DNC Chair Ken Martin: Meet the New Boss, Same as the Old Boss?

Democrats hope for a new leader to right the ship after the failures of 2024 – but perhaps they shouldn’t hold their breath.

 

By James Fite | Feb 2, 2025 @ Liberty Nation News, Tags: Articles, Opinion, Politics

 

The Democratic National Committee (DNC) elected Minnesota party leader Ken Martin as its new chair on Saturday, February 1. Martin’s election is the party’s first real step towards coming back from a disastrous election cycle, and Democrats hope their new leader can right the listing ship before it capsizes completely. Perhaps they shouldn’t hold their breath.

Won’t Get Fooled Again – Or Will They?

In 1971, The Who released a single titled “Won’t Get Fooled Again.” No matter how excited folks get about new leaders following a glorious revolution, the world itself remains little changed – and the people soon find themselves in much the same situation as they had with their old leaders. Some Democrats are excited – they “smile and grin at the change all around” – but will tomorrow’s DNC really look all that different from yesterday’s?

The party didn’t release an official postmortem on the 2016 loss, leaving Hillary Clinton to write her own book. So far, it seems those in charge now – including the new DNC chair – plan to do exactly what she did back then: blame everyone but themselves.

When MSNBC host Jonathan Capehart asked at the committee’s final forum for the chair who “believes that racism and misogyny played a role in Vice President Harris’ defeat,” Ken Martin, who went on to win the election, raised his hand along with all the rest. It was a cringeworthy enough moment that Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) reposted the clip on X and replied: “I’m already looking forward to expanding our majority in 2026.”

It’s Trump’s fault, some argue. It’s his supporters’ fault, others contend. Or maybe it’s all those Democrats who voted for Joe Biden but didn’t then vote for Harris because she’s a woman of color. The excuses quickly piled up, but the idea that Harris was simply a bad candidate or that she and Biden had so thoroughly fumbled their first four years that voters would rather jump ship than risk drowning were nowhere to be found among them.

Martin – like so many who could have filled the role – called Trump a traitor. He, like the others, chose to focus on deflection rather than reflection – and some Democrats are wondering if this isn’t just another case of “meet the new boss, the same as the old boss,” as the song says.

A Fighter for the DNC?

In his victory speech Saturday, Martin, who served as vice chair until this weekend and had previously led the association of state Democratic Party chairs, promised to go on the offense. “We’re going to go out there and take this fight to Donald Trump and the Republicans,” he said.

Skip the Scrolling – Head to Roku!

“Minnesota nice has two sides: Minnesota nice is a pleasant, earnest ability to engage with people publicly, and it is also a private ruthlessness and a coldness that only comes when you’ve lived in 10-degree-below weather half your life,” said John Bisognano, president of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee. “Ken will cut you if he has to, but that ruthlessness is what we need to achieve electoral success.” Politico quotes one unnamed Democrat who calls Martin a “knife-fighter.”

The new DNC chair himself took up this mantle, saying, “I’ve always viewed my role as chair of the Democratic Party to take the low road, so my candidates and elected officials can take the high road, meaning, I’m going to throw a punch.”

“This is a new DNC,” argued the party’s previous chair, Jaime Harrison, who added, “we’re taking the gloves off.”

Rough Sailing Ahead?

Looking back at the Biden presidency and the election cycle of 2024, one might think the DNC never donned gloves to begin with. The left’s crusade against Donald Trump certainly looked like a bare-knuckle brawl. So then, what’s changed? One thing that certainly hasn’t is the lack of unity. The same party that was split between Biden loyalists and Harris hopefuls after the former president’s embarrassing re-election campaign is now divided over the DNC chair. Some are excited, yes, but others see him as simply another part of the institution. Others still worry he sought the job only for the sake of building up his own name through the position.

And his knife-fighter persona, it seems, cuts both ways. “Yes, he’s a knife-fighter, but the problem is, a lot of people in this room feel like that knife is in their backs,” a DNC member who didn’t support Martin told reporters. “He won the job, but he didn’t necessarily win everyone’s trust.”

Martin took the top spot in the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party in 2011, inheriting a party in shambles … and debt. Over the next decade, he managed to rebuild it, and he did so ruthlessly. “He ran the DFL with an iron fist, was very impressive,” said one Democratic Party strategist. “He’s like Stalin, and I say that as a compliment.” Now Martin has taken over another party with what most would consider crippling debt.

This time, however, he faces a potential money problem moving forward. Martin was the clear choice of the delegates. He beat his nearest competitor, Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler, by 100 votes. There were plenty of folks in the party, however, who saw Wikler as a real reformer – something they say Martin is not. Among those were many of the wealthier donors.

