Exclusive Excerpt—Charles Hurt: ‘Still Winning: Why America Went All In on Donald Trump—And Why We Must Do It Again’

When Trump jumped into the presidential race in 2015, he was a well-known figure. He had been in the hot glare of the New York tabloid media for decades. Everything from the unveiling of golden buildings that bore his name to raunchy details about his various divorces made headlines. His business accomplishments in the real estate world and his success as a reality television star put him on par with a tiny handful of stars known around the world by one name.

But when Trump descended the escalator in Trump Tower that day, he had made political headlines more recently for something entirely different.

Four years earlier, Trump shocked the political world by launching a campaign questioning whether President Barack Obama was born in the United States. For the entire political-media establishment inside Washington, D.C., this merely proved that Donald Trump was some kind of crazy conspiracy loon. For these establishment people, it also proved Trump was a racist. […] But outside Washington, Trump simply proved he was willing to talk about things and ask questions about things that the entire political establishment had deemed unmentionable—even racist.

Having already demonstrated his unflinching willingness to go crashing wildly into the choppy waters of political incorrectness, Donald Trump was ready to announce his campaign for the presidency. From the first words, it was clear this would be a different kind of candidate running a different kind of campaign.

“Wow. Whoa,” he said, admiring the crowd cheering him from all sides and the balcony above. “That is some group of people. Thousands,” he said.

That line still gets me. Literally, within the first ten words of Trump’s campaign—even before he actually announced his intentions—Trump was focused on crowd size. Much more on that later. But suffice it to say that in the years since Trump uttered those words, he has talked a great deal about crowd sizes, and it has driven his enemies absolutely out of their minds. Which, in turn, brings wild, lusty cheers from audiences who pack monster truck arenas to see their president perform.

After admiring the assembled crowd, he thanked them. He called it “an honor” to have them in “Trump Tower.”

Never. Stop. Selling.

I think it was along about that moment in his speech that I said to myself, This guy could be our next president.

His message was simple. Clear. Pro-American. He was selling something. He was telling a story. After seven years of bitter disappointment and the wasted opportunities of Barack Obama’s nerdy, professorial, lecture-some presidency, this guy could be just what America needs, I thought.

Quickly, Trump got back to the size of his crowd.

“This is beyond anybody’s expectations,” he beamed. “There’s been no crowd like this.”

Then he attacked. Ferociously.

Some of the Republicans who had already announced for president botched their kickoffs. The air conditioner didn’t work, or something. “They sweated like dogs,” Trump sneered.

Worse, their crowds were too small for the rooms they hired.

And then the kill shot: “How are they going to beat ISIS?” he asked.

“I don’t think it’s gonna happen. Our country is in serious trouble.”

It’s a fair point. If you cannot pull off a simple announcement speech on television, then how on earth can you possibly be expected to destroy the most diabolical and determined jihad of our time?

There is a larger point here as well. It has to do with language.

In the very first moments of his announcement speech, Donald Trump was declaring a pact with American voters. Earlier, he had proved his willingness to go wildly off script from establishment officialdom when he brazenly questioned Obama’s birth certificate.

Now he was promising to use the same scalding rhetoric and blunt honesty to expose and fix a whole host of grievous maladies facing regular Americans across the country.

Maladies that had crept into American society over the decades under the blind—or, often, encouraging—eye of political leaders in both parties.

Terrorism, globalism, “free” trade, illegal immigration, legal immigration. Trump was willing to be as belligerent as he needed to be in order to finally stand up to ISIS, China, Japan, Mexico, and the entire global world order.

Trump shrewdly understood in that moment that if political candidates were incapable of speaking bluntly about thorny issues, or if they shied away from harshly identifying America’s enemies, then there would be no hope for anything ever getting better.

Standing there in my office, watching this amazing spectacle unfold, it was that different way of talking that most gripped my attention. A wildly fresh vocabulary with sharp notes of brazenly impolitic honesty.

“The U.S. has become a dumping ground for everybody else’s problem,” Trump said, just a few lines into the speech.

My goodness, I thought. Nobody in Washington talks like this. But it sounds like exactly what you hear just about anywhere if you leave Washington, D.C., or New York City.

“When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you,” he said, karate chopping the air.

“They’re sending people that have lots of problems and they’re bringing those problems to us. They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime, they’re rapists, and some, I assume, are good people.”

On its face, this statement is technically true. Illegals from Mexico (and other places south of the border) come into the United States. They smuggle drugs into the country. They certainly commit crimes (including illegally crossing our border). And some of them are indeed rapists.

Trump was highlighting a real, destructive and expensive problem that a lot of American voters care deeply about. Yet almost nobody in Washington cares about fixing it.

Democrats are desperate to change the voting electorate. So, they want every warm body they can get into the country to hustle to the voting booth. Republicans, being more business friendly, are delighted to turn a blind eye on a process that floods our country with cheap labor.

The only group without a voice in this debate were millions of regular American voters. Until Trump announced his campaign.

Donald Trump’s furious assault on the political establishment brought condemnations from every corner of it. Sure, those people were perfectly content letting political sleeping dogs lie. China ripping off America was no big deal for them. Free trade was going gangbusters for the stock market and Wall Street. Everybody who was anybody was making a killing off illegal immigration. Cheap nannies for all!

But the seething rebukes of Trump and his announcement speech were about so much more than just those issues. They were about Trump’s language, his rough-and-tumble demeanor, and his willingness to court such political upheaval.

In her memoir, former first lady Michelle Obama eviscerated the man who followed her husband into the White House for just this. Trump’s questioning of Obama’s birth certificate, she wrote, “was crazy and mean-spirited, of course, its underlying bigotry and xenophobia hardly concealed.”

Again, any hint of questioning Obama’s American loyalty was deemed racist. Such a questioner was not just called out as dishonest or stupid or uninformed. They were flat-out racist for questioning Obama’s alliances.

That was not all Michele Obama had to say about Trump and his style of politics. Trump’s birth certificate inquiry “was also dangerous, deliberately meant to stir up the wingnuts and kooks,” she wrote. “What if someone with an unstable mind loaded a gun and drove to Washington? What if that person went looking for our girls? Donald Trump, with his loud and reckless innuendos, was putting my family’s safety at risk. And for this I’d never forgive him.”

Wow. Perhaps Michelle Obama spoke too soon when she said that she was finally proud of her country once her husband got elected.

But I have to ask: What is more incendiary? Asking questions about where a political opponent was born? Or accusing a political opponent of deliberately and willfully trying to inspire “wingnuts and kooks” to assassinate the daughters of a president?

While we’re at it, what about a president who wades into local police issues around the country and his only contribution is to inject race into them? What about a president who goes around the world apologizing for America and giving long lectures about how America is exceptional, you know, like every other country on the planet is exceptional in its own way. In other words, nothing exceptional whatsoever about America. What about a president who belittles Americans for their “guns” and their “religion”?

After eight years of insufferable academia out of the White House, it should have been little surprise that American voters would be in the mood for something very different. They would be looking for a guy who speaks bluntly and paints vivid pictures. A guy who spent years savoring his time talking to the workers and tradesmen who built his buildings, and learned to talk like them. Above all, he was listening and listening and taking to heart what he was hearing.

Every now and then, some reporter churns a Trump speech through some word program on the Internet that calculates the grade level the speech was written at. As in sixth-grade level, meaning a sixth grader could understand it. And these simpering, obnoxious, arrogant asses somehow think that speaking so plainly is an insult, when Trump—along with American voters—knows it is actually the highest, most honest achievement there is.

Independent Authenticity Voter

Strangely, this was a counterintuitive gambit for some of the very same voters who wound up stunning the political establishment by voting for Trump—after having voted for Barack Obama. Twice! I call them the independent authenticity voters. They don’t much care about parties and don’t particularly like Washington politics. But every four years they generally turn out and vote. And when the noise of the campaign gets as loud as it does every four years, they are reminded of how much they despise politics and most politicians. But they mostly turn out and vote.

Overwhelmingly, they choose the lesser bastard. The least dishonest one. The one they think comes closest to being genuine and authentic. In 2008, that was obviously Barack Obama. His hopeful campaign about neither red America nor blue America but one red, white, and blue America resonated with these voters. Funnily enough, the late senator John McCain would have appealed to these very voters eight years earlier when he was still a true political “maverick” and before he got co-opted by Democrats and the media (I repeat myself) to kneecap Republicans at every turn. As bad as things were in 2012, President Obama still had enough authenticity left in the tank to beat the hopelessly repackaged Mitt Romney.

These voters yearned for someone authentic to be president. Most horrifying to mainstream political observers is the number of voters who voted for President Barack Obama—twice!—because they thought he was that authentic nonpolitician. Oh, how they were betrayed!

