Widget Image
Follow PPD Social Media
follow
1,000 Followers
follow
0 Followers
follow
People's Pundit Locals Community
Tuesday, February 11, 2025
SECTIONS
logo
mobile-logo
HomeStandard Blog Whole Post (Page 521)
Politics

Then-Secretary Hillary Clinton, left, works from a desk inside a C-17 military plane following her departure from Malta, in the Mediterranean Sea, bound for Tripoli, Libya, Oct.18, 2011. Former Libyan dictator Col. Moammar Gaddafi, right. (Photo: Kevin Lamarque - Associated Press)

Then-Secretary Hillary Clinton, left, works from a desk inside a C-17 military plane following her departure from Malta, in the Mediterranean Sea, bound for Tripoli, Libya, Oct.18, 2011. Former Libyan dictator Col. Moammar Gaddafi, right. (Photo: Kevin Lamarque – Associated Press)

On Monday, U.S. planes began bombing Islamic State (ISIS) targets in Libya, a nation once touted by Hillary Clinton as a major foreign policy achievement. The U.S. bombing campaign is a response to the U.N.-backed government’s request to aid in driving the militants from Sirte in what U.S. Pentagon officials confirmed will be a sustained airstrikes campaign against the ISIS in the city.

“The first air strikes were carried out at specific locations in Sirte today causing severe losses to enemy ranks,” Prime Minster Fayez Seraj said on state TV. Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said the strikes did not have “an end point at this particular moment in time”.

The Islamic militant group has spread rapidly through the country once run by the former Libyan dictator Col. Moammar Gadhafi, who previously relinquished his nuclear weapons program to President George W. Bush and cooperated in the U.S. war on terror in exchange for humanitarian aide. Judge Andrew Napolitano said after the release of the 800-plus page report by the House Select Committee on Benghazi that there “is ample evidence to support their argument that Benghazi was the unintended consequence of Clinton’s private war against Libyan strongman Col. Moammar Gadhafi.”

“It was supposed to be the crown jewel of Clinton’s foreign policy stewardship — ousting the dictator, replacing him with a democracy, putting no American boots on the ground and avoiding American bloodshed,” the judge said.

Indeed, emails obtained by the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks, which were previously reported by People’s Pundit Daily, clearly show Clinton’s inner circle at the State Department were crafting the Libyan story in the political context to use to boost Mrs. Clinton’s foreign policy credentials.

“Colonel Qadhafi and those around him must be held accountable for these acts, which violate international legal obligations and common decency. Through their actions, they have lost the legitimacy to govern,” Mrs. Clinton said in Geneva, Switzerland on February 28, 2011. “And the people of Libya have made themselves clear: It is time for Qadhafi to go — now, without further violence or delay.”

That statement, along with a list of several others, was included in an email sent by State Department employee and Clinton aide Jake Sullivan on August 21, 2011 praising the secretary’s “leadership/ownership/stewardship of this country’s libya policy from start to finish [sic].”

To be sure, lawmakers were complicit in Clinton’s Libya agenda. In late June, Clinton met “with House Democrats and Senate Republicans to persuade them not to de-fund the Libya operation,” the emails read, referring to the arming and funding of groups that are now openly hostile to the pro-Western forces and America.

Meanwhile, militants loyal with Prime Minster Seraj have been battling Islamic State in Sirte, which is the home town of former dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Without the dictator, who like it or not acted as a stabilizing force in the region and the nation, ISIS militants seized the Mediterranean coastal city last year, making it their second biggest stronghold and strategically important base outside Syria and Iraq.

The White House said in a statement that the U.S. assistance to Libya would be limited to air strikes and information sharing.

U.S. planes began bombing Islamic State (ISIS)

Elections

Incumbent Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and former Democratic congressman and governor Ted Strickland. (Photo: AP)

Incumbent Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and former Democratic congressman and governor Ted Strickland. (Photo: AP)

Ohio, Pennsylvania and Nevada will play a pivotal role in deciding both the outcome of the presidential election and control of the U.S. Senate. On Monday, Freedom Partners Action Fund announced a $3.9 million ad buy targeting Democrats in the key races for U.S. Senate.

