Who's Up for Paying Higher Taxes?
As President socialist/scumbag/liar-Joe Biden and President-in-Waiting lowlife/liar-Kamala Harris embark on a tour of the country to inform us all just how popular their $1.9 trillion Not-COVID Relief legislation really is, there are rumors swirling that the bill for that bill is coming due. That’s right — stay tuned for the biggest tax hike in three decades.
Of course, we warned during the campaign that socialist/ scumbag/liar-Biden/lowlife/liar-Harris intended to “roll back” the Republican tax cuts of 2017, so this isn’t unexpected. And technically, the tax hike isn’t being floated to pay for the pandemic bill; it’s for more spending coming down the pike.
Bloomberg broke the story: “Unlike the $1.9 trillion Covid-19 stimulus act, the next initiative, which is expected to be even bigger, won’t rely just on government debt as a funding source.” Tax hikes would hit the higher brackets as well as the corporate rate, likely raising it to 28% from 21% — making corporate taxes 33% higher than they are now. (Many news stories are getting this wrong and saying it’s only a 7% increase.) Remember too that many small businesses pay the highest individual rate, which would likely rise back to nearly 40%.
It’s never a great time to jack up tax rates, but nothing says “reopen the economy after a pandemic” like telling businesses “here’s your bigger tax bill.” One might almost begin to think this is an orchestrated economic disaster.
This also isn’t just about revenue, as if somehow Democrats have suddenly found religion on balancing the budget. After all, even liberal projections expect only $2.1 trillion in additional revenue over 10 years, which wouldn’t even cover the deficit this year. Moreover, that revenue claim is based on the errant assumption that a massive tax hike on businesses won’t change economic behavior.
“For the socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden administration,” adds Bloomberg, “the planned changes are an opportunity not just to fund key initiatives like infrastructure, climate and expanded help for poorer Americans, but also to address what Democrats argue are inequities in the tax system itself [emphasis added].”
Fact-check: The tax system is definitely inequitable, by design. Contrary to Democrat talking points about a “fair share,” high earners already pay the vast majority of taxes.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen won’t rule out dinky/liar-Elizabeth Warren’s wealth tax, either. “President socialist/ scumbag/liar-Biden during the campaign proposed a higher tax rate on corporations, on individuals and on payments, capital gains and dividend payments that are received,” she said, “and those are alternatives that address — that are similar in their impact to a wealth tax.” Yellen also said a wealth tax is “something that we haven’t decided yet and can look at.”
Democrats hope to sow division by stoking envy as a way to increase the popularity of paying for all the spending they’ve done. Unfortunately, it’ll work with millions of Americans, because Democrats have willing propagandists in the Leftmedia. But make no mistake: Tax hikes always hurt economic growth. It’s just a matter of how well the economy can cope with a blow like that while it’s trying to regain footing after the pandemic. ~The Patriot Post
The Post Gets Caught Faking the News
Fake news, anyone?
If you thought the mainstream media’s malpractice toward Donald Trump couldn’t have been any worse, the elitist hacks at The Washington Post would like you to hold their chardonnays. Decency, it seems, also Dies in Darkness.
As Fox News reports, “The Washington Post made a massive correction Monday to a January report about a phone call between then-President Donald Trump and Georgia elections investigator Frances Watson, admitting it wrongly attributed multiple quotes to Trump based on an anonymous source.”
Here’s the Post’s “correction,” which has been tacked atop the original story.
How does a paper stay in business when it admits to having “wrongly attributed multiple quotes” to a sitting U.S. president? This wasn’t some anonymous bureaucrat weighing in on an obscure policy matter; this was The World’s Most Important Man, and this was one of the world’s most influential newspapers making up, er, stuff about him.
“The Post,” Fox News continues, “initially reported Trump had told an official working in Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s office to ‘find the fraud’ in the state, which he lost narrowly to socialist/scumbag/liar-Joe Biden, and that she would be a ‘national hero’ if she did.”
But a newly emerged recording proves the former president never said any such thing. Instead, Trump said that Georgia elections investigator Frances Watson would be “praised” when the “right answer comes out,” and he encouraged her to closely examine mail-in ballots in Atlanta’s deep-blue Fulton County. It’s all right here for any journalist with integrity to listen to and then accurately transcribe: ~The Patriot Post
Vatican Reasserts Catholic Church's Stance
The Vatican released a statement Monday reaffirming the Catholic Church’s historic doctrine opposing homosexual acts, including so-called same-sex marriage and same-sex unions. The reason given by the Vatican for maintaining its doctrinal position is simple: Since God “does not and cannot bless sin … the Church does not have, and cannot have, the power to bless unions of persons of the same sex.”