The accepted language of politics is defended by those who practice it as merely polite and responsible. And this is often true. I know many decent politicians and staffers and journalists who embrace polite language. And they are disgusted by anything else in the political arena.

If the 2016 election proved anything, it proved that Donald Trump was exactly right. There was, after all, a tremendous thirst out there for something different. Something new. Above all, something authentic.

So, from the very first lines of his announcement speech that day at the foot of his glass escalator, Mr. Trump proved to be impolitic. Unpolished. Dripping with authenticity. That guy you know who talks rough, who doesn’t own a set of church clothes but would be the first person you would call if you found yourself in a life-threatening situation and needed some really dirty work handled.

Trump knew at that moment that he had to break through all the soft, white noise of modern American politics. All the fake niceties of acceptable political speech. After all, it was a lie and had been for a very long time. Behind all those fake niceties were the raw, brutal realities of vicious politics played by the nastiest of operatives going back decades. They peddled in the most dishonest, soul-crushing, character-destroying sewage that you could imagine—but then wore nice seersucker suits at garden parties, talking all sorts of high-minded pleasantries.

Yuck!

Donald Trump saw all of this for exactly what it was. It was a fraud. Whether it was trade, immigration, wars, spending, or taxes—it was all a fraud. The American people were getting taken to the cleaner’s financially, and the American people were getting sold out as losers.

And Trump wasn’t even president yet! He was still just one of sixteen people vying for the Republican nomination. If you polled the media that day, every single reporter in all of politics would have given Trump a zero percent chance of winning the nomination, let alone the presidency.

After the speech was over, I called my office at the Washington Times and told my editor to scrap the column I had filed—that a new one was on the way. I endorsed Donald Trump, something I had never done before in a newspaper column. Because, after all, who gives a crap what I think about anything? But this was clearly something different. The speech was brilliant. It was daring, to be sure, but it also reflected an enormous amount of intentional thought. Trump had been listening very closely to voters. He had also been talking to some very smart people who clearly follow politics closely and understood the political landscape far better than any of the self-anointed geniuses inside the Beltway.

So I picked up the phone and called Steve Bannon, a friend who I knew liked to dabble in the more contrarian world of counterpolitics. We agreed the speech was great and, of course, Bannon told me he had been talking to Trump. A speech had been written. Bannon had seen it as late as the night before, he said. But the speech Trump delivered on live television to the country was entirely different than the one that had been prepared.

“Yeah, he didn’t read the speech,” Bannon marveled. “He got up there and just decided to wing it!”

Even at that point, Trump was not to be handled or scripted or managed or staffed. He was going on nothing but his own raw political instincts. And in the end, voters trusted Donald J. Trump to remain in character more than they trusted any politician to keep his campaign promises.

That turned out to be a pretty smart bet.

SOURCE
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Dems Vote To Enhance Med Care for Illegals Now, Vote Down Vets Waiting 10 Years for Same Service

House Democrats voted Thursday to fast-track an electronic medical records system that would serve illegal immigrants, something America’s veterans have been seeking for years.

The House passed the bill on a largely party line vote of 230-184, American Military News reported. Only two Republican congressmen supported the bill — Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania and Fred Upton of Michigan.

The proposal has yet to be considered by the Republican-controlled Senate.

The Democratic proposal would require the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Customs and Border Patrol to create an Electronic Health Records system.

Part of that system’s job will be to provide information to Congress on the health of migrants who enter the country illegally, according to The Hill.

The bill gives the DHS 90 days after the bill receives final approval to get the job done. In contrast, the Veterans Administration has been working for years to implement an EHR system for veterans.

Democratic Rep. Lauren Underwood of Illinois said it is important for Congress to ensure that workers at the border are doing their jobs.

“As DHS works to improve its medical screening of children and migrants at the border to ensure there is a minimum standard of care, the need for proper record keeping on those screenings will only increase,” she said.

Underwood said that the bill was based on her experiences touring America’s southern Border.

“When I was at the border I saw busy, overworked Border Patrol officials having to keep health records on paper. I also saw how these records don’t follow migrants between facilities and transfers of custody,” she said.

But critics wondered how adding more responsibilities to overworked Border Patrol officials would fix anything

“I oppose this bill because it is poorly conceived, erroneously drafted and extremely risky,” Republican Rep. Jim Banks of Indiana said.

SOURCE 

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For more blog postings from me, see  TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH,  POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, and Paralipomena (Occasionally updated), A Coral reef compendium and an IQ compendium. (Both updated as news items come in).  GUN WATCH is now mainly put together by Dean Weingarten. I also put up occasional updates on my Personal blog and each day I gather together my most substantial current writings on THE PSYCHOLOGIST.

Email me  here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here (Academic) or  here  (Personal).  My annual picture page is here 

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'You are handing him the win!' Eric Trump says his father's reelection campaign has raised $15MILLION in the 72 hours since Nancy Pelosi announced impeachment inquiry

Eric Trump has said that his father, President Donald Trump, has raised $15 million for his reelection campaign since House Democrats announced an impeachment probe.

'We have now raised almost $15 million in small dollar donations (including 50,000 NEW donors) since @SpeakerPelosi started this impeachment charade 72 hrs ago!' Eric Trump wrote in a tweet on Friday.

'Unbelievable numbers!! Keep it going — you and the dems are handing @realDonaldTrump the win in 2020!'

Speaker Nancy Pelosi had long resisted calls for impeachment from within her party, fearing backlash in the 2020 election — but the dam broke suddenly this week after allegations that the president pressured his counterpart in Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden.

After Pelosi announced an impeachment probe on Tuesday, Donald Trump's campaign seized on the opportunity to bolster his reelection effort.  'I need you on my Impeachment Defense Team,' the campaign said in one fundraising text message sent Tuesday.

'Huge groundswell of support leading to Trump landslide in 2020!' Trump's campaign manager Brad Parscale tweeted on Wednesday.

The swell of contributions comes right before next week's third-quarter fundraising reporting deadline and will further pad what is already expected to be a massive haul.

More than a year out from the November 2020 contest, his campaign and the RNC have already reported pulling in more than $210 million since the start of 2019, Federal Election Commission records show.

That's more than all the current Democrats seeking to replace him raised combined during that period.

SOURCE 

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Majority of Americans Favor Trump's Policy Agenda

Democrats attack Trump because their policy goals aren't winning over the American public

Why do Democrat presidential candidates think that their “vote for me because I’m the biggest hater of everything President Donald Trump” is a winning strategy? Why are congressional Democrats redoubling their efforts to impeach Trump even after Robert Mueller’s investigation blew up in their faces? Well, a recent survey conducted by Harvard/Harris may offer the best answer.

The poll of 2,531 registered voters was somewhat unique: It presented not the candidates running for office but only questions regarding policy issues without associating the policies with either political party. For example, a question stated:

Which candidate are you more likely to vote for?


"A presidential candidate who stands for the green new deal on climate change, Medicare for all, free college tuition, opening our borders to many more immigrants and raising taxes to pay for these programs.

Or

A presidential candidate who stands for lower taxes and reduced government regulations, strengthening our military, strengthening our border to reduce illegal immigrants, standing up more to China and Iran and seeking better trade deals for the US."


For almost anyone who regularly follows politics, it’s quite clear that the first presidential candidate most accurately represents the policy proposals of the Democrat Party, while the second candidate’s policy agenda mirrors that of Trump. So, did the poll end up reflect many other national polls that show Trump trailing much of the Democrat field? Not quite.

A whopping 61% of those polled favored Trump’s agenda, which included a third of registered Democrats. And 65% of independents picked Trump’s policy agenda over what Democrats are offering. In fact, as Issues & Insights reports, “The poll went further and broke out specific policy issues. There wasn’t one item on the Democratic agenda that came in the top six. Only 38% say they were likely to vote for a candidate who promised to ‘raise taxes to pay for these programs.’ On the other hand, 83% said they’d likely support a candidate who promised to lower taxes.”

This explains why Democrats are playing up the fallacious “Trump is Adolf Hitler” narrative in the hopes that it will distract enough Americans from seeing their terrible socialist agenda. Moreover, it appears they see no other way to defeat Trump, which explains Rep. Al Green’s (D-TX) recent insistence that “if we don’t impeach this president, he will get reelected.”

SOURCE 

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US blacklists Chinese firms defying oil sanctions

The United States has blacklisted several Chinese companies and officials for allegedly shipping Iranian oil in violation of sanctions.

The sanctions, imposed by the US Treasury Department, against two subsidiaries of Cosco, a Chinese state-owned shipping giant, and four other companies, affect dozens of tankers and will further complicate talks to end the trade war.

American legislation to help protect democratic rights in Hong Kong will also heighten tensions.

