by | BLOG, EDUCATION, FREEDOM, Israel
“Israel bears full responsibility for this tremendous loss of life…I will not condemn Palestinian resistance.” These are the words of former NYU Law Student Bar Association President Ryna Workman, issued via the association’s email list to as many as 2,000 students. The loss of life Workman so callously attributes to Israel was caused by Hamas terrorists who killed approximately 1,300 people and took hundreds more captive; these are conservative estimates. The attack occurred on Simchat Torah (October 7th), a Jewish holiday during the festival known as Sukkot, and marked the deadliest attack on Israel since 1973.
Let me be clear: Workman is a symptom of a larger disease. Workman is one person; the more damning and horrifying aspect of NYU is that she felt comfortable enough to blast it publicly, openly endorsing heinous acts. What was the response of the student body? 41% of them either approved of or applauded her position and vitriol. Sickening.
Workman believes that Hamas are freedom fighters who should be commended and encouraged in their senseless acts of brutality. Fathi Hamad, a senior member of Gaza’s Islamist rulers Hamas, said “…Seven million Palestinians outside, enough warming up, you have Jews with you in every place. You should attack every Jew possible in all the world and kill them.” Hamas seeks the utter destruction and eradication of the Jewish people. That is crystal clear, and these are the people that Ryan Workman, who was placed in a position of authority and prestige by her peers, idolizes.
Ryna Workman is utterly reprehensible, but perhaps the most damning is the NYU student body. Thirty-six percent voted that Workman should remain in office despite her outrageous claims. The evening of Workman’s anti-Semitic email blast, a vote of no confidence was initiated by a student-led petition. Per student affairs, each student received a voting link tied to their netID. A voting link was sent to 2,070 law students, and 1,176 votes were recorded. Seven hundred and seven students (60%) voted that the SBA President, Ryna Workman, should not remain in office. Four hundred and twenty-eight students (36%) voted that she should remain in office, and 41 (3%) abstained. It is utterly terrifying that 40% of law students attending what was once a prestigious bastion of higher education could find nothing wrong with some blatant cruelty and openly side with kidnappers, rapists, and murderers. Four hundred and twenty-eight “highly educated” men and women openly endorsed it, and 41 could care less.
Workman went on to double down on her previous statements by appearing before ABC News and refusing to condemn the murder and kidnapping of civilians, and the use of sexual violence and the separation and torture of children. Workman has been removed from her office and had a job offer from Winston & Strawn revoked over the message, but that is not enough. Everyone that endorsed her via their votes should also face consequences. These men and women are not fit to serve in a court of law. Evil is alive and flourishing within the American higher education and judicial systems.
by | BLOG, FREEDOM, Israel
It has become abundantly clear that there is a big problem with the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) community. DEI has labored to push the narrative that you are either an oppressor or oppressed. The problem for them is that this idea doesn’t work when it comes to Israel. There is absolutely no more oppressed minority in the history of the world than the Jews. And yet the same DEI folks make them out to be the oppressor — and try to do so with a straight face.
Anyone who calls Israel an occupier or oppressor is either lying or grossly ignorant. The Jews were in what is now Israel 4000 years ago until they were kicked out during the Jewish-Roman wars of the 1st century. The subsequent rulers/inhabitants of the land included Romans, Byzantine Christians, Muslims, Crusaders, Mongols, Mamluks, Ottomans, and Brits. It was not only Arabs despite what others tell you. Not until the post-Ottoman empire were Jews really able to return home, and the 1948 Israeli Declaration of Independence provided protection for Jews that was sorely needed in a post-Holocaust world. The Oslo Accords of 1993 saw the PLO formally recognize the state of Israel and the right of Israel to exist, but it still was not recognized by many in the Arab world. As for Gaza, the Israelis withdrew from the region in 2005 and it has been under the control of Hamas since 2006. Israel is hardly the “oppressors.” I would agree that the Palestinians in Gaza are oppressed – but the oppressor is Hamas, not the Israelis, who have been gone for almost 20 years.
