Tag Archive for: taxes

Are You Sick and Tired of Sending Your Tax Dollars to a Federal Government that Doesn’t Give Damn about You?

As we the tax paying citizens of America approach the 2024 tax season, we are witnessing a growing anger against the federal government.

Washington, D.C. doesn’t give a damn about you, they just want your money to spend on everything and anything that keeps them in power.

All three branches of government are wasting our money in different ways.

Big Government Writ Large

Let us look at a list of our top criticisms and recommendations of the Big Federal Government spending troika.

Truths and recommendations (a short list):

  1. They tax us more and more and then spend furiously on things that do nothing for the American citizen. BTW, when was the last time you saw a tax cut?
  2. The growing national debt, now reaching $34+ trillion. Printing money isn’t the answer, cutting government spending, except for mandatory items like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, is.
  3. Spending more and more money to support illegal aliens, a.k.a. illegal migrants/drug cartel members/foreign terrorists/child traffickers/drug traffickers, who are coming across our borders by the thousand each and every week.
  4. Spending billions on foreign wars, with the exception of fully supporting the state of Israel. It’s time to defund foreign wars and use that money to build up our own prosperity.
  5. Buying foreign oil and natural gas when we have abundant amounts right under the ground and off the shores of America.
  6. Investing in private green companies that waste our tax dollars and then go broke.
  7. Bailing out students who took out federal government loans to go to college or university. What are we teaching our children about taking responsibility for their own debts? We need to return student loans back to the private sector.
  8. Using our tax dollars to fund foreign entities, e.g. the PLO, and even terrorists organizations, like Hamas, via our monetary support of the United Nations and U.N.R.W.A.
  9. Funding federal department that are unconstitutional, e.g. the Department of Education.
  10. Stop over paying our federal elected officials, their staff, appointed members of the various departments and their staffs and the growing numbers of federal employees, e.g. the IRS armed agents. Cut the pay at every level.
  11. Wasting our tax payer dollars to attack we the people, via a two-tiered and militarized justice system, that seeks to destroy our Constutional Republican form of government.
  12. Finally, making us taxpayer fund a bloated Executive Branch, Congressional and Supreme Court staff. Cut each branch in half and you will see half the damage done to we the people.

The Bottom Line

Many today are addicted to a bloated, corrupt, and wasteful big government.

It’s past time to cut government and with it government spending.

Time to implement the Fair Tax and get rid of the federal income tax.

We live in the free state of Florida. Florida gets its income from a state 6% sales tax. Florida has a multi-billion dollar surplus.

Get the idea?

Time to defund, defang and damn the federal government to hell.

©2024. Dr. Rich Swier. All rights reserved.

RELATED VIDEO: CBS POLL: More Than Half Of Americans Say Prices Will Keep Going Up If Biden Is Re-Elected

POST ON X: Here is how big government is working to stay in power.

ELECTION 2024: $6 TRILLION in Democrat Tax Increases on November 5th Ballot

It’s the MOAB (mother of all bombs) on America’s dwindling middle class.

No enemedia coverage of this, of course.

$6 Trillion in Taxes Are at Stake in This Year’s Elections

Biden, Republicans offer vastly different plans for handling tax cuts that lapse after 2025

By Richard Rubin, Wall Street Journal Jan. 12, 2024:

The winners of November’s presidential and congressional elections will quickly face decisions on extending tax cuts scheduled to expire after 2025. President Biden and Republicans support starkly different tax plans.

Republicans generally want to extend all expiring tax cuts from the 2017 law former President Donald Trump signed. The price tag: $4 trillion over a decade.

Biden proposed extending Trump’s tax cuts for households making under $400,000 annually but said the rest should expire. Beyond that, he would raise taxes further on top earners and corporations. That plan, including tax increases the president hasn’t fully detailed, would generate more than $2 trillion beyond current forecasts.

That $6 trillion gap is on the ballot, and the ultimate resolution will affect family budgets, corporate profits and the federal government’s fiscal health amid rising debt.

Continue reading.

Keep voting Democrat.

Election 2024 puts $6 trillion in taxes on the November ballot

$4 trillion in tax cuts expire and Biden could add in $2 trillion in additional burdens

By Ted Jenkin, Fox News, February 19, 202:

If the upcoming election in November is reminiscent of the 1993 movie “Grumpy Old Men” with Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau, you might want to also re-watch “The Bad News Bears” with another four years governed under what we colloquially call Bidenomics. It isn’t a dollar’s worth of difference between the two parties, it’s more like $6 trillion at stake when you pull the lever in November.

Embedded within this discourse between the two parties lies some potential deception when you peel back the artichoke and really analyze the numbers. You should never be fooled by percentages and always look at the real dollars coming out of your pocket.

Consider, for instance, a purported 5% increase in capital gain rates for 20% to 25% — a seemingly modest adjustment. However, a deeper examination reveals that this type of tax change would translate to a 25% increase in taxes in actual dollars and not 5% as might be reported. This basic arithmetic underscores the gravity of the electoral choices right around the corner.

Here’s an example. If you had a $100,000 gain and paid 20%, you would owe $20,000. If you had a $100,000 gain and now paid 25%, you would owe $25,000. The difference between $20,000 and $25,000 isn’t 5% … it’s 25%! Here’s why this simple math problem should have you think twice come November.

Depending on how the presidential election goes, taxpayers might be paying Uncle Sam trillions more. (iStock)

As a retrospective glance, the “Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017” ushered in a sweeping paradigm of pro-growth tax reforms, marked by several pivotal provisions. Noteworthy among these were the reduction of top marginal tax rates from 39.6% to 37%, a significant expansion of the standard deduction, and the implementation of State and Local Taxes (SALT) for itemized deductions, among others.