“The delegates wanted Ken, and that must be completely respected. It wasn’t a close race,” Politico quoted one donor advisor. “However, the donors wanted Ben, and they will make the delegates and the new chair painfully aware of that fact over the course of the next four years.”

“Knife-fighter” Ken Martin so ruthlessly pursued the job of DNC chair that he left many in his party feeling stabbed in the back. He blames racism and misogyny for Harris’ loss in 2024 rather than anything his fellow Democrats may have done wrong, and there’s a good chance he could drive away big-money donors. Martin may hope to save the sinking ship that is the Democratic Party and pilot it to victory in the 2026 midterms or in 2028, but there’s rough sailing ahead.

~

Liberty Nation does not endorse candidates, campaigns, or legislation, and this presentation is no endorsement.

Read More From James Fite Editor-at-Large

Tyranny National Convention, AKA, the Democrat National Convention

By Robin Itzler

Editor's Note:  This is one of the commentaries selected from Robin's weekly newsletter Patriot Neighbors. Any cartoons appearing will have been added by me.  If you wish to get the full edition, E-mail her at PatriotNeighbors@yahoo.com to get on her list, it's free. RK 

 

On the Democrat Side:

Kamala Harris received ZERO votes in the primary. Communist Minnesota Governor Tim Walz received ZERO votes in the primary. It doesn’t bother many Democrats that Joe Biden, who received 14+ MILLION primary votes, was tossed out in a coup. Yet, Harris has the audacity to call her quest a “people-powered campaign.” 

That there are so many Americans who would accept the coup should be a high-level warning to all Patriots. In an ABC News interview, while still an official presidential candidate, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. said: 

“I think it was a coronation, it’s not democracy. Nobody voted. Who chose Kamala? It wasn’t voters. She went in four week from being the worst liability for Democratic Party to the second coming of Christ without giving one interview, without showing up for a debate, without a single policy that anyone thinks isn’t ridiculous. It’s not democracy.”

 The same people who forced Biden to leave the race, applauded when he spoke at midnight (east coast) on the DNC’s first night. Talk about chutzpah, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi held up a “We Love Joe” sign. Pelosi and other Democrat leadership politically knifed Biden in the back and then gave him a speaking slot to shout his own political eulogy when half the country had gone to sleep.

On the Independent and Republican Side:

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. announced on August 23 in Arizona that he was suspending his presidential campaign and endorsing Donald Trump for president. RFK would keep his name on ballots in NON-swing states. However, in all swing states where having his name on the ballot could hurt Donald Trump, he would be removing his name. Then a few hours later, RFK appeared at the Trump Arizona rally.

RFK’s timing of this announcement was even very important. Usually there’s a bounce following a convention, but RFK’s announcement followed by his appearance at the Trump rally depleted the communist Harris and Walz momentum.

Also, RFK’s endorsement should lead the way for other endorsements. Some that might be equally unexpected.

On the Independent Side:

The Michigan Bureau of Elections disqualified Cornel West along with his running mate from appearing on the general election ballot due to a notary technical violation of state law. In Arizona, a group of prominent Republican lawyers is trying to help West stay on the general election ballot.

 During Michelle Obama’s lie-filled speech at the DNC convention, the former First Lady insulted our intelligence by saying: 

“We don’t cheat others to get ahead. We don’t get to change the rules so we always win.”

Green Party candidate Jill Stein posted on X/Twitter: 

“Stop the gaslighting. Right now Democrats are trying to sue us off multiple state ballots, hiring spies and infiltrators to sabotage us, and even withholding public funds we qualified for months ago. Democrats ABSOLUTELY cheat and change the rules to maintain their grip on power.”

Oh, but Democrats are going to save democracy.

Cardinal Cupich, Archdiocese of Chicago:

The Democrat National Committee convention had a Planned Parenthood van parked curbside for free on-the-spot abortions and vasectomies! During the Marxist convention, whenever a speaker mentioned abortion, the crowd went wild with standing ovations. 

How could Cardinal Cupich, the Archdiocese of Chicago, bless the DNC convention? 

Republican activist Jack M. Guerrero, who has run for public office, posted on his Facebook page:

“Absolutely disgraceful! Repugnant. Shame on Cardinal Cupich of the Archdiocese of Chicago for blessing the opening night of the Democratic Party Convention, on the same evening the Party celebrated its culture of death, replete with standing ovations for abortion.  Cupich never once invoked our Lord and savior Jesus Christ during his prayer, and even hid his pectoral cross. As a fellow Catholic, I will pray for his soul and redemption.” 

