How to get pissed off by Amazon.

This item was supposed to be here TODAY.

Friday doesn't cut it.

Order cancelled.

Shipment Delay Hello Clark County Politics, We're encountering a delay in shipping your order. The new delivery date is indicated below. We'll send a confirmation when your item ships. We apologize for the inconvenience. Details Order #112-XXXXXXX-XXXXX Placed on Wednesday, April 5, 2017 New estimated delivery date: Friday, April 14, 2017 Ship to: Clark County Politics PO Box 921761... TechOrbits 6440mAh extended Battery... Sold by Techorbits If your shipment arrives too late, you may refuse delivery or return it for a refund. We hope to see you again soon. Amazon.com This email was sent from a notification-only address that cannot accept incoming email. Please do not reply to this message.

I hope you clowns can get your stuff shipped out on time.

We'll both be disappointed.

This is not the first time. And the item in question is to replace my dying Note 4 battery.

What I know for sure is many things... but that Amazon is "sorry for any inconvenience" is a crock.  Because this happens all too often.

If they WERE sorry, they'd discount the item or some such, instead of ignoring the fact that I'm paying for the privilege of two business day delivery.

Makes paying for Prime quite a bit more difficult.

Impressions of Saturday's town hall meeting, Sen. Ann "Gas Tax" Rivers... and why Rivers will never be great.

Wow.  I guess that my esteemed Senator, Ann "Gas Tax" Rivers, is just a tiny bit piqued at moi.

Apparently, she forgot who she works for.

There were two legislators at the meeting yesterday: Gas Tax and Rep. Brandon Vick.

One acted like a rejected 7th-grade girl.  The other acted like, well, a legislator.  One reminded us... twice... that it was her 41st town hall meeting... in 7 years... like that is a big deal.

Clearly, Rivers is the only one counting because, you see, it's not the number of town halls that matters.

It's the quality and the communication between the constituents and their elected officials that matters.

Forty one meetings where you shuck and jive and don't care that you've lied, mislead and/or betrayed?

That's utterly worthless... and certainly not any kind of big deal.

This town hall meeting showed that she clearly wants me dead.  She's not the only one, of course, but her ability to control that outward emotion is in the nature of the job.

In my case and at least one other, she was rude, condescending, and generally, acted like a petulant bitch.

And in front of her constituents!

Here's the thing:

When you lie to get elected, there are, occasionally, people who are going to do their best to hold you accountable.  When you lie and hang a $700 million debt on the county you live in, occasionally, people are going to do their best to hold you accountable.  And then when you lie about WHY you betrayed us... (The $7 billion figure if she had voted "no" is an outright lie in the video below) occasionally, people are going to do their best to hold you accountable.

Rivers lied about her position on the gas tax/tab fee increases to get elected, pledges she put in writing (even though *I* wrote them for her) and then placed on her campaign website.

Here's a screen shot:

Nothing changed from when she put that pledge on her website and her betrayal of those of us who supported her election based on what we wrongly believed was the truth... except someone seems to have bought or blackmailed Rivers.

Everything in the paragraph was true when it was written and true when she betrayed us with her vote.

Of course, when the time came to keep her word, she voted to hang a $700 MILLION bill around the necks of those of us living in Clark County... or a tab of about $1500 for every man, woman, and child living here.

She didn't care that she lied, of course.  Her own words tell us that her only regret is having made that campaign pledge in the first place.

Here's what happened when I asked her about her betrayal in January of last year.

It's an 8 minute or so video of Rivers doing everything but taking responsibility for lying to us about her position on this issue.

When you lie for a year by $185,000 on how much money you've collected for your political campaign, there are, occasionally, people who are going to do their best to hold you accountable.

Obviously, Getting fined $4000 or so by the Public Disclosure Commission stung Rivers a tad bit, but here's the thing:

No one made her lie about her position on the gas tax and tab fees.   And no one made her lie about the tens of thousands over her true amount of money she'd put together for her last fool-fest.

So, in public, which is the only way I can get her to respond (She ignores emails sent to her office concerning legislative issues)  she does not react well to me... my presence... or my questions.

