The Stasi was able to inflict totalitarianism on East Germany with the help of millions of informants. Washington State is taking the same approach:

Substitute Senate Bill 5427 is now on the governor’s desk. Its supposed purpose is “supporting people who have been targeted or affected by hate crimes and bias incidents.” To that end, it establishes “a reporting hotline” and sets up a mechanism for “tracking hate crimes and bias incidents” that will be overseen by the Washington state attorney general’s office.

This goes beyond actual crimes that are punished more severely because the victims are members of favored identity groups. The hotline is to be used to turn in those who say anything members of these groups don’t like.

It also targets reported instances of “a person’s hostile expression of animus toward another person, relating to the other person’s actual or perceived characteristics…” Literally, the hotline gives people a way of informing on others supposedly guilty of thought crimes – or, perhaps, speech crimes.

Image the laughter if someone were to report to Jay Inslee’s Stasi that they perceived animus for being white, male, Christian, an American citizen, heterosexual, to the right of Chairman Mao, et cetera. Thoughtcrime legislation only cuts one way.

The First Amendment used to protect us against such ham-fisted tyranny. But the US Constitution was written by Dead White Males, and is therefore subject to incremental cancelation.

The flaw of all hate crime legislation applies, as noted by State Rep Cyndy Jacobsen (R-Puyallup):

“I think it’s difficult to put things into law which look at the intent of people rather than the actions that they take.”

To the extent our rulers punish us for what they think we think, we are not living in a free country.

The potential scope of abuse with this new hotline is vast – especially since any identifying personal information provided to the hotline is “confidential and exempt from public inspection, copying, or disclosure.” Neither is that information to be included in any written reports. That means if anyone wanted to go after someone whose political opinions they don’t like, they could, conceivably, fabricate a “hate crime” or “bias incident” out of nothing. In fact, this new law, which takes effect on Jan. 1, 2025, exempts so much information from public disclosure that there will be no accountability at all to the people of the Evergreen State. After all, faking hate crimes has become common practice for the progressive left.

Refer to the Hate Hoax List for confirmation.

On tips from R F, Straight Shootr, and DCGere.

One group actually benefits from liberal rule — namely, sexually perverted felons.

In California,

Taxpayers in California have been rolling out the red carpet for prison inmates by splashing out on expensive cosmetic surgeries, that were once exclusive to Hollywood elites, for criminals.

Since 2017, the state has blown $4 million in tax dollars on transgender treatments such as sex changes, cosmetic surgery, and more for prisoners.

California residents even paid for death row prisoners to have expensive transgender surgeries.

The benefits of being a criminal in California include having artificial breasts and vaginas installed at taxpayer expense. The libs running the Land of Fruits and Nuts can find no better use for other people’s money.

No expense is spared when it comes to pandering to felonious perverts:

Two men in the prison system got what were described as “facial feminization surgeries,” totaling $184,141.

Laser hair removal was also given to 69 male inmates, costing $224,000.

Work hard, law-abiding citizens. Someone has to pay for this as the number of transgender convicts shoots through the stratosphere. In California, it has gone from 131 in 2014 to 1,847 this year — and for good reason:

Male inmates who claim to be “female” are often placed in women’s prisons, despite the nature of their crimes.

Meanwhile, up the Left Coast,

The morally depraved are calling the shots. Society’s sickest benefit from this state of affairs, even if no one else does.

On tips from ABC of the ANC and R F.

Sex offenders have a friend in the liberal establishment. This is especially true in deep blue states where social engineers have no significant resistance — like Washington:

Washington’s Sex Offender Policy Board is working with the state’s Sentencing Guideline Commission in an attempt to roll back restrictions and sentence guidelines for sex offenders…

This is on the heels of community blowback from Washington Democrats including Governor Jay Inslee and Attorney General Bob Ferguson, releasing level 3 sex offenders, those deemed the “worst of the worst” and most likely to re-offend from high-security facilities to halfway houses in unsuspecting neighborhoods.

