Tag: Joe Biden

Categories
First Amendment rights Fourth Amendment rights

The Bidening

Joe Biden

It does seem — because of the raids and surveillance and things targeting critics of the regime — that the Biden administration (“the Biden”) is out to get its political opponents.

John Hinderaker of Powerline notes a few recent tip-of-the-iceberg actions by the Biden or its political allies.

The Dilbert comic strip by Scott Adams was suddenly dropped from 80 newspapers after the strip began mocking certain modish pieties about diversity. We’ve learned that ostensibly private censorship is often done at the behest of government or politicians eager to muzzle somebody.

The Biden issued a slew of subpoenas to persons associated with the Trump administration for documents about efforts to challenge the 2020 election results. Nearly all these pertain “to activities that are plainly lawful,” observes Hinderaker.

The Biden seized the cell phone of Mike Lindell, CEO of MyPillow and infamous skeptic of the 2020 election results. He’s accused of identity theft and damaging a computer related to an alleged breach of Colorado voting machines, accusations that Hinderaker regards as implausible on their face. “This all has to do with his opposition to the regime.”

Although the Biden may provide rationales for the targeting, these tend to be paper-thin. Why? Probably because the Biden wants you to know exactly why all this banana-republic stuff is happening. You are expected to take the micro-thin excuses as a hint — so that you will adopt a paranoid stance.

And to avoid saying or doing anything that may get you, too, targeted by the Biden.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

Illustration created with DALL-E

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts

Categories
ideological culture national politics & policies

The New Non-Normal

Joe Biden MAGA speech

“Too much of what’s happening in our country today,” President Joe Biden offered last night, “is not normal.”

You can say that again!

“A crowd of about 300 invited guests — a mix of elected officials and dignitaries, along with Democratic supporters,” reported CNN, “watched Biden speak” at Independence Hall in Philadelphia “from behind panes of bulletproof glass.” 

The president said some other things with which I agree.

“There is no place for political violence in America. Period. None. Ever,” Mr. Biden intoned. Well, “ever” goes just a tad too far. After all, the American Revolution was violence. But generally, yes, Joe is right that “we can’t allow violence to be normalized.”

Which is why he should call out the political violence that occurred throughout the summer of 2020 as well as that of January 6th. 

Biden spoke against “the politics of grievance” and those who “obsess about the past.” But golly gee whiz, does Biden really want to alienate his Critical Race Theorist fan base?

“You can’t love your country only when you win” an election, he argued. Hasn’t that been an equal opportunity foible for both Rs and Ds — considering the 2016 as well as 2020 presidential results!

Losing the battle for the economy of the nation, Mr. Biden is looking for Campaign 2022 to be a “battle for the soul of the nation.” But making sweeping attacks about all who favor Trump being “semi-fascists” has led even Democrats like U.S. Sen. Maggie Hassan to criticize Biden.

“They refuse to accept the will of the people,” the president said of so-called MAGA Republicans. “They embrace political violence. They don’t believe in democracy.”

Sadly, that applies to both parties as well.

“Get engaged,” Biden implored the audience. “Vote, vote, vote!”

Well . . . maybe just vote once.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts

Categories
deficits and debt folly national politics & policies

Relief Spelled S-U-B-S-I-D-Y

Joe Biden, emergency, inflation, student loans

In a bid to bail out the sinking ship of his party, President Joe Biden has decided he can go ahead and bail out Americans who are having trouble paying off their student loans.

Yesterday he announced that (quoting The Epoch Times) “his administration will spend hundreds of billions of dollars to pay off $10,000 in federal student loan debt for some borrowers,” with the Education Department giving the specifics: “individuals earning less than $125,000 a year or families earning less than $250,000 will be eligible for up to $10,000 in debt cancellation.” Pell Grant recipients in the same situation will be eligible for relief of up to twice as much.

The politic nature of the move is so obvious that . . . it isn’t getting enough attention from critics. 

