Leave it to that nasty Republican party to declare an open season on helpless, thirsty immigrants who peacefully wander onto private property north of the border in Arizona.
HB2843 was approved in the Arizona state House in February and now heads to the Senate, which, like the House, is in Republican hands. Presumably, Democratic Gov. Hobbs will veto it if it reaches her desk.
The bill encourages ranchers to use high-powered rifles with very large scopes to drill women and children at ranges of up to 1500 yards with fast, large-caliber rounds.
Actually, that is not what the bill says at all, even a little bit, but by the time Axios is done with their super-in-depth reporting (amounting to 258 words, roughly 2/3 the length of this brief review) that is the impression with which we are left.
What the language of HB2843 really does is broaden the definition of ”premises” in the existing Castle Doctrine.
The previous version of the statute: “Premises” means property adapted for BOTH human residence AND lodging, whether occupied or not. (emphasis added)
The new version of the statute: “Premises” means property adapted for EITHER human residence OR lodging, whether occupied or not. (emphasis added)
Both the old and new versions restrict lawful use of physical force to the “defense of himself or third persons” against someone criminally trespassing.
So, the old version limits the use of force to personal defense only when there is a house on your land, even if the house is vacant. The new version opens the use of force to personal defense whether there is a house on your land or not. In both cases, force is only justified for personal defense.
So much for the thousand-yard rifle scope. Take that one off your Christmas list.
Under the old version, if the rancher was riding the fence line and found his life at risk, he was forbidden to use force to protect himself unless there was a shack on the property. In the new version, he can protect himself even if there is no shack in sight.
Thank you, Axios, for clearing that up for us.
And, by the way, neither version of the statute makes mention of the migratory status of the aggressor. It could be someone from south of the border, or it could be your crazy neighbor come to poison your water well.
Number 4. The Gateway Pundit. Chicago will begin evicting 5,600 illegal migrants from shelters.
Despite the Windy City’s hard-won 40-year-old reputation as a haven for sanctuary-seekers, Mayor Brandon Johnson has found himself forced to evict migrants from city shelters after a mere 60 days living on the government dole.
For many of the 11,000+ non-citizens, the 60 days was up weeks ago, but cold weather (in Chicago??? in February??? who expected THAT???) raised humanitarian concerns and the booting-out of the bootees was delayed.
(By the way, where did this term “migrant” come from? I’m not sure, but I suspect the difference is that an “immigrant” is a foreign-born person who applies for entry to the USA, obtains legal permission, jumps through the requisite hoops and becomes a citizen. As did all our forebears. A “migrant” probably refers to a foreign-born person who merely walks across the border without troubling himself with the tedium of all those pesky laws. “Migrant” sounds better than “illegal,” and will not get your newspaper office torched.)
The question as to where the prospective booted-out Chicago persons will take up refuge remains open.
There are exceptions to the eviction policy.
For some migrants, eviction is a true hardship. Consider the cases of illness, infirmity or pregnancy. It would in fact be pretty uncaring to boot a pregnant person onto the streets just as the baby is due. Some pre-planning was probably called for to avoid this situation (only a true cynic would suggest this is precisely what the pre-planning was about), but now we have a real person about to give real birth.
Expect cases of illness, infirmity and pregnancy to skyrocket in Chicago in the coming months.
An option that we might see is busing some of the 11,000 to other cities which are better equipped to offer care. Such as boomtowns with lots of resources, like… well, pick any town with a population of 5,000 or more in any red state. Surely they won’t turn these people away.
Several years ago, a co-worker at our large corporation relocated from Wichita to Kansas City. Brent and I had voluminous paper records in a couple of cardboard boxes with mandatory retention guidelines. We could not destroy the documents.
At the same time, my Wichita office was remodeled and I was left with no room for storage. He and I hit on a solution: I addressed the boxes to him at his new Kansas City office and delivered them to the company mail room. They obediently put them on the truck for Kansas City.
When the boxes showed up at Brent’s new office, he replaced the mailing label with one showing my office address in Wichita, and had them shipped back to me.
We kept those boxes enroute for months until we found a home for the records.
Maybe that could be applied to migrant busing.
I’m just trying to help find solutions.
