Tag: democratic socialist

Mueller acted before Labor Day, but no one cared

It didn’t make headlines, but apparently Mueller did make a move before Labor Day.  Many media outlets waited breathlessly for something like an indictment of one of Trump’s sons, or a report calling for action on Trump himself.  Instead, the Special Counsel’s office sent a letter to Trump’s attorneys with requests for written responses regarding Russia and the election.  According to the unnamed sources, the questions steered away from obstruction.  This is the best case scenario for Trump since written answers will help him avoid the “perjury trap” that his attorneys had feared.  Trump shoots from the hip when he shoots his mouth off and is notorious for conflicting and changing statements.  Written answers will allow him and his lawyers to get their story straight and on the record.

Mueller passes on interview with Trump, requests written answers instead

Massachusetts is on track to make history.  For their state, that is.  The extreme liberal state will likely have their first African American Congresswoman after Ayanna Pressley beat out incumbent Michael Capuano in the Tuesday primary.  Pressley and Capuano saw eye to eye on many things, but Pressley was definitely more anti-cop.  She also is a Democratic Socialist, calling for Medicare for all and the 100% tax hike that goes with it, and the abolition of ICE.  Although, it’s not clear if she actually means that or like Ocasio-Cortez thinks abolition of ICE just means stopping the agents from raping women and razing villages in a manner like Ghengis Khan.  I think I might be mixing up quotes there.

Capuano responded to the loss saying “America is going to be OK”.  I suppose we will be, as long as we can keep Pressley’s anti-cop, open borders, extreme tax hikes and Medicare for all policies from becoming mainstream.  Although we do need to congratulate the extremely liberal northern state of Massachusetts for finally joining Florida, Texas, North Carolina, Alabama and some of the other backwards redneck states in finally electing an African American woman to Congress.  You’re a little late in the game, but I guess better late than never.

Another Democratic Socialist upsets long-time Democrat politician

The Florida race for governor is too close to call according to a new Quinnipiac poll.  Quinnipiac, which typically leans a couple points to the left, has the race at 50-47 with Andrew Gillum in the lead.  Gillum played the race card on Ron DeSantis within 24 hours of his primary victory, and he has struggled with questions of how to pay for his socialist agenda.  Gillum has also called for a “confederacy of states” to pass Medicare for all, and admitted that he intends to make Florida the highest tax state in the south.  Gillum has also called for relaxed borders and the abolition of ICE, whatever that means.

DeSantis is running on conservative libertarian values and has promised to continue the success of Governor Scott in Florida.  The Cato institute has ranked Florida as the #1 state when it comes to freedom.  The state also has a below average unemployment rate and has continued to see sustained economic growth since Scott was elected.  DeSantis made this point when he asked why Florida would want to harm it’s great economy with socialism.  Unfortunately, leftists only heard the word “monkey” in his phrase “monkey it up”.  Leftists and some in the media ignored the entire comment and assumed DeSantis was secretly calling Gillum a monkey to elicit support from white supremacists.

Sorry, it’s so ridiculous I had a hard time even writing that.  I guess Harry Reid was right.  Democrats will say whatever it takes to win elections as long as it furthers their agenda.

Gillum, DeSantis in dead heat

 

 

 

Cuomo: America was never great

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is in hot water for countering Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan with one of his own: “America was never that great”.  I don’t know how far that’s going to get him with the majority of Americans, but it will play well with the radical Democratic Socialists on the Left.  Just yesterday Bernie Sanders said America is “fundamentally immoral and wrong”.  Andrew Cuomo’s brother and CNN commentator Chris Cuomo recently got himself in trouble suggesting that punching right-wingers was morally justifiable.

Democrat governor says America was never great

Economists are taking Elizabeth Warren to task over her far fetched Accountable Capitalism Act.  Warren, who opposes free market capitalism, came up with the idea of having corporations have to obtain a “Federal charter” to operate.  The license, in addition to the hoops they have to jump through to work in their state, would raise $1 billion in fee taxes.  Warren’s so-called “charter” would require corporate directors to consider not just their stakeholders, but also their employees and communities.