Additionally, at the end of the last legislative session, Democrat Governor Jay Inslee line-item vetoed a provision that would have informed neighbors if such an individual was to be placed in their community.

In 2020, Jay Inslee ran for president as a single-issue candidate hyping the global warming hoax. Looks like he’s branching out.

As always with progressives’ sexual agenda, children are in the crosshairs:

A draft of the recommendations for the Model Penal Code obtained by The Post Millennial from a Sept. 21 meeting reveals that the entities are claiming that “those convicted of a sex offense have some of the lowest recidivism rates compared to individuals convicted of a non-sex offense” adding “This is also true for individuals convicted of sex offenses against children.” The document did not cite the pertinent data.

This is likely because the pertinent data has not yet been fabricated. But it will be, just as it has been in support of other liberal causes like the fictional climate emergency and the transsexualization of children.

Brad Meryhew is the chair of the committee and a defense attorney who represents people who have been charged with sex crimes.

Under Democrat rule, criminals and their representatives are in charge.

On a tip from R F.

In America, we are all equal before the law. This is one reason progressives reject America. They would prefer a system where the law applies differently depending on identity group. The kooks running Washington State inflict progress in this regard:

If a party to a civil lawsuit accuses his opponent’s lawyers of any sort of racial stereotyping, judges must order a retrial. That appears to be the implication of an October ruling from the Washington State Supreme Court.

Adherents to the cult of Critical Race Theory have laid a weighty thumb on the scales of justice.

The background indicates that this is as crazy as it sounds:

The ruling came after a black woman, Janelle Henderson, demanded $3.5 million in damages from a white defendant, Alicia Thompson, who had rear-ended her. At the trial, which took place in 2019, Thompson’s lawyers described Henderson as “combative,” suggested she had coached her witnesses, and accused her of exaggerating her injuries for financial gain.

When the jury only awarded Henderson $9,200—not the millions she’d sued for—she filed a motion for a new trial, claiming that the defense’s “biased statements” had “influenced the jury’s unconscious bias.”

The Washington Supreme Court agreed. By calling Henderson “combative,” [state justice Raquel] Montoya-Lewis wrote, the defense evoked “the harmful stereotype of an ‘angry Black woman.’” And by suggesting that she had coached her witnesses, it “alluded to racist stereotypes about Black women as untrustworthy and motivated by the desire to acquire an unearned financial windfall.”

Evidently this means that because she is “oppressed,” Henderson can keep suing until a jury awards her the $3.5 million — if she is still willing to settle for such a paltry sum.

As for how race-based justice works if you have the wrong skin color, ask Derek Chauvin.

Attorneys observe that the ruling…

…could make it next to impossible to defend against civil suits from minority plaintiffs, let alone conduct a normal trial. By definition, trial lawyers must question the opposing party’s credibility, often by implying negative things about them; if any such implication can be recast as a racial trope, litigants will have unlimited ammunition to challenge outcomes they don’t like.

Anything whatsoever can be recast as a racial trope. This is the basis of the racial grievance industry, which has made grifters like Al Sharpton and Ibram X. Kendi rich.

[T]he new standard could encourage defendants to settle based on the race of the plaintiff. Attorneys’ fees are expensive, even for frivolous lawsuits, said Mark Lamb, a civil litigator in Seattle. “If you have to bear the expense of another trial,” Lamb said, “it effectively works as a financial penalty on the party that initially prevailed.”

Facts are irrelevant. If you belong to a preferred racial group, you win. If you are white, you lose. Liberals call this “social justice.”

On a tip from Dennis G.

Corporate America panders obsequiously to the leftist crocodile, each company hoping that by appeasement it will get eaten last. This contemptible strategy has failed once again. Starbucks is as cloyingly self-righteous about its moonbat politics as any corporation, even allowing itself to be bullied into turning its restrooms in public toilets/drug dens. Stores have predictably become too dangerous to operate. Sixteen will close; more will no doubt follow.

