Tidbits Political Quotations
To Accompany the December 14, 2015 edition of Tidbits
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/tidbits/2015/tidbits101215.htm  
Bob Jensen at
Trinity University




Election Information --- http://www.rockthevote.com/get-informed/elections/

Cross-Over Gaming Primary Elections:  Voting for a Sure Loser Rather Than a Candidate That Might Win in a Race to the Botton
Cross-Over Gaming Primary Elections:  Voting for a Sure Loser to Knock Out Winning Candidates
Based upon a comment I heard on CBS News there are signs that the poll support and crowds supporting Donald Trump are largely members of the Democratic Party intent on messing up the Republican Party primary outcomes. These Trump supporters have no intent to vote for Donald Trump in the 2016 general election if he should be nominated. Something similar may be happening among the supporters of Bernie Sanders who are really Republicans in sheep white wool.

The USA system of selecting nominees in primary elections that precede general elections possibly are becoming a vicious game.
Election Gaming "Fraud" in Primary Elections in the USA:  Making Sure Your General Election Opponent is a Real Loser
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudulentElections.htm

FlackCheck.org --- http://www.flackcheck.org
Headquartered at the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania, FlackCheck.org offers resources that help students "recognize flaws in arguments in general and political ads in particular"

RealClearPolitics: Election 2016 --- http://www.realclearpolitics.com/elections/2016/

Bloggingheads.tv (political commentary --- http://bloggingheads.tv/

OpenSecrets (money and politics blog) --- https://www.opensecrets.org

It's hard to beat a person who never gives up.

Babe Ruth, Historic Home Run Hitter
And he wasn't even thinking about Jihads in those days but I am thinking Jihads these days

Tort lawyers prosper by rounding up potentially injured plaintiffs in class actions, and sometimes the plaintiffs don’t even have to be injured to qualify. On Monday the Supreme Court will consider whether the trial bar can put together class actions seeking hundreds of millions of dollars in damages without showing that anyone was harmed.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/inventing-class-actions-1446416470?mod=djemMER

Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go.
T.S. Eliot

Be brave enough to start a conversation that matters.
Margaret Wheatley,

We must be willing to get rid of the life we've planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.
Joseph Campbell

If you don't know where you're going, you might not get there.
Yogi Berra

If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking.
George S. Patton

Happiness is like a butterfly: the more you chase it, the more it will elude you, but if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder.
Henry David Thoreau

No Future for Jews in Europe
Chief Rabbi of Brussels --- http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3365016/posts

The Refugee Project ---
http://www.therefugeeproject.org/

Fear is the basis of religious dogma
Bertrand Russell --- https://www.brainpickings.org/2015/02/03/bertrand-russell-immortality-good-life/?mc_cid=3cb38aa6f1&mc_eid=4d2bd13843

FBI: 57% of Anti-Religious Hate Crimes Targeted Jews; 16% Targeted Muslims---
http://www.cnsnews.com/blog/michael-morris/fbi-us-jews-targeted-57-anti-religious-hate-crimes-muslims-targeted-16

Live Unfree or Die
Saudi Arabia Sentences Poet to Death for Atheism ---
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/christinerousselle/2015/11/21/saudi-arabia-sentences-poet-to-death-for-atheism-n2083725?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=


Live Free or Die
Official motto of the State of New Hampshire as Written on Every License Plate
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_Free_or_Die

Castro and the intellectuals. Why did so many American leftists embrace the Cuban revolution? It was a retreat into fantasy...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/book-party/wp/2015/11/25/how-the-american-left-fell-in-and-out-of-love-with-fidel-castro/

I will not vote for Ted Cruz, but here are some Jewish leaders who are endorsing him after centuries of Jewish political leanings toward the Democratic Party in the USA
National Coalition of Rabbis Endorse Ted Cruz for President ---
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/1215/rabbis_endorse_cruz.php3#.VmYGPzZdGh3
Traditional Jewish activists entrenched in the Democratic Party, like Barbara Streisand, probably will not follow suit. But terror in the Middle East is changing the underpinnings of global politics.

How ISIS makes more than a million dollars a day
PBS Video --- http://video.pbs.org/video/2365585849/
And ISIS needs Turkey's support in this effort which is the real reason Turkey shot down a Russian bomber over Syria.

Former CIA director Michael Morell said last week that the White House has hampered the intelligence community's ability to attack oil fields and oil trucks controlled by ISIS. Morell said that, “we didn’t go after oil wells, actually hitting oil wells that ISIS controls, because we didn’t want to do environmental damage, and we didn’t want to destroy that infrastructure." He went on to say that there was a pretentious feeling in the war room that bombing ISIS oil targets would indeed cause environmental damage. On November 18th, Colonel Steve Warren said that striking oil trucks owned by ISIS may cause harm to the drivers who may be innocent.
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/justinholcomb/2015/11/28/cia-we-cannot-bomb-isis-because-it-may-harm-the-environment-n2086159?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=

When the NYPD was bringing the murder rate to record lows through America’s most effective gun-control program: stop-and-frisk. This was gun control for bad guys, under the theory that when you take guns away from bad people—or at least make them afraid to carry guns on the street—you reduce shootings. But it was savaged by liberals. Because they don’t want just the bad guys’ guns. They want yours.
William McGurn, "The Liberal Theology of Gun Control" ---
http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-liberal-theology-of-gun-control-1449533861?mod=djemMER
Jensen Comment
Applause is given when the government buys back large numbers of guns. However, the people selling those guns in buyback programs are mostly the good guys who are afraid to deal in the dangerous black market for guns. Gun buyback programs do not take guns away from the bad guys because the bad guys get higher prices selling their guns to other bad guys.

Nuclear Charade: The Obama administration admits to Congress that its nuclear pact with Iran has not been signed by the Iranian regime and has no legal force. Obama's "tough diplomacy" is puff diplomacy ---
http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials/112515-782651-iran-nuclear-deal-is-not-signed-or-binding.htm

Between October 10 and December 1, 2015 ISIS and its sympathizers around the world have killed at least 525 people in six attacks in six countries outside its so-called caliphate ---
NBC News --- http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/isis-terror/isis-trail-death-n475861

These charts show Democrats' extraordinary state election losses under Obama ---
http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2015/12/8/9867860/democrats-obama-house-state

Why does the ACLU only bully Christians?
Schools Sing Praise to Allah, Create Propaganda Posters for ISIS
Todd Starnes
http://townhall.com/video/todd-starnes-schools-sing-praise-to-allah-create-propaganda-posters-for-isis-n2083344?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=

Jimmy Carter Iranians from entering the U.S. "unless they opposed the Shiite Islamist regime or had a medical emergency."
http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/jimmy-carter-barred-iranians/2015/12/09/id/705127/
He also deported Iranian students.

Plan to Bar Foreign Muslims by Donald Trump Might Survive a Lawsuit ---
New York Times
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/12/09/us/politics/donald-trumps-plan-to-bar-foreign-muslims-might-survive-a-lawsuit.html?referer=https://www.google.com/ 

Also see
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2015/12/08/top-scholars-say-trumps-muslim-immigrant-ban-could-be ^

This week our cover looks at the rise of right-wing populists like Donald Trump and Marine Le Pen. For years populists have thrived on the belief that a selfish elite is failing to deal with the problems of working people. Now they are feeding on the fear that governments are failing to keep their citizens safe
The Economist, December 10, 2015

Hillary's Self-Proclaimed Accomplishments Reconsidered ---
http://townhall.com/columnists/brucebialosky/2015/11/22/hillarys-accomplishments-n2082877?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=

Hillary Clinton’s million little lies ---
http://nypost.com/2015/11/28/hillary-clintons-million-little-lies/

No wonder the late William Safire, writing in The New York Times in 1996, at the height of the Whitewater investigation, called her a “congenital liar.” Said Safire: “She is in the longtime habit of lying; and she has never been called to account for lying herself or in suborning lying in her aides and friends.”