I'm sure that every time she sees me or thinks of me... which is a great deal given my efforts... she remembers all that I know.  And it's a problem for her because she also knows that I have not lied about what she has done.  A guilty conscience can cause one to give signs that someone has burrowed their way into your skull.  Saturday's performance tended to show that as well.

But the great ones... those in this line of work who have any political brains whatsoever, NEVER... LET... IT... SHOW.

They treat everyone the same... PARTICULARLY their constituents who for whatever the reason, oppose the actions they've taken in bad faith.  Clearly, Rivers has forgotten who she works for.

But when you represent special interests over your constituency... and with her efforts to let the pot industry off the hook because of their impossibly high, $582 million per year revenue projections is certainty another example of that... occasionally, people are going to do their best to hold you accountable.

The irony of all of this is that none of it was necessary.  And Rivers has no one to blame but herself.

Oddly enough, it extends beyond me as well.

Rivers is rightfully a tad touchy for her efforts to bring the CRC Scam back... and the reality that the only way... the ONLY way this unnecessary and unneeded waste of billions will be built is either WITH light rail or, the OTHER scam, "light rail capable" which means "light rail," period.

So, yesterday, at the town hall, somebody NOT me made an observation that indicated that any I-5 replacement bridge, which we, of course, do not need, would have light rail on it.

Rivers seemed to take affront at that obviously true observation and rudely interrupted this man, (who I don't know) and demanded to know where he heard that.

Well, as Rep. Wylie said, those of us who demand a look at the many other more cost-effective and useful alternatives that would make much more sense... us "ferrets"... have seen nothing BUT loot rail as the main driver for this rip-off.

A "robust mass transit component" is what that clown Wylie called it, and that, ladies and germs, is light rail.

Rivers actually acted like that was out of the question... not even a remote possibility.

But then, she'd also pledged that her support of a massive gas tax and/or tab fee increase was ALSO out of the question... and how did that work out for us?

Memo to Sen. Rivers: (I know you read this blog... you can't help yourself.) feel free to hate my guts all you like.

But in the interim?  Do your damned job and act like an adult.

Clearly, Saturday in Battle Ground, you did not.

President Trump's Syria attack. Now what?

The wind is trying to blow the front of my house off as I put this together, so forgive me if I'm a bit distracted.

Last night, the President launched his first sizable offensive attack against another country.

In this case, it was Syria.  It was, we are told, in retaliation for a chemical weapons attack that killed something on the order of 100 people, about a quarter of which were children.

Syria and the rest of the world have become used to the cowardice and indecisiveness of the clueless idiot most recently president.  Like Ronald Reagan, President Trump is the new sheriff in town, and he has to make up for lost time in a hurry.

Years of cowardice.  Years of lies.  Years of indecision.  Years of backstabbing.

But questions continue.  For years now... decades, even, Americans have built a healthy distrust of their government at all levels.

Regular readers know of the multiple betrayals at the local and state levels; the politicians who've lied to get elected and then lied about their lies.

Certainly, we've been lied to by so many in government that it's the default mode.  Years ago, I nicknamed the "mute" button on my remote control the "Obama" button.

So, it was with some trepidation that I watched the Syrian missile attack develop.

I stayed quiet, more or less.  I needed to process what amounts to the largest Gordian foreign relations Knot on the planet today.

How does one solve the unsolvable?

I'm not going to summarize the Syrian question here.  If you're reading this, you no doubt have at least a rudimentary knowledge of that policy blackhole.

Typically, I have at least some suggestions as to how to solve almost any political problem.  I can also be as wrong as the next guy, but usually, there is SOMETHING that can be said... some plan, some clue.

Here, I've got nothing.

Any strategy I've even begun to ponder quickly leads to quicksand.

Before the day of the strike was out, however, airstrikes by Syrian planes were launched from the same air field we had just expended $75 million attacking.

When we expend $75 million attacking something, I expect... and want... that something to be not functioning again within the day.

Here's a BDA photo of the target.