Two Congress committees cleared the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act yesterday, paving the way for the bill to be voted on the floor in both chambers. The law would require an annual US review of the territory’s human rights records.

The bill follows more than three months of increasingly violent protests in Hong Kong against interference by Beijing. Joshua Wong, a leading pro-democracy campaigner, travelled to Washington this month to lobby Congress to pass the bill.

On his Facebook page he called its progress the result of “Hong Kong people’s sacrifice of blood and sweat”.

China said that its dealings with Iran were legal and should be respected and also denounced the Hong Kong legislation.

Geng Shuang, a spokesman of the foreign ministry, said: “China expresses strong dissatisfaction and firm opposition to the US sanctions against Chinese companies and individuals. China has always firmly opposed to the unilateral sanction and long-arm jurisdiction by the United States. China objects to the bullying acts in which US uses its domestic law to wilfully crack down on Chinese companies.”

On Hong Kong, he added: “This act confuses black and white in disregard of facts, blatantly backs the Hong Kong violent radicals up and grossly interferes in China’s internal affairs. China expresses strong indignation and firm opposition to that. Any attempt by the US to harm China’s interests will be met with a strong response.”

Carrie Lam, chief executive of Hong Kong, has withdrawn the extradition bill that first prompted the protests, but demonstrators say that they will fight on until all of their demands, including universal suffrage and an independent inquiry into police brutality, are met.

In an effort to defuse tensions, Ms Lam held her first community dialogue today. She encouraged the 150 participants, chosen by lottery from the more than 20,000 people who signed up to the event, to freely express themselves and even vent their anger. Yet she is highly unlikely to make further concessions to the protesters.

Aside from the Cosco subsidiaries, the companies sanctioned are the China Concord Petroleum Co and Kunlun Shipping Company, both registered in Hong Kong, and Kunlun Holding Company, registered in the Virgin Islands.

Mike Pompeo, the US secretary of state, said that the sanctions were intended to restrict the activities of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps and punish those who continue to deal with them. “We are telling China, and all nations: know that we will sanction every violation,” he said.

The US has blamed Iran for attacks on Saudi Arabian oil facilities on September 14, which have rattled the Middle East and raised concerns about a broader war. Iran denies involvement.

Mr Pompeo said: “The more Iran lashes out the greater our pressure will and should be. That path forward begins now with two new actions.”

He said that Washington was also ramping up efforts to educate countries on the risks of doing business with Iran’s Revolutionary Guard entities and that it would punish those who continued to engage with them.

SOURCE 

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Kamala Harris, For Which People?

The junior senator from California has cemented herself as a presidential contender, but her history of changing her positions to secure new offices has created distrust. Harris ran to the right of former District Attorney Terence Hallinan and tacked to the center as attorney general, but now is veering to the left as a presidential candidate.
   
Jamal Trulove was innocent, but he spent nearly seven years in prison.

The father of four was convicted in 2010 of murdering his friend, Seu Kuka, in the Sunnydale housing project in San Francisco. Kuka was shot nine times in his head and back shortly before 11 p.m. on July 23, 2007, and, despite a crowd around the body when police arrived, only one person claimed to have seen the shooting, a neighbor who did not identify Trulove as the shooter.

The appeals court ruling that overturned Trulove's conviction found that the prosecutor had committed misconduct when she argued that the witness had risked her life and the lives of her family to testify. "This yarn was made out of whole cloth," Justice P.J. Kline wrote.

Since Trulove's release in 2015, he has resumed his acting career with a role in the 2019 film The Last Black Man in San Francisco. He also has won a $13.1 million settlement from the city of San Francisco and become a vocal critic of the chief district attorney whose office brought the flimsy case against him to trial. Just after he was convicted of a murder he didn't commit, that district attorney was elected attorney general of California. Then in 2016, she won election to the U.S. Senate.

Now, Kamala Harris is running for president of the United States, one of 19 Democrats still standing in the race to replace Donald Trump.

"Kamala Harris talks about how she's proud of her work as California AG, but never as head DA of San Francisco, where evidence of my framing by the SFPD was covered up by 'HER' office just to get a conviction," Trulove wrote on Twitter in August.

But in fact, Harris has made her experience as a prosecutor a key component of her presidential campaign. Earlier this month, she released what she called a "comprehensive plan to overhaul the criminal justice system."

Even her slogan — "For the people" — invokes the introduction of every prosecutor in a courtroom.

"I believe we must have the ability to prosecute the case against four more years of Donald Trump, and it will take a prosecutor to do that," Harris told the Democratic National Committee in San Francisco on Aug. 23. "And I'll tell you, we've got a big long rap sheet to work with."

Outside the grand ballroom where Harris gave her speech, a lone protester wandered the halls with a sign that read, "Kamala convicted innocent people in order to advance her career."

Defining Kamala Harris

Through a campaign spokesperson, Harris declined to be interviewed for this story. But she and her supporters say she worked to reform the criminal justice system from the inside as district attorney and attorney general while taking principled stances against the death penalty, targeting complex criminal enterprises, and going after big banks that hurt homeowners during the foreclosure crisis.

"She was one of the earliest leaders to fight human trafficking and invest in reentry," Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf said at Harris' first presidential campaign rally in Oakland in January. "She was one of the earliest leaders on criminal justice reform. Back when it was still popular to be tough on crime, she was smart on crime."

Criminal justice reform advocates, however, have pointed out that in her first race for district attorney, Harris unseated former defense attorney Terence Hallinan, who was actively working on reforms, by criticizing his conviction rate.

She took a stand early as DA by refusing to seek the death penalty for a man accused of killing a police officer. Though highly controversial with the police, it was a politically popular stance in progressive San Francisco. But as attorney general, Harris appealed a court ruling that the state's death penalty was unconstitutional. Though controversial back in the Bay Area, it was a politically popular stance at the statewide level. Advocates for the rights of sex workers note that she opposed a ballot measure to decriminalize prostitution and led the charge to prosecute Backpage, an online listing site that facilitated the sex trade but which sex workers say was paramount to their safety.

As a presidential candidate, Harris rose to double digits in the polls after the first Democratic debate on June 27, at which she confronted former Vice President Joe Biden for his historic opposition to court-mandated school busing. But Harris faltered following the July 31 debate, when she was forcefully challenged on her record as a prosecutor by U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii.

Gabbard claimed that Harris jailed people for minor marijuana offenses and fought to keep exonerating evidence for death row inmates from coming to light. "The people who have suffered under your reign as prosecutor, you owe them an apology," Gabbard said.

Among the states where Harris is struggling to gain traction is California, where she trailed Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, and Biden in a Sep. 12-15 poll from KQED and Change Research. Harris bolstered her campaign in California in August, bringing on seven new staffers. But she remains well behind Biden, Warren and Sanders in national polls.

Joe Tuman, a professor of political communications at San Francisco State University, said most Democratic voters primarily want a nominee who can beat Trump. But polls show that most top-tier Democratic candidates could win in a head-to-head match-up, so Harris needs to find a way to differentiate herself from the moderate Biden and the progressive Warren and Sanders. Tuman believes that Trump fears Harris more than he does Biden, Warren or Sanders, pointing out that the president has yet to brand her with a nickname, such as "Sleepy Joe," "Pocahontas" or "Crazy Bernie."

SOURCE 

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IN BRIEF

SCALIA CONFIRMED: "The Republican-led Senate on Thursday confirmed lawyer Eugene Scalia, a son of the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, as President Donald Trump's new labor secretary. The Senate voted along party lines, 53-44, to approve Scalia's nomination." (Fox News)

MCCARTHY CONFIRMED: "The Senate has confirmed President Trump's choice to be the top civilian leading the Army. In a Thursday afternoon voice vote, the Senate confirmed Ryan McCarthy as Army secretary. McCarthy, who has served as Army under secretary since 2017, will fill the role formerly held by Mark Esper until he became Defense secretary in July." (The Hill)

IRANIANS BANNED: "The Trump administration on Thursday banned all members of the Iranian regime and their family members from entering the United States, a move aimed at stopping regime figures from sending their children to America for schooling and other opportunities. ... Iranian regime figures have long taken advantage of America's educational institutions, with many sending their children to the United States for college. This will immediately end, according to the Trump administration." (The Washington Free Beacon)

SYRIAN CHEMICAL-WEAPONS ATTACK: "Syrian government forces carried out a chlorine attack in May, the first confirmed violation of the international accord banning chemical weapons since President Trump authorized a U.S. military strike on Syria in 2018 over its alleged use of poison gas, a new U.S. intelligence assessment says. The episode took place on May 19 near the village of Kabana as President Bashar al-Assad's forces sought to subdue resistance in Latakia province, a senior U.S. official said." (The Wall Street Journal)

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For more blog postings from me, see  TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH,  POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, and Paralipomena (Occasionally updated), A Coral reef compendium and an IQ compendium. (Both updated as news items come in).  GUN WATCH is now mainly put together by Dean Weingarten. I also put up occasional updates on my Personal blog and each day I gather together my most substantial current writings on THE PSYCHOLOGIST.

