Hillary’s America

If there’s one word I would use to describe the last Republican debate on March 3rd, it would be “disaster”.  The amount of disrespect was like a cable news show, while the content was more like Jerry Springer.  In the end, many important questions still remained, including who has the bigger penis out of Trump and Rubio.  Unfortunately, that isn’t a joke.  I have heard more than one friend throw their hands up in the air and swear they would vote for Hillary instead of a particular GOP candidate.

Meanwhile, respected former Democrat blue dog Senator Jim Webb is saying the opposite. He is not supporting the Democrats in this election because it will likely be Hillary Clinton. For many former military, her role in Benghazi is inexcusable.  She has also been a lightweight on policy and relied on her biological plumbing as the number 1 reason to vote for her.  Oddly enough, getting her sexual predator husband back in the Whitehouse seems to be her number 2 reason to vote for her.

I can think of one big reason not to vote for her.  The next President will select at least one Supreme Court justice.  In a court that has decided so many crucial cases on a 5-4 decision, the next justice will set the policy for our country for many years to come.  So in the spirit of Ted Kennedy, I think we should take a look at what Hillary’s America will look like.

In McDonald vs Chicago, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that it is in fact a constitutional right to keep and bear arms in the privacy of your own home.  This expanded another 5-4 guns rights decision, District of Columbia vs Heller.  In both cases, the constitutional right for an American citizen to keep and bear arms in the privacy of their own home was at stake.  You would think, given the 2nd amendment, that this would be an obvious decision.  A Hillary Clinton appointed judge will tip the scales, and in Hillary’s America the constitutional right to keep and bear arms will become nothing more than a chapter in our history books.

Freidrichs vs California is likely to go in support of public unions without Scalia on the court.  In Hillary’s America, teachers will no longer have the right to avoid paying union dues to public unions by not joining.  Public unions, who have heavily funded Democrats for decades and are among their top supporters going into 2016, have sued to force teachers to pay union dues even if they are not a member of the union.  In Hillary’s America, that will be more money taken from teachers and put into Democrat campaign coffers.

US vs Texas is a case that will decide whether the President can subvert US immigration laws and determine immigration policy based on executive authority.  Even with Scalia on the court, the Supreme Court has already decided that states cannot require people to prove they are citizens before they vote.  In Hillary’s America, our next President could very likely be chosen by foreigners who have come here illegally.

After bankrupting five major coal companies with crushing regulations, the Court decided 5-4 to halt the EPA’s unconstitutional authority granted by President Obama.  Under a court tipped with a Hillary justice, the executive will have the power to unilaterally pick winners and losers in the US economy and to regulate those who oppose her out of business.

If these reasons to avoid a Hillary Presidency aren’t enough, in Gonzalez vs Carhart, five justices upheld the ban on partial birth abortion.  Partial birth abortion is the barbaric act of killing a baby whose body, arms and legs are already outside of the mother’s womb by crushing the baby’s skull.  These are viable babies, partially born.  Only one justice made the difference in protecting the unborn from this cruelty.  In Hillary’s America, partial birth abortion will be legalized by a 5-4 decision, as will “constitutional rights” granting greater access to abortion and removing even medical safety measures for the mother. Children will be able to cover up sexual assaults through forced abortions with no one, including their parents, ever even knowing.  Limitations for abortion on demand at all stages of viability will be erased.  That is Hillary’s America.

Consider the power of the Supreme Court as you choose who to vote for.  The candidate opposing Hillary Clinton may not be great.  He may be a mess.  You may believe he is untrustworthy.  You may think he has an ugly face, ugly hair, is too short, or doesn’t have a strong enough chin.  But please consider that it’s not just the President up for election in November.  It’s the next Supreme Court.

The Trump University Fraud

So, I’ve been studying up on Trump University. Pretty interesting. It’s not some unusual venture. You’ll hear and see those same type of programs all the time today. Sign up for the free seminar, learn how to flip houses in your area for free, you could be making millions in real estate. I hear them on the radio about as often as I hear “The banks are all buying gold, what do they know that we don’t? Buy gold to protect your future. Now is the time to hedge with gold. You could avoid all sorts of taxes with gold in your IRA. When the economic crash comes, save yourself with gold.  Call now for your free fill in the blank”.

