The Divisiveness in America today:  How much is Harry Reid to blame?

The extreme polarization of American politics in America today has been  blamed on many things.  Democrat politicians blame it on a "racist" President Trump and say they are just trying to protect fairness and justice for all, but particularly for illegal immigrants.  Such brainlessness need not detain us however.  Their constant shrieks of blame are just a poor mask for their complete absence of constructive and realistic policy.

But it's not so long ago that there was a degree of bipartisanship in America.  Ronald Reagan, for instance, got his remarkable reforms through a Democrat-dominated Congress.  And bipartisanship was valued. It was so valued that it was entrenched in the rules of the Senate.  The filibuster rule meant that a President's nominees to the courts had to muster 60 senate votes to pass as distinct from a simple majority of 50.  So judges had to be pretty centrist -- however that was conceived at the time.  Basically, both sides of politics had to agree to a significant extent in order to get anything done.

But impatience  is at the very heart of Leftism -- An impatience with the world as it is and an urgency to change it.  And in 2013 the Democrat leader of the Senate, Harry Reid, pushed through a vote to abolish the filibuster in order to get some of Obama's appeal court nominees through -- over the top of Republican opposition.  Obama nominated extremist judges who had no respect for the law and thus made bipartisanship impossible.

Harry acknowledge that he was loading the gun with ammunition that future Republican majorities might use to Democrat disadvantage, but Leftists live almost wholly in the present so Harry said that was OK by him.  He was warned multiple times of what the future effect of his actions might be but he still went ahead.  And his Senate caucus went ahead with him.  More background here

Reid did have one element of caution, however.  He broke the filibuster for lower court nominees only.  He knew how dangerous a Republican Supreme Court could be to his party so left the filibuster just alive enough to block nominations to SCOTUS.

But once he had put a hole in the dam, it was easy for the rest of of the dam to be breached.  And so it was.  When Mitch McConnell was pushing Trump's SCOTUS nominees through, the Democrats used the filibuster to block Judge Gorsuch.  So McConnell used his majority to abolish the last of the filibuster and got Gorsuch through.  And after Gorsuch there came the dreadfully abused Kavanaugh -- also pushed through in the absence of the filibuster despite a quite incredible cacophany of abuse from the Donks.

Without Harry Reid's attack on the filibuster rule, the Donks could easily have blocked both judges -- and conservatives have been cackling about that ever since.  They now love the now retired brainless Harry.  There have been many "Thank you"s to Harry after Gorsuch and Kavanaugh got through confirmation. I wouldn't be surprised if on some social occasions Republicans have drank toasts to Harry

But the point is that both new judges are very conservative and their very membership of the court has snatched away from the Donks their alternative legislature.  Up until recently, they could get lots through the courts that they could not get through Congress.  They got got through such huge agenda items as homosexual marriage, universal abortion, the barring of Christian observance in the schools and "affirmative action".  All those were legalized through SCOTUS only.  The people did not get a vote on any of it.  That is now gone and it went through their own Donk folly.  No wonder they are half crazed. A large part of their world has fallen apart.  And it is all because of Harry Reid.

Their access to sympathetic courts once kept them happy -- or as happy as they are capable of being.  So that allowed them to be magnanimous to Republicans on some occasions and to some degree.  They could afford to be a bit magnanimous in Congress because the main game was not there.  It was the courts that would enforce their agenda.

But the basic point is that the filibuster demanded and got a degree of bipartisanship if either party was to get anything done.  That is gone and Harry did it.  All restraints are now off.  He clearly had no inking of how great would be the damage he did both to his own party and to the American constitution, broadly conceived

*********************************

Trump outlines new plan to lower Medicare drug  prices, end 'rigged' system

Once again he objects to Americans being treated differently

President Donald Trump outlined a plan Thursday he said would allow Medicare to lower drug prices for its Part B coverage and end this "rigged system" that allows other countries to pay less than the U.S. for the same drugs.

Under the administration's proposal, the Department of Health and Human Services would permit Medicare to create a new payment model that would bring drug prices in line with what other nations pay.

HHS estimates $17 billion in program savings over five years, it said in a press release. The agency is trying to issue a formal rule early next year with the new payment model taking effect in 2020, HHS said.

"For decades, other countries have rigged the system so that American patients are charged much more ... for the exact same drug," Trump said in his speech at HHS headquarters in Washington.

"Americans pay more so that other countries can pay less," Trump said. "The government pays whatever price the drug companies ask ... not any more."

The SPDR S&P Pharmaceuticals index, which tracks drug stocks, was more than 2 percent higher early afternoon Thursday.

In May, Trump said it was time to end the "global freeloading once and for all," referring to how some countries set price controls and therefore pay less for drugs than Americans, while U.S. companies invest in research and drug development.

Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar released a report earlier in the day that said the U.S. pays 1.8 times more, and sometimes four times as much, for prescriptions covered by Medicare Part B than other nations.

"The United States will finally be able to confront one of the most unfair practices ... that drives up the cost of medicine," Trump said. "For decades other countries have rigged the system so that American patients are charged much more, and in some cases much, much more for the exact same drug," he said.

Overall, the prices for Part B drugs in America exceed the prices paid in countries with similar economic conditions. These higher prices mean that Medicare pays nearly TWICE as much as it would for the same or similar drugs in other countries. We can and must do better.

Medicare reimburses the list price of the drug plus 6 percent, so capping price increases could help lower the program's costs. Total Medicare drug spending reached $162 billion in 2015, according to data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

"Because @POTUS wants to end global freeloading, we compared prices for the most costly physician-administered drugs that are covered and paid for by Medicare Part B," Azar tweeted. The "prices for Part B drugs in America exceed the prices paid in countries with similar economic conditions."

SOURCE

***********************************

Lame duck opportunity for GOP to cut spending, pass MERIT Act, build wall and Atlantic pipeline

By Robert Romano

Come what may in the November midterms, whether Republicans hold Congress or not, afterward there are a number of spending measures that remain to be enacted by Congress for Fiscal Year 2019.

So far, all Congress has finished and had signed into law by President Donald Trump are Defense, Labor, Education, Health and Human Services, Energy, Military Construction and Legislative Affairs.

That leaves Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, Commerce, Justice, Science, Financial Services and General Government, Homeland Security, State, Foreign Operations and Transportation, Housing and Urban Development.

Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning said the unfinished business gives Republicans an opportunity in November and December to enact the Trump agenda, including the wall and the President’s call for non-defense discretionary spending to be cut by 5 percent.

“Regardless of the outcome of the midterms, the lame duck session will present the GOP with a rare opportunity to pass legislation that limits the size and scope of government and hopefully implement President Trump’s call to cut spending by 5 percent,” Manning said.

That would amount to about $28 billion in savings, right there, if implemented, which, after the $779 billion deficit for FY 2018, would be welcomed by taxpayers.

Other agenda items that are definitely coming up is full funding for the southern border wall, which would need to be included in the Homeland Security funding bill, a key Trump and Republican campaign promise, and with the migrant caravan still headed for the border, one with some urgency.

Policy riders could also be tied to funding that limit government, for example, the MERIT Act by U.S. Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.) and Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.), that would expedite the firing of federal employees. Similar reform was passed for the Department of Veterans Affairs after too many veterans died waiting for medical attention. Now, the same reforms need to be enacted across the board to all departments and agencies.

For the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, which will transport natural gas across West Virginia, Virginia and North Carolina, Congress could include a simple rider that allows the pipeline to cross the Appalachian Trail, avoiding costly and time-consuming lawsuits.

Also of interest, the Joint Select Committee on Solvency of Multiemployer Plans is expected to complete its work on a report to make recommendations for the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation and Congress to follow in addressing 114 out of the nation’s 1,400 multiemployer pension plans covering 1.3 million workers being underfunded by $36.4 billion.

This could be addressed now, or later. But chances are, Congress will address it.

In fact, these are all things likely to come up, and depending on how the midterms go, Republicans can address them in the lame duck, or take their chances in 2019 when, who knows, Nancy Pelosi might be Speaker. Midterms are usually not kind to the President’s party, and while the GOP holding onto the Senate seems likely, the fate of the House still hangs in the balance.

Depending on how things go in November, clearing the decks on the Trump and Republican agenda in Congress after the election might be the last full opportunity until 2021 the earliest. Something to keep in mind.

SOURCE

**********************************

Obama Is 'Making Stuff Up' About The Trump Economic Boom

Growth: Economists expect the third-quarter GDP number — to be released this Friday — to be a strong one, in the range of 3.4%. Maybe that's why Barack Obama is running around this week trying to take credit for the economic boom. And he says President Trump has trouble with facts?

In a speech at a rally in Nevada, Obama claimed that the current economic boom has nothing to do with Trump's economic policies.

"By the time I left office," he said, "wages were rising, uninsurance rate was falling, poverty was falling. And that's what I handed off to the next guy. So when you hear all this talk about economic miracles right now, remember who started it."

Just the Facts?
Later in that same self-congratulatory speech, Obama said that "unlike some, I actually try to state facts. I believe in facts. I believe in a fact-based reality and a fact-based politics. I don't believe in just making stuff up."

So let's look at some of the facts about the economy that Obama handed off to Trump.

Despite what Obama now says, the economy was far from solid when he left office. In fact, it was in a slump.

GDP growth was decelerating throughout 2016. Household income was flat. The unemployment rate was flat. The stock market was flat.

And, "by 2016, wage growth began to taper off quickly," notes the American Action Forum's Ben Gitis.

Even The New York Times, which has been gamely trying to grant Obama credit for the current boom, now admits that 2016 was an "invisible recession."

"There was a sharp slowdown in business investment, caused by an interrelated weakening in emerging markets, a drop in the price of oil and other commodities, and a run-up in the value of the dollar," it explained.