Yet, these beneficial measures are poised to expire by the end of 2025, wiping out $4 trillion in tax relief. Moreover, if the current administration’s proposed tax reforms materialize, an additional $2 trillion of burden may be imposed upon Americans already grappling with inflationary pressures.

Consider the ramifications: Under the “Tax Cuts and Jobs Act,” the standard deduction, which Forbes estimates is utilized by nearly 90% of filers, was doubled, offering substantial relief particularly to middle and lower-income families.

The potential reversion to pre-2018 figures if these tax cuts expire at the end of 2025 would inflict financial hardship on many, not just the wealthy. Millions of middle-class Americans would see a pay cut.
Suddenly, the GOP and Democrats agree on taxes Video

Similarly, the prospect of reverting to a top tax rate of 39.6% and the proposed adjustments to raising federal income taxes and inheritance taxes won’t squeeze enough out of the lemons to make lemonade.

Absent an extension, the estate tax exemption levels could plummet by as much as 50%, jeopardizing the intergenerational transfer of wealth painstakingly accumulated by families. You did great the last seven years, so what? Get ready to give it back.

The proposed revisions to Social Security taxes also loom on the horizon, with discussions revolving around imposing a 6.2% unlimited Social Security tax on incomes exceeding $400,000, akin to an indefinite Medicare tax.

The president continues the rhetoric saying that, “I’m a capitalist, but pay your fair share.” Fair share! In 2022, it’s estimated by Statista that 40.1% of Americans paid no federal income tax. Here’s a question? Is paying zero fair?

Yet, these beneficial measures are poised to expire by the end of 2025, wiping out $4 trillion in tax relief. Moreover, if the current administration’s proposed tax reforms materialize, an additional $2 trillion of burden may be imposed upon Americans already grappling with inflationary pressures.

How many of those that paid no income tax got money back in tax credits and other structures from the government. When the president says wealthy people need to pay their fair share what he means is help pay more taxes to support all of those who don’t pay any. Isn’t that right?

It’s not that long before each of us must hit the ballot box in November. Before you press the button and cast your vote, there may be 6 trillion reasons to consider the future of how much of your hard-earned money you keep.

Continue reading.

AUTHOR

RELATED ARTICLE: The ‘Biden Doctrine’ Is What Happens When Stupid Meets Impossible

RELATED VIDEO: What the Income Tax Really Costs You

EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

The Congressional Uni-Party Continues to Bury America, like Venezuela, Deeper and Deeper into Debt

The Constitutional Republic of the United States is currently being run like a Communist Venezuelan “Democracy.”

The interest alone on the out of control U.S. national debt is approaching the annual appropriations price tag for our military and national security defense expenditures.

Megan Henney  from FOX Business reported,

The U.S. national debt is climbing at an astronomical pace and has shown no signs of slowing down despite the heightened scrutiny on government spending.

The national debt — which measures what the U.S. owes its creditors — fell to $34,088,375,076,993.31 trillion as of Wednesday afternoon, according to the latest numbers published by the Treasury Department. That is down about $21 billion from the $34,109,378,375,744.03 figure reported the previous day.

By comparison, just four decades ago, the national debt hovered around $907 billion.

The Congressional House Republican and Democrat Communist ran Uni-Party control all expenditures from the Treasury Department.

So the buck stops with those individuals in the Uni-Party congress approving the appropriations currently burying our nation in debt. Instead of a balanced budget they continue to fund useless back door Continuing Resolutions.

Our fractured political system Is ran by two incompetent political parties with massive corruption and the rampant tax and spend fleecing of the American tax payer will probably eventually collapse our economy.

The fake news media continues to blame former President Trump for adding 2 trillion plus to the deficit for his tax cuts instead of blaming the congress for failing to stop the insane spending.

This intentional internal attack on our republic by the Uni-Party Communists will eventually lead to another civil war in my opinion.

Our founding fathers did make sure to include a 2nd amendment in our Bill of Rights to prepare for and approve of this eventuality.

Right now we also have political prisoners incarcerated for trying to bring attention to a massive fraud election via a peaceful (for the most part) constitutionally protected 1st Amendment protest on the Capital on January 6th 2021.

Now in February 2024, Instead of securing our borders with walls and razor wire the Communists are trying to decide how much money to borrow from Communist China to build walls and put razor wire around judicial buildings in the swamp filled Washington, D.C.

This tax payer expense is for Trumps upcoming banana republic trial initiated by Biden’s Marxist weaponized Justice Dept.

Apparently the Biden Administration is afraid of we the people initiating action to protect Trump from their illegal fraud prosecution of our former President vice securing our borders.

As an example, over 7.7 million Venezuelans have left Venezuela, a nation that the United States Congress and Biden economic policies are emulating.

Where can Americans flee now to escape political persecution and the economic turmoil headed our way if our nation collapses like Venezuela?

My Venezuelan wife was granted asylum in the republic of Colombia for 10 years before relocating to Florida to be with me via the “legal” immigration process.

Let’s not destroy our republic with the Biden Uni-Party Marxist agenda as there is no place else left to go.

The majority of the 800,000 Venezuelans and two million plus Cubans living legally in the USA support Trump.

Those who have been granted U.S. citizenship will no doubt be voting for him. They have no place else to go for freedom.

So take a stand and vote in November 2024 to return Trump back to the White House. Our children and grandchildren are depending on us and Trump to keep them free.

©2024. Geoff Ross. All rights reserved.