Most of those alarmed at the move concentrate on the unfairness: rewarding those who have not met their obligations and thereby penalizing those who have. Defenders of student debt relief make the usual arguments about the need to help the under-privileged — by giving them more privilege (if anything’s a privilege it is to be able to take out a loan and then not pay it back).

You may be wondering how a president can authorize spending billions of dollars. Isn’t that Congress’s job? Well, the administration has found a semi-plausible excuse — from Congress: a 2003 higher education law that allows the Education Department to provide relief in response to a national emergency. 

And what is the emergency?

Pick one. Inflation, for example.

Which is spurred by overspending.

Which an extra $250 billion will merely increase.

You gotta wonder: isn’t it college graduates who cook up this stuff?

It’s ‘We the People’ who deserve not relief but a full refund.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts

Categories
First Amendment rights Internet controversy social media

A Welcome Discovery

Joe Biden, censorship, Twitter, Facebook, 1st Amendment, free speech

In recent years, several lawsuits have been launched alleging collusion between the Biden administration and big social media companies to violate our First Amendment rights.

Unfortunately, most of these suits have been dismissed.

Journalist Alex Berenson did obtain some satisfaction after suing Twitter for suspending his account last year because he questioned the efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines.

The suit accused Twitter of acting “on behalf of the federal government in censoring and barring him.” Berenson’s account was finally reinstated as part of the settlement. But only Twitter was required to take any remedial action; the government was required to do nothing.

Still ongoing is a lawsuit launched by the attorney generals of Missouri and Louisiana against the Biden administration for urging social media giants to suppress speech about things like COVID-19 and elections “under the guise of combating ‘misinformation.’ ”

Now a judge has granted the states’ motion for discovery, enabling the attorneys general to make document requests and issue subpoenas to social media platforms. The AGs hope to learn which federal officials have been urging censorship and what exactly they said.

In a certain respect, these actions seem almost superfluous, since administration officials, including Biden, have repeatedly and publicly called on social media to censor harder.

But the more evidence we can get on how the federal government has been urging firms to censor on its behalf and in violation of the First Amendment, the better. 

That brings us closer to getting it to stop.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts

Categories
national politics & policies too much government

Biden’s Peculiar Odor

Biden, inflation, odor, order

William F. Buckley used to say that there is always a presumptive case for order.

Philosopher Joel Feinberg argued that there’s always a presumptive case for freedom.*

This notion of a strong case for or against something prior to specific data can keep philosophers and economists and folks like you and me awake at night.

Here, I’m just going to bring it down to the politics.

Of inflation.

Why are prices — especially fuel prices — rising so?

The Biden Administration has been trying to argue that it’s caused by the war in Ukraine, and Americans’ need to sacrifice to defend that beleaguered country. 

But, as with his talk of “food shortages,” the war is almost certainly an exacerbating, not the prime, factor. Both fuel price spikes and bare shelves demonstrated an alarming trend before Putin invaded Ukraine. 

The cause seems obvious. Do we really need careful studies to show that both were caused by (a) COVID lockdowns and (b) a blizzard of lockdown bailout checks during Trump’s term in office and eagerly pushed also by the current president?

And Biden’s current kick, of demanding that gas stations (!) freeze or reduce prices to “match the cost of production,” has all the odor of cranky, old-fashioned soapbox socialism.

There is a presumptive case that inflation is caused by monetary policy, just as shortages are usually caused by regulations. Trump and Biden and Congress all contributed to over-spending, financialization, and regulatory hits.** But the stink of the growing mess must also affix especially to Biden. After all, one of his campaign promises was to cut production of oil on all government lands and offshore.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 * Joel Feinberg, Social Philosophy (1972), pp. 20-22. Where Buckley discussed his presumptive case is your guess or mine. Probably a column back in the 1970s or ’80s.

 ** A few weeks ago an interesting exchange occurred in this website’s comments section, between two friends of this program.

PDF for printing

h/t crAIyon

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts

Categories
free trade & free markets national politics & policies political economy

Big Oil, Big Profits — Big Deal?