Slow Growth Expected

By the end of 2016, pundits and economists were widely predicting a new era of slow economic growth. Why? Because for eight years under President Obama's leadership, the economy struggled to even top 2% annual growth. It never reached 3%. And every single year GDP growth missed the forecasts by Obama's own economists. So for Obama to claim that he handed Trump a thriving economy is 100% pure poppycock.

What's more, Obama and other liberal Democrats insisted in 2016 that if Trump were elected, he'd send the economy into a tailspin. Well, Trump was elected, and instead of faltering, the economy surged.

Since Trump took office, quarterly GDP growth has averaged 2.9%. Once the recession ended, the quarterly GDP growth averaged 2.2% under Obama.

Since Trump took office, the unemployment rate has been in a steady decline. Economic optimism — which languished for years — suddenly skyrocketed. The stock market took off. The U.S. reclaimed the No. 1 spot in global competitiveness. Family incomes reached all-time highs.

Engineering an Economic Boom

Not one of these trends was in place when Obama left office. So what exactly is Obama claiming? That his policies failed to kick in until after he left office? Talk about "making stuff up."

The fact is that as soon as Trump took office, he started reversing as many of Obama's economic policies as he possibly could.

Trump halted Obama's massively expensive new environmental regulations, and cut back old ones. He signed a massive tax reform bill that took the tax code in the opposite direction of Obama — toward lower rates and fewer loopholes. He signed a law partially dismantling Dodd-Frank, one of Obama's other big "achievements." He dialed back ObamaCare where he could.

In other words, Trump immediately embarked on a policy of tax cuts and deregulation that Obama has repeatedly insisted "never worked" to grow the economy. Yet here we are, with growth topping 4% last quarter, and likely to top 3% this quarter.

Here's a message for Obama: When it comes to today's economic boom, you didn't build that.

SOURCE

********************************

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 (Pictorial) or  here  (Personal)

**************************

This had to happen  -- or did it?

What was behind the bombs sent to prominent Democrats?

Not all Trump supporters are Christians.  Many are in the police and the military, for instance. And they have to be hard men.  So one of them may have come to feel that the contant verbal attacks on Trump and the many physical attack on other Republicans deserve a response.  "Sow the wind and reap the whirlwind" (Hosea 8:7). "As ye sow, so shall ye reap (Galatians 6:7) "Those who live by the sword will die by the sword" (Matthew 26:52).  The Left seem to think that they are above those ancient warnings. So the grave faces on CNN and elsewhere are rather amusing.  When did they put on such faces in response to the many attacks on conservatives?

BUT:  Maybe we are leaping to conclusions.  On my TONGUE-TIED blog, I have often put up reports of "racist" graffiti and so on that were initially attributed to conservatives but which eventually turned out to be done by Leftists as a provocation. Was this bombing done by Leftists as an "October surprise" -- intended to discredit conservatives in the run up to the mid-terms?  You would have to be dumb not to suspect that.

And it looks like the Leftmedia suspect that.  I have not so far heard them attribute the bombings to Trump supporters. And they normally attribute EVERYTHING bad to Trump and his supporters.  So they clearly don't want to get egg on the faces over making a foolish accusation.  Do they know something that we don't?  Could be.

We might also note that nobody was hurt in the bombings, unlike Rand Paul and Rep. Scalise. Someone put it to me: "If conservatives had done it, they would have done a better job


President Donald Trump addressed on Wednesday suspicious packages sent to former President Barack Obama, 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and other individuals as well as CNN, saying the country's leaders must "come together" to speak out against threats of political violence.

"I just want to tell you that in these times, we have to unify," Trump said at an unrelated opioid bill signing event at the White House. "We have to come together and send one very clear, strong, unmistakable message that threats or acts of political violence have no place in the United States of America."

"It's a very bipartisan statement," he added. "This egregious conduct is abhorrent to everything we hold dear and sacred as Americans."

Earlier Wednesday, authorities have intercepted suspicious devices intended for Obama and Clinton, and the Florida office of Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz was evacuated Wednesday after a suspicious package was mailed there.

Also, CNN's New York bureau in the Time Warner Center was evacuated after a package with an explosive device, addressed to former CIA Director John Brennan, was discovered, city and local law enforcement officials said.

In addition, sources told CNN that a suspicious package intended for California Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters was intercepted at a congressional mail screening facility in Maryland and the San Diego Union-Tribune evacuated its building after "suspicious looking packages" were spotted outside.

The President noted he had just concluded a briefing with the FBI, Department of Justice, Homeland Security Department and Secret Service. "The full weight of our government is being deployed to conduct this investigation," Trump said. "We will spare no resources or expense in this effort."

The President spoke from TelePrompTer but added this line at the end -- not on screen in front of him: "We are extremely angry, upset, unhappy about what we witnessed this morning, and we will get to the bottom of it," Trump said.

SOURCE

*****************************

The "bombs" were hoax devices, not meant to do harm

A former Navy explosives expert pointed to some characteristics of the explosive devices sent to CNN and other current and former Democratic officials, which indicated to him amateurish construction and perhaps an ulterior motive beyond causing bodily harm.

CNN posted an image of a pipe bomb sent to its New York City bureau, which prompted the evacuation of the entire building on Wednesday.

The package was addressed to former CIA Director John Brennan, care of CNN’s office in the Time Warner Building in midtown Manhattan.

Thomas Sauer, who according to his LinkedIn profile is a Naval Academy graduate and served as a commander of a Naval explosive ordinance disposal unit, offered some observations on Twitter about the device.

First, he noted that wires were connected on both ends of the bomb, a style of construction he called “dumb.”

Sauer next pointed to the timer and saying that an experienced bomb maker would have placed it inside the pipe. “That thing is just silly looking,” he wrote.

Concerning the appearance of the device itself, he concluded, “Bottom Line: Whoever made that wanted it to be painfully obvious to anyone and everyone that it’s a ‘bomb.'”

Sauer then offered that “hoax devices” are “FAR more common than real ones. In which case, we should ask ourselves what the motives of the ‘bomber’ are and ‘who benefits?’ Go ahead. Think deeply and critically.”

SOURCE

*******************************

A man with zero self-insight

THE blame game has begun between US President Donald Trump and one of his biggest critics, CNN, after the network’s New York bureau was targeted.

Mr Trump said in a press conference on Wednesday afternoon local time that he “will spare no resources” in trying to find the culprit.

He said “this egregious conduct is abhorrent”, adding that America would “have to unify” in these times.

CNN president Jeff Zucker lashed out at Mr Trump, criticising the seriousness of his attacks on media.

“There is a complete lack of understanding at the White House about the seriousness of their continued attacks on the media,” he said.

“The President, and especially the White House Press Secretary, should understand their words matter. So far, they have shown no comprehension of that.”

More HERE

Does the sugary one (Zucker is Yiddish for sugar) have any understanding about the seriousness of CNN's continued attacks on Trump and his supporters?  CNN should understand that their words matter. So far, they have shown no comprehension of that.”

******************************

When Hillary got what she called for, she did a 180

She had to.  She knew she could be blamed for the bombs so had to cover herself

After suspected bombs were sent to her home, Hillary Clinton called for unity at a political rally the same day.

This, of course, is the massive hypocrite who just weeks ago dehumanized Republicans to the point that she wondered how anyone could be civil to them. Earlier in the month, Hillary told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour, “You cannot be civil with a political party that wants to destroy what you stand for, what you care about. That’s why I believe if we are fortunate enough to win back the House and or the Senate, that’s when civility can start again. But until then, the only thing that the Republicans seem to recognize and respect is strength.” Just weeks later, Hillary is now bemoaning a lack of civility.

Hillary’s new views on civility after the bomb scare

Hillary spoke earlier this morning at a campaign rally in Florida and began by addressing the bombs that were sent to her, and others. “It is a troubling time, isn’t it. And it’s a time of deep divisions, and we have to do everything we can to bring our country together.” So I guess the time to bring back civility is now, not after the midterms? Or is it only the right that has to be civil?

She then immediately made things political. “We have to elect candidates who … will set goals that will lift up every Floridian and American, who will look into the future,” Hillary continued.

If whoever is responsible for sending explosives did so only to Republicans, wouldn’t they simply have been abiding by Hillary’s advice to abandon civility? It’s at least nice of her to change her tune once she realized that she could be harmed by the very posture she advocates.

Responses to her comment were mixed, with most highlighting Hillary’s hypocrisy.

SOURCE

******************************

Watch: Audience Roars as Trump Announces Plan to Get Hillary Investigated: Nominate Her to SCOTUS

It was a popular chant for then-candidate Donald Trump supporters during the 2016 presidential campaign season, and even Sen. Bernie Sanders’ supporters got in on the act after they felt he was “robbed” of the Democratic nomination by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

In October 2016, Trump addressed the matter, in a way, by telling the Michigan crowd, “Hillary’s corruption is a threat to democracy. She’s likely to be under investigation for criminality for a very, very long time to come,” reported Dallas News.

And now, the “Lock her up!” theme is back. While in Texas this week, as The Daily Caller‘s Benny Johnson posted on Twitter, Trump made a statement regarding getting Hillary investigated.

With that one quip, Trump landed blows against Clinton, the establishment media, the left’s behavior during Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearing, and the FBI’s investigation of Clinton’s email server scandal. And the crowd loved it.

But her email scandal is not the only thing establishment media largely ignored or dismissed. And it’s not the only thing resurfacing with a vengeance as of late, either.

Establishment media outrage over the alleged murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi is understandable. But many are questioning where their moral outrage was six years ago when Americans were abandoned to die in Benghazi.

It is a scandal that began with lies and, to this day, has uninvestigated ties to Clinton that the establishment media continues to largely ignore or dismiss. Benghazi survivor Kris Paronto, however, has not let the matter rest, and since the Khashoggi news broke, has hit the hypocrisy hard.