I Was A Woman In The Marine Corps In the Mid-70s. Hillary Clinton’s Story Doesn’t Add Up ---
http://townhall.com/columnists/susanhutchison/2015/11/30/i-was-a-woman-in-the-marine-corps-in-the-mid70s-hillary-clintons-story-doesnt-add-up-n2086453?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=

Switzerland overwhelmingly votes for burqa ban with £6,500 fine for Muslim women who rebel ---
http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/622037/Switzerland-votes-burqa-ban-fine-Muslim-women

he only names liberal black intellectuals. He ignores Walter Williams, Thomas Sowell, Star Parker, Larry Elder, Ward Connerly. the people he endorses such as Dyson and Harris-Perry are of the "blacks have no responsibility until whites make everything thousand times better than it is" school. I remember when the football player was accused of abusing dogs and Harris Perry said that the real problem was that white people "fetishized" animals, actually trying to excuse and justify such abuse on the ground of race. That is just one example of egregious nonsense spread by the intellectuals the author likes.
Angela
http://chronicle.com/article/The-Latest-Intellectuals/234339?cid=cr&utm_source=cr&utm_medium=en&elq=b6d4ba6e667e46bbb92eab3cd8e28bf4&elqCampaignId=1940&elqaid=7038&elqat=1&elqTrackId=738cfc888d8a4b8ba7be905594f9d897

The biggest reason women should not be in boots-on-the-ground combat is that they seldom will be treated equally if captured. All prisoners may be tortured, worked as slaves, and held for ransom. But women face an added risk that is too obvious for words.
Bob Jensen

I am sitting at the open window (at four a.m.) and breathing the lovely air of a spring morning… Life is still good, [and] it is worth living on a May morning… I assert that life is beautiful in spite of everything! This “everything” includes the following items: 1. Illness; I am getting much too stout, and my nerves are all to pieces. 2. The Conservatoire oppresses me to extinction; I am more and more convinced that I am absolutely unfitted to teach the theory of music. 3. My pecuniary situation is very bad. 4. I am very doubtful if Undine will be performed. I have heard that they are likely to throw me over. In a word, there are many thorns, but the roses are there too.
Ilyich Tchaikovsky in  happier moment ---
https://www.brainpickings.org/2015/11/19/tchaikovsky-letters-depession/?mc_cid=3cb38aa6f1&mc_eid=4d2bd13843

What do Sweden and Texas have in common?
Of the 21,748 people who have been given deportation orders by Sweden's Migration Agency last month – the largest number in history, by the way – 14,140 are registered by police as "departed" or "wanted," the Swedish website The Local reports. "We simply don't know where they are," said Patrik Engström, the head of the national border police.
http://www.truthrevolt.org/news/sweden-14000-illegal-immigrants-disappear-without-trace

Senator Elizabeth Warren Falsely Claims to be Native American
http://elizabethwarrenwiki.org/elizabeth-warren-native-american-cherokee-controversy/
The  point is that deception is the rule rather than the exception in politics.

Sometimes what passes as writerly craft is actually the product of a political agenda. Consider the Iowa Writers' Workshop in the 1950s ---
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/29/books/review/workshops-of-empire-by-eric-bennett.html?_r=0

Democratic Rout in Louisiana: The teachers unions and trial lawyers and gun supporters gain an ally in the U.S. Senate ---
http://www.wsj.com/articles/democratic-rout-in-louisiana-1448232565?mod=djemMER
His opponent's apology for buying the services of prostitutes was not accepted by voters

Why Two Kids Are Too Many ---
Tom Bartlett, Chronicle of Higher Education
http://chronicle.com/article/Why-Two-Kids-Are-Too-Many/234259?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en&elq=1c00d1b5602046bb82562fe575cc0ae7&elqCampaignId=1908&elqaid=6988&elqat=1&elqTrackId=5577cb76c0dc46218d3ca59a36ef0f9d

Canada to Refuse Entry to Single Male Syrian Refugees  ---
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/cortneyobrien/2015/11/23/canada-to-refuse-entry-to-single-male-syrian-refugees-n2084475?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=
But Chinese immigrants can be single males.

Microloans Don’t Solve Poverty:  But research might reveal what will
There was relatively little evidence that it succeeded in reducing poverty.
IPA is now working with organizations, including the microlender Kiva, to help them find ways to make their programs more effective.
---
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/microloans-dont-solve-poverty/

When last we left Oregon, John Kitzhaber, the Democratic governor, had been forced to resign because his girlfriend, Cylvia Hayes, had involved him in her green energy get-rich-quick scams. Hayes, who lived in the governor's mansion and served as first lady, was said to be steering state consulting contracts for green energy to firms controlled by her and friends of the administration. The state's attorney general was mulling criminal charges.
http://townhall.com/columnists/brianmcnicoll/2015/12/11/cover-oregon-the-scandal-that-wont-end-n2092279

Those coddled, bullying undergrads shouting their demands for safer spaces, easier classes, and additional racial set-asides are exactly what the campus faculty and administrators deserve.
Bret Stephens, The Wall Street Journal
http://www.wsj.com/articles/radical-parents-despotic-children-1448325901?mod=djemMER

The kid arrested for building a clock is suing his Texas city and school for $15 million
http://qz.com/558039/the-kid-arrested-for-building-a-clock-is-suing-a-texas-city-and-school-district-for-15-million/
Actually all he did was buy an alarm clock at Target and make it look like a bomb. He really wanted to be arrested so he and his lawyers could get rich.

ISIS teenage 'poster girl' Samra Kesinovic 'beaten to death' as she tried to flee the ISIS.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/europe/ISIS-teenage-poster-girl-Samra-Kesinovic-beaten-to-death-as-she-tried-to-flee-the-group/articleshow/49923102.cms

On Tuesday, Sweden’s Prime Minister Stefan Löfven said this policy would be reduced to bring it in line with the EU minimum, meaning many would only be granted temporary residence permits. Mr Löfven said the country needed “respite” from accepting such a large intake of refugees. “It pains me that Sweden is no longer capable of receiving asylum seekers at the high level we do today,” he told the conference. “We simply cannot do any more.”
http://www.businessinsider.com/swedens-deputy-prime-minister-cries-as-she-announces-u-turn-on-refugee-policy-2015-11

We'd rather be obese on benefits than thin and working.
Janice and Amber Manzur
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/11347454/Mother-and-daughter-weigh-a-total-of-43-stone-and-get-34k-a-year-handouts-but-refuse-to-diet.html 

She's shoplifted goods worth £2m, has SIX children by four fathers - and lives off benefits ---
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3355779/posts

Family Earning Over $1 million living in NYC public housing ---
http://pix11.com/2015/11/25/family-earning-over-1m-living-in-nyc-public-housing/

Moocher Hall of Fame --- https://danieljmitchell.wordpress.com/the-moocher-hall-of-fame/

 




Election Gaming "Fraud" in Primary Elections in the USA:  Making Sure Your General Election Opponent is a Real Loser
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudulentElections.htm

Table of Contents

Funding Losers

 Communications Juggernauts in Crossover Voting Frauds

Funding Opponent Scandals

Trump part of conspiracy to ensure Clinton presidency ---
Jeb Bush --- http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/dec/8/jeb-bush-suggests-donald-trump-part-of-conspiracy-/
Jensen Question
Is such a conspiracy necessary given the slate of losers running as GOP candidates for President in 2016?

