Dumb Political Correctness

Discussion in 'West Mall' started by Mr. Deez, Feb 8, 2012.

  1. Chop

    Chop 10,000+ Posts

    He looks like a live-in-person version of some of those ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs -- man with dog head, man with ibex head, etc.

    I guess the Egyptians were about 4,000 years ahead of their times...
     
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  2. Monahorns

    Monahorns 5,000+ Posts

    Chop, I really like that idea. I wish there was 1 conservative area in Austin. I would move there if this kind of thing was going on. Alas, there isn't and I am moving out.
     
  3. Monahorns

    Monahorns 5,000+ Posts

    I would say no on vote or job, but reducing laws in general and using alternative forms of punishment to jailing could be a very good thing.
     
  4. Monahorns

    Monahorns 5,000+ Posts

    It will overall impoverish the area. Businesses will have to pay ever increasing theft insurance. Many will go out of business because of it. All will have to experiment with added security. Again many businesses will fail because of it.

    Thieves will be shot. That will cause controversy in a liberal run city. Every person and business that can leave will. Dallas will be hollowed out.
     
  5. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    That was way back in 2006. It was a redder county back then and a less polarized and partisan electorate. Furthermore, KBH was from the Dallas area and had pretty broad appeal. (You'll notice that Rick Perry didn't perform anywhere near as well.) It wasn't too surprising that a small but significant number of voters voted for a center-right Republican but voted Democratic down ballot.

    They didn't necessarily pay attention. It was a wildly different county. In 2006, a turd on the sidewalk could win Collin County if it had a R by its name. That's no longer true. It is now where Dallas was in 2005.
     
    Last edited: Apr 19, 2019
  6. nashhorn

    nashhorn 5,000+ Posts

    So $750 stores will replace Dollar Store?
     
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  7. mb227

    mb227 de Plorable

    FWIW, West Lake Hills is more conservative than most other areas of the Austin and surrounding communities. Rollingwood is similar. Of course, that ALSO means ponying up for the housing. Taxes are a little less if you can get the pocket within WLH that is technically unincorporated Travis County.
     
  8. Horn6721

    Horn6721 10,000+ Posts

    Mr D
    I meant that Collin County is and has been paying attention for the last decade or so.
    More organized and grass roots participation.Yes more Dems have moved in but the Pubs are working hard even for local May elections. Having a strong economy and decent schools help.
     
  9. Monahorns

    Monahorns 5,000+ Posts

    I couldn't afford to live in West Lake if I made double my salary.
     
  10. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    I understand your point, but it's easier to do that in a county like Collin that has had a grassroots base for decades and that had grown on conservative principles (to avoid the high taxes, crime, and crappy schools of Dallas).

    It also helps that until very recently most new residents of Collin County were conservative professionals from suburban areas of liberal states. Dallas attracted some of that, but it has mostly attracted city-dwellers from big states, most of whom were liberals. People from Orange County, California moved to Collin County. People from Los Angeles County moved to Dallas. Of course, nowadays, being liberal is now part of being a professional, so liberals area moving to both.
     
  11. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    West Lake wouldn't satisfy you anyway. It's more conservative that most of Austin, but it's still liberal compared to most of the state. You'd have a ton of rich, guilt-ridden white liberals around you, and I don't picture you to be comfortable in that crowd. And of course, your property taxes would be obscene.
     
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  12. Joe Fan

    Joe Fan 10,000+ Posts

    • WTF? WTF? x 1
  13. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    So if you run the numbers, somebody takes a dump on the ground 77 times per day in San Francisco. And that's just what gets reported. I'll bet that far more often, nobody says or does anything about it. If you make yourself a bum magnet, you're going to get this sort of crap.
     