Email me  here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here (Academic) or  here  (Personal).  My annual picture page is here 

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A small but interesting slice of history

Impeachment has become very boring.  This may be less so



On September 22nd, 1735, Sir Robert Walpole, Britain's first Prime Minister (although the title was not used until much later), moved into Number Ten Downing Street (although it did not have that number then). Its famous door (through which it was not then entered) has become an iconic symbol of Britain's democratic government. That famous door was not added until 40 years later, and was made of oak until after the 1991 IRA mortar attack on the building, following which it was replaced by bomb-proof material. The black bricks that surround the door, separated from it by the cream-coloured casing, are in fact yellow underneath. They were turned black, as were nearly all London buildings, by the 19th and 20th Century smog of the coal fires that heated every home and the smoke from industrial chimneys. Since everyone was by then used to seeing them black, when they were cleaned in the 1960s they were painted black.

Walpole, with the support of two successive monarchs, became Britain's longest-serving Prime Minister, with a spell of more than 40 years. The kings valued his ability to deliver majorities in Parliament to have bills passed to become Acts of Parliament. George II was sufficiently grateful that when Downing Street reverted to the Crown, he offered it to Sir Robert. With admirable restraint, Sir Robert declined it as a personal gift, but suggested it be reserved for holders of the office of First Lord of the Treasury, then the Prime Minister's official title, and one today's Prime Ministers still hold. A brass plate beside the door of Number Ten testifies to this.

Walpole was a moderate. When Europe was at war, he preferred Britain to be out of it, and persuaded George II to stay out of the War of the Polish Succession. In 1733 he proclaimed, "There are 50,000 men slain in Europe this year, and not one Englishman." Without the costs of war, Walpole contrived to reduce taxes. The Land Tax went down from 4s in 1721, to 3s in 1728, 2s in 1731, and finally to 1s in 1732. He also established a Sinking Fund to reduce the National Debt.

He was trying gradually to shift the tax burden away from the gentry, who paid the land tax, and onto the merchants and their customers who paid customs and excise taxes. In modern terms he was trying very sensibly to shift the tax burden from stock to flow, but doing it gradually. He pointed out that gentry "squealed like hogs" at the tax burden, whereas merchants were more like sheep, giving up their wool peaceably.

He built up the Whig ascendency, but his low-key avoidance of controversy and his granting of more tolerance to religious dissenters won him support from moderates of both Whig and Tory groups. The historian H T Dickinson, one of my teachers, wrote, "Walpole was one of the greatest politicians in British history. He played a significant role in sustaining the Whig party, safeguarding the Hanoverian succession, and defending the principles of the Glorious Revolution." 

The residence at 10 Downing Street that he occupied is not what it seems. Walpole had the architect William Kent connect two houses, making the Downing Street front one effectively a passage through to the main building behind it. A corridor connects it to the Cabinet Office much further up Whitehall, and there is a tunnel under Whitehall that we're not supposed to know about that connects it to the Defence Ministry. What is now the Cabinet Room was used by Walpole as his study.

In many ways Ten Downing Street resembles the British constitution it safeguards. There is much more to it than the outward appearance might suggest, and it adapts and changes over time to meet the new challenges it is called upon to face. Yet it preserves the outward form, providing reassurance of continuity. It is modest, rather than grandiose, reminding us that the Prime Minister is a person like us, who lives in a house, as we do, rather than some god-like remote dignitary. Its understated presence reminds us, too, that government and Parliament in this country are here to serve the people, not the other way round.

When people move house, a removal van pulls up outside their house. That is, quite rightly, what happens in Ten Downing Street when we change governments.

SOURCE 

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Democrats' Excessiveness Will Backfire

How many times do Democrats get to cry wolf before a rational body politic tells them to go fly a kite? Instead of retreating with tails between their legs over their failed Russia hoax, they're already at it again.

Did any Democrats leading the false charge that President Trump colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 election ever apologize for putting the country through this nightmare? Did any of their media water carriers ever backpedal from their anti-Trump sensationalism?

Of course not, because in their minds Trump is so evil and his presidency so bad for the country that even ignoble efforts to remove him are morally warranted. What's wrong with deceit and abuse of process if it will rid the country of the orange scourge?

Alert people should now recognize that Democrats are still willing to go to almost any lengths to undo the 2016 election -- or preempt Trump's 2020 reelection. Their raw contempt for Trump and his supporters knows no bounds, and their just-launched "impeachment inquiry" is further evidence of it.

I note in my soon-to-be-released new book, "Guilty By Reason of Insanity: Why the Democrats Must Not Win," that there is no real fissure in the Democratic Party between the old guard and the young radicals, the latter of whom are led by the "Squad." Sure, there is sometimes spirited debate between the established powers and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's socialist quartet, but in the end, the entire party has embraced a thoroughly extremist leftist agenda.

Even if House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would have us believe that she and her veteran Democratic colleagues are more measured, there is no doubt where her party is headed. Even if in her heart of hearts, she thinks the Young Turks are going too far too fast, which I strongly doubt, the Democratic Party base is not about to allow her to vacillate, much less to moderate.

So it is that Pelosi, despite having long resisted Rep. Jerry Nadler's and other Democratic congressional militants' efforts to initiate impeachment proceedings, has snapped to attention over these new hyped-up allegations concerning Ukraine and opened an impeachment inquiry herself.

Just like the Russia hoax, this one already involves more damning evidence against Democrats than Trump. Democrats, in a monumental act of projection, tried for three years to interfere with an election by falsely claiming Trump interfered with that same election. Now they're alleging that Trump abused his presidential power with Ukraine by trying to expose Joe Biden's possible abuse of power with Ukraine. In addition to Biden's alleged misconduct, three Democratic senators wrote a letter to Ukraine's prosecutor general in May 2018 urging him to cooperate with the Mueller investigation. This is plot thickening on steroids.

Pelosi acted precipitously, before Trump released notes from his call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and before release of the whistleblower complaint against Trump, both of which are turning out to be nothing -- veggie burgers with no fries. Then again, with the liberal media in their pocket (or vice versa), Democrats have little to fear from performing such stunts.

Some commentators argue that though Democrats know they don't have the votes to convict Trump in the Senate, they are pursuing this "inquiry" because their agenda isn't resonating with the people. Corruption charges will distract from their policy bankruptcy and might cripple Trump enough to defeat him in 2020. Others say their angle is more subtle -- to snooker Trump and his officials into committing a process crime by defying court orders to produce documents, or perhaps lying to Congress or the FBI.

Of course, liberal commentators dispute that Democrats are trying to distract from their preposterous agenda, because in their view, the Democrats' insane environmental and fiscal proposals and their ruthless obsession over identity politics are winning ideas. Thus, they don't need to fabricate phony corruption charges. These allegations are legitimate. Though there was manifestly no quid pro quo in Trump's comments to Zelensky, the Trump haters divine evil intent and malice aforethought with every Trump stream-of-consciousness utterance.

That they were all embarrassingly wrong for three years over Russiagate gives them no pause. They are incorrigible and shameless.

Some Trump supporters are concerned about this, fearing that Democratic relentlessness will finally bear fruit. I honestly don't think so. Once again, the Trump haters, so consumed with venom that they've lost objectivity, have overplayed their hands. This impeachment fantasy is going nowhere. Democratic excessiveness is part of what led to Trump's rise in the first place, and there's good reason to believe it will aid in his reelection. People have had enough of this insanity. By becoming more extreme and unreasonable, the left is only solidifying and amplifying Trump support. So bring it on.

SOURCE 

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The Death of American Citizenship

The American founders institutionalized the best of a long Western tradition of representative government with the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights. These contracts outlined the rare privileges and responsibilities of new American citizens.

Yet the concept of citizenship is being assaulted on the premodern side by the legal blending of mere residency with citizenship.

Estimates of the number of undocumented American residents range from 11 million to more than 20 million. The undocumented are becoming legally indistinguishable from citizens and enjoy exemption from federal immigration law in some 500 sanctuary jurisdictions. An illegal resident of California will pay substantially less tuition at a California public university than a U.S. citizen of another state.

Multiculturalism has reduced the idea of e pluribus unum to a regressive tribalism. Americans often seem to owe their first allegiance to those who look like they do. Citizens cannot even agree over once-hallowed and shared national holidays such as Christmas, Thanksgiving and the Fourth of July.

It is eerie how such current American retribalization resembles the collapse of Rome, as Goths, Huns and Vandals all squabbled among one another for what was left of 1,200 years of Roman citizenship -- eager to destroy what they could neither create nor emulate.