DEI’s absurd ideology is exposed for what it is: a ridiculous and feeble attempt to see the world through a biased lens in order to push false narratives that don’t hold up to reality.
by | BLOG, FREEDOM, Israel
The atrocity of the October 7 Hamas invasion in Israel has recently been compared to our 9/11 attack. While the situation is similar — an Islamic terrorist group struck against a sovereign nation — the assault on Israel was far worse. To put it in perspective, consider this: on 9/11, 3,000 American citizens died and during the Hamas attack, 1,300 Israeli citizens died. But when you consider those terrible numbers in reference to the total population of each country, the 1,300 deaths out of an Israeli population of 9.55 million would be comparable to a loss of roughly 45,000 Americans. That is 15 times higher than our losses from 9/11. Similarly, the initial injuries incurred by Israelis are 3,227. That would be equivalent to 113,000 injuries to Americans on 9/11, while in actuality that number for us was roughly 6,000.
As a lifelong New Yorker, I am in no way downplaying the monstrosity of 9/11. Yet as an American, it is imperative to show others how wide and cruel the Hamas slaughter really and truly was.
by | BIDEN, BLOG, COVID, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT
How can Biden get away with saying the pandemic is over, at the very same time his attorney wrote the legal opinion that debt forgiveness was constitutional because of the COVID State of Emergency? He is trying to play both sides.
On 60 Minutes this past Sunday, President Biden declared that “The pandemic is over. We still have a problem with Covid.” He furthered this assertion by reiterating “the pandemic is over. If you notice, no one’s wearing masks. Everybody seems to be in pretty good shape. And so I think it’s changing.”
Since Biden says it’s over, then it’s time for the enduring COVID State of Emergency to be over. But that poses a problem for him. With that, any additional COVID funding should also cease. He needs to declare the pandemic over right before midterms to show that he and the Democrats have been successful in something since he took office. But he is simultaneously hanging on to the enduring COVID State of Emergency and using that to justify his unconstitutional student loan forgiveness scheme.
Biden is a criminal liar and simply cannot have it both ways.
by | BIDEN, BLOG, ECONOMY, FREEDOM
Let’s concede the claim that man-made climate change is real and poses significant harm to humanity as a whole. That statement is then used as a rallying cry to inflict irrevocable damage on today’s generation, both the rich and the poor. So often in American society, we see a problem, and the immediate reaction of our politicians is to invoke a top-down approach to “fix it,” which often does more harm than good. Frederich Hayek said it best, “The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design.”
The Biden Administration and the Democratic party have started a never-ending push to wage war on Climate Change and reduce our carbon footprint. Well, how’s it going you may ask? Per one model, eliminating all U.S. emissions would reduce global temperature by less than 0.2 degrees Celsius by 2100. Our current administration would offer you up, today’s citizens, in hopes of saving some future person that has yet to exist in their futile war. They throw us in the fire, yet the Earth grows hotter still; their reprehensible actions are all for naught.
The EPA says, “the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions from human activities in the United States is burning fossil fuels for electricity, heat, and transportation.” The Biden Administration then takes that statement and runs with it. Even with theoretical efficiency in their crusade, the costs of their policies would be staggering. The economy would, in aggregate, lose $7.7 trillion of gross domestic product (GDP) through 2040, which is $87,000 per family of four. What then should we do, you may ask? Well, the best shot we have going forward is a market-based approach. The government should reduce red tape surrounding proven superior energy sources, like fusion energy, reduce unrealistic mandates, and allow people to innovate as they do best. In short, this administration needs to cease and desist their self-proclaimed climate war; the cost paid in American lives is too steep.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, EDUCATION, FREEDOM, HYPOCRISY
The continued maltreatment of Amy Wax at UPenn is egregious and unacceptable. Ted Ruger, Dean of the UPenn Carey Law School, has consistently mismanaged the entire affair; his recent change in policy effectively abandoned his prior stance that upheld the right for faculty to express their views buckling under pressure from students who clearly do not understand the concept of freedom of expression. UPenn certainly doesn’t seem to be doing its job these days.
Wax’s “crime” of expressing unfavorable views to some on the topic of immigration — off-campus and unaffiliated with UPenn, by the way — has resulted in a barrage of unrelenting criticism among her colleagues; Ruger went so far as to issue an official statement distancing the law school from her and then penned an op-ed in an act of pure posturing while thinly conceding that free speech is still a thing.
