is the government funding insignificant or critical?  Well, let’s find out!

The Lunatics are Running the Asylum in Minnesota

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Alleged Minnesota shooter confessed to killings in letter to FBI director

This is a transcript of what was in the confession letter that Minnesota political assassin Vance Boelter left in his car when he ran away from police.

“Dear Kash Patel,

My name is Dr. Vance Luther Boelter Ed.D. I am the shooter at large in Minnesota involved in the east 12 shootings the morning of Saturday June 15th at approximately 2:30 am and 3:30 am and maybe others. I will probably be dead by the time you read this letter. I wanted to share some info with you that you may find interesting.

I was trained by U.S. Military people off the books starting in college. I have been on projects since that time in Eastern Europe, South America, the Middle East, and Africa. All in the line of duty, what I thought was right and in the best interest of the United States.

Recently I was approached about a project that Tim Walz wanted done, and ___ and Keith ___ was also aware of the project. Tim wanted me to kill Amy Klobuchar and then ___ to retire as planned.

Tim wants to be a senator and he doesn’t trust ___ to retire as planned, and plans so I was to stay at the best motel with Amy ___ gave Tim would get one of the open senate seats, and ___ was to be gov, and Keith Ellison would be rewarded with a high governor’s position.

I told Tim I wasn’t willing to do with it and if he didn’t call off that plan I would go public. He said he would call it hurt my family if I didn’t play ball. Then he set up a meeting with me and Mel ___ and ___ to talk about jobs. When I arrived they had some people waiting to kill me. I was able to get away by God’s mercy. So I went back a short time later and shot battled with ___ ___.

You should know how I didn’t fire one round at any peace officers and boy did I have plenty of opportunity. Ask for the report on how my weapons and ammunition I had with me.

Cops were pulling up right next to me in their vehicles and I had an AK rifle armed right at them, hand on ___, I could have took out a pile of cops dead but I didn’t shoot at protect & serve law enforcement. You can ask them. Because I support the police and didn’t want to see them hurt.

But if they are hurting my wife + or kids next time, I won’t give them a pass.

If you think I’m making this up, just get on the phone and tell Tim you have a few questions for him.

Then ask Tim Walz if he knows me and see what he says? If he says he doesn’t know me, never met me, look in the files and you will see that Tim Walz personally approved me to be on his Governor’s workforce. Buildings and elite business representatives. He is probably trying to destroy that info but it’s public record.

Then ask Tim Walz why they kept the shots silent from the media when they first happened. Not a word in the press and it. Why? They needed to get their ___ for strings figured out first so everyone was on the same page about what happened. Tim is probably crapping bricks right now because I’m still at large and he knows what I can document, what I know, what all the buried skeletons are. So I will be shot on sight, you can bet on that.

If you want me to turn myself in, it need to be directly to you and Ben. I need to be held at a military prison + or in Asia or the Middle East, or at least on a ship. These guys have their goons everywhere and can get to anybody, initially over there.

I am willing to spill all the beans. I quit with my family safe. They had nothing to do with this and are totally innocent. This was a one person op.”

Now how do you figure this?  Without a doubt this guy is crazier than a bedbug.  But there’s something very, very fishy going on in the great state of Minnesota.  They must be adding LSD to the drinking water.  This guy claims he can document this madness.  Well, as I said, I’m sure he’s a complete lunatic but there’s more to this than just a single madman on the rampage.  He has a link to Walz that is verifiable.  Is there anything more to this link or is it simply the ravings of a madman?  If there’s more to this maybe by Wednesday there will be some additional documentation of what is going on in the Gopher State.

But let’s assume this is all complete schizophrenia.  Mr. Boelter is just talking to the voices inside his head.  What is a guy like this doing as an appointed official in their state government?  Have they decided that psychosis is a valuable skill for Minnesota state officials to possess?

As I said, something stinks here.  This guy should have been in a looney-bin not sitting on a state government board.  Well, let’s see.

The Boys and I Give Superman (1978) a Try

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Because of the new Superman movie coming out I had a showing of the 1978 Christopher Reeve version for the two younger grandsons.  I was curious to see how they reacted to the somewhat slow startup to this version.  After all I think half the movie is gone before Superman actually dons the suit.  But from all appearances they liked it.

Now the youngest one is a very analytical viewer of science fiction and fantasy so he gave me a short lecture on why kryptonite kills Superman.  Come to think of it he gave me several lectures about various esoteric aspects of the Man of Steel; how he could fly, how he got from one galaxy to another so quickly, why he could never die of old age, how he was able to handle people without killing them by accident.  It was very interesting to find out he had worked out all of these theories in just the time since the beginning of the movie.

I could sense the greatest annoyance with the movie when Lois Lane was on the screen.  Apparently, the love story wasn’t intensely popular with this part of the audience.  But somehow, they soldiered through.  By the time Superman was flying around Earth at ludicrous speed to turn back time and save Lois from death I think they were prepared for the end.  I’m not sure they felt Gene Hackman as Lex Luthor and Ned Beatty as his mentally challenged henchman were sufficiently serious to be credible enemies for Superman.

But by the time the (extremely long) credits were rolling they seemed to forgive some of the weaknesses of the production and wanted to discuss viewing (at least) Superman 2.  Apparently, they wanted to see the return of General Zod after I hinted that he was much more formidable a foe than Luthor.  So maybe we’ll have a second Superman feature this month.

It was funny seeing this movie for the first time in forty-seven years.  What struck me most was how odd Margot Kidder was as Lois.  The rest of the actors and actresses came across as much more professional.  Kidder seemed almost like a fish out of water.  Maybe that was the vibe they were going for.  Probably the worst acting and dialog was Marlon Brando as Jor-El; Superman’s Kryptonian father.  All of the exposition and lecturing about his duty to help humans and his fate is a bit boring.  But I guess some introduction is necessary to establish how he ends up as the man flying around in the suit.

My impression of Christopher Reeve in the movie is very positive.  He brings enormous likeability to the character and he does the comedy part of the role very deftly.  As far as the special effects in the film, this was 1978.  All of the effects are non-CGI.  To a modern audience some of them are less than overwhelming.  There is a scene where Superman is causing an avalanche to stop a flooded river from washing away a town.  But the scene is so obviously done with a miniature set using some sand and pebbles that it’s kind of silly.  But that couldn’t be helped back then.

All in all, the boys and I gave a thumbs up to Superman (1978).  Now bring on General Zod and “Planet Hooston!”