Friday Rant: California Circles the Drain? Guns to Mexico[UPDATE]? Weiner to Go?

California: Been in a foul mood thanks to the once great but now almost late State of California.  A few months ago, out of the blue, I got a notice of a tax lien filed against me by the state of California for taxes owed in 2008. The fact that I don't live in California, and I haven't for some 35 years, don't earn money there, don't have property there, don't vote there, don't have a drivers' license from there and that in 2008, I didn't even visit the place, was all irrelevant.  Some Bozo Maximus somewhere had misread VA for CA on my W-2 and had set loose the hounds on me!  Lots of frustrating phone calls, faxes, emails, special delivery letters. No way to budge the California Franchise Tax Board, "Well, if we have a lien it must be for a reason."  Yes it is:  you're complete morons who only serve to slow down the earth's rotation! I had to prove that I did not owe the money; they did not have to argue at all that I did.  Just hit me with a lien. Wham!  I don't know who they put to answer their phones but I swear it was outsourced somewhere very far away. The accents were indecipherable and the people had no idea of California's tax laws. You get hit with a megathousands lien, and, boy, you have incentive to read everything you can about California tax laws.

In the end, I had to get an excellent California CPA firm that quickly cut through the bureaucratic crap, and fixed the matter. But now, just yesterday, I get my credit score! I lost about 150 points on my credit score because some moron misread CA for VA! Now I have to deal with those idiots and the Tax Board which had promised to send a letter accepting that the lien had been a mistake but, of course, has not.

Imagine your life when Obamacare kicks in, and this is the sort of thing you will spend your time doing. "Yes, I do have an arrow in my back. Yes, I do think that arrow removal is a covered service. No, I am not blaming Native Americans, and I have only the greatest respect for their culture and hunting traditions. No, I don't think the death panel needs to rule. No, I did not vote for Obama, why should that matter?"

Guns to Mexico: I have written before about the nonsense said about US guns going to Mexico. This story is getting worse and worse. It is certainly much worse than I had feared. As you all know, our criminally inept ATF forced law-abiding U.S. gun dealers to sell guns to persons who then passed the guns to the Mexican cartels. The dealers were reluctant and kept checking with the ATF, but were told to sell.  At first, I thought this would have been only a few weapons here and there, but it turns out that it was thousands of weapons! There is some very disturbing press reporting about gun busts in Mexico turning up some of these weapons. This is typical liberal madness. The liberal lie, repeated mindlessly by the media, has been that the cartels' weapons come from the US. Since there was no evidence of that, the ATF set up a whole smuggling operation to provide weapons to the cartels to "prove" that weapons come from the US! Heads must roll. Senior ATF and DOJ people should go to jail; Holder should resign. These weapons have already cost one US border patrolman his life, and we will never know how many Mexican lives have been lost in this insane ATF operation. Keep your eye on this story; not always easy as the MSM does not cover it well, but there are some Senate hearings coming that will be hard to ignore.

UPDATE: Suddenly the ATF has released info to the media that implies that 70% of the cartel weapons come from the US.  That's nonsense. You have to read the story carefully and you will find that it is 70% of the weapons the Mexicans have sent ATF to trace. These were weapons that the Mexicans already had determined were likely from the US. What's not at all clear is how many of those, came from the ATF, itself! The ATF is cooking the books in anticipation of the Congressional hearings.

Weiner Stay!  Every red-blooded Republican must support Anthony Weiner in his fight to remain a Congressman. He must not be pushed out of his office. We need him around as a constant punchline and punching bag. We need his picture posing with Obama and Pelosi! Save the Weiner!