BREAKING: David @friedberg says "California is functionally bankrupt" "People don't realize how screwed California is, & I worry that if California falls, so does the union. "$250 billion to $1 trillion short." "This is because for California to get rescued would be a big cost to red states, & I think it creates in the years ahead a lot of tension." "California's functional bankruptcy is a major risk to the country. & I think we need to figure out what we can change to fix it." How we got here: "California has a public pension system, & that public pension system retirees have paid into it & they get some benefits out, & the amount that they're owed back out is somewhere between $250 billion - $1 trillion dollars more than has been paid in. $250 billion to $1 trillion short. If it was the federal government, it would be like, okay, we'll just print more money. California doesn't have the ability to print money, so California has to pay this out, and you can't restructure retirement benefits. There is a Supreme Court case in California that said that once an employee has been offered retirement benefits, even if they're currently an employee, you can never restructure their retirement benefits. It has to stay forever, and the state cannot declare bankruptcy. There's no way for the state to functionally declare bankruptcy. There's no law to allow it. No state has ever declared bankruptcy, and the retirement benefits sit senior to the bonds in California. So you have to pay out the retirement benefits before you pay out all the bond holders that have loaned California the money that they use to run all their programs and services." Hill & Valley Forum 2026 (@HillValleyForum)

People cannot understand Trump, MAGA, Biden, the FBI, the DOJ, recent USA history, the news media and the source of their currently held beliefs unless they have read this book by Hanson.

😎 Meet Hector 😎 Hector has been in our country illegally for many years. He doesn't have papers, but he sure knows how to work the system. He's been collecting welfare assistance, getting benefits you're paying for, while also working under the table for cash. No taxes. All profit. Do you like Hector's pretty blue truck? 😎 You should. You helped pay for it. Every tax dollar you work overtime for? Yeah, part of it went to Hector's truck payment. Part of it went to his rent. Part of it went to his groceries. Must be nice, huh? Don't worry though... Bye-bye Hector. 👋

Since the current income tax is calculated inclusively, the FAIRtax calculated the same way (apples to apples) is 23%.

YASSSSSSSSS!

The IRS sent armed agents into a family bakery and drained $68,382 from its bank account. Their “crime”? Depositing their OWN CASH in amounts under $10,000. Then the government demanded ANOTHER $160,000 and a guilty plea to a FELONY. The IRS called it “structuring”: deliberately keeping deposits small to dodge bank reporting rules. DAVID VOCATURA: “I said to them, ‘Maybe I should get a lawyer.’ And they said, ‘You don’t need one, step in the back.’” “Until the day they came in, I had no idea what structuring was.” “I’m a law-abiding citizen. I can’t remember the last time I got a speeding ticket.” Nearly three years after seizing the money, a prosecutor came back with a deal that carried up to FOUR YEARS IN PRISON: DAVID VOCATURA: “They wanted us to pay another additional $160,000 in fines and plead to a felony charge of structuring.” They refused. You bake bread for three generations. You pay your taxes. You put your own money in the bank. And the IRS treats you like a criminal, demanding nearly a quarter million dollars. CONTEXT: Fortunately, the IRS didn’t get away with this one. Hours after the Institute for Justice sued, the IRS agreed to return all $68,382.22. Two weeks later, it withdrew a grand jury subpoena demanding eight years of the bakery’s business records. Crazy that they tried to ruin a business over depositing money into their own bank account.