The Week In Congress --- http://theweekincongress.com/



Laffer Curve --- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laffer_curve

Between 1979 and 2002, more than 40 other countries, including the United Kingdom, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Norway, and Sweden cut their top rates of personal income tax. In an article about this, Alan Reynolds, a senior fellow with the right-libertarian think tank Cato Institute, wrote, "Why did so many other countries so dramatically reduce marginal tax rates? Perhaps they were influenced by new economic analysis and evidence from... supply-side economics. But the sheer force of example may well have been more persuasive. Political authorities saw that other national governments fared better by having tax collectors claim a medium share of a rapidly growing economy (a low marginal tax) rather than trying to extract a large share of a stagnant economy (a high average tax)."[38]

Japanese government raised the sales tax in 1997 for the purpose of balancing its budget, but the government revenue decreased by 4.5 trillion yen because consumption stumbled. The country recorded a GDP growth rate of 3 percent in 1996, but after the tax hike the economy sank into recession (although this was also the time period of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis.)[39] The tax revenue reached a peak of 53 trillion yen in FY 1997, and declined in subsequent years, being still 42 trillion yen[40] (537 billion US dollars) in 2012.

Continued in article

"Israel, the Laffer Curve, and Market-Based Reform," by Daniel J. Mitchell, Townhall, November 17, 2015 ---
http://finance.townhall.com/columnists/danieljmitchell/2015/11/17/israel-the-laffer-curve-and-marketbased-reform-n2081727

Since I’m a big fan of the Laffer Curve, I’m always interested in real-world examples showing good results when governments reduce marginal tax rates on productive activity.

Heck, I’m equally interested in real-world results when governments do the wrong thing and increase tax burdens on work, saving, investment, and entrepreneurship (and, sadly,these examples are more common).

My goal, to be sure, isn’t to maximize revenue for politicians. Instead, I prefer the growth-maximizing point on the Laffer Curve.

In any event, my modest hope is that politicians will learn that higher tax rates lead to less taxable income. Whether taxable income falls by a lot or a little obviously depends on the specific circumstance. But in either case, I want policy makers to understand that there are negative economic effects.

Writing for Forbes, Jeremy Scott of Tax Notes analyzes the supply-side policies of Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu

Netanyahu…argued that the Laffer curve worked, and that his 2003 tax cuts had transformed Israel into a market economy and an engine of growth. …He pushed through controversial reforms… The top individual tax rate was cut from 64 percent to 44 percent, while corporate taxes were slashed from 36 percent to 18 percent. …Netanyahu credits these reforms for making Israel’s high-tech boom of the last few years possible. …tax receipts did rise after Netanyahu’s tax cuts. In fact, they were sharply higher in 2007 than in 2003, before falling for several years because of the global recession. …His tax cuts did pay for themselves. And he has transformed Israel into more of a market economy…In fact, the prime minister recently announced plans for more cuts to taxes, this time to the VAT and corporate levies.

Pretty impressive.

Though I have to say that rising revenues doesn’t necessarily mean that the tax cuts were completely self-financing. To answer that question, you have to know what would have happened in the absence of the tax cut. And since that information never will be available, all we can do is speculate.

That being said, I have no doubt there was a strong Laffer Curve response in Israel. Simply stated, dropping the top tax rate on personal income by 20 percentage points creates a much more conducive environment for investment and entrepreneurship.

And cutting the corporate tax rate in half is also a sure-fire recipe for improved investment and job creation.

Continued in article

Jensen Comment
Note that there's likely to be a relatively long lag between tax cuts and increases in tax revenues even in circumstances that are likely to have a Laffer Curve impact. For example, Bill Clinton allegedly was able to balance the budget due to lags in the Regain tax cuts.

The circumstances were not decent for the George W. Bush tax cuts because he was the most spendthrift president in USA history. Tax cuts do not necessarily have a Laffer Curve impact when spending is significantly increased alongside the tax cuts. The George W. Bush veto pen was still full of ink at the end of his term of office as President of the USA.

The circumstances of Laffer Curve impact are also not good if the economy is heading for a deep recession. Too many other variables come into play, especially global variables.

The Miracle of Chile --- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miracle_of_Chile


"Bank of Canada opens door to negative interest rates as oil, dollar sink," by David Parkinson and Barrie McKenna, Globe and Mail, December 8, 2015 ---
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/economy/bank-of-canada-unveils-new-measures-to-deal-with-economic-shocks/article27643760/ 

. . .

“Today’s remarks should in no way be taken as a sign that we are planning to embark on these policies,” he told an Empire Club of Canada luncheon in downtown Toronto. “We don’t need unconventional policy tools now, and we don’t expect to use them. But it’s prudent to be prepared for every eventuality.”

The unveiling of the central bank’s new unconventional-policy framework comes after a week of distressing developments affecting Canada’s still-fragile economy. Oil prices plumbed six-year lows, sending the Canadian dollar to its lowest level against its U.S. counterpart in 11 years. Prices of other resource commodities also slumped, contributing to a 5-per-cent sell-off of the Toronto Stock Exchange in the past five trading days.

And all this is taking place just days before the powerful U.S. Federal Reserve looks likely to raise its key interest rate next week for the first time since before the Great Recession.

Most of the world’s central banks, including Canada’s, have been cutting rates. A Fed hike will mark a major divergence in global interest rates that is already sending tremors through the world’s stock, bond, commodity and currency markets.

Jensen Comment
Most USA banks are looking forward to a return to sanity on interest rates so their loans will become more profitable. I suspect the same is true in Canada. The possibility of negative interest rates on deposits in the Bank of Canada is only that --- a possibility if things get worse in Canada

"Less Than Zero: Living With Negative Interest Rates (in Europe)," by Tommy Stubbington, Business Insider, December 8, 2015 ---
http://www.wsj.com/articles/less-than-zero-living-with-negative-rates-1449621094?mod=djemCFO_h 

 Once, it was a good thing to have money in the bank.

Now, Danish companies pay taxes early to rid themselves of cash. At one small Swiss bank, customer deposits will shrink by an eighth of a percent a year.

But it isn’t all bad. Some Danes with floating-rate mortgages are discovering that their banks are paying them every month to borrow, instead of charging interest on their home loans.

Such is life in the upside-down world of negative interest rates, in which banks impose a levy on customers to hold their money, instead of paying interest on deposits.

The European Central Bank last week pushed down its deposit rate—what it pays commercial banks—to minus 0.3% from minus 0.2%.

Three of the eurozone’s smaller neighbors—Denmark, Sweden and Switzerland—have pushed their interest rates deeper into negative territory in response to the ECB’s rate cuts, resulting in a number of unusual outcomes with ramifications for big businesses and consumers and everyone in between. These countries offer a window into what might happen if the eurozone travels further down the path of negative rates.

Continued in article


Finland --- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finland

Social benefits are now dysfunctional in motivating the labor force in Finland to a point where Finland is considering a bold experiment in changing the welfare model to get people to work ---
Finland is considering giving every citizen €800 a month tax free cash annuity wage supplement --- 
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/finland/12035946/Finland-is-considering-giving-every-citizen-800-a-month.html

Jensen Comment
Unemployment is soaring to record levels in Finland and many people on unemployment or other welfare benefits do better by staying on the dole rather than working to get off the dole. Hence, the proposal being considered in Finland is to give every adult about $1,000 per month tax free and do away with the many other dysfunctional welfare benefits.

The tax free supplemental income is not unlike what is happening in the USA due to the $2 trillion underground cash labor market such as when a San Antonio housekeeper and mother Erika and I know quite well receives $25 per hour tax free for cleaning houses plus getting child welfare, food stamps, and Medicaid. She owns a relatively new car and sends a great deal of money to her family in Mexico. The underground economy is technically illegal in the USA, but enforcement of the law is of low priority. This is why the underground economy is so enormous and growing.

There are many unknowns in the article above such as whether the monthly wage supplements in Finland will become lifetime annuities and/or will eventually be progressively taken away from higher income taxpayers or all taxpayers. It's also not clear what will become of other social benefits like subsidized health care, child care, elder care, higher education, etc. For example, higher education is highly subsidized in Finland but only about a third of the Tier 2 students are allowed into Tier 3 colleges. Perhaps more should be allowed to go to college.

