Divemedic

Oathkeepers

The press calls them a militia group intent on overthrowing the government, claiming that they organized a coup on January 6. The ADL says that they are “a large but loosely organized collection of right-wing anti-government extremists who are part of the militia movement, which believes that the federal government has been coopted by a shadowy conspiracy that is trying to strip American citizens of their rights.” The Southern Poverty Law Center says that the Oathkeepers are “one of the largest radical antigovernment groups in the U.S. today.”

They are none of those things. I wrote about them in 2010, long before they were in the national spotlight. As a patriot and a first responder who has taken the oath multiple times, the basis for the Oathkeepers was one I could support:

  • We will NOT obey orders to disarm the American people.
  • We will NOT obey orders to conduct warrantless searches of the American people
  • We will NOT obey orders to detain American citizens as “unlawful enemy combatants” or to subject them to military tribunal.
  • We will NOT obey orders to impose martial law or a “state of emergency” on a state.
  • We will NOT obey orders to invade and subjugate any state that asserts its sovereignty.
  • We will NOT obey any order to blockade American cities, thus turning them into giant concentration camps.
  • We will NOT obey any order to force American citizens into any form of detention camps under any pretext.
  • We will NOT obey orders to assist or support the use of any foreign troops on U.S. soil against the American people to “keep the peace” or to “maintain control.”
  • We will NOT obey any orders to confiscate the property of the American people, including food and other essential supplies.
  • We will NOT obey any orders which infringe on the right of the people to free speech, to peaceably assemble, and to petition their government for a redress of grievances.

So to those on the left: Which of the preceding points do you disagree? What makes those the goals of a right wing terrorist organization?

By Divemedic, ago

Weekends and holidays

So my wife and I were getting ready to attend an awards banquet, where my Father in Law is receiving an award for his volunteer work in assisting veterans. First, the toilet quit working. Then the shower backed up. So did the guest bathroom. We can’t do without plumbing, so I told my wife to go to the banquet without me.

I opened the cleanout and ran a 25 foot snake into it. Nothing. So I went into the master shower and removed the grate on the drain, which was under an inch or so of shower water. That turns out to have been a mistake. I realized that once copious amounts of shit, toilet paper, and water gushed out of the drain, flooded the bathroom, and got the carpet in the master bedroom wet.

So now I build a cofferdam of old towels and break out the shopvac to suck up the water. Then I bring a bucket to sit on into the shower, and run the snake down that drain. Nothing. Just as I go to get up, the bucket collapses, dropping me into the shit filled water. So now I am covered in shit. I can’t even wash up, because no showers or drains. I wind up hosing off in the yard using dish soap and a garden hose.

I then decided that the clog was between the guest bathroom and the sewage connection, so I remove the guest toilet and run the snake down there. Again, nothing.

At this point, I decide that I have done all that I can do and raise the white flag. I have to work in the morning, so the wife and Father in Law will have to meet with the plumber when he arrives at 11am.

I don’t know if this is related to the ongoing problems that I have had with the plumbing, but this stuff always seems to happen on weekends and holidays.

April of 2021, we had a lightning strike. Christmas of 2020, our heat pump failed and required a compressor replacement. On Christmas day. In May 2020, we had an electrical fire. July 2019, we had a lightning strike. July 2018, Lightning strike. Then there was Hurricane Irma in 2017.

Home ownership.

By Divemedic, ago

The war expands

A Daytona Beach Police officer radioed that he was checking out a suspicious vehicle. That was the last heard from him. He didn’t answer a routine radio check, and fellow officers found him with a gunshot wound to the head. He remains in critical condition.

The police soon released body cam video. There is now a nationwide manhunt for the shooter, which the FBI has joined. The wanted man is Othal Wallace, who is known to be a member of the New Black Panther Party and the Not Fucking Around Coalition, the black terrorist group that wants to take over Texas, a group I have blogged about before. Here he is at two different NFAC events:

According to a Facebook post by attorney Malik Zulu Shabazz, Wallace also recently joined the New Black Panther Party. Shabazz, in a now-deleted June 15 post, “I would like to welcome the young warrior O-Zone Wallace into the New Black Panther Party for Self Defense under our new leadership. Brother O-Zone, a Florida man, is a good man with serious field experience. Brother O-Zone respects me and my history and I respect him. I predict Brother Warrior O-Zone Wallace will be instrumental in the re-building of the New Black Panther Party and the entire movement at large.”