To share your thoughts with Cardinal Cupich: Email: rfedek@archchicago.org (admin secretary Fr. Robert Fedek) Phone: 312-534-8204 Write: PO Box 1979, Chicago, IL 60690

Will the Real Kamala Harris Please Stand Up?

The more she talks, the less we know. 

By Leesa K. Donner | Aug 25, 2024 @ Liberty Nation News, Tags: Articles, Opinion, Politics

(Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Do the names John Breckinridge, Levi Morton, Charles Fairbanks, and Thomas Marshall mean anything to you? Each is a member of an ignominious group of former vice presidents who ran for president and lost. Altogether, 29 of the 48 people who have served as VPs have tried to become president, but only ten have succeeded. The nomination of Kamala Harris as the Democratic Party standard bearer now raises the number of presidential aspirants within this unique cabal to 49. Oddly, Ms. Harris is in the peculiar position of being relatively unknown before she wins or loses.

Some might counter that we know all we need to know about Ms. Harris. But the reality is that she has been so mercurial about her policies and positions that the American electorate is left to speculate. Most thought this vital information regarding what she wants to do and why would be cleared up at the Democratic Convention – but that did not happen. How can she still be such an enigma despite serving as VP for almost four years and delivering an address at a party convention dedicated to her nomination?

Speakers at the Democratic National Convention told us about her background. She even spent a good deal of time talking about herself during her acceptance speech. However, many were left with the feeling that she was someone they encountered at a cocktail party who seemed pleasant enough, but little was learned about who she is and what makes her tick.

Moreover, the Democratic convention is over, and the concern is that Americans don’t know why she wants to be president of the United States. Resting one’s outlook on hope and joy doesn’t say a whole lot about that person. Who doesn’t want hope and joy? It’s meaningless claptrap that doesn’t inform us about her character, beliefs, morality, or spirituality.

There are at least three reasons why Harris is nebulous about what animates her: First, she doesn’t want the American people to know because she fears their rejection. Two, she doesn’t really know herself. And three, she is superficial at her core.

However, we do know a couple of things about her: She hates former President Donald Trump and is not interested in engaging with the media. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. called her refusal to sit for interviews “profoundly undemocratic” in his campaign suspension announcement speech on Friday, August 23. “How are people to judge when they don’t know whom they are choosing,” he asked. “And how can this look to the rest of the world?” Beyond simply confusing to voters, this avoidance of the Fourth Estate is also a bit out of the ordinary for politicians – except for her predecessor, of course. Most people running for president seek media attention.

Kamala Harris: Tropes and Platitudes Tell Us Nothing

The politics of psychological projection were alive and well at the DNC this year. Television star Oprah Winfrey made a point of saying:

“We know all the old tricks and tropes that are designed to distract us from what actually matters. But we are beyond ridiculous tweets and lies and foolery. These are complicated times, people, and they require adult conversation.” 

Winfrey appeared to be making this statement about the Republicans or Donald Trump, but many felt this is what the DNC served up to viewers. The Wall Street Journal picked up on this:

“Ms. Harris attempted to lay out a vision for her Presidency, but it was mostly empty platitudes. She will provide ‘opportunity,’ though she didn’t say how. She will solve the housing crisis without explaining how or why there is a crisis on her watch. And she will reduce prices, without a repeat of her recent proposal to impose price controls.

“The lack of specificity is part of a strategy to separate herself from the Biden-Harris years by calling for a vague ‘new way forward.’”

Much has been written about Harris and her public policy agenda – or rather, her lack thereof. She has gone on record for policies she now says she’s against. These include, but are not limited to, energy, defunding the police, decriminalizing illegal immigration, healthcare for illegals, and eliminating private health insurance.

Harris has done a volte-face on so many issues that it’s impossible to know where she currently stands on any of them. This either makes her one of the least ideologically driven candidates ever to run for president or someone who does not want to tell the American people what she believes in. Perhaps she doesn’t even know.

Most presidential candidates come to the contest with an agenda. However, the Democratic Party appears to be satisfied with Kamala Harris’ description of herself in emotional rather than practical terms. Using this broad brush of “good vibes” doesn’t inform an electorate but instead fosters conjecture and speculation. There are many positions one can hold in life that do not require extensive information about one’s beliefs, but the presidency does not fall into this category.

 

Read More From Leesa K. Donner

Democrat Platform Says America Was Built on Stolen Land

By Daniel Greenfield @ Sultan Knish Blog

The DNC 2016 party platform began by claiming that “Democrats meet in Philadelphia with the same basic belief that animated the Continental Congress when they gathered here 240 years ago.” Four years later, out went the Continental Congress and all of America.