 

"When my daughter went to nursery here in Glasgow, 75% of my salary went towards her care" . . . She pointed out that the situation is very different in Finland, where childcare is means-tested and inexpensive or free. Not all parents take more than the initial year off, either wanting to work or needing the income. The crucial difference is that they have a choice.
Family welfare in Finland - a lesson for Scotland ---
http://www.contributoria.com/issue/2014-10/53e76df48d4eae7d77000005/
It's not clear whether the $1,000 per month annuity would affect the benefit of having a year off work for a new baby in Finland.

 

Jensen Comment
This tax-free annuity supplement to all adults will be very inflationary, and inflation is relatively high in all the Nordic countries. If unemployment among younger workers is approaching 25% in Finland it's not clear that this is the best way to create jobs is this annuity proposal. Finland is a small nation that depends heavily on exports from its electronics, lumber, and ship building industries. At one time Finland manufactured a large market share of the cell phones (Nokia) and television sets sold in Europe. These exports have since fallen off a cliff due to competition such as the superior technology and lower costs of smart phones manufactured in Asia.

What should be considered are more effective and efficient ways to create jobs, especially for younger workers in Finland. Perhaps subsidies to employers would be a better way to motivate the companies to develop more competitive exports, especially in high technology where Finland tended to excel until recently.

Finland, Denmark, and Norway thus far severely restrict refugee inflows that are becoming an enormous drag on the Swedish economy. Sweden's economy is in far greater danger even though it does have an advantage over Finland by not being part of the Euro-currency nations that are being heavily taxed for support of nations bordering on the Mediterranean Sea.

Finland, Norway, and Sweden each have roughly half as many people as Sweden's 10 million population. The Nordic countries combined have many fewer people to care for than California's 40 million (that excludes millions that are not counted in California's census). Small populations enable the Scandinavians to consider annuitizing their social welfare. At the same time it increases their dependencies on balance of trade to maintain their economies at higher employment rates.

Norway is bleeding now because of the crash in oil prices. Sweden is bleeding because of immigration overflows. Finland is bleeding because of technological obsolescence. Denmark is bleeding due to lack of productivity of its work force. These are some of the things Bernie Sanders doesn't mention in his campaign.

Bernie does not mention that social benefits are now dysfunctional to motivating the labor force in all of Scandinavia. I wonder if he will praise the $1,000 per month annuity being considered for every adult in Finland. This sounds great in the headlines but not so great when you read between the lines.


Norway is paying refugees thousands of kroner to return home ---
http://www.businessinsider.com/norway-is-paying-refugees-to-return-home-2015-12

Tens of thousands of kroner are being offered to each person who voluntarily leaves the country. They also have their flights paid for.

Katinka Hartmann, head of the immigration department’s return unit (UDI), said that many of the people arriving from Syria, Iraq, the Middle East and Africa expect to receive protection quickly and cannot wait the months or even years the process can take.

“They thought they would have the opportunity to work or take an education – and maybe even to get their family to Norway,” she told NRK television.

“Many cannot wait (for the asylum process to run its course). They have family at home who expect them to be able to help.

Continued in article


"Those Israel Boycotts Are Illegal:  In many cases, educational associations that shun Israel may be sued for violating their charters,"  by Eugene Kontorovich and Steven Davidoff Solomon, The Wall Street Journal, December, 2015 ---
http://www.wsj.com/articles/those-israel-boycotts-are-illegal-1449013865?mod=djemMER  

The American Anthropological Association (AAA) voted on Nov. 20 to boycott Israel, though the resolution—which would prohibit Israeli academic institutions from any involvement in the organization, such as participation in conferences and hiring events—must still be approved by the group’s full membership in coming months. Ten days later the National Women’s Studies Association voted to call for a boycott of “entities and projects sponsored by the state of Israel.” Boycott votes are also scheduled at the annual meetings of the American Historical Association (AHA) and the Modern Language Association.

The moral myopia and academic perversity of these boycotts have been widely discussed. Less well understood is that in many cases they also are illegal. Under corporate law, an organization, including a nonprofit, can do only what is permitted under the purposes specified in its charter.

Boycott resolutions that are beyond the powers of an organization are void, and individual members can sue to have a court declare them invalid. The individuals serving on the boards of these organizations may be liable for damages.

Consider the American Historical Association. Its constitution—a corporate charter—states that its purpose “shall be the promotion of historical studies” and the “broadening of historical knowledge among the general public.” There’s nothing in this charter that would authorize a boycott. And an anti-Israel boycott will do nothing to promote “historical studies” or broaden “historical knowledge.”

Continued in article


"The Perils of Protectionism," by Dwyer Gunn, Jstor, November 24, 2015 ---
http://daily.jstor.org/the-perils-of-protectionism/

A new report from economists Simon Evenett and Johannes Fritz of the Center for Economic Policy Research indicates that protectionist trade policies are on the rise among the world’s biggest economies.  India, Russia, and the U.S. are the biggest offenders. “Overall, the Group of 20 leading economies, whose leaders meet Sunday, have resorted to so-called ‘trade distortions’ 40% more frequently in the first 10 months of 2015 than they did last year,” writes the Wall Street Journal.

While the protectionist measures of today are limited in comparison to past policies, protectionism has historically backfired on the United States. In 1930, the United States Congress passed the legendary Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, raising tariffs on thousands of imported goods. The role of the tariff on the U.S. economy is subject to debate, but economists agree that it set off a raft of protectionist measures around the world and resulted in a significant collapse in international trade.

Continued in article

 


President Obama Wants to Regulate the Internet Like a Public Utility:  Only the Courts Can Save the Free Internet

"Judging Obamanet’s Power Grab The FCC’s Internet rule gets what should be a rocky day in court," The Wall Street Journal, December 3, 2015 ---  http://www.wsj.com/articles/judging-obamanets-power-grab-1449188669?mod=djemMER

The Obama Administration has specialized in executive overreach, and this year’s grab to control the Internet is among the worst cases. On Friday the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals will hear U.S. Telecom Association v. FCC, which challenges Federal Communications Commission regulations that classified the Internet as a public utility under Title II of the Communications Act of 1934.

One legal problem is that the FCC flouted the Administrative Procedures Act by adopting rules the commission didn’t propose or open for public comment. In 2014 the FCC lost at the D.C. Circuit in Verizon VZ -0.80 % v. FCC, which found that the agency had regulated the Internet as a de facto public utility without changing its classification under law. In that ruling Judge David Tatel sketched out a map for how the FCC might craft legal rules that prevent blocking or slowing traffic. The agency initially followed his blueprint, citing Verizon more than 50 times in its next proposal.

But this year that carefully tailored plan met the paper shredder—as the FCC subbed in, without fair notice under the law, entirely different final regulations. Why the change in plans? President Obama publicly browbeat the FCC to reclassify the Internet as a public utility, and the agency soon saluted the Webmaster-in-Chief in a 3-2 vote. The executive branch mowed over a supposedly independent agency in violation of the separation of powers.

There’s also the plain text of the Communications Act. Check out language Congress added in 1996: It is U.S. policy for the Internet to be “unfettered by Federal or State regulation.” Anyone think a GOP Congress wanted the FCC to wield total control over the Web?

Continued in article


There are 12 Promised New Tax Credits to Date and Counting as She Targets More Credits to Voter Groups:  Making a Nightmare for Tax Software Programmers to Say the Least
Hillary Clinton’s Tax Credit Sweepstakes:  There’s one for you, and you, and you, and don’t forget him over there ---
http://www.wsj.com/articles/hillary-clintons-tax-credit-sweepstakes-1448928410?mod=djemMER

The Democratic candidates are conducting a lively fiscal bidding war. Bernie Sanders favors some $18 trillion in new spending over a decade, give or take a few hundred billion, and raising taxes on the middle class—in part at least—to pay for it. Hillary Clinton supports somewhat less new spending, but she also disguises a huge chunk of her income transfers through the tax code.