The Vatican explains, “It is not licit to impart a blessing on relationships, or partnerships, even stable, that involve sexual activity outside of marriage (i.e., outside the indissoluble union of a man and a woman open in itself to the transmission of life), as in the case of the unions between persons of the same sex.” And the Vatican is clear that its opposition to same-sex unions is not subject to any “benefits” real or perceived from those individuals engaged in such doctrinally illicit relationships. “The presence in such relationships of positive elements, which are in themselves to be valued and appreciated, cannot justify these relationships and render them legitimate objects of an ecclesial blessing, since the positive elements exist within the context of a union not ordered to the Creator’s plan.”
In noting that God does not and cannot bless sin, the statement says, “[God] blesses sinful man, so that he may recognize that he is part of his plan of love and allow himself to be changed by him. He in fact ‘takes us as we are, but never leaves us as we are.’”
The Vatican’s statement is unequivocal in reaffirming the Catholic Church’s doctrine on what constitutes biblical marriage, and is also unequivocal in condemning homosexual acts as sinful. This unambiguous statement is a far cry from Pope Francis’s comments last year when he appeared to endorse the possibility of the Church’s acceptance of same-sex civil unions.
Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League, welcomed the statement. “This finishes it,” he said. “There’s nothing left to discuss. It’s non-negotiable. The Vatican left nothing on the table with these people pushing this agenda. It made it very clear that the Church can bless homosexuals as individuals, but it will never ever bless homosexual unions, never mind gay marriage.”
On behalf of the “most religious president” in history, White House Press Secretary liar-Jen Psaki responded to a question regarding what nominal Catholic socialist/ scumbag/liar-Joe Biden thought of the Vatican’s statement. The president “continues to believe and support same-sex unions,” she said, “and he’s long had that position.” No surprise there, as socialist/scumbag/ liar-Biden has no problem claiming his “Catholic faith” while opposing the Church’s teachings on a myriad of central moral issues, including first and foremost his promotion of abortion. In truth, it is leftist humanism that socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden most believes in, not the infallible word of God. ~The Patriot Post
Another Colossal Fauci Fail
In his address to the nation last week, ironically on the anniversary of when the ChiCom-controlled puppets at the World Health Organization declared the ChiCom Virus a pandemic, President socialist/scumbag/liar-Joe Biden brazenly took credit for the success of the Trump administration’s vaccine development and distribution plan.
Despite that success, socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden decreed, “We will issue guidance on what you can and cannot do when fully vaccinated.” He further advised, “My message to you is this: Listen to Dr. Fauci, one of the most distinguished and trusted voices in the world.”
Fact is, as I noted last week on Fauci’s opposition to “the science” regarding herd immunity, this 80-year-old lifelong DC bureaucrat, having been in the bowels of various federal agencies since 1968, is long past his expiration date.
Now comes revelation of another colossal Fauci fail.
Recall that after the Coronavirus Task Force, with Fauci at the helm, issued its 15 Days to Slow the Spread recommendations in March of 2020, Fauci dictated to the nation that a key factor in social distancing was that we all had to stay six feet away from each other. Fauci’s six-foot diktat was one of the factors that resulted in shutting down school systems, restaurants, etc. — wrecking the U.S. economy and millions of American lives.
For most of the last year, that six-foot mandate has been the hard-and-fast rule, except, of course, for all those “peaceful protests” against the leftist “systemic racism” lie and all those “racist police.” Apparently, the risk of those super-spreader riots was acceptable.
Recall that, according to the protest permission slip issued by more than 1,200 “public health professionals, infectious diseases professionals, and community stakeholders,” the burn, loot, and murder hordes were justified because “White supremacy is a lethal public health issue that predates and contributes to COVID-19.” And according to Johns Hopkins epidemiologist Jennifer Nuzzo, DrPH, “In this moment the public health risks of not protesting to demand an end to systemic racism greatly exceed the harms of the virus.” Those sentimental absurdities were echoed by other “health professionals.”