Citizenship has always been protected by the middle classes -- on the idea that they are more independent and self-reliant than the poor, but can stand up to the influence and power of the elite.

Biden: Undocumented Children 'Become Americans Before a Lot of Americans Become Americans'
Yet until recently, we had seen a decade of stagnant wages and entire regions ossified by outsourcing, offshoring and unfair global trade. Historically, with the demise of the middle class so follows the end of constitutional government.

But citizenship also faces a quite different and even greater postmodern threat.

Many of our coastal elites see nothing much exceptional in America, past and present. They prefer the culture and values of the European Union without worrying that the EU's progressive utopian promises have been wrecked by open borders, economically stultifying regulations, and unapologetic and anti-democratic efforts to curb free expression and local autonomy.

Often, such "citizen of the world" mentalities fuel shame over the origins and traditions of America. Transnational organizations and accords on climate, criminal justice and human rights are seen as superior to their American counterparts.

A new progressive iconoclasm seeks to destroy statues, rename streets and buildings, and wipe away art that does not reflect more global values.

Does voting -- the bedrock right of the democratic citizen -- matter that much anymore? In California, tens of thousands of votes were "harvested" by paid campaign operatives. There was also abuse in state agencies in sending out voter registration forms to those who were not legally entitled to vote.

Lone activist federal judges frequently overturn legislation and referenda they find contrary to their own political take on legal theory -- without worry that the votes of millions are canceled in a nanosecond.

Meanwhile, the proverbial "swamp" of the bureaucratic, administrative and regulatory state is so vast and unaccountable that a few clerks can harass entrepreneurs, issue edicts with the force of legislation that ruins lives, or indict, regulate or audit a targeted individual into legal bankruptcy.

In recent years, we have seen a cake maker, a video maker, and a national security adviser so hounded by federal bureaucrats that they either were nearly bankrupted, ended up in jail or were reduced to penury through legal costs.

We still have a Bill of Rights, but many of our constitutional protections are being rendered impotent. If a rural family cannot find ammunition at the local Walmart or gun store due to organized boycotts and threats to such establishments, then the constitutional right to bear arms is not always exercisable in a practical sense.

Brett Kavanaugh was nominated, audited and confirmed by the Senate as a Supreme Court justice. But if the New York Times and cable news can relentlessly charge without proof that nearly 40 years ago he was a teenage sexual pervert, then a distinguished judge can be rendered impotent without legal impeachment.

If a student cannot safely express opposition to abortion on demand, question the global warming narrative, or object to safe spaces, trigger warnings and race-based theme houses on campuses, does it matter that there is in theory still a First Amendment?

We are unwinding at both ends. Tribalism, the erosion of the middle class and de facto open borders are turning Americans into mere residents of a particular North American region between Mexico and Canada.

Yet even more dangerously, thanks to the fiats of unelected bureaucrats and officials, along with the social media lynch mobs who boycott, harass and shame us, our constitutional rights are now increasingly optional. They mostly hinge on whether we are judged worthy by an unelected, politically correct and morally righteous elite.

In theory, American citizenship remains the same; in reality, it is disappearing fast.

SOURCE 

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IN BRIEF

ANOTHER ASYLUM DEAL: "The Trump administration signed an asylum agreement with the Honduran government Wednesday, marking the latest in a string of asylum deals with Latin American countries aimed at controlling the immigration crisis. The Department of Homeland Security announced it reached a deal with Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, allowing the U.S. to send some asylum seekers from 'third' countries back to his country."

BORDER OBSTRUCTION: "The Senate again voted on Wednesday to end President Trump's emergency declaration on the U.S.-Mexico border wall, paving the way for a veto showdown with the White House," The Hill reports. "Senators voted 54-41 on a resolution to end the declaration, which Trump used to shift billions of dollars from the military toward wall construction." Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer claimed: "The vote [yesterday] is the surest and likely the only way to restore funding the president has stolen from our troops and military projects across the country." He didn't care to mention the jobs, money, and even lives that have been stolen from the American people as a direct result of illegal immigration.

A NEW SHERIFF IN TOWN: "A new national survey shows Elizabeth Warren now sitting atop the 2020 Democratic field, further cementing her ascendancy in the party's presidential primary after a pair of polls reported her leading in the first two primary states," according to Politico. "Twenty-seven percent of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents polled by Quinnipiac University said they favor Warren, according to a survey released Wednesday morning. Twenty-five percent said they prefer former Vice President Joe Biden." Rep. Dan Crenshaw speculates: "This impeachment inquiry seems worse for Biden than it is for Trump. Now the Hunter Biden-Ukraine issue is on everyone's radar AND we know that Democrats overstepped with their 'quid pro quo' accusation. Have to wonder whether they did this to help Warren/Sanders."

CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR: "The marriage vow that usually involves a variation of 'for richer or poorer' may no longer apply. Women may now want to add 'as long as you make as much money as me.' It seems many men aren't getting up to the income level that women prefer in a potential marriage partner, according to the New York Post. That has left successful ladies single and disgruntled, according to a Cornell University study." (Fox Business)

SPENDING BILL PASSES: "The Senate on Thursday cleared a spending bill that will fund the government through Nov. 21, giving lawmakers and the White House more time to reach agreement on the annual appropriations process. The vote was 82-15, with all of the 'no' votes coming from Republicans. President Donald Trump is expected to sign the continuing resolution, holding off another partial government shutdown for at least 51 more days. But this could be the first of several stopgap bills amid tense debates about abortion policy and the border wall." (Roll Call)

REFUGEE ADMISSIONS LOWERED: "The Trump administration is proposing to resettle 18,000 refugees in the United States in the new fiscal year, reducing last year's record-low refugee admission ceiling by a further 40 percent. ... The final ceiling will be decided after consultation with Congress — as required by the Immigration and Nationality Act — but the Departments of State, Homeland Security and Health and Human Services, in a report on Congress, are proposing an 18,000 limit. That's by far the lowest since the modern U.S. refugee resettlement program began in 1980, when the Refugee Act was enacted." (CNSNews.com)

RECORD FOREIGN-BORN RESIDENTS: "The percentage of foreign-born U.S. residents has reached its highest level in more than a century, according to estimates from the 2018 American Community Survey released [yesterday]. A record 44.7 million people are foreign-born, or about 13.7% of the U.S. population. That's the highest rate since 1910 and comes amid a highly-charged political debate over whether the decennial Census survey should include a citizenship question. A subset of the foreign-born figure — the number of people in the U.S. but 'not a U.S. citizen' held at around 22 million in 2018." (Bloomberg)

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For more blog postings from me, see  TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH,  POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, and Paralipomena (Occasionally updated), A Coral reef compendium and an IQ compendium. (Both updated as news items come in).  GUN WATCH is now mainly put together by Dean Weingarten. I also put up occasional updates on my Personal blog and each day I gather together my most substantial current writings on THE PSYCHOLOGIST.

Email me  here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here (Academic) or  here  (Personal).  My annual picture page is here 

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Why the Democrats Have Gone Insane

Impeach! Impeach, they say! If only he were Buckingham, they would take off his head as well. Trump has become the Democrats' version of Richard III, if he wasn't already. (Okay, he was.)

They even moved to open an impeachment "inquiry" (whatever that means -- a little bit chicken, if you ask me -- they've been doing it for the last three years anyway) after Trump announced he was making his phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky public Wednesday in unredacted form. And now he's announcing the whistleblower's complaint, whatever hand it is -- second, third, who knows? -- will be released later in the week. Talk about a reckless jumping of the gun on the Democrats' parts. This reeks of outright panic.

So what's really going on here? Why have the Democrats, to put it bluntly, gone berserk? Why are they risking a backlash of cosmic proportions (other than appeasing their psychotically-inflamed base, of course)?

One, distraction. They live in absolute fear of the coming revelations about the Russia probe, from Inspector General Horowitz but even more from the DOJ's John Durham, who can actually put people in jail. The Dems know -- if they have a brain (and a few do) -- these revelations are likely to point up the line at the leaders of the Democratic Party all the way to President Obama. They were all involved to one degree or another with illegally spying on or undermining Trump and his administration and supporters before and after the election. The extent of this we are only beginning to understand.

Pelosi Makes It Official: Democrats Are Impeaching Trump

To put it mildly, not good. Whether you call this treason is up to you, but you can be sure Middle America (i.e. those elusive independent voters) will not appreciate it.

But there's something worse -- and Pelosi's knows it. The only hope for Democrats to defeat Trump is, remote and quixotic as it may be, impeachment. In the midst of the current brouhaha, Joe Biden -- their great (alas white male) hope -- is being exposed as not just a senile plagiarist, but a senile, corrupt plagiarist with a freaky family out of a Southern gothic novel with tentacles reaching into China and Ukraine. Again, not good.