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  14. Chop

    Chop 10,000+ Posts

    Sorry, I can't help myself. All this talk about people pooping in the streets of San Francisco has lead me to cross-post the stuff below from Esther's Follies:



    Funny and current update to the song--Scott McKenzie's "If you're going to San Francisco":

    If you're going to San Francisco
    Be sure to wear your tall galoshes there
    If you're going to San Francisco
    You're going to step in human feces there

    For those who come to San Francisco
    Summertime will smell like poo-poo there
    In the streets of San Francisco
    Homesless people pooping without care

    All across the nation
    Public elimination
    People pooping
    There's a whole generation
    Of bums defecating
    Taking dumps
    In the street

    For those who come to San Francisco
    Be sure to wear your tall galoshes there
    If you're going to San Francisco
    You're going to step in human feces there

    If you come to San Francisco
    Summertime will smell like poo-poo there

     
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  15. Chop

    Chop 10,000+ Posts

    Put all the political crap (yes, pun intended) aside for a moment. San Francisco used to be a great city--one of the best. Now it's quite literally becoming a sh!t hole.

    This didn't just happen in a vacuum. Something, or more likely many things, have changed there from the '60s-'70s-'80s (or even '90s) to now. It seems like responsible pragmatic city leaders could put aside ideologies and partisanship, get together, do the practical things that any sane person could tell that need to be done, and make it a great city again.
     
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  16. Sangre Naranjada

    Sangre Naranjada 10,000+ Posts

    No pun intended, I'm sure...
     
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  17. Chop

    Chop 10,000+ Posts

    "...somebody takes a dump on the ground 77 times per day..."

    Wow, that dude must eat a very fibrous diet.
    :yikes:
    :yes::yes::yes:
     
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  18. Monahorns

    Monahorns 5,000+ Posts

    The problems with San Francisco is local government and more specifically housing and zoning. Their laws make housing very difficult to afford. That means on the low end of the bell curve, some people who could find housing on the very low end now can't because of Progressive laws (intended to help the poor). When you are homeless you **** where you can. If I was a very poor person in San Fran. I would take regular shits on the steps to City Hall and the Police Station. Really next to any government building. If I get arrested? They feed me and I get to crap on a toilet indoors.

    People. This stuff isn't hard. If you understand normal people's motivations you can predict what will happen. But if you aren't a normal person...
     
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  19. Monahorns

    Monahorns 5,000+ Posts

    Deez. You're right. I am moving to WillCo ASAP. I have to get out before the $100 billion in bonds start being taxed.
     
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  20. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    There have always been some pragmatic city leaders and likely still are, but they are overwhelmed by hardcore leftist partisans. To fix the problem, the city leaders and their citizens would have to radically change the way they think. They'd have to stop making their city a bum-magnet - meaning a less livable city for bums. They'd have to enact and enforce laws against people acting like bums - panhandling, crapping on the sidewalk, sleeping on the streets, open drug use, etc. They'd also have to be willing to give up a lot of political and financial power and leverage. In other words, there'd have to be a radical cultural and political overhaul of the city that involved accepting that they've basically been horribly wrong about every assumption they've made since about 1960. None of that is going to happen.

    The cost of living is a problem, but I don't think it's what drives problems like this. Yes, they should relax zoning and housing regulations so working people can afford to live there. However, expensive housing doesn't make responsible people turn into bums who crap on the sidewalk. Responsible people move to the suburbs where housing is cheaper. The people crapping on the sidewalk are drug-addicted bums. The market isn't going to make housing cheap enough for them.
     
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  21. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    It's not the laws but rather the extremely fast growing economy. We're experiencing the same tech boom in Seattle albeit on a lesser scale. Fully developed cities surrounded by water with massive infusions of highly compensated employees are going to see an extreme increase in housing costs. The demand curve is out of whack in favor of demand. The cities certainly aren't innocent but they are trying to hold rent costs down to not further exacerbate the homeless problem. In reality, these cities are simply too expensive for low income people to live. Those individuals should simply move but who has the fortitude to tell them that?
     
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  22. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    I'm living in this situation and I disagree. In 2018 I was fortunate to have sold a condo I bought in 2004 for ~300% profit. The rent during that time increased 100% and I purposely kept the rent under the market to ensure I kept the renters.

    To be sure, the cost of housing had gone up so high that should someone be unfortunate to be low income it's not a surprise they couldn't afford housing. The bigger question is "why do they stay?" They could move virtually anywhere in the Midwest or even parts of Texas and potentially earn enough to have a home, at least rented. IMHO, a lax policy on drug users is part of the problem but the soft heart of progressive cities like Seattle and San Fran is abused. We pour massive resources into helping the homeless. On my commute into work each day I see dozens of abandoned tents on the side of the road. Why? Because the city hands out tents, sleeping bags and clothing like candy. If I were homeless I can get any of those things on any given day so there is no point in trying to keep the one I was given last week.
     
