Maggie's Farm

In the aftermath of the crash, a friend of mine who happens to be a lawyer and a mortgage broker, was discussing homeownership.

She owns two homes. She believes in ownership as an important part of long term savings and capital growth, as well as a means of improving and exhibiting maturity and responsibility. I agreed with her 100%.

She then stated home ownership is not for everybody. Again, I agreed. She has had several people come to her in the course of purchasing, and she has on occasion recommended they use another lawyer. When they ask why, she replies "you really are not prepared to buy a home. I will work with you if you'd like, but you have to understand the nature of what homeownership means, and your behaviors are indicating you are better suited to renting."

Usually, they will leave. Several stuck with her. All of them eventually went bankrupt because they'd overstepped their abilities. In some cases, she noticed couples who were buying a home to solidify their relationship. She points out this is the worst idea a couple can ever have. In each case, these couples eventually split and many times the house caused more pain and imposed great costs.

That said, renting is no bed of roses. From an economic point of view, a nation of renters is an uncomfortable and disjointed one. As a landlord, and a good one at that, I can point out that you will always have your fair share of nightmare tenants. And those tenants will hate you and cause you all kinds of problems because they don't respect that which isn't theirs.

I've only had one in 20 years of renting. It was horrendous, and she did significant damage. But my friends who also rent out their properties have had more than their fair share. My brother had 2 sets of these tenants in 20 years, and one was so bad they had to call animal control to remove ferrets which had chewed through the walls and were reproducing inside the apartment's walls.

It's not unusual in the US to hear claims of 'abusive' landlords. And I'm sure they exist. But most of these claims are BS. My one particular tenant was so bad I dragged her down to the police station for passing bad checks. She claimed I was the problem. Until she learned passing a bad check from a bank in another state was a federal crime. Then she quickly paid up in cash and decamped.

But not before removing big sections of the shower.

No, home ownership is not for everybody. But renting should be discouraged, too. At the very least we need better laws which prevent the kind of nonsense landlords have to deal with.

Yes, I make money from my apartment. But it's my property and I take care of it. When I have to spend more to fix it because of a lousy tenant, it makes me question the value of being a landlord. Or when I get a call at 11pm (as I have) to "please change the lightbulb". Or a complaint that "this apartment doesn't have a washing machine or dryer". No, it doesn't. You live across the street from a laundromat and we told you there wasn't one when you looked at it.

By and large, most tenants are pretty good. But even good ones have problems. Like the mechanical engineer who didn't know how to turn on the water heater. Or the smoker of weed whose burning seeds put burn marks in my hardwood floors, and covered it with a rug so I didn't notice until he was gone.

Ownership carries responsibility, and a nation of renters is going to be a nation of people who like to defer most of that responsibilty to others, and will seek protections for their 'rights' from the state, while ignoring their own responsibilities.

Better to have a good mix, as we do here in the US. But no reason to encourage everyone to own.

I heard Bill Richardson say this morning that black youths have every good reason to question the justice system in the US today.

Pander much?

Seriously, after OJ, I didn't question the justice system, just the prosecution which I think did a ham-handed job with the case. But just because I didn't like the verdict didn't mean I questioned the justice system. Was OJ guilty? I have no clue. I like to think he probably was.

Was Zimmerman guilty? Depends on what you think he's guilty of. Being stupid and a bit of a screw up? Yeah, I'd say he's guilty of that. But when was stupidity a crime?
Zimmerman admits shooting Martin, but the circumstances of that death are no more clearly a murder than they are a tragic accident.

Reasonable doubt rules whether you're black, Asian, white, Hispanic or Martian.

I don't necessarily "like" the outcome of the case, though I agree with the verdict. And when you consider how far the judge went to make this as rigged as possible to get him into an orange jumpsuit, you have to respect the job the defense did.
Originally, they looked like a bunch of bozos. But in getting Zimmerman the not guilty verdict, they proved the prosecution had no case because they did about as poor a job for Zimmerman as I can imagine, and STILL won!

And for all the people claiming "Stand Your Ground" must go - I'd point out the prosecution never invoked it, and even went so far as to say "Stand Your Ground" wasn't even the issue.

Did Zimmerman kill someone? Tragically, yes.
Did Zimmerman commit murder? I have no idea, and that means there's reasonable doubt.

It looks like the prosecution's problem was bringing the wrong charge. But then again, the judge even allowed the jury to consider manslaughter....

Read them. You have to make a leap of faith to assume anything with that.

Did he "stalk and kill"? No
Did he "stalk"? Questionable. He was following because he suspected a crime, and having put other thieves in jail with his testimony, I suspect he felt was doing right (though he wasn't).
Did he "kill"? Yes, he admits this, though his version of events imply an attack. I doubt, really really doubt, if the gun was pulled, that Martin would have attacked him. So that seems unlikely.
Did Martin attack him? More than likely. Doesn't seem logical that Zimmerman attacked Martin.
Did Zimmerman follow a "lawful direction" to stop following Marting? This is a weird one. He didn't follow that command immediately, though it seems that he did eventually. What's really important, though, is whether or not it's illegal to not follow that command - and it's not illegal at all. That "lawful direction" is really just a recommendation. After all, if you suspect your neighbor's house was broken into are you likely to follow the suspected felon? Probably. Would you stop following him even if the police told you shouldn't? Probably. HUGE leap of faith to assume not continuing to follow Martin was illegal in any sense of the word. And "lawful direction" in this case is really just a made up term to sound as if it's a legal justification for putting Zimmerman behind bars.
Just like "White Hispanic" is a made up term to make certain Hispanics be 'white' (and therefore evil) as opposed to 'black' (and completely innocent).