RELATED ARTICLE: U.S. National Debt of $34,088,375,076,993.31 Trillion is a Ticking Time Bomb

POST ON X:

Mayorkas Enabled Huge ‘Waste And Abuse’ Of Taxpayer Dollars In Handling Of Border Crisis, GOP Probe Finds

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas is directly responsible for massive “waste and abuse” of taxpayer dollars in his handling of the crisis at the southern border, according to a new report by the House Homeland Security Committee first obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Under Mayorkas’ leadership, the use of hotel rooms to house illegal migrants instead of taxpayer-funded beds in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities, along with the cancellation of former President Donald Trump’s border wall construction, have resulted in massive overspending and waste on the American taxpayers’ dime, according to the report. The report marks the final portion of Committee Chairman Mark Green’s investigation into Mayorkas that kicked off in June.

Republican Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green filed articles of impeachment against Mayorkas, a move that Democrats killed. The Homeland Security Committee is set to take up the proceedings early into 2024, a committee staffer told the DCNF.

“In keeping with the House of Representatives’ vote last month to refer articles of impeachment against Secretary Mayorkas to our Committee, we will be moving swiftly into impeachment proceedings in the new year,” the committee staffer said.

ICE projected that each bed costs $142.44 or less in its fiscal year 2024 budget request to Congress, according to the report. Meanwhile, the Biden administration has contracted companies to help house illegal migrants in hotels, a much more costly decision.

“From halting construction on a bought-and-paid-for border wall to leaving detention beds empty and empowering anti-enforcement officials at ICE, Secretary Mayorkas’ reckless decision-making and open-borders policies have led to the waste and abuse of billions of taxpayer dollars,” Green said in a statement to the DCNF.

The administration awarded a roughly $86 million contract to house illegal migrant families at hotels for the cost of $392 per night. An April 2022 inspector general’s report found that “ICE did not adequately justify the need for the sole source contract to house migrant families and spent approximately $17 million for hotel space and services at six hotels that went largely unused between April and June 2021.”

“ICE’s sole source contract with Endeavors resulted in millions of dollars being spent on unused hotel space,” the inspector general reported.

Additionally, the committee’s report found that states are having to bear the brunt of the costs of housing illegal migrants that DHS is “purposefully passing.” Each day, it costs New York city roughly $339 to house each family and $184 for single adults.

“Our most recent report showed how cities and states across this country are paying the financial price of those policies. What this evidence shows is that the federal government is also wasting taxpayer resources on a massive scale. This latest report provides much-needed transparency for the American people, who should not be forced to pay the cost of Mayorkas’ refusal to enforce the law any longer,” Green said.

AUTHOR

JENNIE TAER

Investigative reporter.

RELATED ARTICLE: Feds Raise Concerns Over New Pathway Fueling Migrant Crisis

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.


All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Another Green Energy Co. Failing after Getting Millions from U.S. Government

Reminiscent of the hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars Obama dispersed to failed green energy ventures, a struggling solar energy company that received millions from the Biden administration is about to fold. The northern California firm is called SunPower and it is dedicated to energy storage and solar power. Last summer the Department of Energy (DOE) gave it a $6.7 million grant and earlier this year it received a $1.4 million contract from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). This week SunPower shares are down sharply following a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing warning of “substantial doubt” about its ability to continue operating.

Public funds poured into its coffers as part of an aggressive—and costly—plan to make America green. It began when Biden was vice president and, though the Trump administration halted funding such dubious projects, the money resumed flowing under Biden despite documented failures that have fleeced the American public out of huge sums. They include bankrupt solar panel manufacturer Solyndra, among the most marked failures in the Obama-Biden administration’s effort to force costly alternative energy on consumers. The northern California company received an outlandish $529 million from the government despite the “serious concerns” of U.S. Treasury officials about the risky investment. The controversial deal was suspiciously rushed through for a politically connected entrepreneur that raised large amounts for Obama’s campaign. Judicial Watch investigated the Solyndra scandal and sued both the Obama and Biden administrations for records involving the costly back door deals that led to the loss of hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars.

A number of other green energy endeavors also failed to take off after receiving hefty investments from Uncle Sam. Among them is Fisker Automotive, a southern California startup that went under after getting nearly $200 million of the $528.7 million that the Obama-Biden administration promised it. The electric car company assured that thousands of jobs would be created in the region hit hard by unemployment and touted innovative plans to develop two lines of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles that could go up to 300 miles on a rechargeable Lithium-ion battery. When the government’s multi-million-dollar allocation was announced Biden, then vice president, put the company on a pedestal, saying “the story of Fisker is a story of ingenuity of an American company, a commitment to innovation by the U.S. government and the perseverance of the American auto industry.” Obama Energy Secretary Steven Chu guaranteed Fisker would “save hundreds of millions of gallons of gasoline and offset millions of tons of greenhouse gas emissions…” It never materialized.

Another green business that went under after receiving generous government funding under the Obama-Biden administration is ECOtality, another California company that was supposed to make charging stations for electric cars. After getting nearly $100 million from Uncle Sam, it collapsed. A startup called Vehicle Production Group (VPG) went bankrupt after losing $50 million in taxpayer funds awarded under Obama-Biden. VPG was supposed to create special vans for the disabled that run on compressed natural gas. Here is how the Obama administration justified funding the experiment with public dollars: “This project invests in a socially and environmentally responsible product that will create new jobs, promote the use of alternative fuels, and help the U.S. maintain its competitive edge in the automotive industry.” The DOE eventually took the page down, but the wording is straight from the agency’s announcement promoting VPG. Another scandal-plagued green auto program known as Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing (ATVM) received tens of millions of dollars under Obama-Biden with no results.

The Obama administration also launched a multi-million-dollar program to create “green jobs” that will never exist. Back in 2013 a federal audit revealed that the government has blown half a billion dollars to train workers for the fantasy positions to fulfill Obama’s promise of creating 5 million green jobs over the next decade, which predictably has not materialized.

EDITORS NOTE: This Judicial Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

GOP to Biden: No Ukraine Funding until Southern Border Is Secure

As Congress kicked back into session following the Thanksgiving break, Republican lawmakers are making their position crystal clear regarding continued aid to Ukraine: if the Biden administration wants billions of additional dollars for Ukraine’s war against Russia, it must include legislation to provide solutions for the spiraling crisis at America’s southern border.