Continued in article

Jensen Question
Budget deficit? What's a budget deficit now that the government learned how print new money to erase spending deficits?
Eat, drink, milk the government tits, and turn your tax obligation into a windfall refund.
And there's no reason food stamps should not be for everybody. New Hampshire even lets you use "food" stamps in tobacco shops, tattoo or body piercing parlors, liquor stores, casinos, strip clubs and whatever. Governor Hassan vetoed attempts to limit food stamps to food. Food stamps already contribute to too much obesity. Get some tattoos, a case of beer, and roll the dice.


"Louisiana’s School Voucher Victory:  A sordid Justice Department lawsuit gets a judicial rebuke," The Wall Street Journal, November 20, 2015 ---
http://www.wsj.com/articles/louisianas-school-voucher-victory-1448061539?mod=djemMER

Bobby Jindal made a name for himself in the GOP by championing school choice. Upstaged by new candidates on the block, the Louisiana Governor this week dropped out of the Republican presidential race. But at least the education reformer can take heart that his private-school voucher legacy has finally been protected.

Last week a 2-1 majority of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a district court ruling that granted the Justice Department pre-clearance review of Louisiana vouchers. The “burdensome, costly, and endless” process imposed “a vast and intrusive reporting regime on the State without any finding of unconstitutional conduct,” wrote appellate Judge Edith Jones for the majority.

The rebuke punctuates a sordid, two-year case in which the Obama Administration sought to deny poor, black kids better educational opportunities under the pretext of promoting integration. In August 2013 Justice sued to block Louisiana’s vouchers, which the Administration claimed appeared “to impede the desegregation progress” of public schools under federal desegregation orders dating to the 1960s and ’70s.

Only students who come from families below 250% of the poverty and attend schools with a C or lower grade are eligible for the vouchers. In 2013 black students received 85% of 6,800 vouchers awarded. But Justice complained that black voucher recipients might leave their failing public schools more white.

According to a study by Boston University political scientist Christine Rossell—who has analyzed desegregation plans for more than 25 years—Louisiana vouchers “had no negative effect on school desegregation in the 34 school districts under a desegregation court order.” Justice produced no evidence to the contrary.

Switching tactics, Justice in November 2013 asked the court to allow federal oversight of Louisiana’s vouchers under a 1975 desegregation order that banned public funding of discriminatory private schools. Justice demanded that the state, prior to issuing vouchers, hand over racial data for each public school as well as applicants’ names, addresses, race, previous public school and private school preference.

In April 2014, federal Judge Ivan Lemelle imposed a tortuous federal pre-clearance review that allowed Justice to veto voucher awards. Parents of voucher recipients and the Louisiana Black Alliance for Educational Options petitioned to intervene in the case. They argued that the feds didn’t have jurisdiction over a private school voucher program.

The Fifth Circuit agreed. As Judge Jones explains, Justice can’t compel disclosure of state records without alleging illegal public aid of discriminatory private schools, which it didn’t. “DOJ admits that [its] position amounts to a fishing expedition,” writes Judge Jones, and an “attempt—through pre-award ‘back and forth’ with the state on every single voucher—to regulate the program without any legal judgment against the state.” Justice’s argument “represents more than ineffective lawyering.”

The Administration’s dubious prosecution of vouchers in Louisiana reflects its willingness to throw poor kids under the bus to curry favor with the teachers’ unions. Unlike President Obama, Mr. Jindal will leave office on the right side of history.

 


Political Correctness --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_correctness

"The Coddling of the American Mind:  In the name of emotional well-being, college students are increasingly demanding protection from words and ideas they don’t like. Here’s why that’s disastrous for education—and mental health," by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt, The Atlantic, September 2015 ---
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/09/the-coddling-of-the-american-mind/399356/

Something strange is happening at America’s colleges and universities. A movement is arising, undirected and driven largely by students, to scrub campuses clean of words, ideas, and subjects that might cause discomfort or give offense. Last December, Jeannie Suk wrote in an online article for The New Yorker about law students asking her fellow professors at Harvard not to teach rape law—or, in one case, even use the word violate (as in “that violates the law”) lest it cause students distress. In February, Laura Kipnis, a professor at Northwestern University, wrote an essay in The Chronicle of Higher Education describing a new campus politics of sexual paranoia—and was then subjected to a long investigation after students who were offended by the article and by a tweet she’d sent filed Title IX complaints against her. In June, a professor protecting himself with a pseudonym wrote an essay for Vox describing how gingerly he now has to teach. “I’m a Liberal Professor, and My Liberal Students Terrify Me,” the headline said. A number of popular comedians, including Chris Rock, have stopped performing on college campuses (see Caitlin Flanagan’s article in this month’s issue). Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Maher have publicly condemned the oversensitivity of college students, saying too many of them can’t take a joke.

Two terms have risen quickly from obscurity into common campus parlance. Microaggressions are small actions or word choices that seem on their face to have no malicious intent but that are thought of as a kind of violence nonetheless. For example, by some campus guidelines, it is a microaggression to ask an Asian American or Latino American “Where were you born?,” because this implies that he or she is not a real American. Trigger warnings are alerts that professors are expected to issue if something in a course might cause a strong emotional response. For example, some students have called for warnings that Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart describes racial violence and that F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby portrays misogyny and physical abuse, so that students who have been previously victimized by racism or domestic violence can choose to avoid these works, which they believe might “trigger” a recurrence of past trauma.

Some recent campus actions border on the surreal. In April, at Brandeis University, the Asian American student association sought to raise awareness of microaggressions against Asians through an installation on the steps of an academic hall. The installation gave examples of microaggressions such as “Aren’t you supposed to be good at math?” and “I’m colorblind! I don’t see race.” But a backlash arose among other Asian American students, who felt that the display itself was a microaggression. The association removed the installation, and its president wrote an e-mail to the entire student body apologizing to anyone who was “triggered or hurt by the content of the microaggressions.”

This new climate is slowly being institutionalized, and is affecting what can be said in the classroom, even as a basis for discussion. During the 2014–15 school year, for instance, the deans and department chairs at the 10 University of California system schools were presented by administrators at faculty leader-training sessions with examples of microaggressions. The list of offensive statements included: “America is the land of opportunity” and “I believe the most qualified person should get the job

The press has typically described these developments as a resurgence of political correctness. That’s partly right, although there are important differences between what’s happening now and what happened in the 1980s and ’90s. That movement sought to restrict speech (specifically hate speech aimed at marginalized groups), but it also challenged the literary, philosophical, and historical canon, seeking to widen it by including more-diverse perspectives. The current movement is largely about emotional well-being. More than the last, it presumes an extraordinary fragility of the collegiate psyche, and therefore elevates the goal of protecting students from psychological harm. The ultimate aim, it seems, is to turn campuses into “safe spaces” where young adults are shielded from words and ideas that make some uncomfortable. And more than the last, this movement seeks to punish anyone who interferes with that aim, even accidentally. You might call this impulse vindictive protectiveness. It is creating a culture in which everyone must think twice before speaking up, lest they face charges of insensitivity, aggression, or worse.

Continued in article

Bob Jensen's threads on political correctness ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/HigherEdControversies2.htm#PoliticalCorrectness


Banned From Setting Foot on Campus:  Kiss Her Tenure Prospects Goodbye
With this scarlet letter hanging around her neck it's not likely she will ever be allowed to teach students in the USA

"Kansas Professor on Leave After Using Racial Slur in Class," Time Magazine, November 21, 2015 ---
http://time.com/4123543/kansas-professor-on-leave-after-using-racial-slur-in-class/?xid=newsletter-brief

. . .

But Amy Schumacher, a first-year doctoral student who was in the class of nine white students and one black student, said most “just shut down” after Quenette’s using the slur. Schumacher said she believes Quenette “actively violated policies” during the discussion, hurt students’ feelings — including the one black student, who left “devastated” — and has a previous history of being unsympathetic to students.