Not so anymore. Ruger bowed to student demands that Wax be sanctioned and that tenure be reformed to “ensure that tenure be consistent with the principles of social equity.” Ruger has now announced that he will indeed take action against Amy Way, a tenured professor who may face termination. This change in policy undermines the right of faculty to speak freely and UPenn’s commitment to safeguard those rights. This chilling change will undoubtedly affect anyone who espouses an unpopular idea that might be found offensive at some point. One would think that UPenn faculty would be aghast at such a prospect — for they too could be next.
UPenn has proven to be rather un-collegial in this entire sordid affair which makes me recoil at the thought of supporting such an institution any longer. Clearly gone are the days by which the highest goals of a university are the pursuit of knowledge through the debate and discussion of ideas and the defense of the free expression of those ideas.
by | BLOG, FREEDOM, MEDIA
Whenever anyone talks about George Floyd, we are immediately reminded that he was a black man unjustly killed by a white policeman and that he is now a symbol of racial justice. The problem is that racism was not even a factor in Floyd’s death — but you won’t ever hear about it.
This past April, the Attorney General for Minnesota, Keith Ellison, declined to pursue a hate crime charge against Derek Chauvin. During a CBS News interview when Ellison was asked on the matter, he stated, “I wouldn’t call it that because hate crimes are crimes where there’s an explicit motive and of bias. We don’t have any evidence that Derek Chauvin factored in George Floyd’s race as he did what he did.” It’s worth it to note that Ellison himself is black. When pressed further by Scott Pelley, Ellison explained “we only charge those crimes that we had evidence that we could put in front of a jury to prove.”
George Floyd’s death was unnecessary and cruel. It was an act of police brutality. It’s unfortunate, therefore, that no one has bothered to take an interest in whether (or not) the Floyd killing had anything to do with racism.
by | BLOG, CONSTITUTION, ECONOMY, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, HYPOCRISY, POLITICS, TAXES
On February 2nd Senator Elizabeth Warren announced that she will join the Senate Finance Committee, the committee tasked with writing this country’s tax laws. She stated, “I’m very pleased to join the Finance Committee, where I’ll continue to fight on behalf of working families and press giant corporations, the wealthy, and the well-connected to finally pay their fair share in taxes.”
Warren has often advocated for a wealth tax in the past, especially during her campaign last year for the Democratic presidential nomination. But now she is actually in a position to make proposed legislation happen. In fact, she’s promised that it will be her “first order of business.” This is wrongheaded on many levels, including fairness, constitutionality, impossibility of implementation, history of failure, negative effect on the economy, and morality.
Fairness: Senator Warren has always maintained that corporations and the wealthy are not paying their “fair share”. She has never addressed the question of what that “fair share” might be. That is not surprising, since corporations and the wealthy in the US pay a far higher share of the tax burden than is paid in virtually every other country in the developed world – and by a wide margin. This results not from very high rates, but rather from the fact that our poor and middle class – almost 50% of our population – pay almost no income tax. According to the Tax Foundation’s 2021 data analysis, in 2018 (the most recent figures available),“the top 50 percent of all taxpayers paid 97.1 percent of all individual income taxes, while the bottom 50 percent paid the remaining 2.9 percent.” Additionally, “The top 1 percent paid a greater share of individual income taxes (40.1 percent) than the bottom 90 percent combined (28.6 percent).” To add a wealth tax on top of the already extremely progressive tax system would be anything but fair.
The grotesque unfairness of a wealth tax is even more evident when it is actually calculated. This can be seen by the following example: Assume that an investor with $100M net worth in the present low interest environment (and because not all of his wealth is appreciating assets) has an average rate of return of 4%. His income therefore is $4 million. The investor would pay an income tax rate of about 45% total combined federal/state/local taxes which would be $1.8 million in taxes. Now consider a 2% wealth tax tacked on, which would be an additional $2 million. This would mean the investor would pay a total of $3.8 in taxes and he would have an effective tax rate of 95%. What’s even more sobering is that if he earns less than 4%, or if his tax rate was more than 45% (which it will be with Biden’s plans), then the investor’s taxes would be in excess of 100%.
Constitutionality: Our Constitution provides in Article 1, Section 9, Clause 4 that: “No Capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, unless in Proportion to the Census or Enumeration herein before directed to be taken.”