For 3 weeks Saudi Arabia said Jamal Khashoggi left their consultant safe and sound. They said they had no idea where he was. They denied all wrongdoing to every leader in the world as late as yesterday. Now they say they accidentally killed him in a fistfight. Bullshit.

Leftist journalists & liberals screaming that the President isn’t doing enough to the Saudi’s because one of their own was killed.Where in the hell were you when @BarackObama left 30+ AMERICANS to die in Benghazi Libya including an Ambassador?!!You all are a disgrace .

And speaking of Paronto and Hillary scandals, he’s also hit the Russia collusion scandal with a tie-in to Clinton. Investigation into the accusation that Trump colluded with Russia keeps leading back to Clinton, among other Democrats.

“Now a lot of reporters, some at The Washington Post and some at The New York Times, are complaining that Hillary’s lawyer lied to them. Heaven forfend! Did somebody say collusion with Russians?”

While Trump riles liberals, the media and the establishment of both parties with his utter willingness to speak out in the face of political correctness, his supporters are thrilled by the off-the-cuff, wise-cracking, “genius” that entertains and enthralls so many.

Sick of politics as usual, many longed for a straight-shooter who would just get things done. Things, in particular, that benefit America.

And Trump seems to be doing that, in what — for supporters anyway — is a non-traditional, and thoroughly highly refreshing way.

SOURCE

*****************************

Trump teases 'major tax cut for middle-income people' before midterms

President Trump said Saturday he plans to roll out a major tax cut to the middle class before November.

"We are looking at putting in a very major tax cut for middle-income people. And if we do that it'll be sometime just prior, I would say, to November,” Trump told reporters after his rally in Nevada Saturday. “We are studying very deeply right now round the clock a major tax cut for middle income people."

Trump has taken criticism from Democrats for his tax cuts, which they claim only help large corporations and the top 1 percent. But Trump said the tax cuts he is looking to implement soon would not be related to businesses whatsoever.

“Kevin Brady is working on it, Paul Ryan is working on it,” said Trump. “I would say sometime around the first of November, maybe a little before then.”

SOURCE

********************************

Florida and Texas Post Record Sept.-to-Sept. Job Gains; Ohio Has Largest Gain in 21 Years

Florida and Texas, according to data released today by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, not only led the nation in the number of nonfarm jobs they added in the year running from September 2017 to September 2018 but also added the greatest number of jobs to their states in any September-to-September period on record.

Ohio and Pennsylvania—sometimes considered part of the nation’s “Rust Belt”—also saw significant job gains from September 2017 to September 2018, with Ohio showing the largest increase for its state in 21 years and Pennsylvania showing the largest increase in 18 years.

“Thirty-seven states had over-the-year increases in nonfarm payroll employment in September,” BLS said in its state employment report. “The largest job gains occurred in Florida (+407,300), Texas (+406,400), and California (+339,600). The largest percentage gain occurred in Florida (+4.8 percent), followed by Utah (+3.6 percent) and Texas (+3.3 percent).

The unemployment rate in Florida was 3.5 percent. In Texas, it was 3.8 percent. In California, it was 4.1 percent.

While California ranked third among all states for the number of job gained during the period from September 2017 to September 2018, its statewide jobs growth numbers during that period were actually smaller than they were in two of the previous three September-to-September periods. (From September 2014 to September 2015, California added 493,000 jobs; from 2015 to 2016, it added 393,800 jobs; and from 2016 to 2017, it added 307,500 jobs)

Florida’s jobs grew 4.8 percent during the latest September-to-September period. Texas’s jobs grew 3.3 percent. California’s jobs grew 2.0 percent.

In Texas, the number of jobs rose from 12,232,100 in September 2017 to 12,638,500 in September 2018—accounting for the record 406,400 increase.

SOURCE

********************************

Leftists are untouchable



********************************

A puzzle



********************************

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 (Pictorial) or  here  (Personal)

**************************

Deception Is Democrats' Weapon of Choice

The party of the BIG Lie is at it again, and midterm campaign examples abound.

Some call it spin. Some might refer to a political reality. Others may say it’s the use of propaganda. Regardless, this election is chock-full of devices that either reframe a candidate to hide his or her authentic approach to governance or, in many cases, outright lies are being told to confuse and misrepresent the facts.

The weapon of choice this (and every) election cycle for Democrats is deception.

Let’s look at just a few examples to understand that, while campaigning, some Democrats want to run from their actual record and appear to voters as “Republican-lite.” The reality, however, couldn’t be further from the truth.

The Senate has been the perfect example of the vast schism between reality and political “reality.” Let’s look at a few facts and understand that Democrats not only ignore, avoid, and distort the truth; they don’t recognize truth in their world of the aggrieved and offended. That helps explain their ongoing efforts to engineer chaos and mob rule.

Let’s begin in Michigan, where Sen. Debbie Stabenow, the incumbent Democrat, is facing a tough GOP opponent in John James, a black businessman with distinguished service in the U.S. Army during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Once upon a time, Stabenow was a vocal supporter of tax cuts that “create jobs here rather than overseas.” Funny, she voted against the historic Tax Acts and Jobs Act that added 39,700 jobs in Michigan already this year, 5,500 more than in 2017. Now, the promise of the Democrats is to reverse the Republican tax cuts … simply because President Donald Trump signed them into law.

Run down to Tennessee’s open Senate seat in the Marsha Blackburn vs. Phil Bredesen slugfest and see if you can figure out who’s running as the Republican nominee. Publicly, Democrat and former governor Bredesen can’t run fast enough from the names of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and former NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg. Yet Bredesen landed $3.5 million in ads from Schumer’s political action committee and $1.6 million contributed directly to his campaign while enjoying a high-dollar fete at the New York home of gun-control extremist Bloomberg. The billionaire socialist has pledged $20 million to the Senate Majority PAC, fueling Democrat races in the nation’s upper legislative chamber. Add all this to the undercover video capturing Bredesen operatives freely admitting his deception regarding his support for Brett Kavanaugh, and the camouflage donned in the Volunteer State right now is not just worn by hunters.

A few more on the deception dance card in the Senate are Jon Tester in Montana and Claire McCaskill in Missouri, both of whom campaigned on the importance of securing the southern border, yet voted against funding all the recent measures to fund personnel, structure, and resources to actually stem the tide of illegal immigrants coming to America. Likewise, when Kyrsten Sinema was running for Congress in Arizona in 2012, she pledged legislation that “secures our border from the threats of criminal cartels and criminal syndicates In Mexico.” Now, as a Senate candidate, Sinema has no recollection of voting against immigration reforms. Let’s not forget Sinema’s list of outrageous statements, including getting caught telling stay-at-home moms they are leeches in the world of progressive feminism. She went all in with the pink-hat-gals.

Bundle up and head to North Dakota to see Heidi Heitkamp’s voting history that matches Schumer’s 80% of the time, despite promising she’d be that same kind of independent that Bredesen conjures up. Heitkamp has likely sealed her own doom with TV ads aimed to tie newly confirmed Justice Brett Kavanaugh to domestic assault victims — partly because she failed to get approval to use the victims’ names in the ad. Exploitation for the cause of deception — we guess that’s the collateral damage Nancy Pelosi spoke of last week when calling her Resistance crowd to action.

There is so much more, but the theme is clear: You can’t trust Democrats to tell the truth during campaign season or to govern in a manner that upholds the respect of our laws, our nation’s border and sovereignty or, sadly, the financial security and privacy of average Americans.

While we may laugh in disgust at the dishonesty of politics, heed a serious warning. The type of behavior witnessed by Democrats in power — weaponizing agencies of government like the IRS, DOJ, EPA, etc. to control and punish political foes; using slander at every turn alleging sexism, racism, and all other -isms to marginalize; agitating the offended to the point of riot and violence; importing foreign individuals as part of a ploy to disrupt our government under the guise of asylum and safety; and employing a two-tiered system of justice to exempt criminal acts of the elite but not the average — is not just despicable, it’s dangerous. In decades past, these acts would be accurately defined and viewed as totalitarianism.

#WalkAway from the deception and dangers of the Democrats.

SOURCE 

*********************************

Could Trump Win 20 Percent of the African-American Vote in 2020?
   
The provocative Donald Trump certainly seems to be disliked by a majority of African-American professional athletes, cable news hosts, academics and the Black Congressional caucus. Yet there are subtle but increasing indications that his approval among other African-Americans may be reaching historic highs for a modern Republican president.

Some polls have indicated that Trump’s approval rating among black voters is close to 20 percent. That is far higher than the 8 percent of the African-American vote that Trump received on Election Day 2016.

A recent, admittedly controversial Rasmussen Reports poll showed African-American approval of Trump at 36 percent.

Even 20 percent African-American support for Trump would all but dismantle Democratic Party presidential hopes for 2020. Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 election with 88 percent of the black vote. That was about a six-point falloff from Barack Obama’s share of the black vote in 2012.

But far more importantly, an estimated 2 million of the African-American voters who cast ballots for Obama in 2012 simply did not show up at the polls in 2016 to vote for the off-putting Clinton.

Even a small drop in African-American turnout or anything less than the usual 85 percent to 90 percent supermajority for a Democratic presidential candidate on Election Day can prove fatal. Why?

Republican presidential candidates now routinely win 55 percent to 60 percent of the so-called white vote, and about 70 percent of voters are white. That lopsided margin may widen further, given that progressive Democrats are not making any effort to recapture turned-off white working-class voters.

With continually diminishing white support, Democrats must increasingly count on massive minority turnout and bloc voting — especially among African-American voters, who make up about 12 percent of electorate.