Results will vary. Not representative of typical results. Every diet pill, buy gold scheme, exercise video, real estate seminar, timeshare, shoot even H&R Block is guilty of it. America, get your billions back. It’s refund season. FYI, you might owe. Results may vary.

Did a woman with a son on disability borrow $36,000 to go to Trump university? Yup. Did she not get the results she thought she would? Yup. Did she learn an important life lesson that would have hurt far less if she had learned it after spending $1,500 on the three day seminar or wasting a few hours at the free seminar? Yup.  People buy stuff (used cars especially) because they are marketed to.  Sometimes that stuff is junk.

So is Trump a fraudster?  No, not really.  Coaching, consulting, seminars, motivational speaking, I suppose someone who doesn’t get the results could call them all fraudsters.  I wonder if all those Wall Street corporations got their money’s worth from Clinton’s speeches?  Clinton “University” made millions as she spoke at Goldman Sachs and others. Did she tell them something they didn’t already know?

The Trump University fraud attack will go down in history as one more thing that Trump’s opponents tried that didn’t hurt him.  Trump supporters don’t really care about a business venture that he didn’t even operate.  Chances are, they don’t even know about it.  They are too busy calling now to get the second one free (just pay shipping & handling).  But wait, there’s more.

I think we can learn a lesson from Trump University.  Not how to buy and flip houses.  Not how to make $1,000 a day from the comfort of our home.  Instead we learn to be skeptical of politicians.  When a candidate says he can give us free tuition, free healthcare, free this, free that, look back at the last several decades and understand that results will vary.  In fact, maybe avoid the candidate who over promises and consistently under delivers.  Marketing claims are often too good to be true.  No one tells you about the hidden fees, contract costs after the first six months, or that the initial offer is just a hook to get you into something more expensive.

Maybe Trump is a fraudster, but not because of Trump University.  Because he promises that he’s a winner and we’ll keep winning and winning and winning, and he’ll make you a winner, and he’ll make America great again.  Results may vary.  But Bernie Sanders is also a fraudster.  Cause he’ll give you free college, and free healthcare, and free family leave, and he’ll save the environment, and he’ll end all global conflict, and he’ll get those evil people at Wall Street, and so on.  Cause it worked so well when Obama promised all that.  Hillary Clinton is a fraudster.  I can’t even tell you what she promises, because she doesn’t talk about policy.  When you are selling junk, you don’t talk about what you are selling.  You talk about how buying it will make you feel.  You talk about how the sucker you are selling to feels now and how your product will fix it so they feel better.  It’s called being a used car salesman.  Or a politician.

So when it comes to Trump University, there’s nothing to see here.  No spectacular fraud, no Bernie Madoff scheme.  It’s not Enron, Whitewater, or any other scandalous fraud.  It’s simply a marketing scheme.  And it works as well as Trump’s candidacy has.  I couldn’t imagine spending $35,000 to learn about flipping houses.  I also couldn’t imagine voting for Trump, Hillary or Bernie.  But if there’s one thing Trump University has taught us, it’s that the world is full of suckers.

How Bernie Pays for it All

There is an interesting phenomenon occurring with Bernie Sanders.  Like other populist candidates before him, an entire mythology has been built up around Bernie Sanders. When you confront a Bernie supporter with the facts that he is going to raise taxes on the poor and that his proposals do not square with reality, the common response is that Bernie will only raise taxes on the rich.  That’s simply not true.  Rick Newman posted an excellent article on Finance.Yahoo.com today that debunks a lot of Bernie mythology.

I figured I would summarize his article, and add a few thoughts of my own.  For my source, I’m going to use Bernie Sanders’ own website.  I encourage you to open the link, follow along, and see how Bernie pays for it all.

Rebuild America Act

The Rebuild America Act is a $1 trillion plan to rebuild America’s crumbling infrastructure in a way that Obama’s $1 trillion stimulus couldn’t.  No, I don’t know how either.  But apparently Bernie has cracked the code and will get it done.  How will he pay for it?  With a $100 billion tax on US headquartered companies who have overseas operations.  That’s $100 billion every year for ten years.  I’m assuming he’s calculated interest on that $1 trillion cost.