Both our income tax and a wealth tax would run afoul of this provision. To make the income tax constitutional we had to add the 16th Amendment. But no such amendment exists for the wealth tax. It may be that wealth tax proponents would argue that this tax is somehow taxing income potential using wealth as a proxy. But no Supreme Court, other than an off-the-charts progressive one, would approve of such strained logic. In fact, there’s currently a case before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals challenging Trump’s Mandatory Deemed Repatriation Tax on the ground that it is, in fact, an unconstitutional wealth tax.
Implementation: Taxing someone’s wealth requires determining the fair market value (“fmv”) of his or her assets, and then (presumably since no details are currently available) subtracting all liabilities. For anyone of considerable wealth, this would be an extraordinarily expensive, time consuming, and complicated effort. Even for assets that might have a publicly available market for valuation, it isn’t that simple. Consider volume. If someone has a substantial amount of something, you normally would apply a discount, since selling large volumes of assets can upset the market and reduce the overall value of an item.
But not everything has a value that can be determined easily. Investment in a closely held business, or real estate, or even paintings are examples of assets that are not susceptible to easy valuation on an annual basis, making it not very economically feasible to try to do so. Additionally, valuation can be determined in any number of ways — such as appraisals, discount rates, and reductions in the lack of marketability– so that valuations may be varied.
Another factor that makes valuations difficult are contingencies. For example, many assets have contingencies backed up with guarantees, and it’s difficult to value those contingencies. Finally, there is a question of liquidity/ability to liquidate or pay. Most people who have extraordinary assets like that often don’t have sufficient income or liquid assets to pay a wealth tax on them. Since many assets are not easily marketable, there could be a liquidity crunch.
Of course, a wealth tax would add even more burdensome complexity to the already byzantine tax code. The IRS would have to substantially increase its number of agents and its budget just to have the manpower to devote to compliance and enforcement. Given the IRS’s history of being discriminatory and incompetent, this is not a good thing.
Failure: It should also be noted that the wealth tax has already been tried — and failed — repeatedly. At one point, 15 European countries had a wealth tax. To date, all but four nations have since repealed it because it was ineffective in accomplishing its goals and was extraordinarily complicated and expensive to administer. Additionally, the wealth tax induced capital flight and asset hiding. For instance, in 2017 France decided to abandon its wealth tax after it caused the loss of “10,000 people with about 35 billion euros ($41 billion) in capital abroad” over a 15 year period according to the Prime Minister. Likewise, Switzerland — one of the four remaining wealth tax countries — experienced substantial tax evasion, noting that a mere “.1% wealth tax lowers reported wealth by 3.4%” according to a study by the National Bureau of Economic Research. As Switzerland has a wealth tax rate of 1%, that amounts to 34.5% in unreported assets.
Effect on the Economy: The growth of our economy is dependent on putting capital to productive use. Every time a corporation reinvests its retained earnings, or an individual puts his wealth to work by investing in an ongoing or new venture, the economy grows. This growth results in new purchases of equipment, facilities, hiring of employees, research and development, etc. Conversely, when capital is removed from the economy, such as by requiring the payment of a wealth tax, the economy shrinks. In fact, the wealth tax is a form of double taxation. Wealthy Americans already pay taxes on their income; under a wealth tax, they would then be taxed again for keeping that income in various assets. This not only punishes success, but discourages investment and savings.
Though progressives may argue that the capital taken out of circulation will be used to redistribute income to those who will spur the economy by consuming those funds, we revert back to Economics 101 – consumption has a much smaller effect on the economy than investment.
Morality: There is no moral justification to take something from someone just because they have it, even if they have a lot of it. One is reminded of the great scholar Thomas Sowell, who understands this quite well: “Since this is an era when many people are concerned about ‘fairness’ and ‘social justice,’ what is your ‘fair share’ of what someone else has worked for?” The wealthy in this country are an extraordinarily charitable group. But it should be their choice as to how charitable they wish to be with their hard-earned assets.
Senator Warren has argued that a real benefit of this tax is that it will only affect a relatively small number of people. This reveals what this tax really is – an attempt to foment class warfare by giving a large number of people (read: voters) a benefit through confiscating substantial amounts of money from a small group.