The 2020 DNC platform began with a politically fashionable ‘land acknowledgement’ asserting that America was an illegitimate entity operating on stolen land “built on Indigenous homelands.”

The 2024 platform likewise begins with a ‘land acknowledgement’ claiming that Chicago properly belongs to 13 different Indian tribes. Once again, the DNC asserts that they “recognize that our country was built on Indigenous homelands.” That is to say America should not exist.

If the Democrats truly believe it, why not turn over Chicago to the Indian tribes?

Land acknowledgements were initiated by an Australian Marxist terrorist supporter at a counterculture festival in the 1970s. Its goal was to establish that Australians were foreigners and had to follow aboriginal laws and culture. 50 years later the practice, grounded in ‘decolonization’ has been widely adopted by American leftists and their ruling party.

Land acknowledgements are a form of historical revisionism, like the 1619 Project and destroying Columbus statues, that are paving the way for delegitimizing America.

The DNC transplanting them to Chicago demonstrates a whole new level of historical and scientific illiteracy. The Indians are not “native to this continent” unless the party’s new scientific consensus, which already believes that men can become women, also believes in separate human origins for different races (a racist 19th century belief once held by Democrats.)

Nor have they been here “since time immemorial”, but were Asian populations who crossed the Bering Strait in early human history. (The theory is unpopular with many Indian tribes.)

The DNC platform claims that Chicago was really the property of the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi, along with the Myaamia, Ho-Chunk, Menominee, Sac and Fox, Peoria, Kaskaskia, Wea, Kickapoo, and Mascouten Indians. But what actually happened to those tribes?

The Ojibwe, Odawa, Potawatomi, Fox, Kickapoo and many of the others on the list allied with the British in the War of 1812. During the war, they carried out brutal atrocities such as the Potawatomi massacre of women and children during the evacuation from Fort Dearborn. (The massacre has become politically incorrect and monuments to the victims have been removed.)

The DNC land acknowledgement boasts that it made the Prairie Band of Potawatomi the “first federally recognized Tribal Nation in Illinois in 175 years.”

The Democrat platform claims that Chicago was the “traditional homelands of the Anishinaabe, also known as the Council of the Three Fires: the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations.”

That would have been news to them.

The Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi moved around quite a bit. They were forced westward by Iroquois expansionism. Some of the tribes to whom the DNC wants to assign Chicago were actually living in what is today Canada. There was no eternal Indian homeland in Chicago (named after a foul smelling plant) just a place different tribes passed through in between wars with each other and through alliances and wars with different Europeans. Like the War of 1812.

The United States and Great Britain ended the war with the Treaty of Ghent. Article Nine of the treaty mandated that the United States also conclude all hostilities with Indian tribes and “restore to such Tribes or Nations respectively all the possessions, rights, and privileges” so long as they “agree to desist from all hostilities against the United States of America.”

Some tribes chose to end hostilities, others moved with the British to Canada, and still others continued to engage in attacks. The tribes and smaller groups made and broke alliances with the British, the French and the Americans based on their perceived interests. They were not a fundamentally different “native people” with nobler, peaceful and more spiritual values. That is white liberal noble savage nonsense. They were colonists, warriors and hunters, like the Europeans, but without the same level of civilizational development or technology.

The DNC’s land acknowledgment fails to address any of this thorny history or answer the question of whether the Democrats, whose original party foolishly started the War of 1812 while being unprepared to fight it, would have been better off losing the war and the country.

Would Kamala prefer a world in which the British not only burned the White House but retained possession of it because that is what her party’s idiotic ‘land acknowledgment’ amounts to.

Instead the DNC reduces the Indians to magical “indigenous” people who “have been here since time immemorial” and “protected our lands, waters, and animals.”

The Indian tribes did not protect land and animals, they used them as hunting grounds.

Whatever human population existed in the Americas (which likely little resembled the modern conception of Indian tribes) probably led to the extinction of the megafauna, such as the mammoth and the saber-toothed tiger. They in turn were probably exterminated by the Indians, much as the more indigenous Hawaiians were enslaved and killed by the Polynesian colonists.

The Indians had more trouble hunting herd animals to extinction than they did apex predators, but that was because they lacked the technology to wipe out entire species. And those who did, like the Mayans and the Mound Builders (who built pyramids in Illinois and had more right to a DNC land acknowledgement) lacked the technology to survive overhunting a food species.

The myth of Indians valuing and preserving wildlife only to have Americans swoop in and destroy species like the bison or the passenger pigeon is more white liberal noble savage nonsense. While some tribes sensibly took steps to limit the impact of their hunting, others gleefully killed as many animals as they could. Indian creation myths left them with little grasp of the possibility of species extinction and refused to accept it when it was explained to them.