Setting aside Bernie’s $900 billion first year shortfall for a moment, let’s look at the affect of a $100 billion tax on US corporations with overseas operations.  Apple, Inc is a great example.  Apple has about $203 billion in cash.  Most of that is overseas.  Apple was also the third largest corporate income tax payer, shelling out $14 billion in 2012.  In fact, if you were to take the US income tax burden of the top ten corporations, you end up with about $117 billion a year.  In other words, if you raise taxes on those companies by $100 billion and they move completely overseas, you are now losing money.  So Bernie’s plan to chase away corporations may not be a winner.

College for All

Don’t be fooled.  When Bernie says college for all, he is talking specifically about tuition for public universities.  For example, instate tuition at the University of Florida comes to about $6,400.  That is quickly eclipsed by room and board, fees, and other costs estimated at $14,200.  So you’re not quite in the clear with “college for all”.  And of course, private universities would not be covered.  So Bernie maintains a pretty good class structure, no pun intended, with his “college for all (except room and board, fees, private school, etc)”.

College for all is paid for by what his website describes as a tax on “Wall Street Speculators”.  Now, when you read Wall Street Speculators, what you should say in your head is “My Grandma’s IRA and my Grandpa’s pension”.  The tax on Wall Street Speculators is a per trade tax that hits everyone in the market, including retired seniors living on IRAs or pensions.  It also includes you, if your employer has a 401k.  Congratulations, you are a Wall Street speculator worthy of Bernie taxes.

Paid Family and Medical Leave

Jump down a couple.  This one is pretty small.  It’s just a .2% tax on every worker regardless of their income.  Not too bad.  Will that actually cover government funded paid family and medical leave?  No, probably not.  Here’s my objection: what if you’re a young single person with no intention of having kids in the short term?  It doesn’t really matter, you have to pay the tax.  It is another tax for an underfunded liability that you have to pay no matter what, whether you use it or not.

Medicare for All

Here is where Bernie’s tax on all income brackets becomes more odorous.  As I’ve written about before, this is a 2.2% tax hike on every tax bracket, including the bracket for families making $19,000 or less in taxable income per year.  Bernie is also proposing a 6.2% tax on payroll for every worker regardless of how much they make.  That’s in total an 8.4% tax hike on the rich, the middle class, the workers and the poor.

Here’s the problem.  According to Newman and the Center for a Responsible Federal Budget this may only cover half of the $2.8 trillion a year price tag.  So if Bernie were realistic, he would need a 4.4% tax hike on every bracket and a 12.4% tax hike on payroll.  With our current tax structure, this would mean that even those in the lowest tax bracket would see marginally 42.1% of their income go to the government.

You’ve probably heard the argument that the 6.2% (which actually needs to be 12.4%) is on the Employer side.  That’s true.  Let me let you in on a boardroom secret.  When employers budget for a new employee, or raises, or starting salary, no employer says “Hey, let’s not worry about calculating the cost of payroll taxes in our budget”.  Now you know the secret. When your employer pays payroll taxes, they reduce your gross wages to cover the cost.  Sorry, just the way it is.

Here’s the other issue with replacing the 2.5 million employee insurance industry with Medicare for all.  86% of Medicare recipients have some form of supplemental coverage. Why?  because Medicare has copays, coinsurance, deductibles, prescription costs and things it simply doesn’t cover.

So, are you ready to pay an additional 16.8% of your income for Medicare?

A Premium on Honesty

Something odd has happened in this election cycle.  In the past, candidates have signed declarations that they will not raise taxes.  Others have been very careful to target only the “rich”.  One candidate told voters to “read my lips, no new taxes”.  When he raised taxes it ended his political career.  This cycle we have something different.  Bernie Sanders has promised that he will indeed raise taxes.  Not only will he raise taxes, but he won’t just target the “rich”.

Sanders definitely plays the usual socialist games of using sectarian hatred to gin up support among the poor and working classes.  In Sanders’ world it is an us versus them mentality, and he has no shame in telling voters he’s part of “us” and out to punish “them”.  But Sanders has also taken his socialist ambitions a step further and delved right into the subject most politicians have avoided for decades.  Sanders is reselling the old concept that the government can take care of us and it’s worth paying higher taxes.