This is the second time in the past week that a BLM affiliate has shot a police officer. Is this a continuation of the war that was begun last year? If so, this is the first time that kinetic action has been carried out in Florida. Stay frosty, things continue to escalate. Carry a weapon everywhere. Be aware of your surroundings.

By Divemedic, ago

Extended, again

Emperor Biden has again extended the CDC eviction ban, this time through July 31. They claim that this is the final time it will be extended. I am not holding my breath.

This is royally screwing landlords. I will use Orange County, Florida (the location of Orlando) as an example. As a landlord, the qualifications are:

  • Waive all late fees, penalties and interest related to the tenant’s past-due rent
  • Accept payment made pursuant to this program as full and complete payment by the tenant for all past-due rent and associated fees accrued and owed.
  • Release the tenant from any obligation to pay any rent accrued and owed that exceeds the amount of the program payment
  • Withdraw any eviction and collections actions that they, or one of their agents or associates, filed against the tenant for failure to pay rent and associated fees owed.
  • They must agree to comply with the terms and conditions of this program, including the submission of any documentation requested by the County to confirm and verify the program application.

So, why is this screwing landlords? Keep in mind that evictions have been banned since April 2020. The funds paid will do the following:

  • Cover a tenant’s documented past-due rent only for the time period beginning on April 1, 2020 to present and up to one-month prospective rent and up to one-month prospective rent;
  • Assistance can be provided for up to 12 months of arrears in past-due rent and one month of prospective rent not to exceed a maximum of $20,000. NOTE: One-month prospective rent cannot be provided if rental arrears are $20,000 or more.)

The eviction moratorium has been in place for 16 months, because April 2020 was 16 months ago. As soon as you take the money, you are not permitted to go after the tenant for another dime.

That means any apartment that was renting for more than $1,660 a month, or more than a year, or including late fees means accepting less than was owed. Also, if the lease specifies that the tenant pay things like utilities, trash removal, yard waste, or any other fees, those are not covered by the program, even though Florida law says the landlord has to provide them if the tenant doesn’t pay for them. You can’t sue them.

The average rent in the Orlando area is $1,500 a month for a two bedroom. If a tenant had stopped paying rent in April, they would be $24,000 in arrears as of July 1. Now the program only pays for 12 months of back rent, so the maximum paid would be $18,000. The landlord is out $6,000. To add insult to injury, since the payment is considered full and complete, the landlord must even return the security deposit.

This is why landlords say that it is killing them. This entire thing is government sanctioned theft. The majority of the nation’s landlords are individual investors, like my wife and me. One in four of these individual investor-landlords has a tenant that is behind in rent. By inserting itself into private contracts, the government has stolen our property simply because it wants to.

Why are they doing this? Make no mistake, this isn’t about COVID. No, the disease is just the excuse. Read this story and understand. The subject of the story is RETIRED. Here is the reason:

He and his wife have never been evicted. However, insufficient retirement savings, difficulty in getting rehired and a lack of affordable housing have left many older Americans especially vulnerable to financial shocks like the one from the pandemic.

How would COVID hurt a retired person? It isn’t like they lost their job. They have been living in rented homes for over a year without having to pay rent, can’t waste money by going out. No, this is a pure money grab, yet landlords are the ones being called greedy.

Now the LA Sheriff wants the state of California to declare a state of emergency, so that government officials can use the authority granted thereby to seize homes for the homeless.

This is communism. Pure and simple. It is tyranny, it is unconstitutional. Claiming that people need housing so landlords must provide it at their expense is no different than using the same reason to force restaurants or farmers to give away free food. This is abject slavery.

The Democrats want to give away free college, free homes, free health care, what next? Who will be next to bear the burden of this government?

By Divemedic, ago

Corruption

Developers run the state of Florida. There is a massive influx of people from the north who are coming to Florida, and the current residents are the ones paying the bill. A case in point:

Sumter County Florida contains a large community called “The Villages.” The entire community is being built by a family owned company. They are planning to build 60,000 homes in the next 20 years. The cost for the infrastructure needed for this community is being left to the taxpayers of the county.

To cover these expenses, Sumter county passed a 25% increase in property taxes in 2019. The Villages managed this by getting several of their employees elected to the county commission. The developer claims that they are paying their share by building parks and golf courses- “amenities.” What they fail to say is that the amenities are only permitted to the people who live in the Villages and pay amenities fees. The fire stations, deputies, road maintenance, and other required public infrastructure is left to the tax payer.

If a developer builds a house in The Villages, or any other retirement community in Sumter County, the impact fee to help pay for roads is $972. If a developer builds the exact same house outside The Villages, the impact fee nearly triples to $2,666. That deal is thanks to the three commissioners that were on the board until the last election.