Perhaps the DNC could tell us how hunting bison by driving them off cliffs in huge numbers entailed protecting animals. Or killing entire herds of bison just for their tongues.

Given horses, rifles and a market demand for bison, beaver and other animals, the Indian tribes engaged in large scale killing of animals whose existence they took for granted.

The death of the bison and the passenger pigeon were more due to the Indians than Americans.

But the DNC is not interested in turning over Chicago to the Indians. No more than it is interested in real history and real Indians. Much as black people are to the 1619 Project, the Indians are to land acknowledgements as only a means to delegitimize America.

The DNC’s continuing use of land acknowledgements is more than an accident.

While the 2016 Democrat platform at least tipped the hat to the Founding Fathers, the 2024 platform makes a point of rejecting their work and the entire notion of America.

In a paragraph proposing slavery reparations and a study of “the continuing impacts of slavery” (which ended over 150 years ago), the DNC 2024 platform sarcastically jabs at the Declaration of Independence by endorsing ‘equity’ and contends that “we have a long way to go to realize the full promise of America, but we are committed as a party to continuing the work to build a nation where all people are not only created equal, but treated equally throughout their lives.” There is understandably no mention of the “inalienable rights” that come next since the purpose of equity is to eliminate individual rights and make the state absolute in all things.

The only mentions of the “constitution” in the DNC 2024 platform involve either attacking former President Trump or falsely claiming that there is some constitutional right to killing infants in the womb. Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson, once seen as the founders of the party, are absent, the only Jackson in the document is Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.

Democrats claim that they want to “ensure the promise of America for everyone, including black, Latino, and Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) Americans”, but what is that promise and where was it made? The DNC platform does not know or care.

America, in the DNC view, is an unfulfilled “promise” of equality that their party intends to fulfill through equity. What it is not is exceptional. Its history is of no interest. It is a bunch of racists living on stolen Indian land. And the mission of the Democrats is to put an end to America through a totalitarian state for which the DNC platform is only a partial blueprint.

Daniel Greenfield is a columnist, an investigative journalist and a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center.

When the Vibe Fades, What Remains at the DNC?

Walz headlines a convention night reliant on media support.

by Mark Angelides | Aug 22, 2024 @ Liberty Nation News, Tags:  Articles, Opinion, Politics

Governor Tim Walz headlined the festivities at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago last night, August 21. While a sympathetic media greeted his oratory as a defining moment in the Harris/Walz campaign, there was little mention of policy. It seems the narrative is taking precedence over numbers and that the 2024 strategy is to ignore the last four years in favor of a manufactured and unspecified “vibe.”

With Bill Clinton, Oprah Winfrey, and members of Democrat leadership all appearing alongside the VP contender, there was plenty of talk about Donald Trump and JD Vance. Viewers hoping for the policy road tests that usually mark such conventions may have been disappointed. Slogans, however, were very much the order of the day, and that might, in fact, have been the whole point.

The Secret DNC

The most anticipated speaker of the night was Harris’ number two, Tim Walz. He spoke for less than 20 minutes and did not grace the stage until almost 11:30 PM ET. Similar to President Joe Biden, who spoke on the opening night, it seems the party leadership would rather not have the key players in front of a prime-time audience. And there’s a method to that particular madness.

By having those who face the most scrutiny make their pitches after the East Coast has gone to bed and the West Coast has tuned out, very few people will actually see the speeches in real time. Instead, Americans will be treated to packaged soundbites and headlines that the editors of the left-leaning media feel will advance the ticket’s cause.

It’s a cozy relationship that has, thus far, served the Harris campaign well. Kamala has now gone 32 days without a substantive interview or press conference, and yet, as the Media Research Center revealed, the prime-time network coverage from ABC, NBC, and CBS has given her 66% more coverage than Trump, with  86% of that being “positive.”

The current strategy appears to be to let the media do the heavy lifting of selling her campaign to the public.

Walz Clams the Corner on Freedom

A recurring theme of Walz’s address was “freedom.” He mentioned the word repeatedly during his short speech. Ironically, the 2023 edition of Freedom in the 50 States lists Minnesota as 41st in its ranking of “how [the state’s] public policies affect individual freedoms in the economic, social, and personal spheres.” He said:

“When Republicans use the word — freedom — they mean that the government should be free to invade your doctor’s office, corporations free to pollute your air and water, and banks free to take advantage of customers.

“But when we Democrats talk about freedom, we mean the freedom to make a better life for yourself and the people that you love, freedom to make your own health-care decisions and, yeah, your kids’ freedom to go to school without worrying about being shot dead in the hall.”