Quenette is relieved of all teaching and service responsibilities, university spokesman Joe Monaco said. He said administrative leaves are often used “to address substantial disruptions to the learning environment or concerns about individuals’ welfare” while investigations are underway.

Quenette said she hopes to secure an attorney to represent her.

She also said she believes academic freedom protects her comments and that they were not discriminatory.

“I didn’t intend to offend anyone,” she said. “I didn’t intend to hurt anyone. I didn’t direct my words at any individual or group of people.”

Continued in article
Also see http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/11/22/university-kansas-professor-placed-on-leave-after-using-racial-slur-in-class/

Author (and Lawyer) Wendy Kaminer Defends Her Use Of A Racial Slur During A Free Speech Panel ---
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/05/wendy-kaminer-racial-slur-free-speech_n_7521858.html

Library of Congress:  Banned Books That Shaped America ---
http://www.bannedbooksweek.org/censorship/bannedbooksthatshapedamerica


"Closed Minds on Campus:  Today’s student protesters start with valuable observations, writes John H. McWhorter, but then they drift into a mistaken idea of what a university—and even a society—should be," by John H. McWhorter, The Wall Street Journal, November 27, 2015 ---
http://www.wsj.com/articles/closed-minds-on-campus-1448634626?alg=y 

. . . 

These protesters appear to miss how Orwellian their terms often sound; the enraged indoctrination sounds like something out of “1984,” not enlightenment. Then again, one can almost hear the protesters responding, “Well, yeah, but we really are right!” They assume that their perspective is a truth that brooks no morally conceivable objection.

The question for today’s campuses has become: What is considered unspeakable? Where do we draw the line? There are indeed some truths that civilized people would not dispute: that women should have the right to vote, that genocide is wrong. Critics who pretend university culture is open to “free speech” about all ideas are being disingenuous. These students aren’t so much trying to shut down free inquiry as they are assuming that, on this topic, it has already happened. “Racism is wrong,” they know—and we all agree. “Therefore, when it comes to that which I find offensive as a person of color, civility and discussion are beside the point.”

That second part is where these earnest students go wrong. The idea that only the naive or the immoral would question issues connected to something as broad and protean as race and racism is hasty at best and anti-intellectual at worst. What qualifies as discrimination? As cultural appropriation? As aggression? What is an ethnicity? What does racial courtesy consist of, and for what reasons? These are rich, difficult questions with no hard-and-fast answers.

Any insistence otherwise is religious. The term is unavoidable here. When intelligent people openly declare that logic applies only to the extent that it corresponds to doctrine and shoot down serious questions with buzzwords and disdain, we are dealing with a faith. As modern as these protests seem, in their way, they return the American university to its original state as a divinity school—where exegesis of sacred texts was sincerely thought of as intellection, with skepticism treated as heresy.

The impression that race-related positions are elementary tenets long resolved explains the “safe space” concept so often bandied about at universities today. Commentators harrumph that students who insist on this brand of safety are merely “whining,” but they miss the point; these students assume that any views on race and racism counter to theirs genuinely qualify as benighted and toxic. All of us seek “safety” from genuinely rancid views—how many of us would stay at a party where someone dominated the conversation with overtly racist bloviations? These students have merely overextended the bounds of the conclusively intolerable.

Another factor bolsters the mistaken impression that these protests are founded on truth rather than opinion. One may see the students as driven to a breaking point—with emotion naturally creating some excesses—by endless abuse, erupting after decades of patience. That narrative would implicitly justify the rage, profanity and perhaps even aggression (according to a Nov. 14 article in the conservative Dartmouth Review, a splinter group of black protesters at the university pushed a white student against a wall yelling, “filthy white bitch!”, though the university has said that it’s received no official reports of violence).

Dr. McWhorter teaches linguistics, American studies, philosophy and music at Columbia University. His latest book is “The Language Hoax.”

Jensen Comment
Another aspect of living with the microaggression police is that African Americans are exempted --- like the Black Live Matters protesters screaming out profanities and "whities" in the Dartmouth Library. Microaggressions are not banned entirely on campus; They're reserved exclusively for African Americans.

Black-clad protesters gathered in front of Dartmouth Hall, forming a crowd roughly one hundred fifty strong.
“F*** you, you filthy white f***s!” “F*** you and your comfort!” “F*** you, you racist s***!” These shouted epithets were the first indication that many students had of the coming storm. The sign-wielding, obscenity-shouting protesters proceeded through the usually quiet backwaters of the library. They surged first through first-floor Berry, then up the stairs to the normally undisturbed floors of the building, before coming back down to the ground floor of Novack.
The Dartmouth Review, November 47, 2015 --- http://www.dartreview.com/eyes-wide-open-at-the-protest/
Video:  http://townhall.com/tipsheet/justinholcomb/2015/11/17/could-you-quiet-down-please-im-trying-to-learn-n2081756?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=

Students and their sympathizer who become theatrical about each and every unintended microaggression should listen to Al Sharpton
If you play the theatrics too much, you get in the way of your own cause.
Al Sharpton --- http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/alsharpton366445.html
Jensen Comment
You can also go over the top where the theatrics are extremely counter productive such as when students lock arms to block fire trucks  and ambulances on campus
Jane Fonda suggests this in one of her books admitting that she damaged her life and her cause badly by pretending to fire an anti-aircraft gun in North Viet Nam.

 


Patricia Walters wrote:

What do the students have to lose by making these demands?

Jensen Comment

First and foremost these are the demands of only some students that have promoted themselves as spokespersons for all students on campus. What is the process that lets such a few students make such demands in the name of all students? The more contentious the demands become the more active students who do not agree will become and pretty soon we could have students on different sides rioting against each other with the university officials caught in the middle. And it could also result in lone wolf stalkings and threats made on students by other students.

There's a lot at stake to lose if a few self-proclaimed dictators make silly or contentious demands.

One thing the college loses is intellectual respect for even making some demands such as stupidly demanding that the university violate the constitution and state statutes by no longer being an equal opportunity employer due to prejudicial hiring based upon race, creed, or color. That could result in continual and expensive lawsuits by rejected candidates. It doesn't cost the student leaders anything, but it could cost the university as a whole a whole lot of money and respect.

Consider the following demand by Occidental College students:

Immediate demilitarization of Campus Safety, which includes, but is not limited to, removal of bulletproof vests from uniform, exclusion of military and external policy rhetoric from all documents and daily discourse, and increased transparency and positive direct connection to the student body

Consider the phrase "exclusion of military and external policy rhetoric from all documents and daily discourse." Does this mean burning the history documents and books in the campus library that make any reference to military events? Is this a start of a long list of politically incorrect topics and vocabulary that students decide cannot be mentioned on campus --- like maybe Woodrow Wilson, George Washington, and Thomas Jefferson?

There are all sorts of externalities in terms of loss or reputation of colleges and universities among taxpayers, alumni, and potential donors. Can't you just hear state legislators quoting the silly or contentious demands of a subset of radicalized students threatening to riot on state-supported campuses.

"Resignation at Yale," by Scott Jaschik, Inside Higher Ed, December 6, 2015 ---
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/12/07/academic-center-yale-controversy-over-halloween-costumes-wont-teach-there-again?utm_source=Inside+Higher+Ed&utm_campaign=2743fe76df-DNU20151207&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_1fcbc04421-2743fe76df-197565045

. . .

Douglas Stone, a professor of physics at Yale who organized last week's open letter, said via email that the resignation of Christakis from teaching was a cause for great concern. "This is a very disturbing development," he said. "Last year Erika Christakis's classes were shopped by over 300 students and many who wished to take them were turned away. She has received truly exceptional teaching evaluations. This year she planned to teach additional sections to handle the demand. The attacks she has received, not just on her ideas, but on her character and integrity, have led to the decision not to teach …. Those who mounted the campaign against her have significantly reduced educational choice for all Yale undergrads."