That woke nonsense notwithstanding, it turns out “the science” Fauci used regarding distancing was not the actual science. As the Demos’ “summer of rage” was cranking up in June, a British medical journal, The Lancet, published a study noting, “For the general public, evidence shows that physical distancing of more than 1 m is highly effective…” In other words, three feet or more, not a minimum of six feet, is highly effective at preventing viral spread.
This week Fauci was asked about a more recent study by his CNN sycophant, Jake Tapper: “Does this study suggest to you that three feet is good enough?” Fauci responded, “It does, indeed.” He added, “And I can assure you, within a reasonable period of time, quite reasonable, [the CDC] will be giving guidelines according to the data that they have. It won’t be very long, I promise you.”
That’s it? No apology for being disastrously wrong? Apparently, being Fauci means never having to say you’re sorry! Fauci’s revelation is just a year too late for the disaster he authored, but again, in socialist/scumbag/ liar-Biden’s words, “Listen to Dr. Fauci, one of the most distinguished and trusted voices in the world.” Trust them — they’re from the government.
Additionally, it is now clear that government mandated shutdowns and lockdowns were largely ineffective and have proven disastrous for our people and economy. ~The Patriot Post
Time to Embrace Consequence Culture for the Left
When grassroots Patriots have called out the online mobs for trying to get celebrities like Gina Carano fired, some have responded that it’s part of “consequence culture” — reminding us of the old saying that actions have consequences. Well, that’s fine and dandy, since there are plenty of consequences that the Left and the Beltway Establishment wing of the Republican Party need to face. After all, we should have one set of rules for everybody, right?
For instance, let’s look at the long track record of the Left pushing lies about Republicans being the latest equivalent of Nazis and/or the Ku Klux Klan who were scheming to impose a new version of Jim Crow via so-called “voter suppression” — which is really an effort to prevent the repeat of the bulk-mail ballots that turned 2020 into chaos. The denial of the consequences of these lies among the pundit class — at least outside of Dennis Prager — has been appalling.
The problem is that the lack of pushback against those lies from many of those who sought to lead the Republican Party means there is a good chance that many fellow Americans, including those who count votes in Democrat strongholds, may honestly believe that today’s Republicans, conservatives, and grassroots Patriots are really the next iteration of Nazis/Klansmen. There are consequences for the false tying of conservatives/Republicans to these icons of evil from history. It doesn’t stop at discrimination against conservatives.
Prager raises the possibility that those who bought the lie that Republicans are Nazis who colluded with Russia may very well have felt a moral obligation to defeat President Donald Trump’s reelection by any means necessary, including “fortifying” an election, or as many Trump supporters view it, cheating. If leftists want to claim Trump’s use of a not-so-scientific term for COVID-19 causes hate crimes, then why shouldn’t their lies about Republicans and conservatives also have consequences?
Furthermore, as we asked earlier, if they really see grassroots Patriots as al-Qaida, as some left-wing “national security experts” quoted by The Root do, can we really assume that people okay with dropping bombs on political opponents would not be willing to unleash a flood of bulk-mail ballots while degrading safeguards against fraud? Would they oppose the tactics of New York’s Cuomo-James regime against the NRA — which has conveniently been labeled a domestic terrorist organization, by the way? Would it not be okay to use something akin to Operation Choke Point to squelch conservative media or alternative social media sites like Gab?
In a very real sense, grassroots Patriots already imposed consequences on the Left and the establishment for a long list of failures and abuses — they backed Donald Trump over many other candidates, some with good track records, as a form of political chemotherapy.
Another consequence of the Left’s words and the establishment’s reaction (or lack thereof) is the changed mindset emerging on the Right. By falsely tying Republicans, conservatives, and grassroots Patriots to some of history’s biggest exemplars of evil, the Left has made it easier for otherwise decent people to justify departing from the norms — even to the abuse of power. After all, loyal Patriot Post reader, to paraphrase Prager’s question, how far would you be willing to go to keep Nazis, Klansmen, and domestic terrorists who are colluding with Russia from gaining power in this country?
In addition to raising that question, grassroots Patriots, conservatives, and Republicans are denying the Left the benefit of the doubt. They’re willing to presume the worst about the actions of the Left (actions that seem to reflect the principles of totalitarian regimes), and they’re willing to take measures to protect their fortunes, their liberties, and even their lives from an abusive Left, including demanding action against the redlining of conservatism.
