Category: national politics & policies

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folly ideological culture media and media people national politics & policies political challengers responsibility

The Women-Haters

Hillary Clinton, victim, pay gap, wage gap, misogyny, sexism

“You’ve just spoken eloquently about the sexism, the misogyny and inequity around the world,” CNN anchor Christiane Amanpour said* to defeated presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, “but do you believe it exists here still?”

The audience at Tuesday’s Women for Women International luncheon in New York City erupted in laughter, cutting Amanpour off. A second round of chortles ensued when Hillary Clinton touched the side of her face in wonderment, uttering, “Hmmm?”

“Were you a victim of misogyny?” Amanpour continued. “And why do you think you lost the majority of the white female vote. . . ?”

“Well, the book is coming out in the fall,” Hillary joked. “Yes,” she went on, turning serious, “I do think it played a role.”

Noting that “other things did, as well,” Mrs. Clinton decried Russian interference. Back to misogyny, however, she added: “It is real. It is very much a part of the landscape politically, socially and economically.”

Hmmm, indeed. So, most white women didn’t vote for Hillary Clinton because they hate women . . . per se?

All women?

Simply because they’re women?

“An example that has nothing to do with me, personally,” explained Mrs. Clinton, “is this whole question of equal pay. We just had Equal Pay Day in April, which is how long women have to work past the first of the year to make the equivalent of what men make the prior year in comparable professions.”

Hillary is mistaken about the Gender Pay Gap, which compares completely dissimilar professions (and hours worked, qualifications, etc.). Plus, this same gender pay gap was found at the Clinton Foundation, her U.S. Senate staff, her State Department and among her campaign staff.

Hillary Clinton — misogynist?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* The full interview is here. But you can cut to the chase here.

 

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Categories
Accountability free trade & free markets initiative, referendum, and recall insider corruption moral hazard national politics & policies porkbarrel politics too much government

A Wall of Separation

cronyism, pork, stadium, Tom Hanks, ballot initiative, welfare

Whatever you think of Thomas Jefferson’s letter to the Danbury Baptists, wherein he celebrated the First Amendment for “building a wall of separation between Church & State,” let’s agree that it would have been nice had he penned another letter — to the Waterbury Methodists or someone — urging a wall of separation between Sports and State.

Last week, actor Tom Hanks became another brick in my hoped-for wall. “It’s a billion-dollar industry,” Hanks said of the National Football League.

[T]hey have billion-dollar TV contracts. All the owners are billionaires. And yet when they want to build a stadium they’re going to use for 10 weeks out of the year, they expect the city taxpayers to buy the building.

Hanks is livid. The recent “deal” that lured his beloved Oakland Raiders to Las Vegas included $750 million in public funds to build a $1.9 billion stadium. The Raiders are planning to stay in Oakland for the 2017 and 2018 seasons, while that new stadium is built. “When the Raiders leave,” the beloved star declared, “I am going on an NFL moratorium for two years.”

Unfortunately, Hanks appears more angry that his team is leaving (eventually), than with the principle that taxpayers ought not be ripped off.

Subsidizing businesses is cronyism, not capitalism. It’s even more outrageous when the poor must pay for the rich.

But how to stop it? In every city where citizens can propose ballot initiatives, let’s petition and pass measures requiring a public vote before any such subsidy.

It may not be the great wall I’d prefer, but it’s a high hurdle providing taxpayers some important protection.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

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crime and punishment First Amendment rights general freedom ideological culture moral hazard national politics & policies Regulating Protest U.S. Constitution

Thorns in the Parade

Portland, rose, parade, protest, violence, AntiFa, BAMN, free speech, censorship

Portland, Oregon, styles itself as “The City of Roses.” For over a century, this Pacific Northwest city has held an annual Rose Festival, complete with multiple parades.

This year, there will be at least one parade less.

“The annual 82nd Avenue Rose Parade and Carnival scheduled for Saturday have been canceled because of threats against the Multnomah County Republican Party, a longtime participant in the parade,” we learn from the Portland Tribune. “In a Tuesday afternoon email, the 82 Avenue Business Association, which sponsors the Rose Festival-sanctioned event, said it canceled the entire event because [it] could not guarantee the safety of the community.”

KOIN-6 News reported that the threats came from the Direct Action Alliance, an “antifa”-styled group that “created a Facebook event called ‘Defend Portland from Fascists at the Avenue of Roses Parade.’ The group wanted to disrupt the march because of ‘Nazis and fascists’ participating.”

Now, what you regard as “white supremacist” and what young pseudo-antifascists think of as “white supremacy” are probably very different. I doubt that many real Nazis and fascists would have marched on Saturday.

But the identification issue is irrelevant. If fascists want to peacefully parade, let them.

What is objectionable? Those who engage in violence to suppress views of which they disapprove.

Also objectionable? The organizers and the City of Roses police, who, by caving in, let free speech and assembly be squelched.

Spontaneous marches did occur on parade day, corralled to the left and right sides of the street. Literally and figuratively. Three violent activists were arrested but not identified by affiliation.

Portlanders used to worry that the clouds would rain on their parades. Now, it is ideological violence casting a dark shadow.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Accountability free trade & free markets general freedom national politics & policies tax policy

Death and . . .

taxes, tax cut, Trump, gift, give away, rights, growth, economics

It’s a sure thing — that most folks will like President Trump’s tax cuts. Though we don’t yet know all the details.