He also spent a portion of his precious few minutes on stage to launch verbal potshots at Trump and, especially, JD Vance. “Now, I grew up in Butte, Nebraska, a town of 400 people. I had 24 kids in my high school class. And none of them went to Yale,” he said in a sideswipe at Vance, who graduated from the esteemed university. Interestingly, the two speakers prior to Mr. Walz’s debut as VP nominee were former President Bill Clinton and Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar, alumni of the fabled institution.

His diatribe against the opposing team continued:

“If these guys get back in the White House, they’ll start jacking up the costs on the middle class. They’ll repeal the Affordable Care Act. They’ll gut Social Security and Medicare. And they will ban abortion across this country, with or without Congress.”

Walz followed with a statement that, if it were as widely publicized as his statement on freedom, would raise numerous eyebrows. He said, “Here’s the thing. It’s an agenda nobody asked for. It’s an agenda that serves nobody except the richest and the most extreme amongst us. And it’s an agenda that does nothing for our neighbors in need.”

One wonders who it was that asked for the open border policies that have been the hallmark of Kamala Harris’ time as VP and border czar.

Soundbites Over Speeches

The short address was chock full of sporting metaphors, pastiche, and political homilies, but it was not a speech in the general sense of the word. Veering from topic to topic without a natural connection, it seemed designed for snippets on X and TikTok posts and, more importantly, for 20-second soundbites to be played ad nauseam on the network news.

The convention organizers have determined that the event will be about positivity and “joy.” It’s an easy sell to the committed party supporters, and it helps the Fourth Estate aid its favored candidate with an easy pre-packaged narrative. Yet, the time must come for Harris and Walz to set out their vision for the future in policy proposals and concrete steps. The longer they leave it, the longer they rely on media hype and superstar interventions, and the more it seems that behind the façade of joyfulness, Ms. Harris and her team are terrified of what may happen when they are exposed to the light of public scrutiny.

Read More From Mark Angelides

Chicago’s Recipe for Fiscal Crisis

August 21, 2024 by Dan Mitchell @ International Liberty

What’s the most poorly governed city in the United States? Is it  San Francisco, Detroit, New York City, Minneapolis, or Seattle?

How about none of the above. At least if we care about empirical research.

 

In 2019, I shared a study that put Riverside, California, in last place.

Last year, I shared a report that had Oakland, California, at the bottom.

I’m sure those must be places with terrible governance, but I’m surprised Chicago is not in last place.

It’s been in a downward spiral for years, and you can make a strong case that it has America’s worst mayor.

It also seems to be getting worse rather than better.

Here are some excerpts from a new editorial in the Wall Street Journal.

Chicago…hasn’t had a Republican mayor in nearly a century, making it a showcase for progressive governance. So how do Democrats explain its high crime, fiscal woes, and failing public schools? …The Chicago metro area’s unemployment rate, 6.2%, is the highest of any big city in the country…

Boeing and Citadel have fled. …The city budget has a $538 million hole, and there’s a $51 billion pension debt that siphons off municipal revenue. Chicago has a boat-mooring tax, a fountain-drink tax, a parking tax and an amusement tax, on top of a 10.25% combined state and local sales tax. Mr. Johnson has called for adding another $800 million in new levies. …Chicago schools are notoriously awful, and only 21% of 8th graders in 2022 were proficient in reading.

John Tillman makes similar points in a recent column for Fox News.

Every American should pay close attention to what’s happening in Chicago… Barely 12% of the city’s elementary school students are proficient in math, while only 16% are at that level in reading. The math numbers don’t budge by the time they reach high school. The reading numbers fall, to just 14% proficiency.

…It’s not for lack of taxpayer funding. Democrats have nearly doubled per-student funding in the last 12 years, yet educational outcomes have plummeted over the same time. …taxpayers are mostly propping up teachers unions… More and more Chicagoans no longer see a future here, with nine consecutive years of population decline. …Chicago has the second-highest sales tax in the country, along with the second-highest property taxes.

…Businesses are running from the Windy City, too. …Boeing, Caterpillar, Tyson Foods and dozens of others have all moved their headquarters out of the metropolitan area or downsized their footprint in recent years.

Many local governments have promised too many giveaways (both in the short run and long run) to government unions and those cities then impose high taxes and provide crummy services.

That combination is driving away taxpayers in the economy’s productive sector.

Chicago is an extreme example of this problem. My two cents is that the city is headed toward a fiscal crisis.

What worries me that some politicians in Washington will want to provide a bailout. The obvious answer is no, presumably preceded by some inappropriate words.