Joe Biden, oil, inflation

When President Joe Biden accused oil companies of excessive profiteering, and those profits as a cause of inflation, reactions were . . . mixed.

Democrats love that kind of talk. Ronald Reagan, back in his Democrat days, pitched precisely that sort of rhetoric when he campaigned for Truman’s re-election.

Republicans, along with most other Americans, are skeptical. Or just plain incredulous.

Meanwhile, what did Big Oil say?

Chevron’s CEO, Mike Wirth, took special care to complain of the president’s rhetoric, characterizing the administration as having “largely sought to criticize, and at times vilify, our industry.”

Perhaps Biden’s worst vilification was that Exxon had “made more money than God” — as if spending more money than God were his job and that he resented any money he couldn’t spend. 

EXXON responded by noting that the multinational had continued investing in infrastructure even during the pandemic lockdowns when the company “lost more than $20 billion and had to borrow more than $30 billion to maintain investment to increase capacity to be ready for post-pandemic demand.”

In a helpful mode, the company offered that “government can promote investment through clear and consistent policy that supports U.S. resource development, such as regular and predictable lease sales, as well as streamlined regulatory approval and support for infrastructure such as pipelines.”

Biden, who ran on decreasing oil production by regulatory crackdown, received a square hit.

Nonetheless, the Democrats double-down on their worn-out “windfall profits” alarmism. 

After a huge hit to consumption during the lockdowns, the profits are there not as recompense for Big Oil’s regrettable big losses, but as incentives to get out of the Great Suppression. 

We should want profits to entice more investment.

Could it be that Biden wants neither?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts

Categories
folly national politics & policies

It’s a Gas, Gas, Gas

Joe Biden, gas, inflation

“Senior White House aides are exploring new ideas to respond to high gas prices,” informs The Washington Post, “desperate to show that the administration is trying to address voter frustration about rising costs at the pump.”

Not “desperate” to lower gas prices, mind you — which have hit $5 a gallon, a double-digit increase from last month — but to “address” the resulting “voter frustration” from high prices. 

After all, there’s an election in November. Suddenly, this crisis could affect important people in Washington!

“Biden officials are taking a second look at whether the federal government could send rebate cards out to millions of American drivers to help them pay at gas stations,” The Post reports. This generous brainstorm was previously rejected because “shortages in the U.S. chip industry would make it hard to produce enough rebate cards.” 

America 2022 isn’t even technologically capable of giving money away. 

Administration experts also worried “the idea could backfire by further pushing up prices by adding to consumer demand.” Oh, didn’t Congress repeal the laws of supply and demand?

Someone “familiar with internal administration discussions” offered that the administration was looking at “telling governors to lower or waive their gas taxes.”

Grover Norquist smiles.

“Other proposals floated by policy experts include suspending the Jones Act,” notes The Post story, “which would reduce shipping costs and make it cheaper to get gasoline from the Gulf Coast to the Eastern Seaboard.”

That act should have been repealed years ago. 

“They’re fighting about narrative rather than fighting about substance,” offered an unnamed outside economic adviser, “because realistically, what are they going to do?”

They could open up energy markets, of course — approve gas pipelines rather than blocking them, perhaps. 

Could? Should? Yes. Will? 

Not Biden!

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts

Categories
media and media people national politics & policies

Who’s the Stupid S.O.B.?

Joe Biden, SOB, stupid son of a bitch, press conference, Steve Doocy

President Joe Biden called Fox reporter Peter Doocy a “stupid s.o.b.,” sans the abbreviation.

Biden had balked at answering questions about Ukraine, so Mr. Doocy asked him about inflation: “Do you think inflation is a political liability ahead of the mid-terms?”

“That’s a great asset: more inflation,” Biden mumbled into the hot mic. “What a stupid . . .”

Now, had I said that, I would hasten to explain that I was being sardonic. Of course inflation is a liability. Dubbing it a “great asset” was certainly sarcasm. It could be nothing other. Inflation is a horror show.