To this tune, Sanders is proposing tax hikes on every bracket and higher payroll taxes. These taxes would put everyone on Medicare and extend paid family medical leave to every worker whether they want it or not.  For example, if you are a single woman on birth control, you will pay higher taxes for maternity leave whether you use it or not.  If you are currently a union member with a Cadillac plan, Bernie Sanders will make you give up that plan, raise your taxes, and put you on Medicare.  If you are currently a low wage worker on Medicaid, Bernie will put you on Medicare and raise your taxes.

Is this political suicide?  Perhaps not.  A recent Gallup poll showed that while Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are viewed as unfavorable by more than half the country, Bernie Sanders’ unfavorability rating is closer to 30%.  The only person with a lower unfavorability rating in that poll is the lovable Ben Carson.  Carson is hardly a political genius, but he’s definitely very honest.

So what would make a candidate who wants to raise taxes on the poor so popular?  One reason may be general voter ignorance.  The popular online poll at isidewith.com often returns Bernie Sanders for people who like what he promises.  But the poll never gives a pricetag or tax consequence.  The poll doesn’t ask people if they think the poor should pay higher taxes.  The last candidate to recommend a tax hike on the poor was Michelle Bachmann, a Republican who was castigated for the idea.  Until Sanders recently began unveiling his various tax hike plans, Democrats firmly believed he would stick to sectarian tax hikes and lower taxes for the poor and middle class.  The message that Bernie Sanders would raise taxes on the poor and middle class has not quite reached the masses.

However, for those who know what Bernie’s plan is there may be another factor.  Since “read my lips” and “I did not have sexual relations” to “weapons of mass destruction” and “no tax hikes for those making less than $250,000”; people may just be looking for a candidate who will tell them the truth.  2016 may go down as the election cycle where people put the largest premium on honesty.  On the right, Trump had gained fame and political fortune by being perceived by many as an unfiltered truth teller.  People may question how honest he actually is when compared to his record, but Trump has said things that most would assume are too personally damaging to be lies.  More recently though, a correlation can be seen between Trumps perceived dishonesty and unfavorability.  In the meantime, Hillary Clinton has damaged herself with a high dishonesty rating in polls because she can’t seem to stop lying about her emails. Meanwhile, the lovable Ben Carson is seen as the most honest.  This may currently be his only saving grace.

If you are looking for a way to beat Bernie Sanders, the answer is the truth.  The GOP has been fortunate enough to be handed a Democratic Socialist candidate who says what he actually wants to do.  The more voters understand that Bernie Sanders wants to raise their taxes, take away their freedom, and have the government more involved in their lives, the easier he will be to beat.  On the flip side, the worst thing the GOP can do is put forward a candidate who is perceived as dishonest.  Educated voters will vote against their interests before they vote for a known liar.  So the question is this: does the GOP have an honest candidate who is also an intelligent, articulate conservative leader?  If the answer is yes, that is who the GOP should support in the primaries.  That is who will beat the socialists.

Single Payer: An Analogy

Bernie Sanders has finally released his tax plan to pay for Single Payer Medicare for All health insurance.  It is estimated that Medicare for All will cost $1.4 trillion a year.  That’s only about a 40% increase over our entire current federal budget.  To put it in perspective, that’s about five times what we have spent annually on Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan since 2001.

Obviously a country that is hemorrhaging close to $1 trillion in deficits every year can’t afford another $1.4 trillion in deficits.  Medicare for All will need to be paid for. Fortunately Bernie Sanders has a plan.  Unfortunately, that plan involves a 2.2% tax hike for everyone who makes more than $10,350 a year, regardless of the source of income.  It also means an additional 6.2% tax on payroll.  Currently we pay 15.3% in payroll taxes regardless of income level.

So how is a liberal getting away with calling for an 8.4% tax hike on the poor and working classes?  Here is the rationalization: you are already paying for health insurance.  So instead of paying private companies for health insurance, why not pay the government?

So to make sure you understand what Bernie is saying, he is suggesting that the government can provide health insurance for a lower cost than private insurance companies.  The 2.5 million people who work in the insurance industry, specialize in connecting consumers with medical billing departments, and coordinating those payments will be let go and replaced with how ever many millions of government employees it takes to replace them.  Please see the IRS or Social Security Administration as an example of how great the government is at this sort of thing.