Unfortunately, the rest of the Dems have tacked so far to the left that they wouldn't be able to win an election in Shenyang. Sanders, speaking of senility, is almost risible. He wants to restrict population for reasons of "climate change" when every one of the myriad social programs he so vehemently urges depends on strong continued population growth for economic survival, irrespective of taxes. (Is he that stupid? I don't think so. He's just a liar.)

As for his somewhat subtle clone, Ms. Warren, her proposals are if anything more extreme because she fails to acknowledge (though Colbert did his best to encourage her) that they are going to cost a ton of taxpayer money that approaches national bankruptcy. Even taxing the rich at one hundred percent won't come near supporting her ideas. Wait until Trump gets ahold of that.

So for the Democrats, trouble ahead, trouble behind. Ergo, impeachment.

Of course it will never happen. (Pelosi knows that too. That's why she never held a congressional vote on this "inquiry.") And indeed the whole spectacle might be amusing in a macabre sort of way if there weren't important things going on in the world. The president is engaged in negotiations of tremendous significance with the Chinese and trying to neuter as much as possible the violent mullahs of Iran, but the Democrats don't care. In fact, they would prefer he fail, and seem to be doing everything in their power to make it so. To call that un-American is an understatement. Actually, it's despicable and deeply immoral, not just for the citizens of this country, but for the world. What children!

SOURCE 

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Kamala Harris, Dianne Feinstein Fight to Keep Gay Trump Nominee Off 9th Circuit Court of Appeals

Homophobic!

The Washington Blade, an LGBT news outlet, reports that Donald Trump has tried two times "to confirm a gay U.S. prosecutor to a federal appeals court despite objections from Sen. Kamala Harris over his qualifications for a lifetime judicial appointment."

Patrick Bumatay is a gay Filipino serving as a U.S. attorney in Southern California. He was put on a list of six individuals intended for nominations to the federal bench by the Trump administration.

Bumatay has been nominated to serve on the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. If confirmed, he would become the highest-ranking gay judge serving a lifetime appointment on the federal bench.

Bumatay's nomination has been stymied by objections from both Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and presidential candidate Kamala Harris (D-Calif.). This disagreement led to the president removing Bumatay's nomination for the Ninth Circuit and nominating him for a seat on the U.S. District Court in Southern California instead. However, when U.S. Chief Judge Alex Kozinski left the Ninth Circuit Court because of sexual misconduct allegations that included showing pornography to employees in his chambers, the president nominated Bumatay again.

Washington Blade reports that Harris has decided, once again, to fight Bumatays nomination saying,

"Once again, the president has put forth a highly flawed nominee to the Ninth Circuit, without the support of California’s senators. I first objected to Mr. Bumatay after his initial nomination to the Ninth Circuit a year ago and again raised concerns about his qualifications and fitness when he was nominated for the district court...A nominee for a lifetime appointment to the federal bench must demonstrate exceptional skill, professionalism and respect for the principle of equal justice under law. Mr. Bumatay does not meet this standard. Mr. Bumatay has a troubling prosecutorial record, lacks the requisite experience, and has drawn criticism from members of California’s legal community, across party lines. It is clear that he lacks the judgment and qualifications to serve on the Ninth Circuit."

The Washington Blade requested specific examples of Bumatay's unfitness for the job from Harris's office. No word on when or if Harris will respond.

SOURCE 

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“Left Wing Obsession” Leads New York Times To Libel Supreme Court Justice Kavanaugh With Fake News Headline

In a brazen smear, the once respected paper has published another rape accusation without interviewing the accuser – who now denies the accusation

At least one New York Time reporter says “Every Single Person We Spoke to Said Kavanaugh Has Been a Great Person and an Exemplary Judge,” even as a key witness in Christine Blasey Fords’ congressional testimony says “I was told behind the scenes that certain things could be spread about me if I didn’t comply”

Leland Keyser, who Christine Blasey Ford said was a witness to when Brett Kavanaugh allegedly sexually assaulted her in the 1980s, now doubts that it ever happened. Meanwhile, The New York Times reporters who've written a new book about the Kavanaugh confirmation have blamed their editors for omitting a crucial fact (that the supposed female victim from the "new" accusation does not recall the alleged incident ever happening).

These events, and more, are unfolding as the US Congress is attempting to impeach Judge Kavanaugh and President Donald Trump. The entire Kavanaugh episode illustrates just how low the liberal political wing in America is willing to sink

SOURCE 

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Out-of-touch Democrats push destructive forced unionization bill

Since gaining control of the U.S. House, Democrats have clearly demonstrated that they are not fit to govern. While one might have assumed that gaining a bit of power would have caused them to behave more responsibly, that has not been the case at all. When Congressional Democrats are not busy ignoring the nation’s problems or scheming to overturn the result of the 2016 presidential election, they are pushing radical legislation that shows how just out-of-touch they are. Case in point, Democrats are supporting the Protecting the Right to Organize Act of 2019 forced unionization bill or PRO Act, which would empower and enrich union bosses while disempowering workers and killing jobs.

Here are a few of the PRO Act’s destructive provisions:

The legislation would essentially overturn Right to Work laws in more than two dozen states and force private sector workers to pay fees to a union – even if they adamantly oppose the union – just to keep their jobs.

It would force employers to hand over workers’ contact information, including home addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses. Workers would have no choice in the matter, and union organizers could use this information to harass workers until they agreed to sign a union card.

It would expand the definition of employee to include more independent contractors thereby disrupting the gig economy and endangering jobs.

It would make national franchising companies, such as McDonald’s or Holiday Inn, responsible for the actions of employees of individual franchisees. This would disrupt the franchise industry and endanger more jobs as franchising companies sought to minimize their potential liability.

It would require that unionization elections occur quickly. By minimizing the amount of time that employers have to make their case against unionization – and the amount of time that undecided workers would have to make up their minds – unions gain an unfair advantage.

It would also impose harsher penalties on employers who violate the National Labor Relations Act while leaving the current penalties in place for unions who violate the same law.

Democrat support for the PRO Act is overwhelming. There are now 208 Democrat cosponsors of the House version of the bill, H.R. 2474. What that means is that over 87 percent of the House Democrat caucus supports the PRO Act. House cosponsors include House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, current presidential candidates Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) and Tim Ryan (D-Ohio), former presidential candidates Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) and Seth Moulton (D-MA), and over half of the supposedly centrist Blue Dog Caucus.

There are now 40 liberal Senate cosponsors: 39 Democrat and one Independent. In other words, over 87 percent of the liberal Senate caucus (which includes two Independents) supports this bill. Senate cosponsors include Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), current presidential candidates Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), and former presidential candidate Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.).

The good news is that not one single Republican supports the disastrous PRO Act and that it will not be enacted this year or next; the bad news is that it could pass as soon as 2021, if the elections go poorly next year. Regardless of whether the legislation ever passes, the PRO Act shows that the Democrat Party has grown radical, and voters and donors need to accept this fact. In particular, investors and businesspeople need to recognize that these policies are bad for the economy. So even if they are liberal socially, they are voting or donating against their own interests when they choose to support them.

SOURCE 

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Overdue Tax Bill For Ocasio-Cortez’s Failed Business Remains Unpaid

Prominent Leftists don't have to obey the same rules as everyone elsde

A tax warrant against Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s failed business venture remains open over six months after her office said the unpaid state taxes would be promptly paid back.

The state of New York issued a tax warrant in July 2017 against Brook Avenue Press, a Bronx-based children’s books publisher Ocasio-Cortez founded in 2012, for $1,618.36 in unpaid corporate taxes.

New York issues tax warrants against businesses if they “fail to timely resolve” their tax debt and don’t respond to notices of their debt, according to the New York Department of Taxation and Finance.

The New York Post first spotted the New York Democrat’s unpaid tax bill in early March. An Ocasio-Cortez spokesman told The Post at the time that it was the first they had heard of her business’s unpaid taxes and that the balance would be paid right away.

Former Ocasio-Cortez spokesman Corbin Trent told The Post her lawyers were looking into the matter in a March 23 story noting that the back taxes remained unpaid

Brook Avenue Press’s back taxes remain unpaid six months later.

The Bronx County Clerk confirmed in a phone call with the Daily Caller News Foundation Monday that the Brook Avenue Press tax warrant remains open and that a satisfaction of judgement has yet to be filed in the matter.

Ocasio-Cortez presumably has the means to pay off her business’s unpaid taxes with a congressional salary of $174,000.

Ocasio-Cortez’s office did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.

New York state dissolved Ocasio-Cortez’s company in 2016 using a procedure reserved for corporations that fail to pay taxes for at least two years or fail to file tax returns.