Of course, this is moronic.  Any well run company has to consider the well-being of their employees and communities or the free market will eliminate that company from competition.  In fact, that point was made by none other than BET co-founder Robert Johnson.  The Black Entertainment Television co-founder said “Most companies and most boards look at all of their stakeholders, not only their shareholders. They look at their employees, they look at the community where they reside and do business, they look at even the vendors that they do business with. So I think it’s a solution in search of a problem that’s absolutely not necessary,”

What Warren’s bill, along with the exemptions for friends of the ruling party that we have seen with previous Socialist overreaches, would create a new avenue for crony capitalism.  In other words, to get an exemption for your federal charter or to guarantee you have your charter maintained, you have to stay friendly with the party in power.  We saw the same thing with ACA where Obama’s biggest supporters received exemptions to various new labor rules.

Warren’s new socialist measure to control businesses gets a failing grade

Trump is implementing what Obama failed to do with his new Buy America push.  Trump is planning on using an executive order to create rules to ensure that federal agencies use American made goods and services for their projects.  There are questions about the legality of the executive order and sure to be legal challenges.  There are also issues of increased costs to the taxpayers if the government has to buy more expensive American goods.

Obama tried and failed to pass a buy American provision in 2009 and again in 2011.  He backed off of the provision in 2009 after American companies who sell overseas swayed him away from the influence of the US labor unions with fears of foreign retaliation.  When Obama flopped back to supporting Buy American, the Jobs Act of 2011 was squashed by the GOP.

Our opinion?  It was wrong when Obama tried it, it’s wrong now.  Free trade produces lower prices for consumers and taxpayers, and competition helps American producers to be efficient.  A better way to help American producers is to cut taxes and regulation so that they can compete on the high end of the global scale.  But Trump is doubly wrong by doing this as an executive order rather than through Congress.  Many Democrats support Buy American provisions.  Labor unions love it.  By going it alone, Trump will alienate conservative and free market GOP members, but I doubt he’ll receive any recognition from the left.  Democrats also supported protectionist tariffs, until Trump did it.  All around this is poor strategy and contrary to free market principles.

Trump to accomplish Obama agenda item with Buy American executive order

Both parties have one thing in common: they are running against Nancy Pelosi

Even if Democrats win the House in November, Nancy Pelosi is unlikely to be the next Speaker of the House.  The much anticipated Blue Wave set to hand Democrats control in November has had it’s share of roadbumps.  While Democrats cheer close races in red districts and claim moral victories when they lose, the Blue Wave theory definitely has it’s skeptics.  One reason for the skepticism might be how fast Democrats are running away from themselves.

Democrats breathed a sigh of relief as every candidate Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez endorsed last Tuesday lost.  Saturday saw another Democratic Socialist loss as Hawaii chose a so called “fiscal conservative” Democrat Ed Case over rabidly anti-Trump Democratic Socialist Doug Chin.  The battle to beat back the Democratic Socialists in the DNC seems on track.

But Democrats are also running against Nancy Pelosi.  In fact 49% of Democrats want Pelosi out of Democrat leadership.  79% of independents don’t want Pelosi running the party.  Many Democrat candidates for the House have also promised to replace Pelosi.

The Democrat blue wave relies on history and political theory.  History says the President usually loses the House in his first midterm.  Political theory says congressional elections are all local.  In other words, people care less about party than they do the individuals who are actually running.  At the same time, the Democrat party is struggling.  Their “abolish ICE” movement exposed their activist wing as idiotic.  But Pelosi has also failed to produce anything other than extreme hatred for Trump as a platform.  The best thing they’ve come up with is how important it is to raise taxes again.