Roughly a third of Asians and Latinos vote Republican, and voter turnout among these groups generally isn’t as strong as it is among whites and African-Americans.

But why is the supposedly odious Trump having any success in undermining the traditional marriage between African-Americans and Democrats?

The most recent jobs report revealed that the unemployment rate for African-American teenagers fell to 19.3 percent, the lowest figure on record. That number stands in marked contrast to the 2010 rate of 48.9 percent under the Obama administration. Overall black unemployment is currently at 5.9 percent, which is close to a record low.

Under Trump, the economy is growing at nearly 4 percent per year. The robust growth coincides with Trump’s effort to curb illegal immigration and imported labor. The net result has been to empower minority job applicants in ways not seen in nearly half a century.

Trump’s implicit message is that every American worker is now crucial in maintaining the red-hot economy. In a job-short economy, laborers suddenly have a lot of leverage over their employers. And wages are rising.

Trump’s nationalist message adds to this sense of empowerment, especially when he campaigns on putting Americans first in his economic decision-making.

A former entertainer, Trump is courting African-American celebrities such as rapper Kayne West and football legend Jim Brown. Activist Candace Owens and her Turning Point USA organization are trying to convince black voters that being politically independent forces both parties to compete for the African-American vote.

Ironically, Trump is reaching out to the African-American community to a much greater degree than progressives are reaching out to the estranged white working class.

Trump has other issues that might fuel the effort to redirect black support. Abortion, for example, is supposedly a Democratic sacrament. But few progressives talk much about the high rate of black abortions. African-Americans make up between 12 percent and 13 percent of the American population but account for as many as 35 percent of all abortions.

Yet liberal family-planning advocates were not always shy about their occasionally eugenics-inspired agendas of the past. The spiritual founder of Planned Parenthood, Margaret Sanger, was an unapologetic eugenicist who professed that the object of birth control was to discourage the reproduction of those she derided as “the unfit.”

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a liberal icon, once couched her support for abortion in neo-eugenic terms. In a disturbing 2009 interview, she was quite blunt: “Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of.”

Trump should stress other issues that might appeal to African-Americans, such as the right of access to charter schools, and how boutique environmentalism and over-regulation drive up the cost of affordable housing, fuel and electricity.

Trump might also make it clear that his message is geared to all Americans, including African-Americans. As a group, they are already doing better economically today than during the Obama administration — and everyone gains political clout when politicians must work for, rather than feel entitled to, their votes.

SOURCE

*******************************

ASTROTURF

Is this the October surprise from the Donks?

A new Republican women's group who is "fed up with Trump" and pouring cash into toss-up congressional districts is bankrolled solely by a male billionaire venture capitalist who is a major donor to Democratic campaigns and causes, Federal Election Commission filings show.

Republican Women for Progress, a Washington, D.C.-based "grassroots" nonprofit, was founded by Jennifer Pierotti Lim and Meghan Milloy and is comprised of "right-leaning" women who are opposed to President Donald Trump. The group has garnered glowing national media profiles that include a ten-minute segment on CBS News and articles in publications such as Glamour, Slate, and others.

The group is so far active in competitive congressional districts in New Jersey, Kentucky, and Michigan.

"We think the best thing that we can do for the party and for the country right now is to make sure there are good women—Democrat or Republican—that are elected to office and who can serve as a check on this administration and on the president," Milloy told the Detroit Metro Times. "[This effort] really was inspired by us talking to Republican women in these districts where they said there was just no way that they could vote for the Republican."

The group established a political action committee, the Republican Women for Progress PAC, on Sept. 13 to support their work for the midterms and has since spent $231,000 on independent expenditures for voter recruitment and advertisement productions in the toss-up districts in three states.

The PAC disbursed $76,000 on ads and recruitment in support of Mikie Sherrill in New Jersey's 11th congressional district, $78,000 backing Amy McGrath in Kentucky's 6th congressional district, and $77,000 on Elissa Slotkin in Michigan's 8th congressional district.

The PAC's October quarterly filing—the first from the group—also shows that the group of Republican women is bankrolled by just one donor: Reid Hoffman, a venture capitalist and co-founder of LinkedIn, who is a major donor to Democrats. Hoffman cut a $400,000 to the PAC on Sept. 27, its filings show.

Hoffman has pushed millions into the coffers of Democratic committees and campaigns this cycle.

More HERE 

*********************************

The Trump Manufacturing Jobs Boom: 10 Times Obama's Over 21 Months

The Great Recession officially ended in June 2009, six months into former President Obama’s first term. The economy continued to shed jobs until the following March. Manufacturing was particularly hard hit, with almost 2.3 million manufacturing jobs—some 1 in 6—lost between January 2008 and March 2010.

As is the case during recoveries, jobs bounced back, with seasonally adjusted nonfarm employment expanding almost 12% from March 2010 until January 2017, when President Obama handed over the presidency to Donald Trump.

But during the same period, manufacturing employment grew only 7.7% with manufacturing payrolls virtually flat in the last 21 months of the Obama administration.

We were told it was the new normal.

At a town hall in June 2016, President Obama famously said that some manufacturing jobs “are just not going to come back.” He went on to mock then-candidate Trump by saying he’d need a “magic wand” to make good on this manufacturing job promises.

Months later, as the shock of a President-elect Donald Trump was still being absorbed, New York Times columnist and economist Paul Krugman tweeted on November 25, 2016, “Nothing policy can do will bring back those lost jobs. The service sector is the future of work; but nobody wants to hear it.”

Well, a funny thing happened—Trump’s policies, and just as importantly, the expectation of Trump’s policies, ignited a manufacturing resurgence.

In the first 21 months of the Trump presidency, nonfarm employment grew by a seasonally adjusted 2.6%. In the same period, manufacturing employment grew by 3.1%, reversing the trend under Obama when overall employment grew faster than employment in the manufacturing sector.

Comparing the last 21 months of the Obama administration with the first 21 months of Trump’s, shows that under Trump’s watch, more than 10 times the number of manufacturing jobs were added.

Three things likely sparked this manufacturing jobs spike.

First, eight years of the Obama Administration’s piling on regulation upon regulation, from labor rules, to the Clean Power Plan, to the implementation of ObamaCare, placed industry into a defensive crouch. Business leaders were fearful of investing capital, not knowing how the federal rules might capriciously change, thus wiping out their expected return on investment.

That defensiveness ended in November 2016 when the expectations of additional regulatory burdens under a prospective President Clinton vanished. Not coincidentally, manufacturing employment started its sustained upswing the very month of Krugman’s tweet.

Second, the Trump Administration’s deregulatory practice exceeded expectations, with red tape being cut at a faster clip than achieved under President Ronald Reagan 36 years earlier.

Third, with the Republican Congress, President Trump delivered on a major overhaul of the tax code, including a significant cut to business taxes as well as a change to the treatment of overseas profits that incentivized the repatriation of some $300 billion in the first quarter of 2018 out of what the Federal Reserve estimates is $1 trillion in multinational profits held abroad.

Whether this manufacturing jobs boom will continue is now largely dependent on the Trump Administration’s high-stakes trade stand-off with the People’s Republic of China.

Some economists warn that Trump’s tariffs put our healthy economic expansion (stimulated by tax cuts and deregulation) at risk. The administration’s defenders, on the other hand, see tariffs not as an end to themselves, as they were with the protectionist Smoot-Hawley Tariff of 1930, but as part of a wider effort to renegotiate the terms of trade with China. Included in the effort are the difficult issues of widespread and systematic Chinese intellectual property theft and opaque non-tariff barriers.

Past performance is no guarantee—but so far, President Trump’s pro-growth policies have confounded his critics’ predictions with the prime beneficiaries being hard-working Americans.

SOURCE 

********************************

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 (Pictorial) or  here  (Personal)

**************************

Donald Trump: 'I'm a Nationalist'

His initial hesitancy in using that term is understandable.  In one sense it can mean a desire to make your country rule other countries -- but it can also mean nothing more than an appreciation of your own country's special characteristics and a desire to promote and restore them.  Trump is clearly in the latter camp.

The Left want to destroy everything that is unique and good about America.  As Obama said to immense cheers from his followers ten years ago, they want to "fundamentally transform" America.  The present hysterical hostility to Trump is hostility to what he stands for:  America and ordinary Americans.  Under Obama they had made a start on destroying much that was American, only to have that snatched away from them by Trump


Washington: US President Donald Trump has declared he's a "nationalist" at a campaign rally on as he appealed to Texas Republicans to re-elect Senator Ted Cruz and help the party keep control of Congress.

Trump ran for president as a nationalist, declaring he would place "America first" in his policies. But he has previously declined to label himself, even telling the Wall Street Journal in an April 2017 interview, "hey, I'm a nationalist and a globalist. I'm both."

At the time, some members of his administration were considered globalists by their critics, including former National Economic Council director Gary Cohn.

Trump's declaration on Monday, US time, came as he criticised Democrats, associating them with "corrupt, power-hungry globalists".

"You know what a globalist is, right?" Trump asked his audience. "A globalist is a person that wants the globe to do well, frankly not caring about our country so much. And you know what? We can't have that.

"You know, they have a word - it sort of became old-fashioned - it's called nationalist. And I say, really, we're not supposed to use that word.

"You know what I am? I'm a nationalist, OK - I'm a nationalist,' the President said. 'Use that word."

SOURCE

***********************************

Military Poll a Morale Victory for Trump
   
Under Barack Obama, the biggest threat to our military might have been the policies of the man in charge of it. From the toppling of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” to the rollout of open transgenderism, most service members couldn’t wait to get back to the business of warfighting. In 2016, they got their wish. After eight long years, the new commander-in-chief went to work, rescuing our troops from the radical grip of the Obama years. “I want a very, very strong military,” Donald Trump said. And he is proving it.