But let’s say Bernie pulls it off.  He replaces the entire insurance industry of 2.5 million workers with a single Medicare solution.  Not only that, but the government does it cheaper than private insurance companies who actually care about finding equilibrium market prices.  What would that look like?  I thought of a good analogy:

You decide you want some breakfast cereal, so you go to the grocery store.  You are deciding whether you want Frosted Flakes, Cheerios, or Shredded Wheat.  Frosted Flakes taste good, but aren’t healthy or cheap at $5 a box.  Cheerios taste good, but are expensive at $4.50 a box.  Shredded Wheat is cheaper at $3.50 a box, but doesn’t taste as good.

You get to the grocery store and the cereal aisle, and all there is on the shelves is Government Wheat Flakes at $3.75 a box.  It has all the nutrition you need, it is cheaper than most cereals were, and its taste meets minimum government standards.  Every box on the shelf is Government Wheat Flakes.

In exasperation you head for the front door with your cart empty.  It does not fit any of the choices you actually wanted.  As you pass the cashier, she says in a DMV tone “That will be $3.75 please.”  But wait, you didn’t buy anything.  “Ma’am, it doesn’t matter.  Whether you buy the Government Wheat Flakes or not, you owe us $3.75.  That way we can keep the cost low for everyone!”  You refuse to pay.  You go to jail.

So if you like the idea of your only choice being Government Wheat Flakes, and having to pay for it whether you buy it or not, you’ll love Single Payer Medicare for all.

Hillary’s Fatal Error

It started with a white lie from the flawless future of the Democrat party.  DNC Darling and redemptive daughter of the Clinton family, Chelsea Clinton made a comment about Bernie Sanders’ healthcare plan.  Rather than attacking Single Payer universal healthcare for what it is, Chelsea took a different route.  According to Chelsea, Bernie Sanders wants to “dismantle Obamacare”.  As those words left her mouth, millions of Republicans changed their party affiliation so they could vote for Bernie Sanders.  Perhaps he might have more success at it than the GOP has.

The problem with claiming Bernie wants to dismantle Obamacare is that no one likes Obamacare.  Democrats had to cheat to get it passed because Massachusetts, let me repeat, MASSACHUSETTS has just elected a Republican in order to halt Obamacare from passing.  In the most recent Gallup poll, taken between open enrollment and tax time, only 44% of Americans like Obamacare.  That’s actually up from the 37% who liked it last November.  We’ll see how people like it when their premiums jump double digits again this year.  Since Obamacare passed, Republicans have won large enough majorities in the House and Senate to put a repeal bill on Obama’s desk.

The backlash was quick and severe.  Media outlets typically sympathetic to the Clintons could not overlook such a half truth, that Bernie would get rid of Obamacare but not replace it with something.  Of course, this is a little different then how the media has handled Republican calls to repeal and replace.  I don’t remember any factcheck articles saying “wait a minute, when Republicans call for repeal they actually do have their own plan!”  The only people who actually know that the Republicans have a viable plan to replace Obamacare are people who receive Paul Ryan fundraising emails.

Chelsea’s attack was typical politics.  What followed was not an appropriate retraction, but rather Hillary doubling down on the half-truth.  Again, the Clinton camp found a way to turn off Democrats.

To this point, Hillary has sought to stay away from controversy and just let the primary process run its course.  She has been seen as the sure choice from day one and the DNC has done a lot to protect her.  The healthcare debacle has highlighted differences between her and Bernie Sanders policy.  It has also given a clear example to Democrats of the dishonesty that Republicans have been screaming about for decades.  But perhaps her most fatal error was taking such a huge risk in the defense of a healthcare policy that 59% of independents and 17% of Democrats don’t like.

 

Safe From Pesky Choices

Bernie Sanders has become notorious for his twitter account.  If you thought Trump was looney toons when he makes off the cuff remarks, you should see Bernie’s twitter.  For example, the man who wants to be our President can’t understand why collateralized real estate debt being paid by an adult with credit would carry a lower interest rate than a student loan.  Bernie also thinks ATMs shouldn’t be able to charge significant fees to people with other banks who use them.

There are probably a lot of people who read Bernie’s ATM tweet and said to themselves “Yeah, why should I have to pay high fees to use an ATM?  Stick it to ’em Bernie, force them to lower their fees”.  After all, do any of us really understand why ATMs charge fees to people who don’t use that same bank?  Well, actually they do it because there is some cost involved both in equipment and risk to dispensing money to someone with nothing more than their card’s guarantee that the bank that owns the ATM will be reimbursed by that customer’s bank.