Since President Biden took office in January 2021, the explosion of illegal immigrants flooding America’s southern border has been unlike anything seen in the history of the U.S. According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the total number of apprehensions of illegal border crossers from 2021 through fiscal year 2023 is a staggering 8.3 million. This does not count the number of individuals who escaped capture (gotaways) during the same time period, which is estimated at 1.7 million. Therefore, the number of illegal border crossers during Biden’s presidency so far is over 10 million, a total that is larger than the individual populations of 41 states.

Notably, this number includes 1,586 known or suspected terrorists (KSTs) that were apprehended. In fiscal year 2023, 736 KSTs were captured, the largest number ever recorded in a single year. In addition, almost 50,000 criminal noncitizens were apprehended during fiscal year 2023, the largest total in history. Alarmingly, the 1.7 million gotaways over the last three years is only an estimate, so it is unknown how many more KSTs and other criminal noncitizens managed to escape detection and enter the U.S. interior.

The rate of illegal border crossers shows no signs of slowing. On Monday, Fox News reported on trains seen in Mexico heading to the U.S. with hundreds of migrants openly riding on the top of rail cars. In addition, CBP announced they would be temporarily shutting down vehicle processing at ports of entry in Texas and Arizona in order to redirect personnel to assist the U.S. Border Patrol in taking illegal border crossers into custody. Just last week, CBP reported 15,300 illegal crossings at the Tucson Sector in Arizona, the highest ever weekly total.

The crisis has led Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill, including Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), to demand that the Biden White House do something to stem the tide as a condition of continuing to aid Ukraine in its war with Russia. On Monday, Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) joined “Washington Watch with Tony Perkins” to discuss the situation.

“[We need more than] just legislative fixes, because we have a lawless administration,” he contended. “We have a president that wants an open border. And so we do need to change the law … [such as a] Return to Mexico policy … but we absolutely must make any funding to Ukraine contingent on actually securing the border. And that means benchmarks, metrics. The metric we should use is [the] number of migrants entering America, no matter how they come in, whether they’re encountered and processed and released, or whether we detect them as gotaways. … So, no [Ukraine] funding until you actually achieve those benchmarks on a month-by-month basis.”

Johnson went on to argue that the border crisis will not be solved simply by throwing more money at the issue, which the Biden administration has argued in favor of.

“[Q]uite honestly, providing this administration more money at the border, they’re just going to speed up the processing and dispersing,” he pointed out. “That’s been their whole goal. That’s why they think their policy is [a] success. [They say] we don’t have a crisis on the border. [They]’ve just gotten really efficient at encountering, processing, dispersing more than six million illegal immigrants into this country during their administration. So no, we don’t need [to give them more] money for the border.”

As to the question of whether at least 41 GOP senators will hold the line on the southern border crisis, Johnson expressed uncertainty, while also emphasizing the severity of the border issue.

“I’ve been making the point now for literally months that we need to stop taking whatever the Democrats want and finding just enough Republicans to join them to pass their priorities,” he underscored. “That has to end … particularly when you’re looking at an open border being a clear and present danger to America. Democrats [and] the president obviously want funding for Ukraine. A lot of Republicans do. I’m certainly sympathetic with the courageous people of Ukraine. But what must come first is our own homeland, our own national security. … So you’ve got to set your priorities, and our top priority has to be to secure that border. This is the only leverage we have with a lawless administration. We must use that leverage. And so all we have to do is make sure that 41 Republicans deny cloture on any bill that doesn’t include strong metrics that require … President Biden to secure the border [and] meet those metrics before money starts flowing.”

AUTHOR

Dan Hart

Dan Hart is senior editor at The Washington Stand.

RELATED VIDEO: GOP leadership needs to get serious about corrupt DOJ efforts to enact one party Democrat rule

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Republican Study Committee Moves To Revamp Long-Standing Welfare Programs

The Republican Study Committee’s Fiscal Year 2024 budget will propose amending key welfare programs, including several that provide cash directly to recipients.

The budget, excerpts of which were obtained exclusively by the Daily Caller ahead of its Wednesday release, directs all federal welfare programs to include work requirements and limits cash payouts to recipients. It also converts several programs into state block grants and eliminates marriage penalties throughout the welfare system.

“For too long, the Left has pushed Americans into dependency on government welfare programs. Strengthening work requirements for those receiving government benefits empowers individuals through a good job and raises them up from dependency to self-sufficiency,” RSC Budget and Spending Task Force Chair Ben Cline said in a statement to the Daily Caller. “People want to support themselves and their families rather than prolong their economic hardship. It’s time to get Americans back to work and leave the disastrous policies of President Biden and the Left in the past.”

Government handouts during and in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic have helped contribute to labor shortages, economists generally agree. COVID-19 relief packages initially gave recipients a $600 supplement to their unemployment insurance, effectively an increase of $15 per hour. Many Republican-led states ultimately rejected the American Rescue Plan’s unemployment expansion, and their job numbers rebounded faster than those states that maintained the expansion.

The RSC budget would cap unemployment insurance payouts at the recipient’s previous salary level. It also mandates that work-eligible recipients of Temporary Assistance for Needy Families actually be employed. The current structure of the program requires states to meet a certain workforce participation rate in order to receive funding that they can then distribute. The RSC plan also prohibits states from using TANF funds to pay for other programs.

In addition to strengthened work requirements, the RSC budget also promotes marriage by eliminating tax penalties for married couples who access welfare programs and entitlements. Economists from across the political spectrum have noted that cohabiting adults living just above the poverty line receive more benefits from programs like Medicaid, SNAP, the Child Tax Credit and the Earned Income Tax Credit than married couples.