Will they be effective? Let’s take a look at the ads and their content.

In Ohio, the group shelled out $1.4 million for TV and digital ads criticizing then-Governor Ted Strickland’s handling of the state’s budget surplus. Prior to his defeat, Strickland raised taxes and fees on Ohioans who were “already struggling to make ends meet,” the ad states.

“At a time when hard-working Ohioans were struggling, Ted Strickland made their lives even harder and more expensive by raising taxes and fees on everyday services, including healthcare,” Freedom Partners spokesman Bill Riggs said in a statement. “His policies drove good jobs out of the state, and hit low-income families especially hard. Ohio can’t afford to go back to Ted Strickland.”

[brid video=”56944″ player=”2077″ title=”Strickland Made Our Lives Harder”]

The ad targets Strickland’s record as a tax-and-spend liberal, including the findings of a report from the Legislative Services Commission looking at a two-year $50.5 billion state budget from 2010 to 2011. Strickland signed that budget as governor and it included a $1.5 billion tax and fee increase. As governor, Strickland frequently used budget gimmicks and fee increases (as have many others) to patch revenue shortfalls.

Increases targeted vehicle registration fees and trash disposal, costs that hit the working and middle class taxpayer directly in the pocket. The Columbus Dispatch reported the fee impacted everyday Ohioans “because the state fee for dumping garbage at landfills is going up to $4.75 per ton from $3.50.”

Whether these issues this year will resonate or not to the benefit of incumbent Republican Sen. Rob Portman is uncertain. But Gov. John Kasich, then the Republican challenger, successfully hung the “tax and spend” mantra around Strickland’s neck, highlighting how Strickland redirected a scheduled 2009 income tax cut that PoliFact said took $844 million in refunds earmarked for Ohioans and “instead gave it to the government.”

While polling in Ohio remains tight, the race is rated “Leans Republican” on the PPD Senate Election Projection Model. There is little doubt that Strickland’s only path to victory includes outperforming both himself in prior races and President Obama in his native Appalachia, where Republican nominee Donald Trump ran the strongest and continues to do so.

Another $1.3 million was dropped for a TV and digital ad buy in the battleground state of Pennsylvania, which is in play on the presidential level for the first time since the 1980s. The ad claims how Katie McGinty helped steer subsidies to the “favored few” at the expense of taxpayers in the Keystone State.

“Katie McGinty has spent the bulk of her career propping up special interests with corporate welfare and then leveraged her public position for personal gain when she left office,” Mr. Riggs said. “Katie McGinty didn’t just rig the system for the favored few—Katie McGinty is one of the favored few.”

Public polling shows incumbent Republican Sen. Pat Toomey out in front of McGinty and, while the race is competitive, he is slightly favored to retain his seat in November.

The third and final $1.2 million ad buy on TV and digital will target Catherine Cortez Masto, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid’s handpicked successor. The Silver State is perhaps the heaviest lift for Republicans on the presidential level, though the latest survey shows both Mr. Trump and Republican Joe Heck ahead. Still, the Nevada Senate race is rated a “Toss Up” on the PPD Senate Election Projection Model.

The ad underscores the influence of special interests on Masto and her assault on Uber.

[brid video=”56950″ player=”2077″ title=”Nineteen Dollars Per Hour”]

“If Nevadans want to know whom Catherine Cortez Masto will represent in the U.S. Senate, look no further than her record of fighting for special interests at the expense of hardworking taxpayers as state attorney general,” Riggs added. “Nevadans deserve a senator who will work for them, not one who will embrace the special-interest culture that plagues Washington.”

Ohio, Pennsylvania and Nevada will play a

Video

[brid video=”56932″ player=”2077″ title=”Clinton Campaign Manager Doubles Down On Clinton Lie That Email Claims Were Truthful”]

Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook blamed the State Department for the classified information found on the former secretary’s personal server. Mr. Mook was defending Hillary Clinton for claiming on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace that FBI Director James Comey confirmed she was “truthful” with the American people.