As I say regularly, reasonable doubt is important. In this case, there is more reasonable doubt than there is evidence one way or the other. One thing is absolutely certain - Zimmerman may have set out to have Martin stopped by the police, but he did not set out to KILL Martin. That, unfortunately, is the tragic part of all this.

A series of missed opportunities to de-escalate and avoid trouble led to mistaken assumptions which led to a death. It doesn't matter who started the escalation, because at some point one person's physical attack stepped over the line.

You may happen to think Zimmerman was the first to engage physical contact. The evidence seems to indicate otherwise. I will say I don't know, but I do know that, emotionally, if you feel one way or the other strongly (and I do not), then you are really just letting your emotions overwhelm your sense of rational thought and acceptance of the rule of law.

I believe there are 2 reasons that the White House flips back and forth between parties.
First, there is the 'tired' factor, mentioned by the author. People are definitely tiring of the same nonsense repeated over and over again. But going along with the 'tired' factor is the scandal issue. Almost every second term president has run into significant scandal issues which tarnish their reputation and the reputation of their party. The easiest solution, when you're tired of hearing the same platitudes over and over, and you're tired of the corruption, is to want somebody new.

Second, there is the issue of name recognition. When you're in office for 8 years, you are the face, the voice, and the name of the party. Sure, there are others (like Hillary) who have name recognition and have appeal, but by and large you've dominated the party. Anyone behind you is an asterisk. Gore? People barely cared about him for 7 years, and then when he ran for president he had to avoid Clinton like the plague. This isn't uncommon when running to succeed someone from your own party. George HW Bush was lucky enough to ride a decent economy into the WH, and if he hadn't been so demotivated after 4 years, likely would have won a second term (one of the least inspiring campaigns I've ever seen). At any rate, a same party politician faces difficult headwinds.


BTW, Hillary isn't doing herself any favors. My wife, who was partial to Hillary because "she's a woman" (ahem), has begun to really question her judgement, particularly as Hillary's crown jewel, the Mid East, begins to fall apart. And oh, that work with the Eurozone? Yeah, that's going to end well.

I have 3 HRC stories, all unconnected and from 3 very different sources, and all second hand, which are funny as hell.
My wife hates when I tell these stories, because I wasn't there at any of the 3 events. But my good friends were, and I trust them.

These stories are not flattering, and give great insight into who she is and what her character is. Basically, she is a shrill, nasty being who has certain preferences which are not standard and often questionable. She will use her name and position to get things for herself that ordinary people can never get, and feels it is her birthright.

These are general statements most people who dislike her agree on, usually without backing. I have the stories to back it up, though.
The people who like her, oddly enough, turn a blind eye for one reason. She's a woman, and "She's Awesome!"


One story I can tell is Whitewater. My wife used to work with a large Arkansas firm, and they invited her down for a visit. The firm was heavily Republican, but big Clinton supporters (Arkansas...what can I say?).
She asked about Whitewater, and the commodities trades Hillary made. They all laughed and said (more or less) "honey, you're in Arkansas, OF COURSE that happened, but it's normal here. If you're in New York, you have a million people to work with and get money and information from and it's not easy to track. Here, there's only about 100 people you can work with, so you don't have many choices. You just have to accept it."

My sister (a bleeding heart liberal to the core) met Bill once. Her heart was set aflutter. It began when he entered the room to speak, and saw an infirm woman in the corner, standing. He walked over to her, said something quietly, and found her a chair to sit in.

Sounds like snake oil to me, a set up to win hearts and minds. But my sister swallowed it hook, line and sinker. "Oh what a caring and wonderful man!"

Meanwhile, I know from a former job of mine that when he was attending an event, he was having a conversation with my old boss. Bill suddenly looks up and makes a lacivious statement about a woman who just happened to be the wife of another man standing in the conversation. I recounted that story to my sister, and she said "Oh...boys will be boys."
I said "How would you feel about me if I did that?"
"You'd be a disgusting pig!"
"I see....that's an interesting double standard you have working there."

And that's what it is. A double standard. If you like them, you'll make excuses for them.

Me? I don't like many politicians at all and I won't make excuses for them. I can't stand George W Bush, but I did hear a nice story about him once. A very good friend of mine used to work the Blair House as a kitchen server. Her job was to stand behind the guests and serve them.
One night, W arrived early and was sitting at the table and it slowly filled up. His wife Laura arrived last. When she arrived, he was the only one to stand up as she sat, and when she sat, he gently said "You are always the most beautiful woman in the room."
My sister was unimpressed, saying it was all for show. But Billy boy - he's genuine!