Leftists are talking “consequence culture” as a justification for their usual abuses and disregard for the First Amendment. Grassroots Patriots need to fight back and hold leftists accountable for their words and actions — and demand that those who seek to lead or speak for the cause of Liberty do the same. ~The Patriot Post
Dems Are Pushing an Anti-Gun Agenda
Democrats don’t want women or minorities having easy access to their Second Amendment rights. That might be the logical conclusion one would arrive at after seeing the congressional Democrats’ gun control agenda.
The House recently passed two gun control bills with nearly universal Democrat support. The first would impose background checks on all private person-to-person firearm sales, while the other bill pushes the background check out to 10 days, forcing many individuals to wait longer to exercise their 2A rights.
How are these bills especially antagonistic toward women and minorities? As the Wall Street Journal editorial board observes, “The bills are aimed at making it harder to acquire and own guns. Democrats are betting that background checks are popular, but the result in practice may be to spur more gun sales.” Yet as the National Shooting Sports Foundation discovered last year, some 40% of all firearm sales were to women, and of those, 58% were black. Thus, the impact of the new bills would disproportionately hurt minority women.
Representative Ben Cline (R-VA) argued that all the Democrats’ bills would accomplish is to make Second Amendment rights harder for Americans to access while doing nothing to address crime. “I will not stand by and allow our rights to be stripped away,” Cline said. “My colleagues on the other side of the aisle claim that these bills will save lives. However, nothing in them would have stopped any of the recent mass casualty shootings that have occurred in our country. Rather than go after criminals who break the law, Democrats want to create a false narrative that will criminalize private gun ownership. Democrats will tell you that these bills close loopholes. But the loophole they believe exists is that law-abiding Americans are even able to own guns in the first place.” ~The Patriot Post
Cancel Culture Claims Two More Scalps
In a column last week, our Thomas Gallatin wondered whether cancel culture had peaked or if it was just getting underway.
Where did he net out? “Unfortunately, the most likely answer is that cancel culture has only just begun,” he concluded. “The leftist revolutionaries smell blood in the water as companies fearful of being the next victim of the woke mob willingly run to the front of the line to declare their solidarity with the cause, canceling ‘offenses’ before even being challenged. Buckle in for a bumpy ride.”
It’s hard to disagree, and the recent case of the canceled Georgetown Law professors is just the latest example. One of them was summarily fired for uttering what appears to have been an inconvenient fact on a Zoom call, while the other was forced to resign for “failing to correct” his “racist” colleague.
This Twitter post is what started the firestorm. It includes a video showing the two adjunct professors discussing student performance during the aftermath of a Zoom call that had just concluded. Unbeknownst to the two, Hassan Ahmad, presumably a student, was recording the call when Sellers lamented that a subset of a certain racially distinct group of students seemed to consistently perform poorly in her class. Uh-oh.
“You know what? I hate to say this, I end up having this angst every semester that a lot of my lower ones are blacks,” said Sellers as her adjunct professorial career light began to flicker. “Happens almost every semester and it’s like, ‘Oh, come on.’ I get some really good ones but there are also usually some that are just plain at the bottom. It drives me crazy … so I feel bad.”
Her colleague, Batson, mostly seemed to nod in agreement. And that was apparently his crime: failure to correct.
“Georgetown Law negotiations Professors Sandra Sellers and David Batson being openly racist on a recorded Zoom call,” Ahmad tweeted with his recording of the video call, which has since received more than 1.1 million views. “Beyond unacceptable.”
But if we listen closely to what Sellers says, is she really being racist or merely matter-of-fact? It didn’t seem to matter to Law School Dean Bill Treanor, who addressed the Georgetown Law community last week. “As I wrote to you last night,” he began, “I am appalled that two members of our faculty engaged in a conversation that included reprehensible statements concerning the evaluation of Black students. I have further reviewed the incident and have now spoken to Professor Sellers and Professor Batson, giving each the opportunity to provide any additional context. I informed Professor Sellers that I was terminating her relationship with Georgetown Law effective immediately.”
As for Batson, the ax fell on him too. “A Georgetown law professor has resigned, reports Fox News, "following his participation in a Zoom call with a colleague whose comments about her Black students having a lower academic performance every semester led to her being fired. On Saturday, a Georgetown spokesperson confirmed … that Georgetown law professor David Batson had submitted his resignation letter and that Georgetown Law Dean Bill Treanor had accepted.”