When it comes to taxes, less is more. 

That is, if you’re paying taxes. It is no great mystery that people like it when their own taxes are reduced.

But what about reducing other people’s taxes?

“The core economic case for tax cuts is that they reduce the obstacles to creative and productive activities,” economist Don Boudreaux explained yesterday at the Café Hayek blog.

Cutting the corporate tax rate — which even former President Bill Clinton supported during last year’s campaign — won’t immediately appear in people’s paychecks, but can stimulate economic growth helping everyone. Recent experiences in both Britain and Canada bear this out.

Cutting taxes, of which “the rich” pay more, can also spur growth.

Yet, these ideas do not dominate popular discussions of tax cuts. Boudreaux lamented media reporting that treats any tax reduction as simply a “‘gift’ to high-income earners,” dubbing the coverage: “Biased. Benighted. Blind.”

“Suppose that freedom of the press were reported in the same way as . . . a ‘giveaway to the press’?” he asked. “Most people, of course, do not own newspapers or other media outlets.”

Boudreaux concluded, “When the press is free, the chief beneficiaries are the general public.”

Freedom — of both the press and to keep more of the fruits of our labors — helps the common man. As well as the uncommon man. A tax cut for me helps me directly, and you indirectly. And vice versa. Just as a free press is great for those in journalism as well as those of us not in journalism.

That is not blind, but eyes open; not benighted, but enlightened; not biased, but . . .

. . . Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob. 

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Accountability folly free trade & free markets moral hazard national politics & policies porkbarrel politics

Super-Subsidize Me

welfare, taxes, charity, subsidy, subsidize, shrimp, stadium, Tesla

“In American political discourse, those on the side of the sick, poor, and underprivileged tend to favor more federal government intervention,” writes Heartland Institute policy advisor David D’Amato at The Hill. He explains that many “see government as . . . rather like a charity . . .”

Sure, government can act charitably, except that its money isn’t given voluntarily, and the recipients are often not so needy.

Earlier this month, the stock price of electric car company Tesla, Inc. rose high enough to overshadow General Motors. That’s great news for billionaire Elon Musk, Tesla’s CEO. But an Investor’s Business Daily editorial noted, “[T]he company is heavily reliant on taxpayer support.”

Who benefits (in addition to Musk)? “A study published by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that 90% of electric car subsidies go to the top 20% of households,” the editorial stated. IBD added that it was “a lot of welfare-for-the-rich for very little environmental benefit.”

In addition to funding advanced technology, American taxpayers have spent $6.7 billion over the last few decades to subsidize stadiums for wealthy sports team owners. The latest? In Clark County, Nevada, taxpayers forked over $750 million ($354 for every resident) to bribe — er, bring — the Oakland Raiders to Las Vegas.

The ridiculous Minnesota legislation to feed $5 million in state funds to start two shrimp farms almost seems reasonable in comparison. Almost.

“Maybe growing shrimp in Minnesota is a great idea,” admits John Hinderaker of the Center of the American Experiment. “If so, the owners should do what other small businessmen do: either find investors, or get a bank loan.”

Government’s crony capitalism taxes the poor to give to the rich.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Categories
general freedom local leaders national politics & policies political challengers U.S. Constitution

Wag that Tail, Dog

Maine, ranked choice voting, democracy, constitutionality, law,

Last November, Maine voters passed a ballot measure, Question 5, to begin electing their federal representatives to Congress, and their governor and state legislators, using Ranked Choice Voting. This selection mechanism allows voters to rank their choices, thereby removing the “spoiler effect” that often pushes citizens to support the lesser of two popular evils.*

Last month, Maine’s State Senate submitted advisory questions to the Maine Supreme Court about the new law’s constitutionality.

It is indeed constitutional. “Those who argue that ranked-choice voting conflicts with the Constitution,” explained Marshall Tinkle** in the Bangor News, “seem to be reading things into it that simply are not in the text.”

Last week, the Maine Supreme Court heard oral arguments. Justices Donald Alexander and Joseph Jabar seemed concerned about ranked-choice voting making it easier to vote for the person and not the party.

That’s not unconstitutional. But is it somehow bad?

“We are going to have a lot of people abandoning the political parties if ranked-choice voting remains,” argued Alexander. Or perhaps the parties might better serve voters?

The attorney representing the Committee for Ranked Choice Voting, James Kilbreth, reminded the justices that the voters have spoken, and as to the resistance by legislators in implementing their will, he remarked, “This is the tail-wagging-the-dog kind of problem.”

The courtroom broke out in laughter when Chief Justice Leigh Saufley responded, “Mr. Kilbreth, it’s a fairly large tail.”

I’m a big fan of ranked choice voting***, but the court’s decision is not about the policy. It’s about whether the dog (the people) will wag the tail (the legislators) or vice-versa.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* Portland, the state’s largest city, has used ranked choice voting since 2011.

** And Tinkle should know, since he “wrote the book” on the subject — the reference book, The Maine Constitution.

*** I serve on the Board of Directors of FairVote, an organization that promotes ranked choice voting and other methods to make every person’s vote count.

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