They did a pretty good nailing facilities.  But I don't see very many wrecked planes (though I understand 20 or so were destroyed) or cratered runways.

Unscathed: This collection of five jets on al-Sharyat Air Base somehow escaped the bombing raid, despite being located out in the open, on a patchy grass plain

The end result?

Syrian forces defiantly take off from airfield hit by onslaught of US cruise missiles

The US Navy guided-missile destroyer USS Ross. Reuters

 Alex Lockie

Less than 24 hours after two US Navy destroyers pulled up to Syria's Mediterranean coast and let fly a blistering salvo of 59 cruise missiles, Syrian warplanes took off from the damaged air base targeted by the strike, according to the Syrian Human Rights Observatory.

The US strike, retaliation for a chemical attack in northeastern Syria that killed at least 80 people earlier this week, targeted "aircraft, hardened aircraft shelters, petroleum and logistical storage, ammunition supply bunkers, air defense systems, and radars" at Shayrat air base, according to a Pentagon statement.

But Syria and its Russian backers have many air bases and lots of military infrastructure in the country.

The US intentionally launched a limited strike, which was too small and focused to realistically prevent Syrian forces from flying military aircraft in their country.

More:

I'm a bit more old school.

Any such attack needed to include efforts to deprive the base of its runways.

After all, isn't that primarily the point?

That said, this attack amplifies our willingness to use force to achieve policy aims. 

And after the Obama foreign policy debacle of the better part of the last decade, that is a positive step.

This discussion continues as to whether or not the order to attack was "legal."  Or if the attack was a false-flag scam designed to get this reaction.

I don't know for sure.  But what I do know is that President Trump actually acted in the face of the actions of a group of people who violated the Rules of Land Warfare and a host of other laws designed to regulate war... if such a thing can actually exist. And if this was an action designed to "fool" President Trump into acting, that doesn't explain why they did they same thing when a cowardly, inept dillwad was in the White House that the whole world knew would just sit on his thumb as a result.

The attack accomplished some good things.  It also pointed out that we need better targeting information.

It's difficult to trash the President when he was acting because of the hideous deaths of 27 children.

But dead is dead.  And ISIS has done far worse to far more... as in the thousands.

And they, too, are still in business.

Meanwhile, the question continues: What does President Trump do now?

Are we about to become "pot committed" as they say?

Who knows?  With this president, there's no way of telling.

And his lack of predictability is one of his biggest assets.  It's one of the things I like the most about the guy, given what a completely predictable moron he replaced.

An oldy but a goody: something the democratian no doubt forgot on McEnerny-Ogle.

Back in 2011, AMO got some of the same cash that Tim "The Liar" Leavitt scammed from, it would seem, the same place:  The Cowlitz Tribe.

Here's the story:

Monday, October 24, 2011

McEnerny-Ogle: Jeannie Harris revisited, and the unions are getting what they're paying for. 

Much is made of M.O.'s tenure on the planning commission.  But is anything made of the fact that she couldn't get re-appointed? 

We already have a Jeannie Harris.  Do we need another one? 

“Staff has received a few complaints about both incumbents. In the case of Commissioner McEnerny Ogle, the complaints relate to the way she has treated applicants and their representatives. Some complained that her questioning was unnecessarily harsh and her comments demeaning, particularly related to treatment of school district personnel. There have also been complaints that some of her decisions were made based on personal prejudices, not the decision criteria in the Development Code.”

Is comparing McEnerny-Ogle to Jeannie "Gavel Down" Harris legitimate?  It certainly could be... and here's another comparison that raises my hackles: 

Tim "The Liar" Leavitt was elected with the help of illegal campaign contributions, money laundered through the hotel unions that started from a union in Seattle, was laundered through a union in New York, and dry-cleaned by a local in Portland (Unite Here?  Are you kidding me?) and done with the support of the unions in the Pollard Hilton (How's THAT for irony?) 

Well, check THIS out:  How much does McEnerny-Ogle cost?

$32,556.65. 