Kamala’s Proposed Increase in the Corporate Tax Rate: The Good News and Bad News. 

As part of her tax-and-spend agenda, Kamala Harris says she wants to increase the federal corporate tax rate from 21 percent to 28 percent.

While it doesn’t seem possible, there is a tiny sliver of good news in her proposal. I’m happy that she isn’t proposing to push the rate to 35 percent, which is where it was before the Trump tax cuts.

Though I guess that should be in the not-as-bad-as-it-could-have-been category rather than being considered good news.

With that out of the way, let’s now look at the bad news, courtesy of Kyle Pomerleau of the American Enterprise Institute.

If Harris wins and her plan becomes law, the United States will have the developed world’s highest corporate tax rate.

Only Colombia’s rate would be higher, but I don’t count that country as being part of the developed world since it’s per-capita GDP is only about half the level of the poorest nations in Western Europe (the OECD added Colombia and Mexico as members primarily to counter accusations that it was a club of white-governed countries).

But regardless of how one categorizes Colombia, the big takeaway from Kyle’s chart is that the U.S. would have a higher corporate tax rate than every single European welfare state. Even France and Italy.

At the risk of understatement, that’s not a recipe for attracting jobs and investment.

 

To make matters worse, the United States has a pervasive problem with double taxation.

A few years ago, when Biden was proposing the exact same policy, the Tax Foundation noted that the United States would have the highest tax on business income in the industrialized world (counting the corporate tax and the double tax on dividends).

And America also would be plagued by the highest capital gains tax.

And the highest personal income tax among developed countries.

Given what these policies would do to America’s competitiveness ranking, let’s keep our fingers crossed that she does not turn all of the Biden-Harris tax increases into Harris-Walz tax increases.

P.S. Click here for my explanation about why class-warfare taxation is a bad idea.

 

 

Are We Now a Radical Socialist Nation, Or Is the Tide Turning to Freedom?

By Robin Itzler

Editor's Note:  This is one of the commentaries selected from Robin's weekly newsletter Patriot Neighbors. Any cartoons appearing will have been added by me.  If you wish to get the full edition,   E-mail her at PatriotNeighbors@yahoo.com to get on her list, it's free.  RK

Radical Socialism:

Unless the rigged trial verdict in New York City is overturned, the answer is yes, we are a radical socialist nation. Some other recent events make us wonder if the republic can be saved.

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REP. JAMIE RASKIN—In another asinine example of how Democrats are “saving democracy,” Maryland Communist Representative Jamie Raskin is on video privately talking to other Marxist-Democrats about how to invalidate a Trump victory. In the clip, Raskin is heard saying that it’s up to Democrats to “disqualify him” on January 6, 2025. Raskin also acknowledges that doing so could “lead to something akin to civil war.”

Only the right-leaning news media has reported this. To share your thoughts with Rep. Raskin: Click here to email Rep. Jamie Raskin, Phone: 202-225-5341 ,  Write: 2242 Rayburn House Office Building, Washington DC 20515

On the International scene, in "Great" Britain—there is no freedom of speech, which is why the British government has been reviewing social media posts about the riots and arresting people who they believe are stoking racial flames.  As the western world moves closer to communism, consider what Stephen Parkinson, Director of Public Prosecutions of England and Wales, warned British subjects against doing:

"… publishing or distributing material which is insulting or abusive which is intended to or likely to start racial hatred. So, if you retweet that, then you’re republishing that and then potentially you're committing that offense [incitement to racial hatred].  We do have dedicated police officers who are scouring social media. Their job is to look for this material, and then follow up with identification, arrests, and so forth." So it's very, very serious. People might think they're not doing anything harmful. They are. And the consequences will be visited upon them."

Tyranny so easily imposed in what many would historically call America's Mother Nation", had better make everyone realize....it really can happen here.

American Freedom:

With our prayers and involvement, we must have hope of saving our republic. Let’s look at some recent wins that show the tide might be turning in the direction of Conservative Judeo-Christian values. However, we need Republican leadership,  which seems to be in short supply.

In Texas earlier this month Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott issued an executive order that requires hospitals to collect data on patients who are ILLEGALLY in the United States and report the costs of medical services provided to them. In a statement, Gov. Abbott shared: 

“Texas will hold the Biden-Harris Administration accountable for the consequences of their open border policies, and we will fight to ensure that they pay back Texas for their costly and dangerous policies.”

To share your thoughts with Gov. Abbott: Click here to send a message to Texas Gov. Abbott, Phone: 800-843-5789 ,  Write: P.O. Box 12428, Austin, Texas 78711 

'Not older than 10': Some atrocity-committing terrorists were kids!