“Well, classified information is sent over a completely separate system, so it was their decision to send it,” Mr. Mook said. On Sunday, Mr. Mook told Chuck Todd on NBC News that the campaign was “moving on” from the email issue, refusing to answer questions about whether or not she told the truth about sending or receiving classified information on an insecure server.

But Wallace was moving on and had some tough questions for Mrs. Clinton, who repeated what has been thoroughly debunked and proven to be untrue.

“Director Comey said my answers were truthful, and what I’ve said is consistent with what I have told the American people, that there were decisions discussed and made to classify retroactively certain of the emails,” Mrs. Clinton said. “I was communicating with over 300 people in my e-mailing. They certainly did not believe and had no reason to believe that what they were sending was classified.”

Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook essentially blamed

Politics

Donald-Trump-Hillary-Clinton-New-Jersey

Donald Trump, left, greets supporters as he arrives to appear with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie in Lawrenceville, N.J. on May 19, 2016. Hillary Clinton, right, speaks at a campaign rally in Blackwood, New Jersey, U.S., May 11, 2016. (Photos: Reuters)

Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton faced tough questions on Sunday as the two presidential candidates made their Sunday show rounds. Mr. Trump on Sunday during an interview with George Stephanopoulos continued to discuss his scuff up with Khizr Khan, the father of a Muslim soldier who died in the line of duty.

Captain Humayun Khan, was killed by a car bomb in 2004 while guarding a base in Iraq.

Mr. Trump called Captain Khan a hero and tried to point out the double-standard for Mrs. Clinton in the media relating to the families of the victims in Benghazi. Still, the comments prompted House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., who is engaged in a more competitive than expected primary race in his district, to release a statement again condemning his party nominee’s proposal to place a temporary ban on immigration from nations plagued by Islamic extremism.

[brid video=”56925″ player=”2077″ title=”FULL INTERVIEW Donald Trump On ABC News This Week 73116″]

“I thought this entire weekend was just a disaster for Donald Trump,” Joe Scarborough said Monday on the “Morning Joe” panel on MSNBC. “An absolute disaster and then I saw Hillary Clinton on FOX News Sunday saying I never transmitted any classified material. You sat there going who is talking to her. Both of these candidates had horrible performances on the Sunday shows.”

Mrs. Clinton further went on to continue to lie about her use of a private email server during her tenure at the State Department, claiming FBI Director James Comey concluded her previous statements were consistent with the Bureau’s findings.

“Director Comey said my answers were truthful, and what I’ve said is consistent with what I have told the American people, that there were decisions discussed and made to classify retroactively certain of the emails,” Mrs. Clinton said. “I was communicating with over 300 people in my e-mailing. They certainly did not believe and had no reason to believe that what they were sending was classified.”

That in fact is not what happened.

Mr. Comey, during his press conference and subsequent testimony at a hearing with the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, made it a point to run down a litany of statements made by Mrs. Clinton that were flatly untrue, including the claim she never sent or receive classified information.

Instead of allowing the bad press coverage of Mr. Trump to continue, Mrs. Clinton continued to step all over herself trying to explain “reasonable” gun control laws to “Fox News Channel” host Chris Wallace.

“Well, I think what the court said about there being an individual right is in line with constitutional thinking. And I said in the convention, I’m not looking to repeal the second amendment,” she said. “But that right like every other of our rights, our First Amendment rights, every right that we have is open to and even subject to reasonable regulations.”

Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton faced tough

Opinion

Donald Trump speaks at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio at the Quicken Loans Arena.

Donald Trump speaks at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio at the Quicken Loans Arena.

Donald Trump is, to be charitable, a rather unique and colorful presidential candidate. He seems incapable of letting a day pass without doing something that makes the political establishment shudder with disdain.

Since I’m not a fan of the status quo in Washington, I have no objection to ruffling the feathers of DC insiders. That being said, it’s important to look at why Trump elicits such hostility.