The SAME union that laundered money for Tim "The Liar" Leavitt is NOW laundering money for Anne McEnerny-Ogle. 

So now, we're faced with the possibility of getting not only a version of Gavel Down Harris, but a version of Tim "The Liar" Leavitt as well. 

Now that the word is out, do ya think the rag is going to beat up the unions for AGAIN laundering money and AGAIN doing for MO what they did for Leavitt? 

This expenditure answers a lot of questions about MO: She's for the bridge and loot rail, and she'll be a guaranteed "yes" for tax and fee increases. 

Lovely. 

The slime of Vancouver. 

BTW, vote for Turlay and Wentzel.  You could do a lot, lot, worse.  Just take a look at McEnerny-Ogle, for example. 

What are chances the Tribe is going to pay this kind of money for her again?

Pretty high, I'd say.  And for those of you who like the idea of this economic black hole landing here, sucking up our local economy?

Remember that as those we elect wind up representing THEM, instead of US.

Carolyn Crain polishes her fake Republican image.

Several months ago, it became transparent that Carolyn Crain, who has become the face of division for the local GOP, is no more a Republican than Barack Obama

Crain first shot to minor prominence when she set out to eliminate conservatives from elective office and generally do the bidding of the democrats running her; much like Jimmy Mains has been Marc Boldt's puppet master.

Crain, who is a moderator of the C3G2 hate group on Facebook, surprised local Republicans who mistakenly believed she was one when she endorsed fellow leftist Chuckie Green in the county council raise where sadly, the only choice was between two leftists, one of whom was masquerading as a Republican and who, in fact, has a voting record even more leftist than Greens would have been... Julie Olson.

A reward for her political treason was her elevation to a ring-master for the group of uber-left monkeys at the Clark County Citizens for Democrat Governance Facebook page, (Started by Chuckie Green) which has spread its way around the county like a political cancer.

Crain, who helped lie my witless brother-in-law, Marc Boldt, into office (with 39% of the vote) where he has done all he can to ignore the constituency that put him there, put together a fake Republican PAC which it appears she has used to pay for her stay at the Heathman when they lost money on their moronic little dinner Crain lives in Vancouver, so I guess it was too far to drive after a stressful, poorly-attended dinner when OPM is picking up the tab) has now decided to expand her political perfidy by endorsing uber-leftist AMO... Anne McErnerny-Ogle.

Every fringe-left whack job in the region has rushed to endorse AMO.

Such stellar main stream leftists as Jimmy Moeller, Jimmy Mains, Jennifer McDaniel, Andrew Cleveland, Ed Barnes, Jack Burkman, the aforementioned Chuckie Green, Noland Hoshino, Pat Jollota, Sharon Wylie, Ty Stober, Don Steinke, Mike Pond, Paul Montague, Temple Lentz (The endorsement of Mains, Hoshino and Lentz obviously means that AMO is paying them) Doug Lasher, Eric LaBrant...

And, of course, Carolyn Crain.

If there ever was any question that Crain was a Republican... and that's objectively impossible at this point... this kind of wearing out of the knee-pads that she does so often in front of those of the left should put it to rest.

Crain is a leftist troll.  Her actions, her interviews with her fellow leftists at the local cancer of our community, the democratian... her endorsement and financing of leftist candidates such as my brother-in-law are a sickening reminder of her true agenda which has nothing to do with furthering the Republican cause generally or conservative causes particularly.

She has a record of supporting those who would raise our taxes, increase the size of government and, in this case, support all of those who would ram the hated CRC/Loot Rail scam down our throats.

I have to wonder at this point:

Is Crain going to use that fake Republican PAC of hers to support AMO over a true Republican candidate such as Steve Cox?

Will she use the non-partisan nature of this race as an excuse?

Yes.  THAT Carolyn Crain.

Next time she claims to be a Republican?

Remember this.  And remember all of her other leftist activities... not unlike those on the Executive Board of the local democrat party or the Young Democrats who endorsed my brother-in-law for County Chair.

I do hope the RINOs are pleased.  The outcomes were everything I said they would be.