CEO Howard Schultz blames politicians. As a Democrat donor, he is in no position to cast stones:

“I must say, in my view at the local, state and federal level, these governments across the country and leaders, mayors and governors, city councils have abdicated their responsibility in fighting crime and addressing mental health,” Schultz said in a video posted on Twitter.

The problem is specific to Democrat-governed localities. The store closures are in Seattle, Los Angeles, Portland, Philadelphia, and Washington.

All four states and the District are run by Democrats — Jay Inslee in Washington, Gavin Newsom in California, Kate Brown in Oregon, Tom Wolf in Pennsylvania, and Muriel Bowser in D.C.

Starbucks has made corporate policy of promoting Black Lives Matter moonbattery, and consequently does not deserve to partake of the blessings of law & order — that is, of civilization.

Schultz calls Starbucks “a window into America.” From across the ocean, people look through that window at America disintegrating under moonbat domination and recoil in horror:

On tips from Blackjack and KirklesWorth.

Although Biden has made it clear that he wants Covid to go on indefinitely, even many Democrats admit that it can’t, fun though it has been for authoritarians to milk. However, for some of the people running public schools, masked children are the new normal:

Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee (D) announced last week that the state’s indoor mask mandate, including for schools, would be lifted beginning March 12. And King County updated its guidance shortly after the governor’s announcement to say that indoor masking for schools and several other establishments would not be required starting March 12.

If even King County, home of moonbattery-addled Seattle, admits that Covid is over, liberals need to find a new crisis not to let go to waste. But leftist educrats and teacher’s unions are too used to getting their way to let go.

Seattle Public Schools said in a statement last week that it would maintain its school mask mandate “until further notice.”

According to the district’s statement, it must negotiate with the [Seattle Education Association], “as required by the current collective bargaining agreement, to arrive at a mutually agreeable position regarding any permanent change to mask use requirements throughout the district.”

These negotiations are unlikely to go well for children. According to the local teacher’s union, “masks contribute to feelings of safety and normalcy that schools provide our students.”

Imagine a society where it is normal for children to have their individuality canceled by not being allowed to show their faces in public. That is the society kids are now growing up in.

Even if Covid hadn’t petered out into the mild Omicron variant, there is no evidence that forcing children to wear masks benefits their health, since the ChiCom virus was never a serious threat to them. On the contrary, the masks are vectors for pathogens, including pneumonia, tuberculosis, meningitis, keratitis, food poisoning, Lyme disease, Legionnaire’s disease, and sepsis. Making kids wear them all day results in hypoxia and an increased level of carbon dioxide in the blood. It may cause developmental delays, especially regarding speech. Kids with glasses can’t see through the fog. Masking kids is child abuse.

But as United Federation of Teachers/American Federation of Teachers president Al Shanker famously said, “When school children start paying union dues, that’s when I’ll start representing the interests of school children.” To the leftists who run schools, the conformity and compliance that masks represent are more important than kids’ well-being and healthy development.

On a tip from Varla.

The states of Washington and Oregon were part of America once. Then California established colonies in Seattle and Portland. The results are personified by crazed leftist governors Jay Inslee and Kate Brown.

Flaky liberalism has made California so unlivable that now we see this:

Maybe this time they aren’t colonists. Maybe the majority of former Californians have learned the hard way that moonbattery is not an option, and they will help defend what is left of our country against it.

Otherwise, Fauci’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases should study this graphic to learn how a deadly pandemic spreads.

On a tip from Occam’s Stubble.

Washington State — or more specifically, Seattle — provides two dots that shouldn’t be hard to connect.

Dot 1:

Senate Democrats in Washington state have once again passed a bill that creates a pathway to early release for a variety of incarcerated people serving long sentences or even life without parole, including those sentenced for aggravated murder and murder in the first degree.

King County (i.e., Seattle) Prosecuting Attorney Manka Dhingra sponsored the bill. According to Republican State Senator Judy Warnick, 196 murderers may be released in the next 5 years.