The bottom line is that the enemy of your enemy isn’t always your friend.

In other words, my ideal candidate almost surely would be hated by the crowd in DC, but the hostility would be based on the candidate’s agenda to shrink the size and scope of the federal government, not because the candidate makes offensive and/or controversial statements.

Heck, I’d be willing to forgive a certain amount of distasteful behavior in a politician if that was the price of getting a genuine reformer. For what it’s worth, I’m even willing to tolerate a politician’s misbehavior if he simply allows good reform to happen, which is why I now have a certain after-the-fact fondness for Bill Clinton’s presidency.

As a policy wonk, I don’t spend much time wondering whether Trump is a good or stable person. I’m more focused on the policies he would push (or simply allow) if he wound up in the White House.

On that basis, I’m not brimming with optimism. Here’s some of what I wrote for the U.K.-based Guardian, when asked to share my assessment about the possible economic policy agenda of a Trump Administration. I start by saying we are in uncharted territory.

Normal presidential candidates put forth proposals that usually have been vetted by policy experts. They also generally have track records from their time as elected officials. …Trump is not a normal candidate.

I then point out that Trump is all over the map on policy.

…his views on major economic issues are eclectic. He promises a big tax cut, but it’s probably not very serious since he has no concomitant plan to restrain the growth of government spending. He threatens to impose steep tariffs, which would risk triggering a trade war, but he claims protectionism would merely be a stick to extort concessions from trading partners. ….He makes noises about potentially defaulting on debt but then pivots and says the debt can be financed by printing money. …either approach causes angst among most economists.

My conclusion (which is nothing more than a guess) is that the overall burden of government would increase with Trump in the White House.

With all this uncertainty about what Trump really believes, it’s impossible to guess which policies will change and how the economy would be impacted. For what it’s worth, libertarians generally fear that Trump ultimately would govern as a left-leaning populist.

By the way, this is also why I was not a fan of Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole, George W. Bush, John McCain, or Mitt Romney.

Simply stated, non-ideological Republicans (whether pseudo-populists like Trump or career politicians) don’t challenge the conventional wisdom of Washington. And that generally results in a go-along-to-get-along approach to policy, which means continued growth of government.

Which is why I’ve pointed out that Democrats in the White House sometimes result in less damage.

By the way, my jaundiced assessment of Trump does not imply that Hillary Clinton is any better. She also has personal foibles that – in a normal society – would disqualify her from holding public office.

And I also wrote for the Guardian about her approach to economic policy, which is basically the same direction as Bernie Sanders but at a slower pace.

…she would move public policy incrementally to the left. Some tax increases, but not giant tax increases. Some new regulations, but not complete government takeovers of industry. A bigger burden of government spending, but not turning America into Greece. An increase in the minimum wage, but not up to $15 an hour. More subsidies for higher education, but not an entitlement for everyone. And some restrictions on trade, but no sweeping reversal of the pro-trade consensus that has existed since the second world war.

In other words, become Greece at 55 miles per hour rather than Bernie’s desire to become Greece at 90 miles per hour.

P.S. Since our topic today is so depressing, let’s end with some humor.

We’ll start with this PG-13 pro-Gary Johnson comparison of the candidates.

This shows libertarians can be funny, even though I think it’s wrong to characterize Trump as being on the right (at least from an economic perspective).

Here’s an amusing comparison of a teenage boy and Donald Trump.

I’ll have to add this to my limited collection of Trump humor, most of which is at the bottom of this post.

Donald Trump seems incapable of letting a

Economy

ISM-manufacturing-index

The Institute for Supply Management’s Manufacturing Report On Business Survey. (Photo: REUTERS)

The Manufacturing Report on Business, a gauge of factory activity by the Institute for Supply Management, fell to 52.6 in July from 53.2 in June. The results missed the median economic forecast, as economists’ expected a less stark decline to 53.0 for the month.

Readings above 50 show expansion in the manufacturing, while those below indicate contraction.