It’s hard not to feel a bit sorry for these two. As Power Line’s Paul Mirengoff notes, “It’s normal that when a law school admits Blacks whose credentials show them to be less likely than the average student to perform well academically, the school will find itself with classes in which Blacks disproportionately are ‘at the bottom.’ It’s normal that a professor will feel ‘angst’ over this. … The point is that Sellers’ angst is not evidence of racism. If anything, it’s evidence of the opposite.”
The other point, of course, is that facts are no longer just stubborn things, as John Adams once put it. In the age of cancel culture, they’ve become fireable things. ~The Patriot Post
HANS VON SPAKOVSK
8 Ways That HR 1, 'For the People Act,'
HR 1, the deceptively titled “For the People Act,” has arrived in the U.S. Senate after a party-line vote in the House of Representatives. It is without doubt the most dangerous and irresponsible election bill I have ever seen.
If it becomes law, it will interfere with the ability of states and their residents to determine the qualifications and eligibility of voters, to ensure the accuracy and validity of voter registration rolls, to secure the integrity of elections, and to participate and speak freely in the political arena.
HR 1 is an 800-page monstrosity that would usurp the role of the states. It would not only eliminate basic safety protocols, but mandate new, reckless rules and procedures.
VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQQNgNYnafE
Here are the eight worst provisions of this ill-considered bill:
1) It would eviscerate state voter ID laws that require a voter to authenticate his or her identity. Indeed, it would force states to allow anyone to vote who simply signs a form saying that they are who they claim they are.
When combined with the mandate that states implement same-day voter registration, it means I could walk into any polling place on Election Day, register under the name John Smith, sign a form claiming I really am John Smith, cast a ballot, and walk out.
Not only would election officials have no way of preventing that or verifying that I am not really John Smith, I could repeat this at as many polling places as I can get to.
2) It would make absentee ballots even more insecure than they already are. Not only could states not apply any ID requirement to absentee ballots, they could not enforce any witness signature or notarization requirement.
States that wisely ban candidates, campaign staffers, party activists, and political operatives from handling or delivering absentee ballots would see that ban voided. HR 1 would require states to give access to absentee ballots to third-party strangers who may have a stake in the outcome of the election.
All states also have to create permanent absentee ballot lists for anyone who wants to vote entirely by mail in all elections and mail absentee ballot request forms to all registered voters, a real problem given how inaccurate state voter registration rolls are.
3) It would worsen the problem of inaccurate registration rolls, which are full of people who have died, moved away, are ineligible felons or noncitizens, or are registered more than once. HR 1 severely restricts the ability of states to take the basic steps necessary to maintain the accuracy of their voter rolls, such as comparing their lists with those of other states or using the U.S. Postal Service’s National Change of Address System to find individuals who have moved.
4) It would take away your ability to decide whether you want to register to vote. Instead, it requires states to automatically register individuals who interact with state agencies such as the Department of Motor Vehicles and welfare offices, as well as numerous federal agencies.
This will not only lead to multiple registrations of individuals in the same and multiple states, but the registration of aliens and other ineligible individuals.
5) It would force states to allow online registration, opening up the voter registration system to massive fraud by hackers and cybercriminals. Worse, it severely restricts the ability of state officials to reject a voter registration application, even when it is rejected because the official thinks the individual is ineligible to vote.
6) It imposes onerous new regulatory restrictions on political speech and activity, including online and policy-related speech, by candidates, citizens, civic groups, unions, corporations, and nonprofit organizations. The disclosure provisions that apply to membership organizations like the National Rifle Association, Citizens for Life, and other organizations that Americans of all political stripes join to multiply their voices on important issues will subject donors to intimidation and harassment.
It is the modern equivalent of the donor disclosure requirements that state governments tried to impose on civil rights organizations in the 1950s—requirements the Supreme Court deemed unconstitutional.
7) It would authorize the IRS to investigate and consider the political and policy positions of nonprofit organizations when they apply for tax-exempt status. This would enable the political party in control of the White House (and thus the IRS) to use the IRS to go after anyone criticizing it or its policies.
8) It would set up a public funding program for candidates running for Congress. This would force taxpayers to subsidize the political campaigns of individuals they may vehemently disagree with and wouldn’t vote for in a million years.
Senators who supports HR 1 should realize that they are essentially in favor of throwing the validity and credibility of future elections in doubt and taking away the authority of the voters of their states to make their own decisions on how their elections should be run.
How much more anti-democratic can you get? ~The Patriot Post
Replies