I didn’t used to believe them. The cons, I mean . When they spouted all of their drivel about how everybody is out to get them, I dismissed it. I thought THEY thought it was a winning rhetorical strategy of politics and nothing more. Now? Yeah, I believe they actually believe the words coming from their mouths.

Ask ’em, they’ll tell you. You CAN NOT fool a con. If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it sure as hell AIN’T a duck. In fact, it’s probably a scheme Joe Biden cooked up to distract from Hunter’s legal troubles. And don’t try to fool them with facts. Facts are folly.

Everything, everything, everything, is conspiracies and paranoia. Liberals, Democrats, the “deep state,” Hillary (of course), Sleepy Joe (natch), “mainstream media” (except lying Fox Not-News), Obama (if you didn’t spit that, you didn’t say it right), anybody with facts and/or evidence, lawyers, doctors, the butcher, the baker, AND that lyin’ candlestick maker. Everybody who doesn’t agree with them, anybody who knows better than them? In on it. Obviously. Clearly, a deep state operative or mindless rube, blindly following along for…reasons.

Do you know how you can tell who’s in on it? They’re the people saying things like, “Climate change is a real and present danger.” “Cops shouldn’t kill unarmed suspects.” “Maybe there should be a little gun control.” “Working people should be paid a fair wage.” “Maybe rich people should pay their fair share of taxes.” “WOW! The mountain of evidence against lying criminal, sexual predator, and alleged traitor Donald Trump is huge!”

They’ve got “answers” for all of those, of course. “Huh-uh!” “They should comply.” “What part of ‘…shall not be infringed’ don’t you get?” “They should get a better job.” “Rich people already pay ALL the taxes.” “Every bit of so-called ‘evidence’ – all 482,593,678,912 pounds of it? Made up – oh, and planted.”

Is there a single issue on which the cons have the correct position? Honestly, I can’t think of one. I used to commonly refer to “always-wrong cons.” I kind of moved off of that position for a time. I thought, “There must be something they’re right about.” Alas, (hey, when do you get to use ‘Alas?’) nope. Not one thing. And it’s not just this week, either. Cons have been wrong about everything for the last 40 years or so. Even when they get close to right on something, “Hunter Biden’s laptop is a problem…” they get there for the wrong reasons, “…for Joe Biden!”

It’s not entirely their fault, of course. Not entirely. They’ve been led astray by conservative media, designed and built to lead them astray. But they’ve had 40 years to catch on to the con and it just eludes them. They’re having so much fun “owning libs,” they don’t notice what it’s doing to them or their reputations. Nor do they much care. Their “true” friends, those who know that, say, Hillary is a master of “wet work” for the CIA and just murders people for fun, will support them. And if they don’t? In on it.

Just think about John Durham. Durham was supposed to find all the big, bad, evil evidence that would put Hillary and Obama and every other Dem in prison for life for trying to frame Donald Trump for dealing with Russians during the 2016 campaign. They KNOW it was a set-up. Durham came in, spent millions of dollars, took YEARS investigating, TRYING to find proof of malfeasance, and, finally? Nothing. Crickets. No evidence of crimes.

When one of their own, hand-picked guys, well-established in conservative circles looks into the charges for years, spends millions on the investigation, and turns up nothing, the cons, obviously, shrugged. “Oh, well,” they say, “we thought we had something there.” Ha, ha! Don’t be a rube! Clearly, Durham caved…or was bought off…or threatened. Either way, RINO and deepest of deep state operatives. All they need, they insist, is the right guy to find and present all of the totally incriminating evidence they’re just sure must exist somewhere.

I’ll tell you this: I’ve spent years trying to point out to them, very much against their will, that wild-eyed accusations only hurt their credibility rather than making them appear as intrepid sleuths. But Maya Angelou was correct: when someone tells you who they are, believe them. The cons keep insisting they don’t understand things. ANY things. I’ve come to believe them. Look for a return of the “always wrong cons” moniker soon…

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California has long suffered the greed of the oil companies a the gas pump. We pay higher prices than most places and there has never really been a good reason for it. I mean the oil companies have a list of “reasons.” They just always seemed…contrived. As an example, California requires a different gasoline blend for summer driving. Every year, this meant a huge price increase at the pump as the industry “re-tooled for the summer driving blend.” Even though they had done it every year since 1996, each year seemed to catch them off guard.

“Well, we didn’t know we had to do that again THIS year so we have to raise prices at the pump, say, oh, I don’t know…how about a dollar a gallon?”
“A dollar?”
“Dollar ten, bitch.”
“Wait, I was just asking…”
“Dollar twenty.”
“Okay, okay, here you go. Thank you for making the gas, oh great lords of petroleum.”
“That’s better…”

The oil companies pressed and pressed and pressed. Prices at the pump regularly flirted with $6.00/gallon or more. It did serious damage to the California economy and was a money tap the oil companies could open and close at will. Californians got sick of the charade pretty quickly. California politicians FINALLY caught on to the problem a year or two ago and in March of this year, passed a gouging oversight law. With the exception of one lone Democrat, the bill was opposed by always-wrong cons. (<– See? There it is…)

Since the passage of SBx1-2, gas prices (mostly) have not risen higher than $5.00/gallon – even as we entered the (gasp!) summer driving season! Despite all the doom and gloom guaranteed by the cons, the bill worked. For now.

I’ll tell you this: I’m sure the industry is raining money on politicians in an effort to attain “carve-outs” and other work-arounds to have a free hand in price gouging again but, for now, I’m glad the bill was passed. It seems to be working. It’s a good start…