The New Orders Index came in at 56.9%, a decline of 0.1 percentage point from June. The Production Index was 55.4%, a 0.7 percentage point increase and the Employment Index was 49.4%, a decline of 1%. Inventories of raw materials were 49.5%, a gain of 1% from the month prior. The Prices Index was 55%, a decrease of 5.5%, which suggests higher raw materials prices for the fifth consecutive month.

The manufacturing sector, though weak, grew in July for the fifth consecutive month, as 12 of our 18 industries reported an increase in new orders in July (same as in June), and 9 of 18 industries reported an increase in production in July (down from 12 in June).

Of the 18 manufacturing industries, 11 are reporting growth in July in the following order: Textile Mills; Printing & Related Support Activities; Miscellaneous Manufacturing; Wood Products; Furniture & Related Products; Chemical Products; Food, Beverage & Tobacco Products; Fabricated Metal Products; Nonmetallic Mineral Products; Petroleum & Coal Products; and Computer & Electronic Products. The seven industries reporting contraction in July — listed in order — are: Apparel, Leather & Allied Products; Electrical Equipment, Appliances & Components; Plastics & Rubber Products; Machinery; Primary Metals; Transportation Equipment; and Paper Products.

MANUFACTURING AT A GLANCE
JULY 2016
Index Series
Index
Jul		 Series
Index
Jun		 Percentage
Point
Change		 Direction Rate
of
Change		 Trend*
(Months)
PMI® 52.6 53.2 -0.6 Growing Slower 5
New Orders 56.9 57.0 -0.1 Growing Slower 7
Production 55.4 54.7 +0.7 Growing Faster 7
Employment 49.4 50.4 -1.0 Contracting From Growing 1
Supplier Deliveries 51.8 55.4 -3.6 Slowing Slower 3
Inventories 49.5 48.5 +1.0 Contracting Slower 13
Customers’ Inventories 51.0 51.0 0.0 Too High Same 2
Prices 55.0 60.5 -5.5 Increasing Slower 5
Backlog of Orders 48.0 52.5 -4.5 Contracting From Growing 1
New Export Orders 52.5 53.5 -1.0 Growing Slower 5
Imports 52.0 52.0 0.0 Growing Same 2
OVERALL ECONOMY Growing Slower 86
Manufacturing Sector Growing Slower 5

Manufacturing ISM® Report On Business® data is seasonally adjusted for New Orders, Production, Employment and Supplier Deliveries indexes.

*Number of months moving in current direction.

The Manufacturing Report on Business, a gauge

Opinion

Trump-Putin-AP-Reuters

New York businessman Donald J. Trump, left, and Vladimir Putin. (Photo: Andrew Harnik/AP; Reuters)

With Democrats howling that Vladimir Putin hacked into and leaked those 19,000 DNC emails to help Trump, the Donald had a brainstorm: Maybe the Russians can retrieve Hillary Clinton’s lost emails.

Not funny, and close to “treasonous,” came the shocked cry.

Trump then told the New York Times that a Russian incursion into Estonia need not trigger a U.S. military response.

Even more shocking. By suggesting the U.S. might not honor its NATO commitment, under Article 5, to fight Russia for Estonia, our foreign-policy elites declaimed, Trump has undermined the security architecture that has kept the peace for 65 years.

More interesting, however, was the reaction of Middle America. Or, to be more exact, the nonreaction. Americans seem neither shocked nor horrified. What does this suggest?

Behind the war guarantees America has issued to scores of nations in Europe, the Mideast and Asia since 1949, the bedrock of public support that existed during the Cold War has crumbled.

We got a hint of this in 2013. Barack Obama, claiming his “red line” against any use of poison gas in Syria had been crossed, found he had no public backing for air and missile strikes on the Assad regime.

The country rose up as one and told him to forget it. He did.

We have been at war since 2001. And as one looks on the ruins of Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya and Yemen, and adds up the thousands dead and wounded and trillions sunk and lost, can anyone say our War Party has served us well?

On bringing Estonia into NATO, no Cold War president would have dreamed of issuing so insane a war guarantee.