  23. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    Do you really disagree? Because you said a bunch of things that largely reinforce my point. I would relax housing regulations because I'm a free market supporter and think the regulations have bad, unintended consequences.

    However, I don't think the regulations are causing the problem of homeless people crapping in the streets. A freeer housing market might enable some people who are on the line if being able to afford a house to get one, but it's not going to enable a drug-addicted homeless person who's crapping in the street to suddenly be able to buy a house.

    I agree with you that they are exploiting progressive cities' willingness to hand out resources to them rather than simply being victims of regulations. Why? Because living in a tent and crapping on the isn't what responsible person who's gainfully employed but can't afford a house does.
     
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  24. theiioftx

    theiioftx Sponsor Deputy

    Don’t tell any Californians or New Yorkers, but my Williamson County TENNESSEE property taxes are nearly 1/3 lower than my Harris County TX taxes for a much more expensive home. All this with no state income tax and the state runs in the black with a substantial surplus.
     
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  25. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    To be fair, your sales tax is significantly higher and broader than Texas's. I'd still happily make that trade. Texas property taxes are ridiculous.
     
  26. theiioftx

    theiioftx Sponsor Deputy

    Not enough to notice. Everyone pays their fair share.
     
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  27. Chop

    Chop 10,000+ Posts

    Re: the San Francisco pooping problem. Consider that before Guiliani (a "moderate" yet very pragmatic Republican) took over as mayor of NYC, there was massive street crime, prostitution, sleaze, and filth in Manhattan. Guiliani came in and strictly enforced the 'little' laws and cleaned up Manhattan and at least made the outer Burroughs noticeably better. Importantly, NYC, and especially Manhattan, is a very expensive/very high cost of living place--like SF.

    San Francisco should take note.

    Stop and frisk may be too much for the San Francisco mindset to stomach, but they could take a few pages from Guiliani's book and dramatically improve their city.

    One left leaning thing NYC does is have many, many massive public housing projects--which, of course, create their own set of problems. Not sure if that's something SF would want to follow, but things are so out-of-control, maybe it is. Plop a giant housing project or two in Pacific Heighs. Heh, heh, heh...
     
  28. Mr. Deez

    Mr. Deez Beer Prophet

    And that's why I'd prefer their system. If everyone pays a little, government doesn't have to be that expensive.
     
  29. Chop

    Chop 10,000+ Posts

    Time warp back to the late 1970s oil boom. Houston was growing out of control fast and its local economy was booming even more than Seattle or SF today.

    There were tent cities that sprung up and a multitude of new trailer parks to house newcomers. But no pooping on the streets. The Houston Police of that era was frequently under investigation for police brutality--they were sort of known for it back then (fairly or not). If anyone pooped on the streets of downtown Houston back then, the HPD would have cracked his head open. I don't condone police brutality at all, but they've got to be able to, and encouraged to, enforce the 'little' laws, and have the backing of the city, or the city becomes unliveable.

    I saw a recent tv special on this sort of problem in Seattle. The Seattle police doesn't enforce the little laws any more. The rank and file want to, but police and city leadership, and the DA's office does not. Predictably, there's now lots of poop on the streets of Seattle... SF North it has become.
     
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  30. Joe Fan

    Joe Fan 10,000+ Posts

    I lived in Paris for a little while and one of the first sentences in our guidebook was "someone steps in dog poo in Paris every 133 steps." Paris is for dog lovers as San Fran is for feral human lovers. In Paris, the dogs at least had the excuse of not much grass anywhere.

    The City did have a unique pooper-scooper motorcycle with a long elephant trunk vacuum cleaner that would let the poo-technician reach between parked cars from the street to the sidewalk. Never seen them in operation anywhere else but San Fran needs some form of these for its human poopulation. While it might seem like a good opportunity to employ some of these vagrant squatters, being NoCal, the jobs will likely go to drones/robots instead.

    One from my era
    [​IMG]



    The new ones look like vespas
    [​IMG]
     
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