So Bernie artificially caps ATM fees.  What do you do as a bank?  You stop allowing access to your ATM without a debit card issued by your bank.  That’s easy enough.  And it’s one more pesky choice socialism can keep us safe from.  Now you don’t have to choose whether or not you want to spend possibly up to $5 in fees to withdraw the $40 in cash you realized you must have at that moment.  That choice is gone with a wave of the government’s magic wand.  Hopefully you didn’t need that $40 for an emergency.

Let’s take college as an example.  The Bernie plan (Hillary too) is that instead of choosing to go to college, taking out a student loan, and then paying for college, we all just pay for everyone to go to college through higher taxes.  Isn’t that great?  The choice of whether or not to pay for college is gone, just like that.  You can still choose whether you want to go or not, but if you have an income you’ll pay for somebody to go to college.

Bernie was recently asked about his Single Payer health plan (another one Hillary also supports).  The question was asked, won’t that raise taxes?  Of course it will, he responded.  But you’re already paying an insurance company.  So why not just pay higher taxes instead?  Another pesky choice avoided.  Instead of having to choose an insurance company based on service they provide, price levels, what doctors they pay for, and ease of use, you can all pay taxes for a single government program where the government can decide what services you get, how much you pay, what doctors are covered, and whether it will be easy to use or not (remember the healthcare.gov rollout?).

But, Bernie argues, with a single payer system you’ll have access to any doctor you want!  Really?  The government pays less to doctors than an insurance company does.  Many doctors simply don’t serve Medicare/Medicaid patients.  Doctors who don’t work with the government won’t go away.  They’ll simply be very selective with their clientele.  Rather than choosing an insurance company that pays the best doctors, Single Payer will create two classes of doctors.  There will be the doctors willing to take what the government will give them, and the doctors who only the rich, upper class, and political class will be able to afford.

At least that will be one more choice Bernie and socialism can keep you safe from.

Obama Does Gun Control

We have to DO something.  It doesn’t matter what.  We can’t just sit back and DO nothing.  So Obama did gun control.

When Obama gave his tear filled speech about his executive orders on gun control, it was a magical political moment.  It was like when a politician kisses a baby and the baby stops crying, or gives an impassioned speech that evokes a slow clap.  Obama began his “doing gun control” speech by listing off a bunch of mass shootings that his executive order would not have changed or prevented.  But that doesn’t matter.  We have to DO something.  We make a difference by doing things, even if those things don’t make a difference.

Next up the emotional Obama brought up Gabby Gifford, a prime example of why we need to do something.  Also a prime example of a mass shooting that would not have been prevented by Obama’s executive action.  After a long speech filled with the same old falsehoods and platitudes, Obama tearfully announced that we were finally doing something.  So what exactly did Obama do?

For one thing, he didn’t really change much.  Most of his executive order is actually what an executive order should be:  direction to federal agencies on how to enforce the existing laws even if they wouldn’t have prevented any of the mass shootings. Perhaps the worst aspect of the executive order was the part about potentially violating the HIPAA Act in order to get everyone’s mental health labels into a federal database.  But that’s good information for us to have as consumers.  Now I’ll make sure to load up at the gun store BEFORE I go see my shrink about the voices in my head.

Aside from Obama’s crocodile tears and phony crusade to give his supporters the appearance of DOING something about gun violence, what frustrated me the most is the tone that Obama continues to set in Washington.  Republicans support additional help and reforms for handling mental health patients.  Obama had a chance to work with them on that issue and build bridges.  Republicans would likely support more funding to speed up the background check process.  But when you are only doing something for political purposes you don’t want it to look like your opponents are participating.

This was the key to Obama’s executive order.  For all the hype, it didn’t accomplish anything drastic.  However, it fed the mantra that Republicans don’t do things and Obama does.  Republicans, the perennial obstructionists no matter where they fall on the power spectrum, are an obstacle that only the wisest and smartest can circumvent.  Oops, sorry, not circumvent.  I meant to say go around.  That’s completely different.  But the point is that Obama, through absolutely no fault of his own, can’t work with Republicans so he has to do things without them. (Please pay no attention to the $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill Republicans just passed).