The bill passed along party lines 28-19-2.

The bill now moves to the House…

Democrats outnumber Republicans in the House 57 to 41. Leftist Governor Jay Inslee can look forward to signing the bill into law.

Dot 2:

The Seattle Police Department released its annual crime report for 2021 on Friday, detailing across-the-board increases in rates of crimes across all major categories.

According to the report, overall crime increased by 10% from 2020 to 2021; violent crime increased by 20%, while property crime went up 9%.

Thank the Black Lives Matter/Antifa riots and the liberal War on Police.

SPD highlighted Seattle’s violent crime rate as a primary concern, after reaching “a 14-year high in 2021.” That was driven by marked increases in aggravated assaults (up 24% year-over-year) and robberies (up 18%).

Consistent with recent county-level reporting, shootings and “shots-fired events” increased in Seattle over the last year as well, rising by 40% year-over-year, and by 86% from 2019.

Democrats zero in on the gun violence so as to exploit it as a pretext to disarm law-abiding citizens, rendering them still more vulnerable to the criminals Democrats enable.

It isn’t just a matter of letting dangerous criminals roam free instead of keeping them locked up. A signal has been sent loudly and repeatedly that ruling Democrats are on the side of criminals, so it’s party time.

On tips from DCGere.

Skeptics of defunding the police might ask, “What are you going to do when a gang of thugs breaks into your house? Call Black Lives Matter?” To which the moonbats running Seattle might respond, “Sure, why not?”

During the BLM/Antifa riots of 2020, the East Precinct was abandoned to the mob, which declared an “autonomous zone” without rule of law for weeks on end. This was allowed to happen because local Democrats sided with the criminals. Now we learn that they considered officially turning over the East Precinct to Black Lives Matter.

From the Seattle Times:

At the height of Seattle’s racial justice protests in 2020, then-Mayor Jenny Durkan’s administration drafted legislation to transfer the Police Department’s East Precinct building to a Black Lives Matter activist organization and researched relocating the station’s operations, newly released documents show. …

The draft resolution for transferring the property to Black Lives Matter Seattle-King County (BLMSKC) included a July 1 effective date, and Durkan’s office subsequently discussed the possibility with the nonprofit, which at one point pushed to remake the building as a hub for public health and community care.

As it turns out, July 1 was the day the police reclaimed the East Precinct, after abandoning it on June 8.

The building is worth $millions, but apparently BLM had not yet acquired its extravagant taste for acquiring property.

In a recent deposition, former Deputy Mayor Casey Sixkiller said the Durkan administration nixed the East Precinct transfer possibility after the activists decided they didn’t want the property.

Where was the federal government while mobs of thugs were taking over police stations? Keeping out, at the request of local Democrat authorities. As the BBC reported in June 2020:

State authorities in the north-western US state of Washington have hit back after President Donald Trump threatened to “take back” a police-free district controlled by protesters in Seattle.

Governor Jay Inslee said Mr Trump should stay out of the state’s business, and Seattle’s mayor said any invasion of the city would be illegal.

Democrat policy has predictably resulted in an explosion of violent crime. Democrats control the White House now. Biden’s press secretary sneers at us for believing that crime is a problem.

On tips from Occam’s Stubble.

They have them in Australia and Canada. Why shouldn’t we have them in the USA? Authoritarians are planning concentration camps for those they want held in isolation in the name of Covid.

From the moonbat-ruled state of Washington comes a bill called WAC 246-100-040. It starts out like this:

At his or her sole discretion, a local health officer may issue an emergency detention order causing a person or group of persons to be immediately detained for purposes of isolation or quarantine in accordance with subsection (3) of this section, or may petition the superior court ex parte for an order to take the person or group of persons into involuntary detention for purposes of isolation or quarantine …

Now that any extreme of tyranny can be justified to the media’s satisfaction in the name of public health, health officers are the new Gestapo:

A local health officer may invoke the powers of police officers, sheriffs, constables, and all other officers and employees of any political subdivisions within the jurisdiction of the health department to enforce immediately orders given to effectuate the purposes of this section …

Reportedly, internment camps have already been constructed in the Evergreen State. Video apparently of a Covid quarantine site under construction in Washington was posted here previously. The administration of leftist Governor Jay Inslee — who ran for president on a platform consisting almost entirely of global warming hysteria — has been recruiting what it has called “strike teams” to run the camps.