Ocasio-Cortez reported she was the founder of Brook Avenue Press in her financial disclosure report filed with the House of Representatives in May.

As a member of Congress, Ocasio-Cortez has called for tax rates up to 70% on income earners at the “tippy tops” to fund her signature policy proposal, the Green New Deal, which would fully decarbonize the U.S. by 2030.

Ocasio-Cortez sang a different tune on taxes as a small business owner in 2012 when she came out in support of a bill that would provide tax deductions for business start-up costs.

“You don’t really make a profit in your first year,” Ocasio-Cortez told the now-defunct DNAinfo when she was trying to get Brook Avenue Press off the ground. “To get taxed on top of that is a real whammy.”

SOURCE 

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IN BRIEF

"BILLIONAIRES SHOULDN'T EXIST": "Democratic presidential candidate Senator Bernie Sanders on Tuesday rolled out his plan to levy an 'extreme wealth tax' on millionaires and billionaires, which he plans to enforce through the creation of a 'national wealth registry,'" National Review reports, which adds, "Sanders' annual tax on the top 0.1 percent would apply to Americans with a net worth of over $32 million, or about 180,000 households, and would raise approximately $4.35 trillion over the next decade, the Sanders campaign estimates. ... Under the plan, the IRS will be required to audit 30 percent of the top one percent's wealth tax returns and 100 percent for billionaires." The senator further groused on Twitter, "Billionaires should not exist." And socialism should?

THANKS, OBAMA: "Iran has spent more than $16 billion during the past several years to fund militant terrorists across the Middle East, cash that was repatriated to the Islamic Republic under the terms of the landmark nuclear deal, according to new disclosures from the Trump administration. As Iran's economy teeters on the brink of collapse under the tough sanctions regime imposed by the Trump administration, the Islamic Republic's authoritarian leadership has spent its limited cash reserves to bolster terror groups such as Hezbollah and Hamas, as well as militant terrorists in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen." (The Washington Free Beacon)

FENTANYL SURGE: "The flow of the deadly narcotic fentanyl from China to the U.S. has surged despite President Trump's trade war with the communist county and President Xi Jinping's promise to crack down on the illicit trade. Customs and Border Protection agents have seized nearly 2,400 pounds of fentanyl this year through Aug. 31, enough to kill roughly 475 million people. That represents a nearly 32% increase from the same period last year. CBP's numbers represent a sliver of fentanyl flowing into the U.S. because U.S. authorities missed so much of it. China, the world's largest producer of fentanyl, accounts for 68% of the synthetic opioid's movement." (The Washington Times)

TURKEY'S NUCLEAR AMBITIONS: "Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan hinted at an interest in acquiring nuclear weapons, telling the United Nations that it is unjust for the weapons to be possessed only by major powers. 'It bothers us like anyone else that the weapons of mass destruction are used as leverage in every crisis instead of their total elimination,' Erdoğan said Tuesday during the annual meeting of the U.N. General Assembly in New York. 'The position of nuclear power should either be forbidden for all or permissible for everyone.'" (Washington Examiner)

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For more blog postings from me, see  TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH,  POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, and Paralipomena (Occasionally updated), A Coral reef compendium and an IQ compendium. (Both updated as news items come in).  GUN WATCH is now mainly put together by Dean Weingarten. I also put up occasional updates on my Personal blog and each day I gather together my most substantial current writings on THE PSYCHOLOGIST.

Email me  here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here (Academic) or  here  (Personal).  My annual picture page is here 

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How To Help The Poor Without Subsidizing The Rich

If you are a high net worth individual you probably already know about it. A seminar on the subject at Manhattan’s Harvard Club attracted financial advisors to some of Americas richest dynasties – including the Pritzker and Soros families.

A Las Vegas meeting on the subject was organized by former White House aide Anthony Scaramucci and attracted such attendees as Mark Cuban, the billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks, and former New Jersey governor Chris Christie. It has spurred the Swiss bank UBS to create a fund for its “ultra high net worth” clients – people who have at least $50 million in investable assets.

So, what’s all the excitement about? They are called OZs, or Opportunity Zones. They are the hottest investment opportunity around, and they were created by a mere 8 pages in the 185-page tax reform bill the Republicans passed in 2017.

Today In: Business
In theory, the idea was to provide capital to revitalize the urban areas that President Trump has portrayed as “wastelands, ravaged by crime and homelessness and infested by rats.” In practice, it’s gentrification on a grand scale – as luxury high-rises for the rich replace run-down buildings and other structures.

For example, an OZ project in New Rochelle, N.Y., is financing an upscale apartment building that has a yoga studio, 24-hour valet parking and a spa for residents’ pets. One in New Orleans’ trendy Warehouse District is building a hotel with an opulent restaurant and a roof-top pool.

As explained in a New York Times investigative report (which is the source of most of what I am relating), here is how it works. Investors in an OZ can defer any capital gains taxes for up to 7 years. After 10 years, an investor can cash out and not owe any taxes at all. On paper, an opportunity zone is a census tract where poor people live. But there can be affluent areas within the tract and that’s where the investments can be targeted.

Bottom line: A tax break meant to benefit the poor has become a boon to hedge funds, real estate developers and wealthy investors.

Here is what the tax reform bill might have done instead. Almost 40 years ago, Stuart Butler, then at the Heritage Foundation, proposed Enterprise Zones – a concept first imagined in Margret Thatcher’s Britain. Butler’s idea was to take a depressed area, remove burdensome taxes and regulations and allow laissez-faire capitalism to flourish. Within no time at all, he expected the South Bronx, for example, to look like Hong Kong.

This idea was championed by Jack Kemp, HUD secretary during the George H.W. Bush presidency, and by New York congressman Charlie Rangel. It was partly implemented during the Clinton administration.

But by most measures, the experiment was a failure. The reason? No regulations were actually repealed. What we got instead was increased spending and a few tax breaks – making government a partner in every private decision that was made. We didn’t get less government. We got more government – on top of the government we already had!

That prompted a different approach by my colleagues and me  – one called enterprise programs.

Here is the idea: instead of carving out a geographical area for deregulation, let’s carve out essential services that are needed by low-income families. All too often, burdensome regulations are pricing poor people out of the market for the services they need the most. So why not remove those regulations?

Take transportation. Did you know that low-income families use taxi cabs more than any other income group? The reason: they are less likely to own a car. So, in cities where taxi regulations have done little more than create a transportation cartel, poor people are hurt the most.

Uber and Lyft have made a huge dent in this market – but they are mainly serving the high end of the market. It’s still illegal for me (without a license) to drive a van to a low-income neighborhood in South Dallas, pick up a group of would-be workers, transport them to a job site in North Dallas, and charge each of them a couple of bucks for the ride.

Then there is medical care. Studies show that nurses following computer protocols in MinuteClinics provide care that adheres to best practices as well or better than traditional primary care physicians. Yet in most states, access to this type of high-quality, low-cost care is limited by regulation. That’s why there are virtually no MinuteClinics in rural Texas.

Housing is another example. Local governments often block the use of inexpensive modular homes, limit the number of rental housing units, create minimum lot sizes, and impose cost-increasing amenities such as landscaping requirements. All too often, regulations designed to protect property values in affluent neighborhoods have the unintended consequence of reducing housing construction and availability in non-affluent areas.

Most home-based businesses are started by women and they are a principal way women entrepreneurs become self-supporting. But numerous local regulations stand in the way and day care regulations are among the most severe. Suppose you offered to take care of your neighbors’ children for a modest fee during the day, while their parents are at work. In most cities that would be illegal unless you obtain a license and meet all kinds of burdensome regulations.

The Brookings Institution estimates that almost 30 percent of all the jobs in the country require a government license. Whom does that type of regulation hurt the most? People with less education, lower incomes and fewer resources. It hurts them in two ways. On the supply side, occupational licensing is a barrier to a job. On the demand side, licensing raises the cost of goods and services people buy.

Our idea is to let the middle and upper-middle class keep all the regulations they want. For them, nothing would change.

But low-income families should have access to a free market.

SOURCE 

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Wise Judge Blocks California Law Targeting Trump

We’re all used to seeing California throw its weight around, but its new law requiring a presidential candidate to provide five years of tax returns to be eligible to appear on a primary ballot is a new low. Now, however, a federal district court judge has blocked the state from enforcing it, at least temporarily.

It’s the right decision. The law is nothing more than a political attack on President Donald Trump, the federal elections process, and the right of free association of citizens and all political parties.

California is weighing its options, but if it chooses to appeal, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court should affirm the district judge’s decision because the law violates the presidential Qualifications Clause and the First Amendment of the Constitution.

The Qualifications Clause in Article II, Section 1 sets out the sole requirements to be president of the United States. You must be a “natural born Citizen,” 35 years of age, and a resident “within” the U.S. for 14 years.