House Republicans are already gearing up for a protracted battle with the Senate and White House over the Fiscal Year 2024 appropriations process. The Fiscal Responsibility Act set budget caps for FY2024 discretionary domestic spending at FY2022 levels, and limits FY2024 defense spending to a 3.3 percent increase. Some members, however, want to limit all discretionary spending to FY2022 levels, a goal House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and House Appropriations Committee chairwoman Kay Granger have said that they will pursue by writing appropriations below the Fiscal Responsibility Act’s caps.

Senators in both parties have argued for spending levels to be set at the caps, with Senate Appropriations Committee ranking member Susan Collins of Maine saying members would “go up to” the caps. Others, including Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, worry that a House budget would limit defense spending.

The RSC budget would cut spending by $16.3 trillion over ten years, according to an RSC aide, and reduce taxes by $5.1 trillion over the same period.

AUTHOR

MICHAEL GINSBERG

Congressional correspondent.

RELATED ARTICLE: EXCLUSIVE: RSC Chairman Kevin Hern Calls For ‘Strong Debt Limit Bill’ By End Of April

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Biden’s World Bank Pick Calls For ‘Trillions’ In Climate Spending

Ajay Banga, the former CEO of Mastercard that President Joe Biden has nominated to head the World Bank, told Axios Wednesday that both the bank and the private sector needed to spend “trillions” to combat both climate change and poverty.

Banga has been aggressively campaigning for the job, meeting with officials from 37 different governments in the past three weeks, Axios reported. The World Bank faces competing pressure from wealthy and developing countries over whether to focus on combating climate change or poverty mitigation, but Banga said he does not view the two goals as inherently opposed to one another.

“I think it’s a fallacious argument that says, either-or,” Banga said to Axios. “I have every intention of focusing the bank and its people on the idea that this is an intertwined challenge.”

The efforts to combat both climate change and poverty would cost “trillions of dollars a year” each, and the private sector would need to be a “constructive part of the solution,” Banga told Axios.

A group of developing nations including Russia, China and Iran signed a letter in February calling for the World Bank to “avoid measures” that might jeopardize its triple-A credit rating, the Financial Times reported. Banga said that the “only way” the World Bank can effectively combat climate change is if it maintains its triple-A rating, according to Axios.

Biden’s decision to nominate Banga, a former Wall Street executive with little background in climate issues, drew significant pushback from some environmentalists, who had been calling for a nominee that would aggressively tackle climate issues.

Banga was nominated after Trump appointee David Malpass — who is married to Daily Caller News Foundation president Adele Malpass — announced he would step down early from his role as the bank’s head on June 30.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.


All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Gavin Newsom Shells Out $1.6 Million To Stop Climate Measure That Would Raise Taxes On The Rich

Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s reelection campaign spent over $1.6 million to oppose a climate initiative that would raise taxes on millionaires to help low-income Californians buy electric cars. Despite this, Newsom, who is a multimillionaire, has previously touted his administration’s efforts to rapidly cut carbon emissions and get more electric vehicles (EVs) on the road.

Newsom, who boasts an estimated net worth of around $20 million, signed a bill in September to codify ambitious emissions reduction targets and praised the California Air Resources Board’s decision to ban all gasoline-powered car sales by 2035. However, Newsom’s campaign gave $1,617,216 to the “No on 30” committee, which opposes Proposition 30, a ballot measure that institutes an additional 1.75% tax on individuals that make over $2 million a year to help disadvantaged Californians buy EVs, according to campaign finance disclosures filed Tuesday.

Newsom aims to make his state’s auto industry “all-electric” by 2035 and will spend $10 billion of taxpayers’ money to “aggressively fight the climate crisis” by phasing out gas cars and building EV infrastructure. The Democrat called Proposition 30 an irresponsible “special interest carve-out” and argued that the proposed law was designed to “funnel” state income tax to Lyft, a large rideshare company, according to a statement Newsom’s campaign provided to the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Newsom aims to make his state’s auto industry “all-electric” by 2035 and will spend $10 billion of taxpayers’ money to “aggressively fight the climate crisis” by phasing out gas cars and building EV infrastructure. The Democrat called Proposition 30 an irresponsible “special interest carve-out” and argued that the proposed law was designed to “funnel” state income tax to Lyft, a large rideshare company, according to a statement Newsom’s campaign provided to the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“California’s tax revenues are famously volatile, and this measure would make our state’s finances more unstable − all so that special interests can benefit,” Newsom said in the statement. “Californians should know that just this year our state committed $10 billion for electric vehicles and their infrastructure, part of a $54 billion nation-leading package to fight climate change and build a zero-emission future.”

A small percentage of California taxpayers would fund Proposition 30’s EV initiatives as only 35,000 of the state’s residents reported adjusted gross incomes greater than $2 million, according to 2019 statistics published by the state’s Franchise Tax Board.

Although the measure could help Lyft by raising money to help the company’s drivers buy electric cars, environmentalists began drafting the measure before the company became involved, CEO of California Environmental Voters Mary Creasman told CBS News. A Lyft spokeswoman previously told the Daily Caller News Foundation that none of the $3.5 billion to $5 billion in tax revenue generated by the law was “earmarked” for the rideshare industry.

Californians will vote to implement or reject Proposition 30 on Nov. 8.

AUTHOR

JACK MCEVOY

Energy & environment reporter.

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What House Of Dragon Can Teach Us About Power And Wealth Creation

House of Dragon, like its predecessor Game of Thrones, is The Godfather of epic fantasy. Westeros is a land where power rules and individual rights do not exist.


The first season of HBO’s House of Dragon is nearing its conclusion, and the Game of Thrones prequel has not disappointed.