Stone added that there was "real reason" to worry about academic freedom at Yale. "Several undergraduates have told me in conversation or by email that they feel scared to express their honest opinions relating to current events that have raised racial issues because of the likely negative and aggressive response of peers," he said. "In some cases these were nonwhite students, who care deeply about racism and sexism, but nonetheless support the sentiments expressed in our letter of support for the Christakises. They have also claimed that their view is probably held by the majority of undergrads; even if that is not true (and I don't know how one can decide at the moment), it suggests that there are substantial barriers to free exchange of views on these issues at Yale in the current climate."

Among those expressing concern about the Christakis announcement was Corey Robin, a professor of political science at Brooklyn College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. Robin is a prominent voice of the academic left on Twitter.

He said that he wouldn't have been concerned if Christakis had quit or been removed from her position in a residential college, since that is primarily an administrative role.

More issues are raised, Robin wrote on Twitter, by someone in a teaching position who feels unable to teach because of political pressure over her ideas. "All the evidence suggests she is an excellent, popular teacher; the only reason she is stepping down is because of political views she has expressed in the public sphere," Robin wrote.

Continued in article

Jensen Comment
Some comments at the end of this article to me are particularly distressing because they reveal the embedded hate of faculty.

Recall that Alan was on OJ Simpson's winning defense team
 "Famous Harvard professor rips into 'tyrannical' student protesters, saying they want 'superficial diversity'," by Abby Jackson, The Wall Street Journal, November 17, 2015 ---
 http://www.businessinsider.com/alan-dershowitz-thinks-student-protesters-dont-want-true-diversity-in-colleges-2015-11 

High-profile incidents of racial discrimination at the University of Missouri have spurred students across the US to protest racism on their own campuses.

And while many civil libertarians have lauded their actions, Alan Dershowitz, a prominent Harvard Law School professor, has ripped into these students for what he argues are hypocritical demands.

"The last thing these students want is diversity," Dershowitz told Business Insider.

"They may want superficial diversity, because for them diversity is a code word for 'more of us.' They don't want more conservatives, they don't want more white students, they don't want more heterosexuals."

Dershowitz, a leading proponent of civil liberties and a defense attorney who advised on the O.J. Simpson murder trial and a number of other celebrity cases, was commenting on what he calls a dangerous trend of "tyrannical students" on college campuses.

At a number of schools — including The University of Missouri and Yale University — students have protested racism on campus and called for the resignation of administration members who they claim are creating a dangerous environment. And at Amherst College, students have threatened to respond in a "radical manner" if their demands are not met.

Continued in article

Jensen Comment I spent two years in the CASBS think tank with Alan. He most certainly is not conservative in economics or civil liberties.

Conclusion
What these radicalized students are losing is the respect of the public for our colleges and universities, including intellectuals and scholars in the public who truly despise and fear antics by the new generation of anti-establishment activists who falsely claim they are speaking for all students on campus.


What is sad is that faculty who protest alongside the other students are pressuring one or more colleagues to give up due process for job retention.

Jensen Comment
There is due process for "firing employees" at universities. By threatening to protest and even close down a university the students are placing enormous pressures on targeted faculty and administrators to give up their due process rights in order to prevent protests, riots, and campus shut downs. Students want all sorts of due process when it comes to preventing their academic dismissal. But they want to deny those rights to employees by threats and protests that force resignations in the face of shutting down the universities with protests.

What is sad is that faculty who protest alongside the other students are pressuring one or more colleagues to give up due process for job retention

Students at Occidental College demanded the Immediate removal of President Veitch ---
http://www.oxy.edu/news/oxy-student-protest-updates

"Protests at Still More Campuses," Inside Higher Ed, November 17, 2015 ---
https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2015/11/17/protests-still-more-campuses?utm_source=Inside+Higher+Ed&utm_campaign=9802823de8-DNU20151117&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_1fcbc04421-9802823de8-197565045 

One controversial issue is that your score must be absolutely perfect in the game of political correctness or "microaggression." Unlike in baseball, one error gets you kicked out of the game.
All it takes is one innocent slip of the tongue or keyboard to earn your lifetime scarlet letter

Mary Spellman, dean of students at Claremont McKenna College, resigned after her comments in an email to a student prompted protests and hunger strikes ---
http://chronicle.com/article/Facing-Protests-About-Racial/234191 

Unhappy with a series of small concessions from the administration, protesters at Yale University have released a new list of demands that include firing people they don’t like and giving their favored programs a budget increase of at least $8 million a year.
http://dailycaller.com/2015/11/13/yale-protesters-demand-school-give-them-8-million-or-else/#ixzz3relcold8

Students at Occidental College who have occupied an administration building this week have demanded that campus safety officers stop wearing bulletproof vests ---
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/11/18/students-demand-no-bulletproof-vests-occidental/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social
Jensen Comment
This made me think back to my early days at Trinity University. An unarmed campus security officer at nearby Our Lady of the Lake University was shot dead in the chest late at night in a dormitory parking lot by one of San Antonio's countless car thieves. If the officer had been wearing a bulletproof vest he might have lived to be with his family the next day. Now our students want only the killers to have bulletproof vests.

Hi Elliot,

Your research is too shallow. If you go to the Occidental College site you find the following at
http://www.oxy.edu/news/oxy-student-protest-updates 

Immediate demilitarization of Campus Safety, which includes, but is not limited to, removal of bulletproof vests from uniform, exclusion of military and external policy rhetoric from all documents and daily discourse, and increased transparency and positive direct connection to the student body

Smith College Protesters Bar Journalists From Covering Sit-In Unless They Support the Cause ---
http://chronicle.com/blogs/ticker/smith-college-protesters-bar-journalists-from-covering-sit-in-unless-they-support-the-cause/106834?elq=46cf6e8cc18e4732b0d54a222e1e06cd&elqCampaignId=1900&elqaid=6971&elqat=1&elqTrackId=c828256ed86e4e7e9eaee73385a1dce0
Jensen Comment
This reminds me of those letters from friends who request that I write letters of recommendation for their tenure and/or promotion candidacy but only if I don't write anything negative. Recently I got a letter from a former colleague requesting that I write a letter in support of his application for a job at another university under the condition that I let him read the letter before it's sent out.

Princeton University's president, under pressure from African American student activists, said Thursday night that the school would begin a process to consider expunging the legacy of former President Woodrow Wilson from campus
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/princeton-university-agrees-weigh-erasing-woodrow-wilsons-name-n466796

Those coddled, bullying undergrads shouting their demands for safer spaces, easier classes, and additional racial set-asides are exactly what the campus faculty and administrators deserve.
Bret Stephens, The Wall Street Journal
http://www.wsj.com/articles/radical-parents-despotic-children-1448325901?mod=djemMER

Exterminating the Campus of Those Dreaded Conservatives
"Academia’s Rejection of Diversity," by Arthur C. Brooks, The New York Times, October 30, 2015 ---
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/31/opinion/academias-rejection-of-diversity.html?_r=1

Wasn't tenure intended originally to protect free speech dialog on campus --- especially controversial issues?
How much power should we give to the politically correct police on campus"
Protesters Demand Firing Of Tenured Vanderbilt Law Professor Over Publication Of Op-Ed ---
http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2015/11/protesters-demand-firing-of-tenured-vanderbilt-law-professor-over-publication-of-op-ed.html
Jensen Comment
Carol Swain is one tough African American professor. She told the political correctness faculty and student protesters to "grow up."

Students and their sympathizer who become theatrical about each and every unintended microaggression should listen to Al Sharpton
If you play the theatrics too much, you get in the way of your own cause.
Al Sharpton --- http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/alsharpton366445.html 
Jensen Comment You can also go over the top where the theatrics are extremely counter productive such as when students lock arms to block fire trucks and ambulances on campus
Jane Fonda suggests this in one of her books admitting that she damaged her life and her cause badly by pretending to fire an anti-aircraft gun in North Viet Nam.