The key case on this is U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton (1995). There was a movement across the country in the late 1980s and early 1990s to impose term limits on members of Congress. This political movement ended, however, when the U.S. Supreme Court held in Thornton that an Arkansas law limiting the number of terms that a member of Congress could serve was a violation of the separate Qualifications Clauses that apply to members of Congress.

The Arkansas law provided that once a representative or senator reached the maximum term, he could not have his name “placed on the ballot” — a ballot-access restriction akin to California’s new law.

Arkansas was adding an additional qualification to being a representative or a senator; the court, in a 5-4 opinion written by Justice John Paul Stevens, said that “States lack the power to impose qualifications.” Although the Thornton case dealt with congressional elections, the same constitutional consideration would apply to presidential elections and the presidential Qualifications Clause.

Arkansas also tried to argue that the term limit was not an additional qualification, but simply a ballot-access requirement. But the court disagreed. States can “adopt generally applicable and evenhanded restrictions that protect the integrity and reliability of the electoral process itself.” States have the right to implement rules that are intended to avoid “voter confusion, ballot overcrowding or the presence of frivolous candidacies.”

But what states cannot do is try to disguise additional qualifications as ballot-access requirements.

In another decision in 1983 — this time involving Ohio — the Supreme Court in Anderson v. Celebrezze (also a 5-4 decision written by Stevens) threw out a March filing deadline for a presidential candidate to appear on the November ballot. The deadline placed an unconstitutional burden on the voting and associational rights of supporters of a candidate in violation of the First Amendment.

According to the court, “state-imposed restrictions implicate a uniquely important national interest” since “the President and the Vice President of the United States are the only elected officials who represent all the voters in the Nation.” Thus, “in a Presidential election a State’s enforcement of more stringent ballot access requirements” have “an impact beyond its own borders.”

So states have far less power to regulate presidential elections “than statewide or local elections, because the outcome of the former will be largely determined by voters beyond the State’s boundaries.”

Similarly, in 2001, in Cook v. Gralike, the Supreme Court, this time in a unanimous opinion written by Stevens, said that the authority of states is limited to regulating election procedures. The acceptable regulations are those necessary to impose “some sort of order, rather than chaos” on the “democratic process” as well as to protect the integrity of elections.

The new California law says its purpose is to “provide voters with essential information regarding the candidate’s potential conflicts of interest, business dealings, financial status, and charitable donations” so they can “make a more informed decision.” Gov. Gavin Newsom said in his signing statement that states “have a legal and moral duty to do everything in their power to ensure leaders seeking higher office meet minimal standards, and to restore public confidence.”

The law’s stated purpose reveals that it has nothing to do with regulating the “reliability of the electoral process itself” and ensuring orderly voting procedures. Newsom’s statement about the law imposing “minimal standards” also shows the law isn’t about protecting the voting process — it’s about imposing California’s minimal qualifications on anyone who wants to be president.

California passed a similar bill two years ago. When then-Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed the bill, he not only acknowledged that it might “not be constitutional,” but he expressed his concern “about the political perils of individual states seeking to regulate presidential elections in this manner.” He called it a “slippery slope.” Tax returns now, but what else might states start to demand he said. Health records? High school report cards? Certified birth certificates?

All of that might depend, as Brown warned, “on which political party is in power” and it could “lead to an ever-escalating set of differing state requirements for presidential candidates.”

Neither California nor any other state has the right to impose additional requirements for presidential candidates, whether they categorize them as “qualifications” or as restrictive ballot-access requirements.

More HERE 

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A military mind that most of the world does not understand

Our military men on dire occasions do remarkable things

It was 2003 on the march into Baghdad. Brian Chontosh was a platoon leader rolling up Highway 1 in a humvee.

When all hell broke loose.

Ambush city.

The young Marines were being cut to ribbons. Mortars, machine guns, rocket propelled grenades. And the kid out of Churchville was in charge. It was do or die and it was up to him.

So he moved to the side of his column, looking for a way to lead his men to safety. As he tried to poke a hole through the Iraqi line his humvee came under direct enemy machine gun fire.

It was fish in a barrel and the Marines were the fish.

And Brian Chontosh gave the order to attack. He told his driver to floor the humvee directly at the machine gun emplacement that was firing at them. And he had the guy on top with the .50 cal unload on them.

Within moments there were Iraqis slumped across the machine gun and Chontosh was still advancing, ordering his driver now to take the humvee directly into the Iraqi trench that was attacking his Marines. Over into the battlement the humvee went and out the door Brian Chontosh bailed, carrying an M16 and a Beretta and 228 years of Marine Corps pride.

And he ran down the trench.

With its mortars and riflemen, machineguns and grenadiers.

And he killed them all.

He fought with the M16 until it was out of ammo. Then he fought with the Beretta until it was out of ammo. Then he picked up a dead man’s AK47 and fought with that until it was out of ammo. Then he picked up another dead man’s AK47 and fought with that until it was out of ammo.

At one point he even fired a discarded Iraqi RPG into an enemy cluster, sending attackers flying with its grenade explosion.

When he was done Brian Chontosh had cleared 200 yards of entrenched Iraqis from his platoon’s flank. He had killed more than 20 and wounded at least as many more.

But that’s probably not how he would tell it.

He would probably merely say that his Marines were in trouble, and he got them out of trouble. Hoo-ah, and drive on.

“By his outstanding display of decisive leadership, unlimited courage in the face of heavy enemy fire, and utmost devotion to duty, 1st Lt. Chontosh reflected great credit upon himself and upheld the highest traditions of the Marine Corps and the United States Naval Service.”

That’s what the Navy Cross citation says.

And that’s what nobody will hear.

That’s what doesn’t seem to be making the evening news. Accounts of American valor are dismissed by the press as propaganda, yet accounts of American difficulties are heralded as objectivity. It makes you wonder if the role of the media is to inform, or to depress – to report or to deride. To tell the truth, or to feed us lies.

But I guess it doesn’t matter.

We’re going to turn out all right.

As long as men like Brian Chontosh wear our uniform.

SOURCE 
 
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IN BRIEF

NO MORE "CATCH AND RELEASE": "The Trump administration will no longer allow migrant families apprehended at the border to enter the U.S. under the immigration policy commonly known as 'catch and release.' The policy change was announced Monday by Acting Secretary of Homeland Security Kevin McAleenan in remarks at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, D.C. ... McAleenan said the end of 'catch and release' is a reaction, in part, to the record number of 144,000 migrants apprehended or encountered at the southern border in May. He said that 72% were unaccompanied children or families." (NPR)

BORDER ENABLERS: "The Marine Corps has charged 13 members with smuggling illegal immigrants into the U.S., in addition to a range of other offenses including failure to obey an order, drunkenness, endangerment, larceny, and perjury, according to a statement released Friday. Lance Corporals Byron Law and David Salazar-Quintero were specifically charged with transporting illegal immigrants into the country for financial gain. The two were based in Camp Pendleton, located between San Diego and Los Angeles, Calif. The other marines included in the indictments, some of whom were charged with distributing cocaine and LSD, were not named." (National Review)

PRESS BRIEFINGS INDEFINITELY SHELVED: "White House Press Sec. Stephanie Grisham said Monday that she has no plans on bringing back the daily White House press briefings, saying reporters used them to make themselves famous. 'Ultimately, if the president decides that it's something we should do, we can do that. But right now, he's doing just fine. And to be honest, the briefings had become a lot of theater, and I think that a lot of reporters were doing it to get famous,' Grisham said on Fox & Friends. ... It has been over six months since a press secretary has held a traditional briefing in the White House press briefing room, according to Axios." (The Daily Caller)

NO RESPECT: "In August, a group of Trump supporters led by conservative activist Scott Presler went to West Baltimore for a massive clean-up operation following tweets sent by President Donald Trump highlighting the dire conditions in the area. Keeping to his promises, Presler has since led clean-up efforts in Newark, New Jersey and Virginia Beach, Virginia. And on Saturday, Presler and some 200 volunteers headed to Democrat-run Los Angeles, removing a stunning 50 tons of garbage, according to the activist. ... The impressive feat, however, has gone widely unnoticed by the mainstream media." (The Daily Wire)

NOLA CRIME: One in seven adults in New Orleans has a warrant out for arrest (The Washington Post)

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For more blog postings from me, see  TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH,  POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, and Paralipomena (Occasionally updated), A Coral reef compendium and an IQ compendium. (Both updated as news items come in).  GUN WATCH is now mainly put together by Dean Weingarten. I also put up occasional updates on my Personal blog and each day I gather together my most substantial current writings on THE PSYCHOLOGIST.

Email me  here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here (Academic) or  here  (Personal).  My annual picture page is here 

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