Voters were incensed, and replaced three of them in the 2020 election. The new commissioners passed a bill to roll back the tax, and make impact fees the same throughout the county.

That was defeated when the state of Florida passed a law limiting impact fees. The Representative who sponsored the impact fee limit? He is an employee of The Villages with a $350K a year salary. The number one contributor to his election campaign? His employer, the Holding Company of the Villages, Inc.

Hage’s employment with The Villages was revealed on a Form 6 Full and Public Disclosure of Financial Interests filed by him last year. The form shows that during 2019, he was paid $141,003 from the Holding Company of The Villages. He also was paid $113,554 from T&D Distribution Inc., $14,410 from T&D Concrete Inc., and $11,000 from T&D Supplies Inc. T&D is the construction company that does all of the construction work in the Villages. Hage’s state representative salary – one he clearly isn’t earning – was $29,697.

When what is bought and sold is decided by the legislator, the first thing that is bought and sold are the legislators.

By Divemedic, ago

They want the camps

More and more, we see those on the left advocating for camps. Reader “QuestionMark” posted a couple of comments on American Greatness:

If you still believe that the election was stolen or any of the Qanon myths, then you need a reading list and a visit to a reeducation camp too.
It never fails to amaze how gullible some people are.

QuestionMark,

Just found this website and it is clear that crazy runs deep here!
I know reeducation camps run counter to American values but reading just three stories and the comments on them convince me that there’s a strong case for locking some of you up for your own good. Delusional isn’t a strong enough word to describe your mental state, demented maybe is better.

QuestionMark

This is what many on the left think: Either agree with me, or be sent to a camp until you do. This is also why they want red flag laws.

By Divemedic, ago

Badasses

More thoughts on the President’s false bravado about citizens and their AR15’s being useless in the face of fighter jets and nukes.

Remember how brave they were 5 months ago?

Members of the Flintstones Order of the Water Buffalo captured the Capitol while unarmed.

honk honk

This was just before they summoned 30,000 fat assed National guard clerks and office personnel from MEAL Team 6 to guard DC.

By Divemedic, ago

Nukes are useless

Joe Biden today said that US citizens can’t use AR15s to resist the power of his government because they’d need F-15s & nukes to take on the government.

I know how we can get some- just look on the Internet, where the geniuses of the US Air Force have posted the information needed to steal them.

All kidding aside- what the President is saying is that he is going to use nukes on US citizens on US soil. I cannot ever remember any sitting US President threatening to use nuclear weapons against his own country. So, to you on the left who are apparently feeling like you are experts in military conflict: Explain exactly how nuclear weapons would help the US government win a war against its own citizens. Will you drop one on Chicago? Your own farmland?

What about those F15s? What can an F15 do against a citizen militia? In case you didn’t know- the F15 is a fighter aircraft, completely useless against anything but other aircraft. Now I know that you idiots think that the F15 is somehow a magic talisman, even to the point of trying to use one to intimidate protesters, but it won’t work.

Let me explain to you how such a conflict would work:

You call out the troops, and they show up with tanks and every heavy weapon they can find. The militia disappears, blending into the populace. Then, while this massive army is in the field, the citizens showed up at the factory that made some indispensable widget required for your tanks to work, and killed half of the assembly line workers.

So half the army now has to be posted at the factory. The next time, the citizens show up at the houses of the families of those troops. Now they all have to be moved onto secure bases.

Then what? A soldier goes out on the town for a bit R&R then disappears.

Wars like that get ugly. I think that at this point, such a conflict appears unavoidable.

By Divemedic, ago

Threats

One of my employees had a bit of an anger management problem. He has frequent bouts of ranting and yelling when things don’t go his way. He will even throw things on occasion. He once broke a computer monitor when he threw a stapler during one of his fits. Everyone knows about his temper, and frequently jokes about it when he isn’t around.

This week’s rant is a scheduling dispute. Short version is that he doesn’t like his schedule and is taking it as a personal attack. He made the statement “I’m tired of getting screwed. Everyone responsible needs to die a painful death.” I had enough and went to the supervisor. She replied: “I didn’t hear the death threats. The other stuff is just how he is. He’s been saying that stuff for years and hasn’t done anything.”

So I am carrying a handgun to work, in violation of policy. Hard to do in scrubs. I have a S&W Bodyguard .380 in a Graystone holster tank top underneath my scrubs. It is the only gun I own that is small enough not to show under the thin material of hospital scrubs.

By Divemedic, ago