Eisenhower refused to intervene to save the Hungarian rebels. JFK refused to halt the building of the Berlin Wall. LBJ did nothing to impede the Warsaw Pact’s crushing of the Prague Spring. Reagan never considered moving militarily to halt the smashing of Solidarity.

Were all these presidents cringing isolationists?

Rather, they were realists who recognized that, though we prayed the captive nations would one day be free, we were not going to risk a world war, or a nuclear war, to achieve it. Period.

In 1991, President Bush told Ukrainians that any declaration of independence from Moscow would be an act of “suicidal nationalism.”

Today, Beltway hawks want to bring Ukraine into NATO. This would mean that America would go to war with Russia, if necessary, to preserve an independence Bush I regarded as “suicidal.”

Have we lost our minds?

The first NATO supreme commander, Gen. Eisenhower, said that if U.S. troops were still in Europe in 10 years, NATO would be a failure. In 1961, he urged JFK to start pulling U.S. troops out, lest Europeans become military dependencies of the United States.

Was Ike not right? Even Barack Obama today riffs about the “free riders” on America’s defense.

Is it really so outrageous for Trump to ask how long the U.S. is to be responsible for defending rich Europeans who refuse to conscript the soldiers or pay the cost of their own defense, when Eisenhower was asking that same question 55 years ago?

In 1997, geostrategist George Kennan warned that moving NATO into Eastern Europe “would be the most fateful error of American policy in the post-Cold War era.” He predicted a fierce nationalistic Russian response.

Was Kennan not right? NATO and Russia are today building up forces in the eastern Baltic where no vital U.S. interests exist, and where we have never fought before – for that very reason.

There is no evidence Russia intends to march into Estonia, and no reason for her to do so. But if she did, how would NATO expel Russian troops without air and missile strikes that would devastate that tiny country?

And if we killed Russians inside Russia, are we confident Moscow would not resort to tactical atomic weapons to prevail? After all, Russia cannot back up any further. We are right in her face.

On this issue Trump seems to be speaking for the silent majority and certainly raising issues that need to be debated.

How long are we to be committed to go to war to defend the tiny Baltic republics against a Russia that could overrun them in 72 hours?

When, if ever, does our obligation end? If it is eternal, is not a clash with a revanchist and anti-American Russia inevitable?

Are U.S. war guarantees in the Baltic republics even credible?

If the Cold War generations of Americans were unwilling to go to war with a nuclear-armed Soviet Union over Hungary and Czechoslovakia, are the millennials ready to fight a war with Russia over Estonia?

Needed now is diplomacy.

The trade-off: Russia ensures the independence of the Baltic republics that she let go. And NATO gets out of Russia’s face.

Should Russia dishonor its commitment, economic sanctions are the answer, not another European war.

On the issue of NATO and Russia,

Video

[brid video=”56818″ player=”2077″ title=”Trump campaign couches commitment to presidential debates”]

Paul Manafort, the campaign manager for Donald Trump, said the nominee wants to participate in the upcoming presidential debates, but wants a “maximum audience participation.” He criticized Hillary Clinton for preferring the debates be on the same days as sporting events because she prefers not to have anyone watching, just like it was during the Democratic presidential primary.

To be sure, the DNC emails released by the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks showed that in fact was the aim, but Trump has taken some heat for suggesting he won’t participate in “rigged” debates.

Paul Manafort said on Sunday Donald Trump

Policy

In this June 25, 2015 file photo Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, left, and Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi speak with German Chancellor Angela Merkel during a round table meeting at an EU summit in Brussels. Merkel has been named Times' Person of the Year, praised by the magazine for her leadership on everything from Syrian refugees to the Greek debt crisis. (Photo: AP, File)

In this June 25, 2015 file photo Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, left, and Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi speak with German Chancellor Angela Merkel during a round table meeting at an EU summit in Brussels. Merkel has been named Times’ Person of the Year, praised by the magazine for her leadership on everything from Syrian refugees to the Greek debt crisis. (Photo: AP, File)

Even though it has the largest economy in Europe, I routinely ignore Germany. This isn’t because of deliberate malice or neglect, but rather because the country has boring economic policy.