By Bob Unruh November 15, 2023

 The atrocities of the Hamas terror attack on Israelis on Oct. 7 already have been well-documented, including videos that offer a truly detailed look at the horror inflicted. Babies beheaded and whole families burned alive are among the gritty details that have emerged from the assault that killed 1,400. In addition, of course, to the reports of rape and abuse that also have been made.   

But it gets even worse.

Now a report says some of the attackers, the terrorists who inflicted atrocities against Jews not seen since the Holocaust, were children.  An investigation by the Washington Free Beacon cited Eran Smilansky, a 28-year-old potato farmer who reported watching Gazan children going from house to house, laughing as Hamas terrorists killed people............ To Read More....

• Children as young as ten participated in the October 7 attack in Israel -  November 15, 2023 By Andrea Widburg -  In Israel, it’s emerged that when the Gazastanians attacked on October 7, they brought their kids with them. Worse, it seems that the kids enjoyed themselves.  Over and over, one reads that the attack on the Israelis was incredibly sadistic. For example (serious content warning):

  Eyewitness describing how she saw a woman being raped by several Hamas terrorists, pulling her hair as they raped her and took turns. One of them cut her breasts off - the others played with them like a toy. The last terrorist to rape her shot her in the head and continued to rape her until her [sic] finished. Eyewitness also says some terrorists were carrying heads in their hands (beheaded) as trophies, saying there wasn’t a thing the[y] didn’t do to the heads. She also saw a Hamas terrorist carrying a naked girl over his shoulder.

  This is Stone Age barbarism, completely unburdened by the civilizing influences of modernity. It’s also not the stuff of “take your kids to work day”—and yet that’s exactly what Hamas did: ................ 

  • Gaza Children as Young as 10-Years-Old and Women Participated in Massive Slaughter of Jews in Israel on Oct. 7

• An Israeli show again targets both British moral corruption and Hamas’s core rot - November 15, 2023 By Andrea Widburg - The problem with Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals is that he bent them to bad ends. In fact, as strategic devices, they’re genuinely smart. A rule I particularly like is No. 5: “Ridicule is man's most potent weapon. There is no defense. It is almost impossible to counterattack ridicule. Also it infuriates the opposition, who then react to your advantage.” That’s correct. Tyrants, whether in Nazi Germany or American academia, hate humor. That’s why the videos from Eretz Nehederet, an Israeli comedy show, are so powerful............
• Looking at the hugely successful pro-Israel rally in D.C., AFT’s Randi Weingarten beclowns herself - November 15, 2023 By Andrea Widburg - Yesterday, almost 300,000 people were in Washington, D.C., to support Israel in its fight against the unrelieved evil that is Hamas. It was such an overwhelming turnout that the Washington Post had no option but to try to bury the story in its print edition lest it give people ideas. But teachers’ union boss Randi Weingarten did notice the rally, and she came out with one of the most strikingly ignorant pronouncements imaginable from a Jewish woman who claims to be “deeply religious.” The rally was big. Although some potential attendees did not make it to D.C. because antisemitic bus drivers staged a sick-out to prevent them from traveling there, almost 300,000 people did show up to exercise their First Amendment rights. Unlike the pro-Hamas marches that were filled with covert and overt calls for a new Jewish genocide, the pro-Israel rally was distinguished by civility..........
• Jew-Hating Bus Drivers at Dulles leave 900 Jews Stranded on DC Tarmac for Hours – Refuse to Take Them to March for Israel at National Mall
• Pro-Palestinian Protesters Clash with Police Outside DNC - Paul Bois 15 Nov 2023 - Several arrests have been made outside the DNC offices in Washington, DC, where pro-Palestinian protesters violently clashed with police on Wednesday. “U.S. Capitol Police said they were making arrests at a pro-Palestinian protest on Wednesday night in Southeast D.C.,” noted NBC Washington.........
• Pro-Hamas Rioters Try to Storm DNC Headquarters in DC, Get Arrested Instead [VIDEO]. . . Unhinged Pro-Palestine Leftists Being Carried Out Kicking and Screaming
• Top Israeli Politicians Demand Europe & U.S. Take Gaza Refugees. - William Upton - Israeli politicians Danny Danon and Ram Ben-Barak say they believe Western governments should open their borders and welcome refugees fleeing the Israeli ground assault underway in Gaza. Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Danon and Ben-Barak – both lawmakers serving in Israel’s Knesset – argue European governments and the United States are ideal for taking in refugees since they have “a long history of assisting refugees fleeing conflicts.”.............

My Take - And why isn't this an insurrection?  When you promote insanity you don't get stability, you get more insanity.  Schadenfreude.