It wasn’t easy restoring a sense of pride to a military devastated by two terms of social engineering. But this president didn’t wilt under the pressure. He walked right into the fire and did what was right — whether the issue was the budget, sexuality, faith, gender, or draft-related. Now, almost two years into upending the policies of Obama, Trump’s troops are showing their gratitude. About 44 percent of active-duty troops have a favorable view of the commander-in chief — nine points higher than Obama’s top mark.

Of course, the headlines will be misleading. Even the reporters at the Military Times, who conducted the poll, say the president’s support is “fading.” But barely. Unlike Barack Obama, who watched his approval rating fall through basement — barely cracking 15 percent when he left office — Donald Trump is only 2.8 points off his 46.1 percent mark from inauguration day. That’s almost within the statistical margin of error. Obama’s support, on the other hand, almost completely evaporated, dropping 25 points between 2009 and 2015.

When it comes to Trump’s actual policies, the numbers are night and day. “Troops surveyed continue to give high marks to the president for his handling of military issues specifically,” the survey points out. “More than 60 percent said they believe the military is in better shape now than it was under President Barack Obama, and nearly the same number have a favorable view of his handling of the military.” Only 13 percent think Obama’s military was in better shape than Trump’s. That shouldn’t be surprising. Instead of dismantling the military like the last administration, this president is focused on rebuilding it. And when he does, it’s with an eye on their mission — not his.

“Trump has done some things to win the hearts of the military, whether it has been the budget or just avoiding a foreign policy catastrophe,” said political science professor Peter Feaver. “And he has talked about the importance of the military, making it a focus of his campaign and presidency.” Some of the men and women interviewed agreed. “[Trump’s] definitely improving the readiness of the military and giving us the resources we need to get the mission done, not hamstringing us by cutting our budget,” said Staff Sgt. Kyle Overholser, an airman stationed in Arizona.

And while officers trail in their enthusiasm of Trump, even their favorability ratings have jumped 10 points — from 31 percent a year ago to 41 percent now. In the enlisted ranks, there’s always been a more positive opinion of the president than negative. Gender seems to be the only real divide. Female troops (who made up just 11 percent of the respondents) are much less supportive of this White House than their male counterparts.

Thanks to President Trump, the military is finally fighting something other than the culture wars. And honestly, that’s the difference between his administration and Obama’s. This president uses our troops to advance America’s interests — not his own. And our service members aren’t the only appreciative ones!

SOURCE

*********************************

Voices of Reason — and Unreason

Susan Collins put on a clinic in thoroughness and justice
   
What did the Kavanaugh controversy tell us about our historical moment? It underscored what we already know, that America is politically and culturally divided and that activists and the two parties don’t just disagree with but dislike and distrust each other. We know also the Supreme Court has come to be seen not only as a constitutional (and inevitably political) body but as a cultural body. It follows cultural currents, moods, assumptions. It has frequently brushed past the concept of democratic modesty to make decisions that would most peacefully be left to the people, at the ballot box, after national debate. So citizens will experience the court as having great power over their lives, and nominations to the court will inevitably draw passion. And this was a fifth conservative seat on a nine-person court.

But the Kavanaugh hearings had some new elements. There were no boundaries on inquiry, no bowing to the idea of a private self. Accusations were made about the wording of captions under yearbook photos. The Senate showed a decline in public standards of decorum. A significant number of senators no longer even pretend to have class or imitate fairness. The screaming from the first seconds of the first hearings, the coordinated interruptions, the insistent rudeness and accusatory tones — none of it looked like the workings of the ordered democracy that has been the envy of the world.

Two Republican senators this week wrote to me with a sound of mourning. One found it “amazing” and “terrifying” that “seemingly, and without very much thought, nearly half the United States Senate has abandoned the presumption of innocence in this country, all to achieve a political goal.” The other cited “a truly disturbing result: One of the great political parties abandoning the Constitutionally-based traditions of due process and presumption of innocence.”

At the very least, Senate Democrats overplayed their hand.

My bias in cases of sexual abuse and assault, and it is a bias, is in favor of the woman. I give her words greater weight because I have not in my personal experience seen women lie about such allegations, and I know the reasons they have, in the past, kept silent. If you know your biases and are serious, you will try to be fair — not to overcorrect but to maintain standards. On Sept. 16, the day the charges made by Christine Blasey Ford appeared in the Washington Post, I was certain that more witnesses and information would come forward. We would see where justice lay. The great virtue of the #MeToo movement is that the whole phenomenon was broken open by numbers and patterns — numbers of victims, patterns of behavior, and the deep reporting that uncovered both. In this case great reporters tried to nail down Ms. Ford’s story. But they did not succeed. The New Yorker story that followed was dramatic but unpersuasive, a hand grenade whose pin could not be pulled. The final allegation, about rape-train parties and spiked punch, was not in the least credible.

It was Ms. Ford’s story that was compelling, but in need of support or corroboration. It did not come.

It was a woman who redeemed the situation, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine. In her remarks announcing her vote, she showed a wholly unusual respect for the American people, and for the Senate itself, by actually explaining her thinking. Under intense pressure, her remarks were not about her emotions. She weighed the evidence, in contrast, say, to Sen. Cory Booker, who attempted to derail the hearings from the start and along the way compared himself to Spartacus. Though Spartacus was a hero, not a malignant buffoon.

Ms. Collins noted that she had voted in favor of justices nominated by George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump. She considers qualifications, not party. She reviewed Brett Kavanaugh’s 12-year judicial record, including more than 300 opinions, speeches and law-review articles; she met with Judge Kavanaugh for more than two hours, and spoke with him again for an hour by phone with more questions.

She judged him centrist in his views and well within the mainstream of judicial thought. He believes, he told her, the idea of precedent is not only a practice or tradition but a tenet rooted in the Constitution.

As to Ms. Ford’s charges, since the confirmation process is not a trial, the rules are more elastic. “But certain fundamentally legal principles about due process, the presumption of innocence, and fairness do bear on my thinking, and I cannot abandon them.”

“We must always remember that it is when passions are most inflamed that fairness is most in jeopardy.” She called the gang-rape charge an “outlandish allegation” with no credible evidence.

At this point it was understood the Democrats had gone too far.

It is believable, said Ms. Collins, that Ms. Ford is a survivor of sexual assault and that the trauma “has upended her life.” But the four witnesses she named could not corroborate her account. None had any recollection of the party; her lifelong friend said under penalty of felony that she neither remembers such an event nor even knows Brett Kavanaugh.

Ms. Collins said she has been “alarmed and disturbed” by those who suggest that unless Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination was rejected, the Senate would somehow be condoning sexual assault: “Nothing could be further from the truth.”

The atmosphere surrounding the nomination has been “politically charged” and reached “fever pitch” even before the Ford and other charges. It has been challenging to separate fact from fiction. But a decision must be made. Judge Kavanaugh’s record has been called one of “an exemplary public servant, judge, teacher, coach, husband, and father.” Her hope is he “will work to lessen the divisions in the Supreme Court so that we have far fewer 5-4 decisions and so that public confidence in our judiciary and our highest court is restored.”

And so, she said, she would vote to confirm.

It was a master class in what a friend called “old-style thoroughness combined with a feeling for justice.”

A word on the destructive theatrics we now see gripping parts of the Democratic Party. The howling and screeching that interrupted the hearings and the voting, the people who clawed on the door of the court, the ones who chased senators through the halls and screamed at them in elevators, who surrounded and harassed one at dinner with his wife, who disrupted and brought an air of chaos, who attempted to thwart democratic processes so that the people could not listen and make their judgments:

Do you know how that sounded to normal people, Republican and Democratic and unaffiliated? It sounded demonic. It didn’t sound like “the resistance” or #MeToo. It sounded like the shrieking in the background of an old audiotape of an exorcism.

Democratic leaders should stand up to the screamers. They haven’t, because they’re afraid of them. But things like this spread and deepen. Stand up to your base. It’s leading you nowhere good. And you know it.

SOURCE

*************************************

Top 3% of U.S. Taxpayers Paid Majority of Income Taxes in 2016

Individual income taxes are the federal government’s single biggest revenue source. In fiscal year 2018, which ended Sept. 30, the individual income tax is expected to bring in roughly $1.7 trillion, or about half of all federal revenues, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

Bloomberg looked into the 2016 individual returns data in detail for some additional insights:

The top 1 percent paid a greater share of individual income taxes (37.3 percent) than the bottom 90 percent combined (30.5 percent).

The top 50 percent of all taxpayers paid 97 percent of total individual income taxes.

Top 3% of U.S. Taxpayers Paid Majority of Income Taxes in 2016
In other words, the bottom 50 percent paid 3 percent. Which small percentile of tax payers also paid 3 percent or more? You might have guessed it. It is the top 0.001%, or about 1,400 taxpayers. That group alone paid 3.25 percent of all income taxes.

The individual income tax system is designed to be progressive – those with higher incomes pay at higher rates.

SOURCE

***********************************

Global Competitiveness Report: U.S. is World’s Most Competitive Economy, Closest to ‘Ideal State’

The United States has the most competitive economy in the world, according to the 2018 Global Competitiveness Report published by the World Economic Forum.

“The United States is the closest economy to the frontier, the ideal state, where a country would obtain the perfect score on every component of the index,” the report reads.

The United States obtained a competitiveness score of 85.6% on the scale of zero to 100, which places it in the top spot among 140 countries, states the report.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the U.S. has not reached the No. 1 spot “since 2008,” when “the financial crisis stalled output and triggered a global economic slowdown.”

Singapore occupies the No. 2 spot (83.5%), followed by Germany in third place (82.8%).

The report “assesses the competitiveness landscape of 140 economies” and “provides insight into the drivers of economic growth in the era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.”

The new Global Competitive Index (GCI) 4.0, which is featured in the document, includes 98 indicators that are grouped into “12 pillars of competitiveness.” The pillars are “Institutions, Infrastructure, ICT adoption; Macroeconomic stability; Health; Skills; Product market; Labour market; Financial system; Market size; Business dynamism; and Innovation capability.”

Among these pillars, the U.S. ranks the highest in three, including Labour market, Financial system and Business dynamism. It ranks second in Market size and Innovation capability, and third in Skills and Product market.

Despite the U.S.’s glowing competitiveness score, however, the report pointed out that there is still “room for improvement.”

“With a competitiveness score of 85.6, it is 14 points away from the frontier mark of 100, implying that even the top-ranked economy among the 140 has room for improvement.”

Some areas of improvement include Health, in which the U.S. scored 47th, as well as Homicide rate (92), Complexity of tariffs (108) and Imports % of GDP (136).

The median competitiveness score of all 140 countries is only 60.0%, according to the report. Chad, with 35.5%, holds the lowest spot.

According to the report, the GCI 4.0 weighs pillars “equally rather than according to a country’s current stage of development. In essence, the index offers each economy a level playing field to determine its path to growth.”

SOURCE

********************************

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 (Pictorial) or  here  (Personal)

**************************

JAMAL KHASHOGGI: The terrorist truth behind the media lies

In high school, Jamal Khashoggi had a good friend. His name was Osama bin Laden.

“We were hoping to establish an Islamic state anywhere,” Khashoggi reminisced about their time together in the Muslim Brotherhood. “We believed that the first one would lead to another, and that would have a domino effect which could reverse the history of mankind.”

The friendship endured with Jamal Khashoggi following Osama bin Laden to Afghanistan. Khashoggi credited Adel Batterjee, listed at one time as one of “the world’s foremost terrorist financiers” by the Treasury Department, with bringing him to Afghanistan to report on the fighting.

The media calls Khashoggi a journalist, but his writings from 80s Afghanistan read as Jihadist propaganda with titles like, "Arab Mujahadeen in Afghanistan II: Exemplifies the Unity of Islamic Ummah".

And when Osama bin Laden set up Al Qaeda, he called Khashoggi with the details.

After Afghanistan, Jamal Khashoggi went to work as a media adviser for former Saudi intel boss, Prince Turki bin Faisal, alleged to have links to Al Qaeda. Those allegations came from, among others,  Zacarias Moussaoui, the alleged twentieth hijacker.

When the other 19 hijackers perpetrated the attacks of September 11, Khashoggi wrote that the Saudis would not “give in” to American “demands” for “unconditional condemnation” and “total cooperation”.

"Saudis tend to link the ugliness of what happened in New York and Washington with what has happened and continues to happen in Palestine. It is time that the United States comes to understand the effect of its foreign policy and the consequences of that policy," he declared.

"A Muslim cannot be happy with the suffering of others. Even if this suffering is that of Americans who neglected the suffering of Palestinians for half a century."

That’s the real Khashoggi, a cynical and manipulative apologist for Islamic terrorism, not the mythical martyred dissident whose disappearance the media has spent the worst part of a week raving about.

Jamal Khashoggi was not a moderate. Some describe him as the leader of the Saudi Muslim Brotherhood. The Islamist network admires Hitler and seeks to impose Islamic law around the world. Nor was he a supporter of freedom of the press. In one of his Al Jazeera appearances, he complained that the Saudi government was allowing some journalists to report positively on Israel.

His final project, DAWN or Democracy for the Arab World Now was meant to aid Islamists. According to Azzam Al-Tamimi, an old Muslim Brotherhood ally aiding Jamal, "The Muslim Brothers and Islamists were the biggest victims of the foiled Arab spring." Al-Tamimi has endorsed suicide bombings.

But unlike Osama bin Laden, Khashoggi did not use the Muslim Brotherhood as a gateway drug to the pure and uncut violence of Al Qaeda or ISIS. He was still betting on a political takeover. As he recently put it, “Democracy and political Islam go together.”

Khashoggi went on making the case for the Islamic state of the Muslim Brotherhood. He went on making that case even as the Saudis decided that the Brotherhood had become too dangerous.

Like his old friend, Jamal Khashoggi went into exile in a friendly Islamist country. Osama bin Laden found refuge in Pakistan and Khashoggi ended up in Turkey. The Khashoggi family had originated from Turkey. And Turkey was swiftly becoming the leading Sunni Islamist power in the region. Living in Turkey put Khashoggi at the intersection of the Turkish-Qatari backers of the Brotherhood and the Western media.

His disappearance has touched off fury and anger from the Islamist regime that harbored him. And it has also set off an unprecedented firestorm of rage and grief by the American media which adored him.

Media spin describes Khashoggi as a dissident. And he certainly was that. But so was Osama bin Laden.

What Khashoggi wasn’t, was a moderate. No more so than the Muslim Brotherhood. He wasn’t a proponent of human rights, but of Islamic rule. He could be found on Al Jazeera, Qatar’s Jihadist propaganda network, bemoaning Saudi opposition to the Brotherhood and its friendliness to Israel.

"Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman should get rid of his complex against the Muslim Brotherhood and stop treating them as the enemy or a threat to Saudi Arabia," he complained, and urged the Saudis to fight Israel instead.

 Jamal Khashoggi’s career of spouting Muslim Brotherhood propaganda for his new Turkish and Qatari masters came to an end in a curious way. Before Khashoggi allegedly entered the Saudi embassy, from which Turkey claims that he disappeared, he told his Turkish fiancé to call Yasin Aktay if he didn’t return.

Yasin Aktay is the Turkish equivalent of Obama’s Ben Rhodes, and served as the AKP Islamist ruling party’s spokesman. Why call one of the regime’s top propagandists instead of the police?

Before the summer coup of 2016, Turkey was said to have 50,000 political prisoners. Many of them were members of the country’s oppressed Kurdish minority which is deprived of its most basic civil rights. These include even the use of their own language. Doing so can carry a prison sentence.

In that terrible summer, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Turkey’s Islamic tyrant, finished securing his absolute hold on power with the coup as his Reichstag fire. The alleged coup became a blank check for the mass arrest and torture of countless thousands of political prisoners. Amnesty International estimated that 50,000 had been detained. The UN listed a figure as high as 180,000. They included 300 journalists.

Lawyers described clients being brought to them covered in blood.

Erdogan went after professors, judges, law enforcement, the military and the last remnants of a free press. A Human Rights Watch report documented electric shocks, beatings with truncheons and rubber hoses, and rape by Erdogan’s Islamic thugs. Heads were banged against walls. Men were forced to kneel on burning hot asphalt. Medical reports showed skull fractures, damage to testicles and dehydration.

The media didn’t show any of the hysterical outrage at these crimes that it has over the disappearance of Jamal Khashoggi. The media cares more about Khashoggi, a former media mouthpiece of the Saudi regime before it turned on his Muslim Brotherhood brothers, than about 300 Turkish reporters.

It’s not hypocrisy, it’s consistency.

Erdogan and Khashoggi are both militant Islamic activists. And their opponents, the victims of Erdogan’s Reichstag fire and the new Saudi king, had fallen afoul of them for being insufficiently militantly Islamist.

The media will always take the side of Islamists over non-Islamists. That’s why it bleeds for Khashoggi.

There was a reason why Jamal Khashoggi felt so comfortable in Turkey, while actual journalists in the country were terrified of being locked up, tortured and disappeared. If that was the fate that befell Khashoggi, it was a commonplace one in Turkey. And it may have been carried out by his own Turkish allies who decided that their Saudi subversive had more value as a false flag martyr than a house guest.

The media’s disproportionate outrage over Khashoggi has nothing to do with human rights. If it did, the media would have been just as outraged at the arrests and torture of tens of thousands in Turkey.

It’s not. And it won’t be.

And the politicians shrilly urging that we punish the Saudis never thought about curtailing arms sales to Turkey. Many of the same politicians were unhappy when President Trump used economic pressure on Erdogan in an effort to free American hostages, like Pastor Andrew Brunson, being held by Turkey.

This is about Islam.

The struggle between Saudi Arabia and the UAE on the one hand, and Turkey, Qatar and Iran on the other, is the next stage of the Arab Spring. And, from Yemen to Turkey, the media has made no secret of being on the Islamist side. Its outrage over Khashoggi, like its claims of a human rights crisis over the Saudi bombings in Yemen, are not journalism, they’re the political spin of the Islamist axis.

The media has reported every claim of victimhood by the Muslim Brotherhood and Qatar’s Al Jazeera propaganda arm, while giving as little attention as possible to the victims of Muslim Brotherhood church bombings. Its coverage of Israel has been little more than terrorist propaganda since Osama was in diapers. Its coverage of the Khashoggi case is every bit as dishonest as its slanted attacks on the Saudi embargo of Qatar, as its propaganda about the wars in Yemen and Libya, and just as devoid of context.

The Khashoggi case demands context.

Before the media and the politicians who listen to it drag the United States into a conflict with Saudi Arabia over a Muslim Brotherhood activist based on the word of an enemy country still holding Americans hostage, we deserve the context.

And we deserve the truth.

The media wants the Saudis to answer questions about Jamal Khashoggi. But maybe the media should be forced to answer why the Washington Post was working with a Muslim Brotherhood propagandist?

The real mystery isn’t Khashoggi’s disappearance. It’s why Republicans aren’t asking those questions.

The media’s relationship with Khashoggi is far more damning than anything the Saudis might have done to him. And the media should be held accountable for its relationship with Osama bin Laden’s old friend.

SOURCE 

************************************

Ben Carson Takes on High Housing Costs

When Ben Carson was appointed the nation’s 17th secretary of housing and urban development, there were ample reasons to doubt his qualifications, and the first few months of his time in office were largely dominated by missteps and misstatements, including a mini-scandal over a $31,000 dining table, which seemed to validate his critics.

But since then, Carson has quietly pushed a number of policy initiatives that could cement his legacy as one of Trump’s most consequential cabinet members. If successful, Carson’s efforts could be some of the biggest boosts for the poor and disadvantaged to come out of Washington in quite some time.

Carson has not hesitated to challenge many of his department’s sacred cows. He’s called for the elimination of Community Development Block Grants, long known as a source of both corruption and political patronage, and he’s been willing to slash some of the bureaucratic red tape that has long afflicted HUD. He’s also shown a willingness to adjust rents in public housing in an effort to control the department’s ballooning expenditures.

But Carson’s most important initiative — and the one that holds the most promise — is his full-frontal assault on zoning and land-use ordinances that deprive the poor of affordable housing.

Born largely out of racism (Baltimore’s zoning laws, for instance, explicitly prohibited anyone from buying a house or renting on a block where more than half the residents were of a different race), zoning has evolved into a tool for wealthy property owners to protect their property values at the expense of the poor and minorities. It is a simple question of supply and demand: By restricting the supply of new housing, zoning and land-use regulations drive up the cost of housing and rents beyond the reach of many poor Americans. Studies show that such regulations add as much as 20 percent to the cost of a home in Baltimore, Boston, and Washington, 30 percent in Los Angeles and Oakland, and an astounding 50 percent or more in cities such as San Francisco, New York, and San Jose.

Is it any wonder that the poor have trouble finding affordable housing?

The traditional response to this regulation-driven increase in housing costs has been to simply chase rising costs with higher subsidies. That is the approach currently championed by California senator and probable 2020 presidential candidate Kamala Harris, who has sponsored legislation that would provide a tax credit to subsidize rents for families earning as much as $125,000 per year whose housing costs exceed 30 percent of their income.

But instead of pursuing this costly policy that mostly redounds to the benefit of landlords, Carson has decided to go directly after the source of the problem. Specifically, he has let it be known that he intends to link federal housing funds to local officials’ willingness to reduce regulations that restrict affordable housing. He wants to ensure that if mayors and governors continue to pander to wealthy special interests by enacting barriers to housing construction, Washington will no longer bail them out.

The high cost of housing is an important factor in trapping millions of Americans in poverty. On average, Americans in the lowest third of incomes spend more than 40 percent of their income on housing, a number that rises to more than 50 percent for renters. In addition, high housing costs can prevent geographic mobility, making it all but impossible for the poor to move to areas with less crime, more jobs, and better schools. Zoning also continues to be an important factor in reinforcing American racial segregation.

Carson aims to change this state of affairs for the better. “We’ve been looking for ways that we can remove some of the restrictions nationally and some of these zoning ordinances nationally so that we can, in fact, build more affordable housing,” he has said. “Because we have the capacity to do it; we just have to be able to get out of our own way.”

If he’s able to make good on that potential, Carson will strike a powerful blow on behalf of the poor and vulnerable. And in that case, his critics might be forced to admit that they severely underestimated him.

SOURCE 

************************************

Pelosi calls border wall ‘immoral’ — while protecting her Napa vineyard with one

Self-proclaimed future House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is laying out her priorities for after Democrats’ assumed victory in the midterms, and she’s made it clear there’s “nothing” that will persuade her to approve President Trump’s promised border wall.

Erecting a big beautiful wall along the nation’s southern border to stop the steady flood of illegal immigrants and drugs is “immoral, expensive, ineffective, not something that people do between countries,” Pelosi said in response to a question at Harvard’s Institute of Politics on Tuesday, according to The Harvard Gazette.

“In any event it happens to be like a manhood issue for the president,” she said, “and it’s wrong and I’m not interested in that.”

A wall to protect the nation from illegal and dangerous intruders – “immoral,” not interested. But wall to protect Pelosi’s posh Napa Valley vineyard, that’s totally different. The Trump-supporting duo Diamond and Silk exposed Pelosi’s hypocritical position on immigration in the hilarious and timely documentary “Dummycrats,” which premiered in Washington, D.C. this week.



In the movie, presented by The American Mirror, the sisters from North Carolina explain how Democrats often say one thing, they do whatever they want. The flick features Pelosi, Bill and Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama denouncing a border wall, while highlighting the fences, guard shacks and brick barriers that separate the unwashed masses from their mega-mansions and lavish properties.

Diamond and Silk also take to the streets of Pelosi’s San Francisco district to document the impact of her brand of progressive politics: illegal plastic straws but free plastic drug needles, resources for illegal immigrants amid an epidemic of homeless citizens, and streets littered with garbage, used needles and human feces.

The girls “talk about what’s happening right now in these communities,” Diamond told The Epoch Times. “People living in tents, people defecating on the streets. That’s a problem that’s got to be solved.”

Diamond and Silk’s message is simple: “We are holding Congress accountable. Long gone are the days when you can walk in poor come out rich.

SOURCE 

*******************************

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 (Pictorial) or  here  (Personal)

**************************

The party of Antifa fascists?

Do we really want these intolerant, violent mobs and their representatives running America?

Paul Driessen

Who are the “Antifa” mobs? What are they doing to our country? How long will we tolerate them?

The Brett Kavanaugh confirmation hearings were their latest excuse for tantrums and intolerance. Dismissing fairness, propriety and due process, they screamed that mere allegations of misconduct were enough to bar him from the Supreme Court, despite no corroborating evidence or witnesses.

Vicious harassment of senators and White House officials in restaurants, streets, grocery stores, and Senate offices and elevators was matched by ambush tactics and despicable behavior by Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats. If Justice Clarence Thomas’s confirmation hearings were “an electronic lynching,” those hearings were an electronic assault on a respected jurist, his wife and young daughters.

When Kavanaugh fought back, the same Senators and their media friends said he “lacked the proper temperament” to be on the Court. (Apparently, he should have just tried to enjoy the experience.)

The fact is, Democrats and their allies had said in lockstep and from the outset that they intended to keep any Trump nominee off our highest court. The Women’s March mistakenly released a statement saying it opposed the “nomination of XX” to the Court. (They forgot to fill in the blank.) They view the Court as their supreme state and national legislature: it’s far easier to get 5 votes than 5 million or 50 million.

In reality, this ongoing attempted rule by mob (with Portland, Oregon a prime example) goes back to the 2016 elections that put Donald Trump in the White House. The mobs weren’t just disappointed that Hillary Clinton had not won. They were enraged. And they’ve remained so ever since.

In fact, their furor goes back even further – to mounds of excrement they left behind in North Dakota, for instance, where they tried to block the Dakota Access Pipeline, by burning and bombing bridges, threatening local residents and killing cattle. One “peaceful protester” tried to shoot a deputy sheriff.

In another example, they enlisted state attorneys general, universities, wealthy leftwing foundations and private law firms (on a contingency fee basis) to bring RICO and other actions against scientists and think tanks that voice skepticism about “cataclysmic manmade climate change.” On college campuses they have banned, disinvited, mobbed, harassed or just plain screamed over 300 conservative speakers into silence. Being a Republican or wearing a Trump MAGA hat can get you beaten, or worse.

They forget President Obama’s dictum: “Elections have consequences.” One is the President’s right to nominate Federal judges. But from their perspective, “consequences” must never apply when they lose – and the Electoral College must be abolished when it works as our Founding Fathers intended: to keep populous urban areas from dominating presidential elections and imposing a tyranny of the majority. (The fact that 85% of all US counties voted for Donald Trump illustrates this principle in action.)

In most of these cases, “they” are the Antifa mobs. Antifa being short for “anti-fascist.” Don’t be conned.

The Antifa mobs are fascists! And they have become the ski-masked thug wing of the Democratic Party.

They (and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Kyrsten Sinema, Andrew Gillum, Bernie Sanders and other favored candidates) certainly espouse socialism as their vehicle for wealth redistribution. However, in almost every other respect, their philosophies and actions reflect fascism, which is generally defined as:

A political system in which an authoritarian government does not own businesses and industries, but strictly regulates and controls their actions, output and rights – while forcibly controlling and suppressing citizens and their thought and speech via stringent laws, intimidation and even violence.

Sadly, the Democratic Party is slipping further into these tendencies, becoming ever more closely aligned with these radicals. It relies on Antifa thugs to “rally the base,” intimidate and abuse Republican voters and candidates, and get Democrat (and “undocumented”) voters to the polls. Like too many in the “mainstream” news media, Democrats refuse to condemn the mob behavior – and say it’s wrong to even call them mobs. They’re just concerned citizens, peaceably assembling and seeking redress of their grievances. Right. (Hint: You don’t like being called fascist mobs? Stop behaving like fascist mobs.)

“You cannot be civil with a political party that wants to destroy what you stand for, what you care about,” Hillary Clinton said recently. So instead of civil debates we’re to have civil war over whose vision and agenda will rule? Is there something wrong, antiquated or “threatening” about debating issues?

Former Attorney General Eric Holder said, when Republicans “go low” with their rhetoric, “we kick them.” Rep. Maxine Waters (R-CA) incites Antifa mobs by ranting, “If you see anybody from the Trump Administration in a restaurant, in a department store, tell them they’re not welcome anymore, anywhere.”

Now on top of the speech codes, trigger warnings, boycotts, censorship, groupthink and identity politics, Google, Facebook and Twitter control and restrict access to conservative views; crowd funding sites prevent conservative groups from raising money; and the Obama IRS prevented Tea Party groups from getting the tax status needed to operate. When all that fails, we’re supposed to tolerate mobs and riots.

On campuses, LGBTQ diversity is virtuous. Diversity of viewpoints or political affiliation is intolerable. Some say Republicans want to control what you do in your bedroom. But Democrats want to control everything you do anywhere outside your bedroom. And Antifa mobs will keep you quiet and in line.

Antifa thugs fire-bombed a North Carolina Republican office and trashed another one in New York City, where they left a note that said, “This is just the beginning.”Others knocked a 71-year-old female congressional staffer unconscious! It even reached the point where a rabid Bernie Sanders supporter tried to gun down Republican legislators and staffers who were practicing for a charity baseball event.

Indeed, death on a large scale, to serve state or other “higher interests,” is another aspect of fascism. We see that with millions of people dying every year in Africa and Asia, because pressure groups deny them access to energy, insect control, water purification, agricultural and other modern technologies, in the name of protecting the environment from dangerous climate change, chemicals and biotechnology.

There are crazy ironies, too. Google helps the Chinese Communist Government prevent its citizens from accessing “forbidden” knowledge and ideas – but then claims helping the US Defense Department with Cloud computing or artificial intelligence surveillance would “violate its principles.”

Around many neighborhoods, signs proclaim “Hate has no home here,” in multiple languages, with an American flag heart logo reminiscent of the Obama campaign logo – in liberals’ yards. The signs are part of a project that “promotes just and inclusive communities.” Trump supporters need not apply.

Democrats appear to be depending on all of this to counter a possible “red wave” – and regain control of the House of Representatives and maybe even the Senate. If they succeed even with just the House, Democrat congressional committees will investigate, interrogate and try to impeach Trump, Kavanaugh and other officials. They will impede and obstruct everything the Trump Administration tries to do.

They’ll also try to abolish ICE, block the Wall, pack the Supreme Court, ban guns, bash Israel – and replace the fossil fuels that provide 80% of our energy with “100% renewable energy” that is so expensive and unreliable it will bring our industries, economy and nation to its knees, while blanketing rural and habitat land, damaging people’s health and property rights, and butchering birds and bats by the millions.

Our rebounding energy, employment, economy, markets and living standards would get rolled back.

Victorious Democrats would also end congressional investigations into the Hillary-Deep State-DNC-Russian-Clinton Foundation collusion and corruption. All the players in these massive, sordid affairs will be deemed “too big to jail” – and too closely tied to the Democratic Party to be investigated further.

Some say the Antifa-Schumer-Pelosi-Clinton-Holder-Waters strategy will backfire. I hope that happens, because it would be disastrous if these people run Congress, America and our lives. But I won’t bank on it.

If you’re worried too (and you should be), get inspired and involved. Above all, VOTE! Vote to preserve our democratic Republic, our freedoms, our booming economy, reliable and affordable energy for all Americans – and equal justice for all, based on the presumption of innocence until proven guilty.

Via email

************************************

The Democrats are wrong about tax cuts and deregulation

By Geoff Diehl (R) Mass. State rep.

In December 2017, Senator Elizabeth Warren teamed up with Bernie Sanders to complain in The New York Times that the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, then on its way to being passed by Congress, would be “an enormous tax giveaway to the wealthy.” In a subsequent interview on CNBC, Warren opined that the act gave “$1.5 trillion away to the richest Americans and the biggest corporations, and let everybody else pick up the crumbs.”

But if she delved into the economics of the legislation and addressed how it would benefit her constituents, she would find that the act has significantly helped the Massachusetts economy. According to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, about 80 percent of the Commonwealth’s taxpayers will receive a tax cut, helping people all across the board and creating a surplus of $1.2 billion in revenue for the state.

The key provision of the Tax Cuts Act is the reduction in the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent. Never mind that the idea of reducing the US corporate tax rate, previously the highest in the world, has long had bipartisan support. And never mind that support for cutting the rate is based on data from the Tax Foundation showing that a lower tax rate would spur GDP growth, investment, and job creation.

In the short time since the passage of the act, we already have evidence of its effectiveness in promoting economic growth. US real GDP growth in the second quarter of 2018 was 83 percent greater than it was in the second quarter of 2016, the last year of the previous administration. The growth of real private fixed investment was 129 percent greater. The unemployment rate fell from 5.0 percent in September 2016 to 3.7 percent in September 2018

The Tax Cuts Act is not the only action to come out of Washington that has spurred the economy. There have been 74 recent steps to eliminate burdensome regulations that have played their own role in hindering the economy. It is worth delving further into the effects of the Tax Cuts Act, though, in order to grasp the class-warfare mindset that characterizes our senior senator.

The US economy grew 4.1 percent during the second quarter, a healthy clip that suggests the recovery may be accelerating.

Mainstream economic theory argues that a reduction in the corporate tax rate will incentivize corporations to invest and create jobs. The only question is how much investment and how many jobs. Using its peer-reviewed US Economic Model, the Beacon Hill Institute, a Massachusetts think tank, has found that the Tax Cuts Act will, by the end of 2018, have caused real US GDP to rise by $547 billion and private investment by $179 billion. It will have added 2.9 million new jobs to the US workforce. Massachusetts alone will have added 29,000 new jobs, $3.2 billion in private investment, and $6.7 billion in disposable income by the end of the year. Both the Tax Foundation and the Joint Committee on Taxation of the US Congress have likewise found positive effects on the economy.

For many Democrats, however, none of this matters. Corporations are just pots of money to be redistributed from self-interested shareholders to their own preferred social classes. They can’t grasp the idea that when shareholders are allowed to keep more of their profits, they will want to invest in plant, equipment, and job creation.

To avoid going back to a stagnant economy of no wage increases, no job growth, and high unemployment and underemployment, policies need to be evaluated by how they will affect Massachusetts industry and jobs. By decreasing regulations and taxes, we will continue to encourage entrepreneurs and small businesses, which create three out of every four new jobs in the Commonwealth.

To roll back the 2017 tax cuts and to reintroduce the regulations that have recently been lifted by the federal government would threaten to return the nation — and the state — to the economic doldrums that beset the Obama administration.

But we want to go forward, not backward. Congress needs to make the individual tax cuts in the Tax Cuts Act permanent and act on their many more proposed deregulatory measures that need to be undertaken if we are to keep the economy humming. It is necessary to expand the policies that have led the nation and the state to its current wave of prosperity and build toward the future rather than obstruct.

SOURCE 

*********************************

Go Figure: Federal Revenues Hit All-Time Highs Under Trump Tax Cuts

The Laffer curve agan

Critics of the Trump tax cuts said they would blow a hole in the deficit. Yet individual income taxes climbed 6% in the just-ended fiscal year 2018, as the economy grew faster and created more jobs than expected.

The Treasury Department reported this week that individual income tax collections for FY 2018 totaled $1.7 trillion. That's up $14 billion from fiscal 2017, and an all-time high. And that's despite the fact that individual income tax rates got a significant cut this year as part of President Donald Trump's tax reform plan.

Income Taxes After Trump Tax Cuts

True, the first three months of the fiscal year were before the tax cuts kicked in. But if you limit the accounting to this calendar year, individual income tax revenues are up by 5% through September.

Other major sources of revenue climbed as well, as the overall economy revived. FICA tax collections rose by more than 3%. Excise taxes jumped 13%.

The only category that was down? Corporate income taxes, which dropped by 31%. Overall, federal revenues came in slightly higher in FY 2018 — up 0.5%.

Spending, on the other hand, was $127 billion higher in fiscal 2018. As a result, deficits for 2018 climbed $113 billion.

Let's compare these results with Obama's last full fiscal year in office, 2016.

Individual income tax revenues went up by a mere 0.3%, Treasury data show. Fiscal 2016 also saw a 13% drop in corporate income taxes. FICA tax collections climbed by less than 1%. Excise tax collections dropped almost 3%.

Overall revenues increased by 0.5% — about the same as this year. The deficit? It climbed by $148 billion.

So, in other words, the government did better on revenues and deficits in the year after Trump's tax cuts went into effect than it did in Obama's last year in office.

Trump Tax Cuts To Blame For Deficit?
To this, critics say, yes, but revenues would have climbed faster had it not been for the tax cuts, because the economy was booming in 2018, unlike in 2016.

Not necessarily.

Yes, the economy was booming in fiscal 2018. But it probably wouldn't have been booming without the tax cuts. Had Trump not succeeded in getting his pro-growth tax cuts across the finish line, it's possible we'd have seen a year like Obama's last one. A sluggish economy, barely increasing federal revenues, and a large increase in deficits.

Does that mean Trump's tax cuts are fully "paying for themselves"? We wouldn't make that argument. But the faster economic growth is clearly offsetting at least some of their costs — which is precisely what backers said would happen.

What is unmistakable from the data, however, is that the Trump tax cuts are not entirely, or even mostly, responsible for the increase in the deficit. Blame for that rests squarely with spendthrifts in Congress — on both sides of the aisle — who refuse to bring federal spending under control.

So, the question is: Would it have been better to have kept taxes high, and sacrificed economic, job and wage gains we've been enjoying, so that the government could have collected a little bit more in taxes?

SOURCE 

**********************************

Evangelical leader: Not worth risking ties with Saudi Arabia over missing journalist

Robertson is diplomatically naive.  Any sanctions are likely to be symbolical and hence innocuous -- e.g. temporarily barring members of the administration from visiting Saudi

A prominent evangelical leader told viewers to “cool down the tempers of those who are screaming blood for the Saudis” and not risk a $100 billion arms deal over the apparent death of Saudi-born journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Appearing on Christian television show "The 700 Club," Pat Robertson, founder of the Christian Broadcasting Network, said America’s relationship with Saudi Arabia is too important to risk.

“These people are key allies,” Robertson said Monday on the show, first reported by Right Wing Watch. “I don’t think on this issue we need pull sanctions and get tough. I just think it’s a mistake.”

More HERE 

************************************

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 (Pictorial) or  here  (Personal)

**************************