Obama had an opportunity to do what every politician promises but few actually do.  He had an opportunity to cross the aisle and find common ground.  He had an opportunity to do something about gun violence that actually mattered.  Instead he opted for grand showboating, political gamesmanship, and making the atmosphere in DC just a little more poisonous than it already was.

 

Notes on the Oregon Militia

Quick notes on the Oregon militia:

They are

• violating the law.
• practicing civil disobedience.
• protesting a clear injustice.  The Hammonds, who peacefully surrendered on Monday, were charged under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 for doing a controlled burn of harmful plants on their leased federal grazing grounds.  They were given the minimum mandatory sentence of five years.  The maximum sentence for a terrorism conviction under this act is death.

The Oregon militia could appropriately be charged with something more severe such as sedition for arming themselves and taking control of federal property.  See the Whiskey Rebellion for how these things have been handled in the past.  See also Baltimore for a different way things like this have been handled in the past.

They are not

• terrorists, especially not comparable to Al Qaeda.
• violent.  Not yet anyway.
• evangelical Christians. Maybe some or even most of them are, but they are not doing this as some sort of Biblical crusade.  It’s not even a valid Mormon crusade.
• politically affiliated. You could guess at their political party, but if you had also guessed that Westboro Baptist was a bunch of Republicans you were just about 100% wrong.
• vastly supported by any particular group.  Everyone from the Republican candidates to the Mormon church have already publicly distanced themselves from this group.  The Hammonds themselves have disavowed this group.
• southern.  It’s Oregon.  Y’all Qaeda?  Really? Could the internets make their bigotries any more transparent?

 

 

Hillary’s Emails

Hillary’s emails.  What an incredibly dull subject.  After all, articles written over nine months ago based on what we knew at the time say she did nothing technically illegal.  Hillary herself, nine months ago, claimed that none of her emails contained classified material.  According to the State Department, nine months ago, it’s true that Hillary never had classified material on that server.  So why would I bring this up?

It turns out, nine months later this story is a pretty big deal.  As of December 31, 2015, Politico reports more than 1,200 of Hillary’s emails have been deemed classified by intelligence agencies. According to the article, 1,274 have been deemed classified, including two more being classified as top secret.  This is based on 41,000 of the 54,000 pages of Clinton emails that are being released by the State Department.

This may come as a shock, but it means that Hillary Clinton either lied about having classified information on her server, or was severely incompetent as Secretary of State.

The emails we have represent the emails that Hillary was unable to get rid of.  At this point, we still don’t know whether her private server was wiped or emails were hand-deleted.  But the dedication to this distinction between deleting and wiping leaves me asking the question: what does it matter now anyway?  I’m not sure there would be articles dedicated to whether Arthur Anderson shredded or burned Enron documents.

The investigation is ongoing, but what seems to be an apparent mishandling of classified information does violate the law.  In fact, it can be a felony.  In fact, people go to jail for it.

So what is Hillary’s defense?  In a September article, Politifact attempted to come to Hillary’s aid.  The argument is that these emails had not been deemed classified at the time that they were sent or received, therefore she did not or should not have known that they contained classified or sensitive material.  Ok, I buy that.  Let’s slap her with a $100,000 fine and two years of probation like they did to Gen. Petreaus.  Right?  What?  She’s running for President??

The argument that the emails on Hillary’s private email server, physically stored in the bathroom of a small IT company in Colorado, were not classified or sensitive because no agency had labeled them as such has a couple major flaws.  First, the reason those emails weren’t reviewed and labeled by intelligence agencies might be because they were stored on a private server that those agencies didn’t have access to.  Second, and perhaps more important, who would willingly vote for a presidential candidate and former Secretary of State who doesn’t know that emails about North Korea’s nuclear weapons programs should be classified?

There are still more than 10,000 pages of emails to be processed by the State Department. Hillary is already under investigation by the FBI.  If her server had been compromised by Russia or China, they would have stolen the pre-wiping, non-redacted versions.  We don’t actually know that they didn’t.

Using a private server for all of her official email as Secretary of State was not just a mistake.  It was a serious lack of basic judgment that should at the very least disqualify her as a candidate.