Tag Archives: politics

Hillary Clinton’s Tax Proposals

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And she has lots of them. I’ll list her tax credit proposals here.

  • $1,200 to offset the costs incurred by a family member caring for an aging parent
  • $5,000, refundable (it’s paid even to those who aren’t paying any income tax), for out of pocket health costs
  • $1,500 “apprenticeship” for businesses who hire entry-level workers, per such hire
  • 15% of the value of bonuses paid out if businesses create employee cost-sharing programs, paid to those businesses
  • Unspecified amounts for low-income homeowners who install solar panels

She also wants to expand these extant wealth redistributing credits:

  • Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit
  • Work Opportunity Tax Credit
  • New Markets Tax Credit
  • American Opportunity Tax Credit
  • Wind, solar, ethanol tax credits

We don’t have enough pages to our tax code rules, you see, and we don’t have enough special exceptions to our tax rules and who pays—and who gets.

Never mind that none of this tax gerrymandering, none of this redistribution of OPM according to Progressive rules rather than the needs and wishes of those doing the earning, would be necessary with a low, flat rate tax code that admitted of no exceptions, no deductions, no credits, no loopholes, no gerrymandering; a tax code that would be used to fund government and not be abused for social engineering in accordance with Progressive demands.

Awfully Decent of Him

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The Obama administration is offering to send state governors personalized reports with detailed information about refugees that have been resettled in their state so far this year.

Now, in the aftermath of 30 governors saying they’d do what they could to block resettlement of Syrian refugees in their states (because the governors don’t trust the adequacy of this administration’s vetting), President Barack Obama’s Chief of Staff Denis McDonough is saying that State will provide letters to each governor providing information “on refugees resettled in the last month and throughout the year so far.” Furthermore, State will maintain a passworded Web site on which it will make monthly updates to this information and that the updates would “break down refugees by nationality, gender and age range.”

That’s nice, but it begs a couple of questions. Why couldn’t this information have been made regularly available over the last seven years (or longer)? Why can’t those older data be provided now and kept current? Why can’t the currently promised data include resettlement location information?

Civil Disobedience

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A college student who jumped over the White House fence while draped in an American flag was committing civil disobedience and had no plans to harm himself or others, his attorney said Sunday.

OK.  True civil disobedience includes suffering the consequences of breaking the law in that act of disobedience. This particular act of law breaking has the consequence of up to a year in jail.

That works.

[The student’s attorney Stephan] Seeger said his client had no intention of taking his life and was only trying to communicate the possible consequences of his actions.

Fine. Now the public can see for ourselves whether the absurdity of the situation or of the punishment truly exists. That’s what juries are for.

Driver Licenses and Illegal Aliens

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Five illegal aliens are suing Oregon over an Oregon citizen-passed (by two to one) law that denies driver licenses to illegal aliens.

This is about as cynical as it gets in the illegal immigration movement. One of the signs held by protestors supporting the suit (not visible at the link unless you play the video) insists that “driving is a privilege not a crime.” The sign is correct. What the sign holder misses, though, what the movement misses, what the suit carefully elides, is that driving also is not a right and that driving without a license is a crime. Driving is a privilege, and it’s awarded to those legally in the state in the form of a license to drive issued by the state. Being present illegally in no way confers a “right” to the privilege.

[T]he lawsuit alleges Measure 88 is unconstitutional because it “arbitrarily” denies driving privileges based on membership in a “disfavored minority group.” It alleges Oregon voters were motivated by “animus toward persons from Mexico and Central America.”

This is an example of the cynicism. There’s nothing arbitrary about the law: it targets illegal aliens. It denies access to a privilege (not to a right), not to a disfavored minority group, but to those present in Oregon illegally. Unless citizens with driver licenses suspended for this or that series of law violations also are a “disfavored minority group.” Neither does it show animus toward persons of particular nationality or “regionality.” It shows no animus at all; it only says illegal aliens aren’t entitled [sic] to the privileges of citizens and aliens present legally.

Long time readers of this blog know that I take a very loose and open view toward immigration. I just insist that immigrants enter legally and that if they choose to remain, they do so legally. Those currently present illegally need only take steps to become legal—admittedly hard to do under our current immigration system, and much easier to do were my proposals or those of some of the Republican Presidential candidates passed into law, but possible to do nonetheless.

A Bit About Global Warming

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The climate panic-mongers need to explain some things. This, for instance, from Steven Mithen’s After the Ice: A Global Human History 20,000-5000 BC (quoted at Watts Up With That:

The next century of human-made global warming is predicted to be far less extreme than that which occurred at 9600 BC [11,600 BP]. At the end of the Younger Dryas, mean global temperature had risen by 7°C in fifty years, whereas the predicted rise for the next hundred years is less than 3°C. The end of the last ice age led to a 120 meter increase in sea level, whereas that predicted for the next fifty years is a paltry 32 centimeters at most,….

The timeline that opens the article at the link is complex, and it’s instructive. So is Andy May’s article at that link.