Based on George R. R. Martin’s novel Fire & Blood, the new series depicts House Targaryen’s efforts to rule the Seven Kingdoms amid its own internal power struggles. The story takes place about 170 years before the events depicted in Game Thrones and centers on Rhaenyra Targaryen, a princess who’s named heir to the Iron Throne by her ailing father King Viserys. This puts her at odds with her uncle Daemon (Matt Smith) and later her infant brother, who also have claims to the throne.

While I was initially skeptical that House of Dragon would bring back the magic of Westeros, the series has managed to live up to the hype (so far). The show’s writing and acting are superb, and just like GoT, the series explores power and morality through the gritty lens of realism. The realism is conveyed not just through the show’s ample sex and violence, but also the promise that the hero might actually not win or may not do the right thing. House of Dragon, like its predecessor Game of Thrones, is The Godfather of epic fantasy.

Viewers may be pleased to notice that, with the exception of the size of Targaryen dragons, almost nothing has changed in the Seven Kingdoms, even though nearly two hundred years have passed. Armies still fight with swords and arrows. Most of the people are still poor. Soldiers ride horses. Farming is presumably the primary occupation for the vast majority of people who are not lords or ladies.

To understand why so little has changed in Westeros, one need only look to our own world. Though many of us have personally witnessed massive change and innovation in our own lifetime, this was the exception, not the rule, in history.

Economist Brad Delong has noted that the standard of living didn’t change much for most of the last two thousand years, and GDP figures from Our World in Data confirm this.

In 1 AD, the GDP of the entire world was less than $182 billion (in 2011 US dollars). A thousand years later, global GDP was higher, but not by much—an estimated $210 billion. A few hundred years later, the world’s GDP was actually lower. Four hundred years after that, in 1700, the world’s total GDP was still only about $640 billion.

In other words, the world had changed very little over a period of 1700 years, at least in terms of material wealth.

That changed the next century, however. By 1820, global GDP had increased to $1.2 trillion. By 1870 it was $2 trillion. On the eve of World War I, global GDP was $4.74 trillion and by1950, despite the two most catastrophic and deadly wars in human history, it was up to $9 trillion. By 1998, it was $58 trillion and by 2013 it was $101 trillion.

The evidence for this miraculous growth in wealth is visible all around us. From automobiles and computers, microwaves and laundry machines, to sunglasses, TVs, and cell phones, most middle-class families own goods that were scarcely imaginable a century ago. Things as vital as toilet paper, toothpaste, and hot showers are available to most of the people in the world.

It’s no coincidence that the rise in material wealth the world witnessed over the last 250 years coincided with the global rise of capitalism.

When Adam Smith published The Wealth of Nations in 1776, he offered the world a roadmap to wealth creation. It was surprisingly simple. Peace and trade—not brute force, coercion, or the yolk of slavery—was the formula.

“Little else is requisite to carry a state to the highest degree of opulence from the lowest barbarism but peace, easy taxes, and a tolerable administration of justice: all the rest being brought about by the natural course of things,” Smith wrote in The Theory of Moral Sentiments.

The formula might be simple, but its execution is not. The world of Westeros shows us why.

While many of the characters in Game of Thrones and House of Dragon are interesting, and some are even good, it’s impossible to miss that Westeros is a land defined by war, injustice, power, and plunder.

In the first season of Game of Thrones, we see the Crown is basically bankrupt. King Robert is spending money the Crown doesn’t have, and “beggaring” the realm in the process, placing an immense burden on his people (who will eventually be the ones to pay off the Crown’s debts). Over the course of eight seasons, viewers witness what is largely a bloody power struggle to rule.

House of Dragon offers its own examples. We quickly see that the Crown is a source of aggression, not benevolence. In the very first episode, Daemon Targaryen, the king’s brother, descends on Flea Bottom (the most poverty-stricken party of King’s Landing) with his Gold Cloaks (i.e. the city watch) to bring “law and order” to the district.

“My brother’s city has fallen into squalor. Crime of every breed has been allowed to thrive,” he says. “No longer. Beginning tonight, King’s Landing will learn to fear the color gold.”

In the darkness, men are accused by the Gold Cloaks—”thief!” “raper!”—and rounded up. They are not tried, but executed on the spot. Daemon himself takes at least one man’s head. All it takes is the accusation from a Gold Cloak.

While there is some fuss the next day over Daemon’s actions, the king’s council ultimately overlooks the carnage, reasoning that Daemon’s actions, draconian though they may be, project strength and power.

This is why nothing changes in Westeros. It’s a land where power rules and individual rights do not exist. Whatever wealth people manage to accumulate can simply be taken from them by anyone—whether it be their lord, pirates, or the Crown itself—who has more power than they do. The king’s justice is rarely to be found.

Adam Smith was correct when he observed that the formula to wealth creation is surprisingly simple: easy taxes, peace and the adequate administration of justice. But Westeros shows us this is hardly easy to achieve, especially where power is concentrated and those who wield it are rarely held accountable.

AUTHOR

Jon Miltimore

Jonathan Miltimore is the Managing Editor of FEE.org. His writing/reporting has been the subject of articles in TIME magazine, The Wall Street Journal, CNN, Forbes, Fox News, and the Star Tribune. Bylines: Newsweek, The Washington Times, MSN.com, The Washington Examiner, The Daily Caller, The Federalist, the Epoch Times.

RELATED ARTICLE: What Is Entrepreneurship?

EDITORS NOTE: This FEE column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Federal Agents Believe They Have Enough Evidence To Charge Hunter Biden

Federal agents investigating Hunter Biden for tax and gun crimes believe they have enough evidence to charge him, The Washington Post reported Thursday.

Biden has faced investigation in the Federal District of Delaware since 2018 over allegedly failing to pay taxes and lying on a federal firearm application. U.S. Attorney David Weiss, a holdover from the Trump administration, is conducting the investigation, and would be the person who decides whether or not to bring charges, according to The Washington Post.

“It is a federal felony for a federal agent to leak information about a Grand Jury investigation such as this one,” Biden’s attorney said in a statement. “Any agent you cite as a source in your article apparently has committed such a felony. We expect the Department of Justice will diligently investigate and prosecute such bad actors.”

The gun charges would stem from a firearm application Biden submitted to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms in 2018. Biden claimed on the application that he was not “an unlawful user of, or addicted to, marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance.” However, he later suggested in his memoir that he was using crack cocaine during the time period in question, writing that he was “smoking crack every 15 minutes.”

The Internal Revenue Service placed a $112,805 lien on Biden in 2015, the same time that he was serving on the board of the Ukrainian energy company Burisma. Rosemont Seneca Bohai (RSB), a firm controlled by Biden’s business partner, paid him more than $700,000 between June 2014 and October 2015. Burisma received funds from RSB at the same time as it paid Biden.

Biden paid a “significant” amount in back taxes shortly after the 2020 election, The New York Times reported. In revealing that he was under investigation, Biden claimed that he was “confident that a professional and objective review of these matters will demonstrate that I handled my affairs legally and appropriately.”

Biden could also face charges related to the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), which requires “agents of foreign principals… to make periodic public disclosure of their relationship with the foreign principal.” He and business partner Tony Bobulinski texted about setting up a shell corporation that they believed could help them avoid registering under FARA. Biden conducted business with CEFC China Energy through the company Hudson West III in 2017 and 2018.

This is a breaking news story and will be updated as more information becomes available.

AUTHOR

MICHAEL GINSBERG

Congressional reporter.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

PODCAST: Help Wanted, IRS, Candidate Must Be Willing to Use Deadly Force

UPDATE: ‘In A Tyrannical State, You Have To Rule By Fear’ – Why Are IRS Agents Armed?


“The common enemy of humanity is man. In searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill. All these dangers are caused by human intervention, and it is only through changed attitudes and behavior that they can be overcome. The real enemy then, is humanity itself.” – Club of Rome, a premier environmental think-tank, consultants to the United Nations.


These globalists believe the common man is the enemy. So it makes perfect sense that the IRS is armed when they come for your taxes, or DOES IT? Will you comply?

All policies in the Green Broke Deal can be found in UN Agenda 21. This document is over 300 pages, 40 chapters of total control over the means of production and distribution of all means of human activity.

After the raid on Mar-a-Largo, do not for one minute think you will not be next. This is the way intimidation works. This is what globalists use to keep you in line. Prepare. Read about communists, and dictators taking over. They are at their end game, where they reveal themselves because they think they won. But they got sloppy and now will lose.

We are being set up, so be on your guard. Pay attention locally and to your state politics. Sadly Globalists have taken the worst plans their evil leaders offered, plans that ultimately hurt people without remorse, were definitely over budget, and full of graft and corruption.

We will be hit with many things that don’t make sense. Don’t pay attention. Choose your battles wisely.

Sometimes we must look at things through different lenses. Join us al listen to some stories of people who were forced to live under a communist regime.

Is America worth saving? Join us on The Prism of America’s Education and find out…

GUESTS

Chris Wright is an independent liberty activist in the leadership of the Potomac Tea Party, a national Tea Party based in Northern Virginia. He is also president of the first and only nonprofit formed to empower grassroots activists with small grants. A long-time student of public affairs, Mr. Wright, began his Daily Skirmish commentaries in 2020 to directly confront the Left and deconstruct its phony narratives. Daily Skirmish Commentaries, Website:  www.Liberato.US, and www.Spider-and-the-Fly.com.

Erik Seligman is co-host of the  Stories of Communism podcast. Erik served from 2013-2017 on the board Oregon’s 4th largest school district, helping to oversee the education of about 20,000 students. He was continually frustrated with the entrenched socialist philosophy being promoted in the schools. After leaving the board, he started the Stories of Communism podcast (with his friend Manuel Castaneda, a successful local businessman & immigrant), to share the real stories of those who had suffered under socialism. He earns his living as an engineer, having recently retired from Intel after nearly three decades there, and is now a Senior Product Engineering Architect at Cadence Design Systems. He also produces a podcast called Math Mutation in his spare time. He now lives in the suburbs of Wichita, Kansas, with his wife, daughter, and cats.


The Prism of America’s Education can be heard on weekends at 1 pm ET, with an encore at 9 pm ET. Listen on iHeart Radio, our world-class media player, or our free apps on AppleAndroid, or Alexa. All episodes can be found on podcast networks worldwide the day after airing on talk radio.


©. All rights reserved.

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Americans Can’t Afford Gas, Congress Just Gave Itself a 21% Raise

The $1.5 trillion omnibus bill has plenty of inflationary spending, and the honorable members of the legislature didn’t leave themselves out.

As part of the $1.5 trillion omnibus spending bill released Wednesday, the $5.9 billion fiscal 2022 Legislative Branch funding portion would substantially boost the office budgets of House members to pay staff more…

This legislation would provide $774.4 million for the Members Representational Allowance, known as the MRA, which funds the House office budgets for lawmakers, including staffer salaries. This $134.4 million, or 21 percent, boost over the previous fiscal year marks the largest increase in the MRA appropriation since it was authorized in 1996, according to a bill summary by the House Appropriations Committee. For paid interns in member and leadership offices, the House would get $18.2 million.

It’s not technically a pay hike for congressmembers, but, in particular House members, are notorious for putting family members on the payroll. And for using staffers to run their errands and handle assorted personal projects for them.

In August, Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced staffers’ salaries could exceed those of lawmakers. Members in both the House and Senate, with the exception of leadership, make an annual salary of $174,000. Staffers can make up to $199,300.