Unlike Estonia and Switzerland, it doesn’t have any really good policies that are worth applauding.

Not does it have really bad policies that deserve to be mocked, so it doesn’t get the negative attention that I shower upon nations such as France, Italy, and Greece.

Heck, about the only really interesting thing about German policy is whether the country’s politicians will be dumb enough to underwrite the profligacy of some of their neighbors.

Let’s try to atone for this oversight by giving some attention to the peculiar German tendency to be a bit over-zealous about generating money for the government.

  • The Germans, after all, came up with an odd scheme to make streetwalkers pay a nightly tax via parking meters.
  • The Germans also imposed a tax on online coffee beans that cost €30 to enforce for every €1 collected.
  • The Germans even fined a one-armed bicyclist because he didn’t have handbrakes on both handlebars.

We have another example of über-intense tax enforcement to add to our list.

The BBC reports that homeowners on a German street are having to pay for a road that was built by the Nazis.

Homeowners on a street in Germany have been told they must foot the bill for their road’s construction – even though it’s been there for nearly 80 years. …The bills included a conversion from the Nazi-era Reichsmark currency into euros for the original road surface, first laid in 1937… The figures were also adjusted for inflation. …a court has now confirmed that they must cough up the cash. It determined that while construction began in the 1930s, the road was only officially completed in 2009 when pavements were added. For the intervening period it was considered to be under development. …Auf’m Rott’s current residents will be shelling out for the “Hitler asphalt”, streetlamps dating back to 1956, a sewer from the 1970s, and pavements and greenery added in 2009.

How stereotypically German. Not only is there an unusual tax, but they even have the records from the 1930s and went though all the trouble of adjusting the numbers for inflation.

Wow, no wonder other Europeans think the Germans aren’t very compassionate.

By the way, I suspect the German homeowners also think their country isn’t very considerate. The homeowners aren’t getting hit with some annoying-yet-trivial €100 euro charge.They really are “shelling out.”

…city authorities told them pay an average of 10,000 euros ($11,000; £8,400) per household

I guess I’m lucky that Fairfax County in Virginia, which just re-paved my local street, didn’t send me a similar bill!

Though in the interest of fairness, let’s contemplate the German system, which apparently is vaguely based on a user-pays principle.

In Germany, residents have to pay a “development contribution” to the local authority for things like new roads, cycle paths and street lighting.

Part of me actually likes this approach. It’s better to have local communities pay for local infrastructure rather than having some convoluted and wasteful nationwide program (like we have to some degree in the United States) that is susceptible to waste and cronyism.

On the other hand, surely there must be something wrong with doing some routine maintenance on a street and then using that as an excuse to send homeowners a giant bill for expenses that mostly occurred during the Hitler era.

P.S. I haven’t totally ignored Germany. Over the years, I’ve bemoaned the fact that the ostensibly conservative Christian Democrats aren’t conservative and complained that the supposedly classical liberal Free Democrats aren’t classical liberals.

P.P.S. Though I’ve also given the Germans some modest praise for a period of spending restraint last decade and also for largely resisting the siren song of Keynesianism  during and after the recent recession (by the way, you won’t be surprised to learn Krugman botched the numbers when writing about Germany’s fiscal policy during that period).

P.P.P.S. And I have pointed out that the German government occasionally can waste money with Gallic flair. Or even display Greek levels of government incompetence. So, unlike the Washington Post, I would never refer to the country as being “fiscally conservative.”

P.P.P.P.S. By the way, it’s not just the German politicians who are in love with the idea of taxation. There are even some German taxpayers who protest because they want to be saddled with higher tax burdens (though I wonder if they’d be as hypocritical as their American counterparts if they faced a put-up-of-shut-up challenge).

