Tag Archives: political parties

Infrastructure, Investigations, and Agendas

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President Donald Trump has said that he’ll do infrastructure negotiations and legislation after the Progressive-Democrats end their investigations of his administration, not before. Pointing out House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D, CA) bad faith approach (my term, not Trump’s) to any such negotiations, he said that

he had watched House Speaker Nancy Pelosi…accuse him of a “coverup” in remarks to reporters shortly before their scheduled infrastructure meeting at the White House.

Never mind that Trump has completely cooperated with the Mueller investigation throughout the 2+ years of that effort, and that Mueller found that there was no collusion between Trump’s administration or his campaign and the Russian effort to interfere in our elections.  Never mind that Mueller also found no obstruction (in the expanded portion of his authorized investigation), only embarrassing instances of loud venting of his frustration.

When Pelosi and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D, NY) arrived for that meeting following their press op, a meeting at which Republican leadership also was present, Trump advised them

I want to do infrastructure. I want to do it more than you want to do it. But you know what, you can’t do it under these circumstances.

Indeed. The Progressive-Democrats are so intent on their several inquisitions that they have no time for serious matters, no energy left for serving their employing constituencies.

Which brings me to a strange remark by the WSJ piece’s authors.

The president’s declaration raises questions about how he would pass any of his legislative agenda in the remaining year and a half of his first term.

There are no questions here.  The Progressive-Democratic caucus in the House has been intent on blocking his agenda since they took office last January.  The Progressive-Democrat caucus in the Senate has been intent on using their filibuster powers to try to block all of Trump’s agenda, with considerable success (and a couple of notable failures) on legislative matters, since Trump’s term began two and a half years ago.

Union “Dues”

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Now the taxpayer looks to be on the hook.  At least in New York.

[O]n May 1, New York’s state Senate voted to let strikers get benefits one week after walking off the job—essentially putting them on equal footing with those who are laid off.
If Governor Andrew Cuomo signs this bill, he’ll effectively be using New York’s unemployment-insurance program to subsidize union strikes, upending the balance of power between workers and management.

Union strikes are little indistinguishable from extortion, except that they’re legal. They’re used to threaten a company’s ability to function—to survive—unless they surrender to union demands.  “Nice little business you got here. Be too bad if something was to happen to it.”

In a way, though, Cuomo’s pandering makes sense. Since unions can’t commandeer pieces of the paychecks of non-union workers anymore, they have to make up the money loss from somewhere.

Enter the victim-taxpayer.

A Foolish Proposal

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Senator and Progressive-Democratic Party Presidential candidate Kamala Harris has one.  She’s

proposing that large employers pay women on an equal basis with their male counterparts or face government fines, seeking a sweeping shift in the way the nation addresses pay inequity.

She wants to impose a 1% tax on “large” companies’ profit for every 1% disparity in pay.  The size of the disparity is an open question, though.  The favorite number of the Progressive-Democrats is that women are paid in the neighborhood of 70-75 cents for each dollar a man is paid for the same work; although the number Harris bandied was 80 cents.  That would make the Harris Payroll Tax run 20% or 25%-30% of profit.  The more valid, empirically derived number, though, puts that disparity between 0 and 7 cents less for the woman than the man, with a heavy lean toward the 7.  This more accurate number actually presumes to correct for time in the workforce, experience level on the job in question, and so on.

Beyond that, the Harris Payroll Tax is just plain bad finance.  Companies—small as well as large—pay Social Security and Medicare taxes on the wage they pay, and those same companies tie perks like health coverage, paid time off, bonuses, etc to the wage they pay.  An increase in wage would carry with it those added payroll costs.

It’d be cheaper for the companies to pay the Harris Payroll Tax than it would to raise the wage paid the woman.

Further, Harris would

put the burden on companies to demonstrate that they are not engaging in pay discrimination.

Because, typical of today’s Progressive-Democrats, we’re all guilty until proven innocent.  Especially when it’s difficult even to define the crime.

Trade Deals

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The Progressive-Democratic Party has once again shown us its meld.

“It used to be Congress versus the administration; now it feels like the administration is at least coming around to the Republican point of view” on trade, a Democratic congressional aide said, adding that “it’s going to be hard for them to work with Democrats in a productive way.”

Never mind the Progressive-Democrats’ refusal to work with the White House or Republicans in a productive way.  “A productive way” means, as it always has, doing it the Progressive-Democrats’ way.

Take the present case.  The US, Mexico, and Canada have agreed to lift the metals and other tariffs the three had imposed on each other—per Progressive-Democrat demands.

It’s not enough.  Progressive-Democrats want to renegotiate the deal altogether because the labor parts of the agreement don’t suit them.  Never mind, here, that the agreement effectively mandates significant pay raises for Mexican workers.  Never mind, either, that the rules are supported by American unions.  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D, CA) and her cronies want to scuttle the Trumpian deal altogether.

It’ll never be enough.  It’s not just hard, it’s nearly impossible, to work with Progressive-Democrats in any productive way.

An Ill-Informed Candidate

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On Fox News‘ Claremont, New Hampshire town hall with Progressive-Democratic Party Presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg Sunday, Buttigieg had this to say about abolishing our Electoral College.

“States don’t vote, people vote.  …if we’re going to call ourselves a democracy,” the US should move to a popular vote system.

When the moderator, Chris Wallace, asked further about that, particularly comparing the voice of small States like New Hampshire with large States like California, Buttigieg gave an unresponsive answer about how New Hampshire wouldn’t be harmed by abolishing the Electoral College because New Hampshire is one of the first-to-vote-in-primaries States.

There are so many things wrong with Buttigieg’s remarks; here are a couple biggies.

We don’t call ourselves a democracy.  We don’t call ourselves that because we are not a democracy; we are a republican democracy consisting of a federation of States.  As a republican democracy, States do, indeed, vote, doing so alongside citizens (not just “people”), and that’s by design.  The Great Compromise in the final agreement on our Constitution was the creation of the Senate as a separate house in our Congress, which body would give equal representation to the States as States—the two Senators per State structure.

This was intended to produce a number of outcomes.  Two of these were a guarantee that our nation’s member States all would be on an equal level among each other within our central, federal government; large population States would not dominate small population States.  Thus, we would not be a popular democracy with its inevitable devolution through a tyranny of a majority into mob rule.  We would, instead, be a republican democracy with greater protections for and balance of the rights of the minority along with the rights of the majority.

Associated with that is the Electoral College, which functionally extends the protection of small States from domination by large States to the election of our President and Vice President.  States are allocated a number of Electors equaling the sum of the number of Representatives a State has, which is based on that State’s population, and its two Senators.  Thus, States vote as States for these candidates alongside the citizens, with the citizens represented, in addition to their individual votes, a second time, indirectly through their State’s Electors.

Within that, Buttigieg’s facile answer that New Hampshire wouldn’t be harmed because it’s an early primary voter ignored similarly small States like New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, and others—none of whom are early voters.  Rather, his answer was (how to put this delicately) dismayingly ignorant.

Anyone who paid attention in eight grade Civics knows all of this.  A man so ignorant of the structure of our republican democracy and the reasons for that structure simply is unqualified for the office of President.