But the negative characterization of Doocy that immediately followed undermines that Irony Interpretation. Does it sound ironic? And if the insult is earnest, does it not suggest that the preceding declaration about inflation is not only earnest, but in the Contempt Mode that Democrats have been adopting to criticism in recent years?

Of course inflation is great! 

For them.

After all, inflation does help a few at the expense of the many. It helps insiders at the expense of the outsiders. This is ancient wisdom.

Insiders in government gain through inflation, getting to “spend first,” while we on the outside — in society — suffer from decreased purchasing power.

After the event, Biden contacted Doocy. “It’s nothing personal, pal.” 

But the objective issue is whether Biden was being sarcastic about inflation.

While we may argue over who will have the last word on monetary policy, it was Doocy who had the last laugh . . . at himself: “nobody has fact-checked [Biden] yet and said it’s not true.”

But then, fact-checkers ain’t what they used to be.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts

Categories
First Amendment rights social media

Google Shareholders vs. Google Censorship

Joe Biden, censorship, big tech

Some Google shareholders are pressing Google for records of its communications with the Biden administration. And not just any old records. They are specifically demanding those pertaining to the administration’s demands for censorship.

Per the First Amendment, it is unconstitutional for government to seek to muzzle people for saying things that government officials disapprove of.

Yet the Biden Administration and others, including members of Congress, have openly (and repeatedly) urged big-tech social media companies to more assiduously censor discussion of COVID-19 policy, COVID-19 vaccines, the nature of COVID-19. The president did this again just last week: “I make a special appeal to social media companies and media outlets — please deal with the misinformation and disinformation that’s on your shows. It has to stop.”

Everything we’ve seen adds up to a slam-dunk case against the government for violating the First Amendment. We know that government officials are asking social-media companies to censor. They’re not hiding it.

Suing the government’s big-tech lackeys — and government officials, when plausible — is one way to combat the evil.

The National Legal and Policy Center, a Google shareholder, is trying to secure a requirement that the company disclose the content of any communications between itself and the government related to the Biden Administrations calls for censorship. Last summer, the administration stated that it was “in regular touch” with the big-tech giants.

Will Google voluntarily produce documents showing that it acquiesced in specific Biden administration demands for censorship?

No. But as Charles Glasser has pointed out, there is precedent for a judicial finding that media are de facto “government agents” when they work “hand-in-hand with government in violating constitutional rights.”

The effort may not succeed, but it’s worth a shot.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts

Categories
ballot access national politics & policies

The Other Big Lie

Joe Biden

“Let me be clear,” President Joe Biden told a Georgia crowd yesterday, addressing changes proposed by the Democrats to election laws nationally, “this is not about me or Vice-President Harris or our party.”

Of course not. Who would even suggest such a thing? 

On this same “voting rights” subject six months ago, Biden called Republicans “bullies and merchants of fear and peddlers of lies” who “are threatening the very foundation of our country.” Though less colorful, yesterday’s address was merely more of the same. 

“Pass the Freedom to Vote Act! Pass it now!” the president shouted, arguing that it “would prevent voter suppression.”  

How? Well, that’s less than clear. 

For years, Democrats slammed laws requiring voters to show photo identification as “racist,” contending the requirement disproportionately suppressed black voters. But then, when polls demonstrated that voters “of color” are even more supportive of Voter ID laws than are whites, Democrats quickly insisted they had always been for such laws.

Now — keep up! — voter ID laws are back to being suppressive. And the very purpose of the Dems’ Freedom to Vote Act is to strike down all such state laws.

When Georgia’s Secretary of State called for photo ID requirements last Sunday on CBS’s Face the Nation, host Margaret Brennan offered, “The Freedom to Vote Act actually does promote a national standard for states that have an ID requirement for in-person voting,” adding, “You could use a bank statement or utility bill.”

Neither of which constitutes a photo ID, as the secretary pointed out.

Democrats battling former President Trump’s so-called Big Lie have concocted one of their very own.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts