After years of overtaxing the rich, Connecticut tax receipts decrease and Connecticut’s richest citizens flee to other states

Connecticut income-tax collections declined last year for the first time since the recession due to lower earnings of wealthy residents. Many of Connecticut’s millionaires have fled for lower-tax states.

In the past five years 27,400 Connecticut residents have moved to no-income-tax Florida.

According to the Wall Street Journal, one of Connecticut’s largest companies, Aetna Insurance, is preparing to leave the state. Aetna CEO Mark Bertolini says that Connecticut Governor Malloy “has spent two terms treating business as a bottomless well of cash to redistribute to public unions.” See here.

Socialist Venezuela is a paradise for government: officials live like kings among the starving

Wherever socialism takes hold, society spirals downward into poverty, dependence, sickness and weakness while elitists in government prosper.

In modern Venezuela, the people dive through trash for food, eat pigeons, cats and dogs for food, and die in knife fights on the streets over dollar bills.

Meanwhile the elitists and government officials in the socialist state travel in private jets and shop in luxurious jewelry stores in Europe and Asia. See here.

The billionaire daughter of Hugo Chavez is reportedly the wealthiest person in Venezuela (although she spends most of her time outside the country). Meanwhile thousands starve on the streets and go without lifesaving medicines.

Police now pulling over vehicles for “firewood checks”

The police state expands.

Police in a number of jurisdictions are reportedly pulling over vehicles for “firewood checks.”

The stated reason is to prevent cars from transporting firewood containing improper weeds, seeds, insects or invasive species. See here.

Almost half of Americans die broke in response to government policies

Years of government policies which punish saving, investing and working have taken their toll.

USA Today reports that 69% of adults have less than $1,000 in the bank, and 34% said they actually don’t have any savings at all.

And a study by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that almost half of Americans die nearly broke. That number climbs to 57% among retirees who are single.

Only 37% of seniors 65 and older claimed to have $1,000 or more in the bank. See here.

Portland mayor calls for cancellation of free-speech rally

Too dangerous and controversial, the mayor says. See here.

Government school monopoly slowly losing out to charter schools and home schoolers

Steven Greenhut of Reason Magazine is out with an interesting article about the gradual increase of homeschooling and other market responses to government school monopolies. See here.

Greenhut writes that “Supporters of charter schools, homeschooling and other forms of school choice are so used to fighting in the trenches against the state’s muscular teachers unions that they often forget how much progress they’ve made in the last decade or so. Recent events have shown the degree of progress.”

Greenhut describes a recent school district election where trusters of government schooling spent massive amounts to campaign to retain government control of “education.” (Charter school advocates also spent massively.)

The result: advocates of government schooling lost. And trends indicate the future looks bright for education freedom.

Obamacare’s devastation continues

Obamacare has:

(1) Increased, rather than decreased death rates.

(2) Caused numerous health insurers to got out of business or abandon markets. Aetna has pulled out of the Exchanges. Blue Cross in Maryland, Virginia and D.C. has already requested a 52%, 35% and 29% increase for 2018 respectively. Aetna has already lost $500 million since 2014.

(3) Crushed the competitive marketplace for insurance and driven up its costs and out-of-pocket expenses.

See here.

Fresno State Professor tells students there is no freedom of speech on a college campus

America’s government colleges and universities promote a steady stream of government worship and control.

The very second that a person walks onto a government college campus, he becomes less free.

Here is a video of a professor at Fresno State university telling student protesters that there is no freedom of speech on a college campus.

The “professor” had apparently previously told his own students to destroy, remove or vandalize the protesters’ sidewalk chalk markings, as the video shows some students wiping out such markings and saying their “teacher,” “Thatcher,” told them to do so.

Almost everything said by ‘mainstream’ news about melting in the Arctic is fake

For a decade, government trusters have promoted a theme of apocalyptic hysteria about manmade global warming.

This hysteria is aimed at convincing people to give governments even more power and control over them.

But almost everything reported about warming or melting in the Arctic is fake. Here is an informative video from realclimatescience.com.

Impoverished Venezuelans who protest their government are now subjected to secret midnight military trials

Every government ultimately comes for all money, all property, all freedom, and to kill all who resist.

Just 20 years ago, Venezuelans were the wealthiest people in Latin American. They had a thriving business and investment sector. Then the people voted for socialism.

Now, after dozens of Venezuelans have died in the streets while protesting their starvation and poverty, the Venezuelan government is increasingly “trying” accused “rebels” and “traitors” in secret military tribunals.

The “trials” take place in secret, often in the middle of the night. The government rarely publishes information about numbers or names of defendants, or outcomes of cases. See here.