That’s convenient since it can act as a pay hike without the negative press.

MRAs tend to be between $1.2 and $1.4 million. A massive MRA increase has all sorts of political and potentially personal benefits. It’s also completely indefensible during an economic crisis.

House Dem leaders are cheering the disgusting pork sandwich as a victory for diversity.

House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (MD-05) and House Democratic Caucus Chair Hakeem Jeffries (NY-08), released the following statement this morning on the inclusion of a 21% increase in Member Representational Allowance (MRA) funding in the Fiscal Year 2022 Omnibus legislation.

Leader Hoyer and Chair Jeffries have long advocated for this increase to the MRA in order to ensure that Members, leaders, and committees can attract and retain the best and brightest to help them serve the American people while promoting a more diverse workforce.

Is there any obscenity that can’t be justified in the name of diversity?

“We join in thanking Chairwoman DeLauro and Ranking Member Granger as well as the Members on the Appropriation Committee for producing a bipartisan omnibus package that includes this increase in office budgets so that Congressional staff pay can be a priority and enhance this institution’s ability to deliver For the People.”

For the People.

Ask not what Congress can do for you, ask what you can do for Congress.

COLUMN BY

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Biden Plan Would Sabotage U.S. Economic Competitiveness in One Huge Way, Analysis Finds

That’s not ‘Building Back Better’—it’s shooting ourselves in the foot.  


President Biden has heralded his $4.5+ trillion spending proposals and accompanying tax hikes as an investment in “leading the world versus letting it pass us by.” Yet, paradoxically, a new analysis exposes one huge way Biden’s plans would make the US less competitive on the global stage.

Key to financing the spending plans is a proposed increase in the corporate tax rate from 21 percent to 26.5 percent. When factoring in state corporate taxes, the US’s average corporate tax rate would reach a whopping 30.9 percent. And according to a new Tax Foundation analysis, this punitive level of business taxation would be the third-highest corporate tax rate among developed countries, outstripped only by Colombia and Portugal.

CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE TAX FOUNDATION INFOGRAPHIC

Why is this a problem?

Well, the US would become a less attractive place for business investment, which is bad news for entrepreneurs, workers, and customers alike. Businesses would understandably be less likely to conduct business in the US when they could go to dozens of other developed countries with lower tax rates. As a result, our economic competitiveness would suffer.

“Returning to near the top of the OECD in corporate tax rates would… disincentivize investment and encourage firms to shift profits and locate elsewhere, resulting in fewer job opportunities for Americans and less tax revenue for the U.S. government,” the analysis explains.

Yikes.

Biden claims his tax-and-spend agenda is meant to reassert America’s dominance. But the costly tax hikes the president seeks would set our economic competitiveness back on the global stage. That’s not “Building Back Better”—it’s shooting ourselves in the foot.

COLUMN BY

Brad Polumbo

Brad Polumbo (@Brad_Polumbo) is a libertarian-conservative journalist and Policy Correspondent at the Foundation for Economic Education.

WATCHNew Biden Vax Mandate Doesn’t Make ANY Sense (Here’s Why)

EDITORS NOTE: This FEE column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. Like this story? Click here to sign up for the FEE Daily and get free-market news and analysis like this from Policy Correspondent Brad Polumbo in your inbox every weekday.

Does Biden’s $1.2 Trillion Infrastructure Bill Include a Mileage Tax?

Here’s a dismaying prospect: Paying 6, 8, or 10 cents in new taxes for every mile you drive. It may sound small, but at an 8 cent rate, that would be $1,144 in new annual taxes for the average American, who drives about 14,300 miles a year. Yikes!

Some on social media are claiming that this punitive tax scheme has been slipped into President Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure spending legislation—which, after all, is nearly 3,000 pages and is chock full of unrelated waste and partisan pet projects. But are they right to be concerned about a mileage tax soon becoming reality?

No. At least, not yet.

The infrastructure legislation does not include a mileage tax or another form of driving tax. What it does include is a pilot program to study and test the idea. The legislation authorizes $125 million in taxpayer funding for this test initiative. (A lot of taxpayer money for an experiment, no?)

“People would volunteer to be part of the test,” fact-checkers at local New York news outlet WGRZ-TV report. “The test would require volunteers to record their miles, pay the fees, and then be reimbursed by the government. This pilot program would go through the year 2026 and at that point, if Congress and the president like it, they would have to pass another bill making it into law. This infrastructure bill simply creates the program.”

We can certainly question the wisdom of this endeavor. But rest assured that if the infrastructure legislation ultimately passes—a likely if not certain outcome—you won’t get a new per-mile bill from the IRS. However, this move does represent a shift toward mainstreaming and advancing the idea of a per-mile driving tax.

Such a tax would be highly regressive, meaning that it would disproportionately burden low-income Americans. So, too, the costs would fall harder on rural Americans who drive more than their city-dwelling counterparts. That said, proponents argue it simply funds highway infrastructure by taxing those who use it. They also note that it could replace the gas tax, which currently attempts to do the same yet fails to capture usage by electric vehicles.

Still, the prospect of sizable new taxes levied on working-class Americans solely for the privilege of being allowed to drive your own car isn’t an attractive one. Luckily, we aren’t actually facing this as an immediate reality, even if it is slowly being advanced into the mainstream.

WATCHNew Biden Vax Mandate Doesn’t Make ANY Sense (Here’s Why)

COLUMN BY

Brad Polumbo

Brad Polumbo (@Brad_Polumbo) is a libertarian-conservative journalist and Policy Correspondent at the Foundation for Economic Education.

EDITORS NOTE: This FEE column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. Like this story? Click here to sign up for the FEE Daily and get free-market news and analysis like this from Policy Correspondent Brad Polumbo in your inbox every weekday.