Number 3. News finale dot com. Denver pleads with landlords to rent their properties to migrants.
One more while we’re here.
Denver, population 700,000, grew by some 38,000 last year as migrants were bused in from Texas. Many of those ended up in impromptu tent cities downtown — even in the snow — but some 5,000 were in city-owned shelters.
Mayor Mike Johnston, citing unsustainable budget shortfalls, has now closed some of the shelters.
To make space available, he has sent letters to landlords asking them to rent properties to migrants.
The Mayor’s hope is that the newcomers will all find work and be paid enough to pay rent on the apartments, and all will be well. The City has navigated the bureaucracy to obtain work permits — maybe not enough, but some is better than none — so that when new people arrive they will be able seek work immediately.
Seeking work may not be the same as finding work, but it’s a start. Whether “arrive” is actually followed by “seek work immediately” is also a little vague.
But the city’s budget is in trouble; business owners downtown have their retail entrances blocked by tents; and it appears the landlords are being asked to come to the rescue. This plan — to ask one group of residents to solve problems for another group of residents — actually did not work well in 1620, when the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth, and it has not gotten much better since.
But what’s 400 years of history, anyway? Maybe this time, Coloradoans can show us how it’s done.
Move over, Dr. Watson. All you murder-show addicts glued to your streaming services ought to like this one.
Sherlock Holmes meets Isaac Azimov.
Routine space travel is right around the corner. As we fallen humans venture past the atmosphere we will take our envy, greed and lust with us. Blood splatter will not be far behind, and right after that, Lt. Columbo will show up in a battered 1959 Peugeot space suit to analyze it.
Scientists from England are studying the random patterns generated by blood splatter in near-zero gravity conditions. This is made possible by a Boeing 727 owned by the Zero Gravity Corporation.
The new field of study, in which your child or grandchild may pursue a college degree, is called astroforensics.
I am not making this up.
Researchers used syringes filled with glycerin and red dye #2 to stand in for human blood, squirting it onto various surfaces as the Boeing entered a shallow dive to simulate weightlessness.
There are a lot more concepts in this article using words like parabolic, viscosity, gravity, air drag, variance, cohesion and surface tension, but the idea is that blood splatters will look different on the space shuttle. It will be up to some enterprising sleuth to find Col. Mustard guilty in the observatory with the ray gun.
Number 1. IFL Science. Edible ants could be the next hot seasoning.
As we get closer and closer to declaring the earth without form and void due to diesel trucks, kitchen gas ranges and ranch feedlots, it is imperative we find new sources of protein to sustain us as we sit together huddled against the night in a petrochemical-free future.
Consider the ant, you sluggard! says the Bible. And considering it we are, especially for the tasty delicate flavors that different representatives of that precious and delectable species can offer.
Black ants have formic acid, conveniently secreted from their on-board venom glands, which will provide a vinegary zest in your salad.
Chicatana ants produce aldehydes and pryazine — I have no idea what these are, and I absolutely refuse to find out — which can add a real boost to hamburgers on the grill. Except I think the point is NOT to put hamburgers on the grill any more.
“New research is opening up huge opportunities to ward off hunger as we completely reject that worn-out old saw about having dominion over the fish and the birds and the animals,” said the lead researcher from the Tasty Segments department of the Copenhagen Institute for Aardvark Studies. “My colleague, Dr. Sloth, is conducting literally ground-breaking work in bringing fire ant populations into domestic living spaces,” he reported. “They multiply quickly and make a pleasant sizzling sound when basted in raccoon fat over an open fire. Our hope is that soon they will join mainstream cuisine at fine restaurants.”
The culinary possibilities are wide open, as scientists are able to isolate particular aromas using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. Most of the smells originate with the production of ant pheromones, principally associated with something called nestmate recognition, and which is a subject on which we will not further dwell.
Just think of this article the next time you try that zesty new experimental Cobb salad on the menu! The one with the tasty little black flecks all over it. Rum-num-num!
And that’s The Alligator News Roundup for Friday, March 22, 2024. I hope your weekend is filled with new and unusual flavors and aromas as you gather with friends to celebrate the demise of western civilization.
Don’t forget to share this with someone special. That’s one way to ensure they will not forget you!
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