A wealth tax will certainly not bring in the revenue expected by the progressives – who relish the thought of punishing wealthy Americans in order to throw more money at their failed policies. Wealth redistribution is inherently the antithesis of the American Dream. Bastiat was right. No matter how you spin it, explain it, try to justify it, a wealth tax is simply “legal plunder.” Perhaps Senator Warren is being disingenuous (since the wealth tax would never be passed) but she will nevertheless score political capital among her constituents who do not know any better. She is taking advantage of the lack of economic knowledge among people who don’t understand the complexity and stupidity of a wealth tax.
by | BLOG, CONSTITUTION, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT
There is a renewed push for ending qualified immunity especially since the unrest earlier this summer. Qualified immunity affords police officers protection from litigation for their actions in pursuit of the law, while immunity is lost if an officer violates a citizen’s constitutional rights. At least, that is what qualified immunity was before it metastasized into a near entitlement shield for officers and other public officials. Qualified immunity does not need to be abolished but it should definitely be qualified. It needs to be turned around to what it originally meant, not what decades of SCOTUS rulings has made it to be.
by | BLOG, ECONOMY, ELECTIONS, FREEDOM
When we have a generation of voters who take their policy lessons from a person who believes that billionaires shouldn’t exist, we are in trouble. What’s more, she boasts of having an economics degree but her ideas are not rooted in reality. Let’s take a look at some of her more unorthodox economic positions:
- Green New Deal: AOC created a sweeping bill that puts the environment impact as the basis for economic policy. Not only is this inherently anti-free-market, her objectives of addressing climate and economic inequalities are completely undermined by the staggering cost of her proposal. Estimates fluctuate wildly between a minimum $10 trillion and $93 trillion, which would obviously exacerbate economic inequality by massively increasing American’s debt load on the backs of the taxpayer.
- Socialism: While on the subject of the Green New Deal, did anyone notice 8B in her bill? “It is the duty of the Federal Government to create a Green New Deal (8B) to create millions of good, high-wage jobs and ensure prosperity and economic security for all people of the United States.” It is out-and-out socialism to insist that the government is the chief means of generating wealth and try to do so through policy.
- 70% Tax Rate: Shortly after taking office, AOC proposed a 70% tax rate on incomes over $10 million aimed at going after wealthy Americans for whom she has utter contempt. After all, during an interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates, AOC explained, “I’m not saying that Bill Gates or Warren Buffett are immoral, but a system that allows billionaires to exist when there are parts of Alabama where people are still getting ringworm because they don’t have access to public health is wrong,” But she fails in understanding that Bill Gates or Warren Buffett has earned their wealth through the creation of millions of jobs and products that have improved the lives of Americans and lifted the economy. Yet a 70% tax rate will quite likely limit future entrepreneurs knowing that being successful results in confiscatory taxation.
- Rent Control: In an attempt to combat poverty through affordable housing, AOC has proposed a sweeping national rent control bill that would institute a cap of 3% or the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI), whichever is greater, for housing markets nationwide. But this is a classical example of price control; what’s more, it would exacerbate the problem of housing affordability that AOC purports to want to fix. Creating new housing (such as apartments) is the best way to help with affordability, but rent control would create scarcity; housing developers will certainly not build if there is a cap on the amount that could be charged to the consumer-renter.
- Investment tax breaks: AOC was viciously against tax incentives for Amazon when they attempted to set up a new, major headquarters in NYC. When New York offered a $3 billion temporary tax break that would result in the creation of 25,000 new jobs for New Yorkers, she proclaimed “If we’re willing to give away $3 billion for this deal, we could invest those $3 billion in our district ourselves if we wanted to.” What AOC fails to grasp is that nothing was being given away as if there was $3 billion locked up somewhere. It’s merely taxes Amazon won’t have to pay on in the future, money that has yet to exist and now won’t at all. Even worse are the other benefits that won’t exist now that Amazon decided against New York: besides the 25,000 jobs (many likely going to people within her own district), there’s additional sales, income, and property tax revenue that would have been generated for New York. Of course, AOC later gloated about a “victory” when Amazon decided to simply expand some existing NY office space, adding about 1,500 new workers, as if that will grow the economy better than 25,000 would have.
AOC is indeed economically illiterate. The fact that so many people have such little understanding about economics themselves that they are not laughing her out of office for her ideas is even more troubling.