Maybe Democrats won’t need global warming after all. Even as it peters out into the mild Omicron variant, Covid may serve as pretext enough to impose Total Government.

As noted earlier, the People’s Republic of New York has already produced legislation allowing for the internment of undesirables in the name of public health. Naziesque Assembly Bill A416 has passed the Assembly and the Senate and only needs the signature of Governor Kathy Hochul to become law. Hochul is a tyrant who has squeezed every drop of power she can get out of Covid (see here, here, here, and here). She can be expected to sign the alarming bill.

The CDC has already taken steps to impose Covid quarantine camps at the federal level.

It becomes increasingly obvious that the exploitation of Covid by authoritarians is more dangerous than Covid itself. With Democrats controlling nearly every lever of power, there is no guarantee that even the most fundamental liberties will survive.

On tips from Chris Neilson and 100Bravo.

Our only hope is that Biden and the moonbats he surrounds himself with will be too incompetent to accomplish their goal of turning America into Venezuela. The appointment of Suzan LeVine is encouraging in this respect.

Although she is supposed to start today, it has been unclear what her actual title is. She will reportedly help states to manage jobless benefits. Fraud has been a major problem in that area.

LeVine has a qualification other than not being a white male. She used to be the Commissioner for the Washington State Employment Security Department.

Via RedState:

As head of the ESD, her job was ostensibly to protect her state from fraud involving things like benefit payments. Instead, she lost $600 million to Nigerian scam artists. …

After that was revealed, Levine attempted to cover her own backside by refusing an audit to figure out what the heck happened. Her agency has been embattled and under investigation ever since. She also oversaw long delays during the pandemic in getting people benefits.

Yes, the Nigerian thing really happened. But here is her actual qualification to serve under the guy who personifies corrupt Big Government:

Levine and her husband gave $400,000 toward Biden’s election effort during the 2020 cycle.

Failing upward is easy in the Swamp, so long as you are a moonbat and you grease the right palms.

On a tip from R F.

Moonbats overflow with condescending reverence for the allegedly oppressed, but when it comes to respect, they have none for anyone. They don’t even respect the dead:

Washington State University helped to launch a startup that will turn human remains into compost for a fee of $5,500.

Recompose, which seeks to replace traditional funeral care with “natural organic reduction,” will open for business in November 2020. CEO Katrina Spade launched the concept in 2014, which has since raised $6.7 million in investment capital and convinced the state of Washington to become the first to legalize human composting.

From the leftist point of view, a human corpse is no different from horse manure.

Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee signed the bill into law.

That figures. Inslee has one position on everything: enviromoonbattery cranked to the furthest extreme. He actually ran for president on this platform. Still more amazingly, the nomination went instead to someone arguably even less suitable than Inslee.

The organization promises investors that their money will go toward helping to “reimagine our relationship with death,” “create a framework for ritual,” and “create healthy soils,” as well as to reduce toxins in the environment and greenhouse gases.

The History page at the Recompose website confirms that yes, these people are moonbats:

From its germination, Recompose has been a progressive company. We draw upon the work of queer feminist practices of inclusion and equity and are committed to advocating and protecting for the rights of BIPOC, religious minorities, and undocumented people.

Their “framework for ritual” must produce some truly exotic alternatives to a Christian funeral service.

Again and again, throughout the world, leftist ideology has led to massive quantities of dead bodies. When the corpses pile up as the Great Reset is imposed, progressives will know just what to do with them.

On a tip from Steve T.