Tag Archives: political parties

The Fix is In

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Recall that Delaware Federal Prosecutor David Weiss is the prosecutor who agreed to a wrist-slap plea deal regarding Hunter Biden’s tax failures and his illegal possession of a firearm. That deal was so soft, and so shady—Weiss even tried to slide an indemnity against any further prosecution on any matter into the rehab program Weiss had agreed—that the judge presiding on the case tossed it the day it was formally presented to her.

Now, Attorney General Merrick Garland, President Joe Biden’s (D) wingman in DoJ has appointed a special counsel to oversee the continuing/renewed investigations into Hunter Biden’s shady foreign dealings (many of which border on, if not actually are, FARA violations), money laundering, and influence peddling, all of which have implications regarding Joe Biden’s involvement.

That special counsel is…David Weiss. That David Weiss.

This is move does two things: it sets the stage for whitewashing the Biden family, and it actively interferes with the House investigations into Hunter Biden’s dealings and those dealings’ implications regarding Joe Biden. Now the principles and other witnesses have cover to refuse to testify before the House’s investigating committees: “it interferes with an ongoing investigation.”

Sure.

And one more thing. The appointment of Weiss as special counsel is a sham. Special counsels, by statute, must come from outside government, not just outside DoJ. Weiss is not and he will not be outside of anything as a result of this move of Garland/Biden.

One more one more thing: all a special council can do, all the teeth that one has, is write up a report on his findings. He cannot require, or even recommend, prosecution or exoneration. Nor is there a deadline even for that senior thesis to be delivered.

A Step toward Downsizing the Federal Government

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Rightsizing is what the cool kids call it in their desperation to avoid notice, but what the House’s Republican Party’s Freedom Caucus is proposing represents a small, but needed, initial step toward downsizing our bloated Federal bureaucracy. Some of the State Department cuts being proposed include

  • State’s US Agency for Global Media would be reduced from $798 million to $734 million
  • State’s Democracy Fund and the United States Agency for International Development would be reduced from $355.7 million to $227.2 million
  • State’s US Global Health Programs would be reduced from $6.3 billion to $5.7 billion
  • State’s Global Environment Facility would be eliminated altogether, cutting $139.5 million

And so on.

In absolute terms, these are, individually, chump change cuts, for all that they represent significant reductions in each agency’s budget. They do, however, add up to $1.2 billion, including other State cuts not listed here, and so are an initial cut of 2% of the $58.5 billion 2022 State budget.

Over at the Energy Department, the Freedom Caucus is proposing elimination of the Aquatic Decarbonization and the Algae-Related Bioenergy Technologies, cutting $80 million from Energy’s 2023 $149 billion budget.

Freedom Caucus is proposing similar reductions for Agriculture.

I don’t often agree with the Freedom Caucus’ “my way or nothing” approach, but on matters regarding our nation’s morbidly obese Federal spending (and a deficit of $1.62 trillion just in the first 10 months of this fiscal year) and our resulting even more dangerously fat national debt, the Republican Party as a whole needs to stand tall on actual cuts.

Even if it means shutting down (some of) the Federal government next fall and winter. And spring. And summer. That, in itself, would result in badly needed spending cuts.

Vivek Ramaswamy’s Brief Thought on Taxation

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And my brief response. Ramaswamy has said in the past that he favors an estate tax as high as 59% on his theory that passing wealth from parents to children breeds inequality and “hereditary aristocracy.” Stipulate that’s reasonably accurate: he needs to show that he’s considered other means of preventing that aristocratic development and how those alternatives are inadequate to the task.

More importantly, though, is this underlying theory of his:

I do believe in a vision of bringing income taxes as low as possible, if one could collect it back on the back end[.]

Collect what back, exactly? The money in question belongs solely to the one who has, or had, the income. Money being retained by its owner rather tautologically leaves nothing for government to “collect back” at some later time; government has lost nothing and so has nothing to regain.

Be More Obsequious

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Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi (D, CA) is tired of the Republican Party.

I wish the Republican Party would be—somebody would take it back, that we’d have a real Republican Party.

The Progressive-Democratic Party position, as demonstrated by Pelosi, is that the Republican Party should go back to being satisfied with being the loyal opposition and stop being so uppity.

Backwards

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Senator Tommy Tuberville (R, AL) has a hold on a number of President Joe Biden’s (D) DoD appointments and promotion lists—something often distorted into being an outright block, but in fact is only a requirement that these appointments and lists go through by floor votes in the Senate rather than by rubber stamp, unconsidered unanimous consent. Tuberville’s hold is motivated by his opposition to SecDef Lloyd Austin’s insistence that DoD fund military members’ abortions, travel to locations providing abortions, and abortion-related services. It’s bad enough that DoD would cover these expenses—can only cover these expenses—with taxpayer monies, but Austin’s insistence is in direct violation of the Hyde Amendment, which blocks just such taxpayer-funded expenses.

And that’s before we get to the immorality of killing unborn babies in the first place.

Lucas Kunce is a Progressive-Democratic Party candidate for Senate from Missouri and is running against the incumbent Josh Hawley. He decries Tuberville’s hold. He thinks Tuberville’s hold is negatively impacting national security, and he cynically wraps himself in his 13 years as a Marine, including his time in the badly bloated (my characterization) Pentagon.

Kunce has it backwards, and cynically so. To the extent the lack of these appointments and lists affects national security, that is solely from Austin’s insistence on DoD support for abortion. If Kunce—and Austin and Biden and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D), the latter whom controls the Senate’s vote schedule—were serious about claims of national security risk, they’d leave off from holding out for abortion at taxpayer expense. They’d drop that matter and allow the appointments and lists to go through, or they’d push for the floor votes; either way, they’d desist from using the disagreement for their personal political gain.