There is no plan B.  Joe Crowley was destined to be Pelosi’s replacement, until he lost to an upstart Democratic Socialist in New York.  For the blue wave to work, Democrats will need to continue to keep it quiet that a Democrat House will be led by Nancy Pelosi or Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Leftists admit Socialism is unaffordable

“The democratic socialists may do well in November.  Yet upon arriving in Washington, they will discover that even their revolution cannot repeal the laws of math.”  That is how an article with Vox by Brian Riedl ends.  Riedl uses leftist and Democrat sources to compile the costs of the Democratic Socialist agenda and finds that even the most generous sources leave them with $3.4 trillion per year to make up in tax revenues.

Democrats have gained traction in the coming election by claiming that deficits are bad and we need to tax the rich to fix it.  But don’t mistake their feigned concern for actual fiscal sanity.  Even the extensive list of new taxes laid out by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wouldn’t cover 10% of the cost of their agenda.

According to Reidl, Democratic Socialists could pay for all the free stuff they are promising with a 100% tax on all corporations and 100% tax on all family income over $150,000 for married taxpayers and $90,000 for singles.  This would be on top of the current tax structure and assumes the willingness of business owners and capital providers to devote their hard work to charity rather than profit.  Another idea to add on to our current taxes would an 87% value added tax.  Basically, in every step of the manufacturing process, the government gets 87 cents of every dollar made.  The inflation would kill the middle class.  Lastly, we could do it if we added a 37% flat payroll tax on top of the current tax structure.  For the middle class this would mean an all in tax rate of 77%.

So let’s talk about this blue wave?  Are voters really ready to kill the economic growth by ending the Trump tax cuts?  Are they really ready to hand over their healthcare decisions in exchange for giving 77 cents of every dollar they make to the government?  Is this what people really want?  It’s not like the Left is running on anything else, except for extreme Trump hate.  Well, now you have an idea of how much that hatred will cost you just in taxes.

Need to Know 8/3/18

Job growth disappointed in July….Ok, not really.  That’s just the headline.  Actually, the news is pretty much all good in the jobs department.  The economy added 157,000 jobs in July and the unemployment rate dropped back below 4%.  We continue to be at full employment.  The underemployment rate also dropped from 7.8% to 7.5% which is the lowest it’s been since before the 2008 financial crisis.  So what’s the bad news?  Economists were expecting 193,000 jobs, so that’s a 41,000 miss.  Keep reading.

June’s jobs report was revised upward from the 213,000 originally reported to 248,000.  That’s a 35,000 increase over what was originally reported.  May was also revised up to 268,000.  Originally they had reported 244,000 jobs in May.  That’s another 24,000.  So we missed July by 41,000, but revised May and June up 59,000.  I’m feelin’ alright.

“US Economy added fewer jobs than expected in July” but more than previously thought in May and June

Speaking of unemployment, the unemployment rate for adult women is at 3.7%, for blacks 6.6% and for Hispanics a record low 4.5%.  The black unemployment rate had been at 7.9% at the beginning of the Trump economy and as high as 16.3% during the Obama administration.  And yet Democrats want to go back to the way it was before Trump.  They want to raise taxes back to where they were and bring back all the regulation that hurt the economy.  I think black Democrat voters need to ask themselves if they want to go back.

Unemployment for minorities drops again

“…relics from the past, frumpy and outdated”.  This was the description of the terms “feminism” and “empowerment” by none other than young Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.  You may not know this, but Ocasio-Cortez used to be an anti-tax capitalist and economics student.  This was of course before her publishing company went under in 2016, she tried to vote for the first time and found out she had been purged from the voter rolls for inactivity, she went full blown socialist, and joined up with Bernie Sanders.  Turns out in 2009 she had a right leaning blog too and described herself as an Adam Smith capitalist.  She also had the harsh words for feminism back then.  I’m sure she’d hate if anyone brought that up today, as she runs as the icon of the Democratic Socialist movement.

In 2009, Ocasio-Cortez trashed feminism, supported capitalism, and cooled on the fight for equality