Homeowners living on a street in Germany

Elections

Supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders protest against Hillary Clinton and the DNC outside the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. (Photo: Stephen Melkisethian/Flickr/Creative Commons)

Supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders protest against Hillary Clinton and the DNC outside the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. (Photo: Stephen Melkisethian/Flickr/Creative Commons)

The People’s Pundit Daily U.S. Presidential Election Daily Tracking Poll results show a small but clear movement to Green Party candidate Dr. Jill Stein post convention. The survey, which was used to make the PPD Election Projection Model the most accurate on the Internet in 2014, began tracking on July 3 and was first released for public consumption on Saturday.

As expected, we were bombarded by readers on both sides either agreeing with or disputing the results. Other surveys either mirror the U.S. Presidential Election Daily Tracking Poll, come very close or don’t at all resemble our results. Regarding the surveys that don’t at all resemble our results, we have a very simple response.

We’re right, They’re wrong. Period. That was the case in 2014 and it’s the case now. Donald Trump still maintains a roughly 4-point lead over Hillary Clinton, though that’s down several points from his post convention bounce. Mrs. Clinton has enjoyed a small bounce after she accepted the nomination at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.

However, there are a significant number of voters who supported Sen. Bernie Sanders during the Democratic primary who now say they will either vote for Dr. Stein, Mr. Trump, former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson or not at all–in that order.

Below is an interactive chart based on more than 400 responses conducted last night (7/30/2016) via our Internet panel and live interviews. It provides cross tab data to determine the presidential preference for primary voters based on the candidate they voted for in the primaries. While these results are particularly strong for Dr. Stein–there were also an unusually high number of 18 to 29 year-old samples–the total results include the 7-day rolling average, are weighted based on demographics from the U.S. Census Current Population Survey and show Mr. Trump ahead 46.8% to 42.2%.

The sub-sample shown in the chart paints pretty much the same picture as the overall result. The polling data indicate Mr. Trump did a better job winning over those Republicans who did not vote for him in the Republican presidential primary (88%), as well as maintain those who did (97.8%). Mrs. Clinton is maintaining 94.4% of Democratic voters who cast their primary ballot for her, but less than half (47.7%) of those who voted for Sen. Sanders say they are certain they will be on board.

Now to Dr. Stein’s bump. Again, we do not believe Mrs. Clinton will only end up with half of Sen. Sanders’ voters. Last night was an unusual response. But we are saying many, many voters are very, very angry.

Nearly 16% of Sanders supporters say they will vote for Mr. Trump, but more than a quarter are at least giving Dr. Stein a serious look. Sanders’ voters also have a largely favorable view of Dr. Stein (56%), compared to only 33% who say the same for Mrs. Clinton. Not surprisingly, these voters are markedly more likely to say they don’t believe the federal government acts in the interest of the people. Another 5.6% of her support comes from the small pool of voters who supported another candidate in the Democratic presidential primary.

Whether Dr. Stein can maintain that level of support is uncertain and worth debating as we collect and digest more polling data in the upcoming days and weeks. But what isn’t up for debate is the fact that a significant number of Sen. Sanders’ voters have extremely negative views of Mrs. Clinton and are not quite ready to just suck it up and move on.

Worth noting, we did not see this level of discontentment before the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks released some 20,000 embarrassing emails that revealed the DNC was actively working against the socialist senator from Vermont to coronate Mrs. Clinton. Despite the fawning media coverage, Mrs. Clinton still has much work to do ahead of November. The good news for the former secretary of state and her supporters is that we anticipate the anger to subside, at least somewhat. When it does, it will no doubt become much closer, though Mr. Trump was trending higher even before the conventions.

Still, the numbers are readily available to carry her to victory in November, if she can bring everyone home.

[brid video=”56811″ player=”2077″ title=”Jill Stein Crashes The DNC”]

The People’s Pundit Daily U.S. Presidential Election

People's Pundit Daily
You have %%pigeonMeterAvailable%% free %%pigeonCopyPage%% remaining this month. Get unlimited access and support reader-funded, independent data journalism.

Start a 14-day free trial now. Pay later!

Start Trial

Subscribe