All it takes is one innocent slip of the tongue or keyboard to earn your lifetime scarlet letter
Mary Spellman, dean of students at Claremont McKenna College, resigned after her comments in an email to a student prompted protests and hunger strikes.

http://chronicle.com/article/Facing-Protests-About-Racial/234191

Complimenting a Chinese student that she speaks English very well is an egregious microaggression.

You just know that nanoaggression is coming down the line. Make sure you smile (or don’t smile) equally at all students passing by in the hall.
Glen Gray
Jensen Comment

Distracted, misbehaving children (including college students) aren’t learning ---
Eva Moskowitz --- http://www.wsj.com/articles/why-students-need-to-sit-up-and-pay-attention-1447373122?mod=djemMER 

I wonder if anybody has ever documented microagressions in The Bible and the Koran and other great works of history?
Bob Jensen
These books should be banned and burned since they contain egregious microaggressions --- Oops that includes most of the books in the campus library like all those books in history that used "he" to refer to a generic person..

Wasn't tenure intended originally to protect free speech dialog on campus --- especially controversial issues?
How much power should we give to the politically correct police on campus"
Protesters Demand Firing Of Tenured Vanderbilt Law Professor Over Publication Of Op-Ed ---
http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2015/11/protesters-demand-firing-of-tenured-vanderbilt-law-professor-over-publication-of-op-ed.html
Jensen Comment
Carol Swain is one tough African American professor. She told the political correctness faculty and student protesters to "grow up."

Hinkle: Crybaby nation ---
http://www.richmond.com/opinion/our-opinion/bart-hinkle/article_00ee8528-db06-54e6-bdc6-bd27d189cbc9.html

"The right to fright;  An obsession with safe spaces is not just bad for education: it also diminishes worthwhile campus protests," The Economist, November 14, 2015 ---
http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21678223-obsession-safe-spaces-not-just-bad-education-it-also-diminishes-worthwhile-campus?cid1=cust/ednew/n/bl/n/20151112n/owned/n/n/nwl/n/n/NA/n

. . .

Like many bad ideas, the notion of safe spaces at universities has its roots in a good one. Gay people once used the term to refer to bars and clubs where they could gather without fear, at a time when many states still had laws against sodomy.

In the worst cases, though, an idea that began by denoting a place where people could assemble without being prosecuted has been reinvented by students to serve as a justification for shutting out ideas. At Colorado College, safety has been invoked by a student group to prevent the screening of a film celebrating the Stonewall riots which downplays the role of minorities in the gay-rights movement. The same reasoning has led some students to request warnings before colleges expose them to literature that deals with racism and violence. People as different as Condoleezza Rice, a former secretary of state, and Bill Maher, a satirist, have been dissuaded from giving speeches on campuses, sometimes on grounds of safety.

What makes this so objectionable is that there are plenty of things on American campuses that really do warrant censure from the university. Administrators at the University of Oklahoma managed not to notice that one of its fraternities, Sigma Alpha Epsilon, had cheerily sung a song about hanging black people from a tree for years, until a video of them doing so appeared on the internet. At the University of Missouri, whose president resigned on November 9th, administrators did a poor job of responding to complaints of unacceptable behaviour on campus—which included the scattering of balls of cotton about the place, as a put-down to black students, and the smearing of faeces in the shape of a swastika in a bathroom.

Distinguishing between this sort of thing and obnoxious Halloween costumes ought not to be a difficult task. But by equating smaller ills with bigger ones, students and universities have made it harder, and diminished worthwhile protests in the process. The University of Missouri episode shows how damaging this confusion can be: some activists tried to prevent the college’s own newspaper from covering their demonstration, claiming that to do so would have endangered their safe space, thereby rendering a reasonable protest absurd.

Fifty years ago student radicals agitated for academic freedom and the right to engage in political activities on campus. Now some of their successors are campaigning for censorship and increased policing by universities of student activities. The supporters of these ideas on campus are usually described as radicals. They are, in fact, the opposite.


Black-clad protesters gathered in front of Dartmouth Hall, forming a crowd roughly one hundred fifty strong.
“F*** you, you filthy white f***s!” “F*** you and your comfort!” “F*** you, you racist s***!” These shouted epithets were the first indication that many students had of the coming storm. The sign-wielding, obscenity-shouting protesters proceeded through the usually quiet backwaters of the library. They surged first through first-floor Berry, then up the stairs to the normally undisturbed floors of the building, before coming back down to the ground floor of Novack.
The Dartmouth Review, November 47, 2015 --- http://www.dartreview.com/eyes-wide-open-at-the-protest/
Video:  http://townhall.com/tipsheet/justinholcomb/2015/11/17/could-you-quiet-down-please-im-trying-to-learn-n2081756?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=

Students and their sympathizer who become theatrical about each and every unintended microaggression should listen to Al Sharpton
If you play the theatrics too much, you get in the way of your own cause.
Al Sharpton --- http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/alsharpton366445.html
Jensen Comment
You can also go over the top where the theatrics are extremely counter productive such as when students lock arms to block fire trucks  and ambulances on campus
Jane Fonda suggests this in one of her books admitting that she damaged her life and her cause badly by pretending to fire an anti-aircraft gun in North Viet Nam.


"University of Minnesota Rejects 9/11 Remembrance Because it Might Incite Racism," by Christine Rousselle, Townhall, November 12, 2015
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/christinerousselle/2015/11/12/university-of-minnesota-rejects-911-remembrance-because-it-might-incite-racism-n2079788?utm_source=thdailypm&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl_pm&newsletterad=

Here's another instance of political correctness on a college campus going a smidge too far, courtesy of the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities: A proposed resolution to recognize the 9/11 terrorist attacks on campus each year was rejected by the Minnesota Student Association as it may potentially violate a "safe space" on campus.

Continued in article

"The right to fright;  An obsession with safe spaces is not just bad for education: it also diminishes worthwhile campus protests," The Economist, November 14, 2015 ---
http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21678223-obsession-safe-spaces-not-just-bad-education-it-also-diminishes-worthwhile-campus?cid1=cust/ednew/n/bl/n/20151112n/owned/n/n/nwl/n/n/NA/n

. . .

Like many bad ideas, the notion of safe spaces at universities has its roots in a good one. Gay people once used the term to refer to bars and clubs where they could gather without fear, at a time when many states still had laws against sodomy.

In the worst cases, though, an idea that began by denoting a place where people could assemble without being prosecuted has been reinvented by students to serve as a justification for shutting out ideas. At Colorado College, safety has been invoked by a student group to prevent the screening of a film celebrating the Stonewall riots which downplays the role of minorities in the gay-rights movement. The same reasoning has led some students to request warnings before colleges expose them to literature that deals with racism and violence. People as different as Condoleezza Rice, a former secretary of state, and Bill Maher, a satirist, have been dissuaded from giving speeches on campuses, sometimes on grounds of safety.

What makes this so objectionable is that there are plenty of things on American campuses that really do warrant censure from the university. Administrators at the University of Oklahoma managed not to notice that one of its fraternities, Sigma Alpha Epsilon, had cheerily sung a song about hanging black people from a tree for years, until a video of them doing so appeared on the internet. At the University of Missouri, whose president resigned on November 9th, administrators did a poor job of responding to complaints of unacceptable behaviour on campus—which included the scattering of balls of cotton about the place, as a put-down to black students, and the smearing of faeces in the shape of a swastika in a bathroom.

Distinguishing between this sort of thing and obnoxious Halloween costumes ought not to be a difficult task. But by equating smaller ills with bigger ones, students and universities have made it harder, and diminished worthwhile protests in the process. The University of Missouri episode shows how damaging this confusion can be: some activists tried to prevent the college’s own newspaper from covering their demonstration, claiming that to do so would have endangered their safe space, thereby rendering a reasonable protest absurd.

Fifty years ago student radicals agitated for academic freedom and the right to engage in political activities on campus. Now some of their successors are campaigning for censorship and increased policing by universities of student activities. The supporters of these ideas on campus are usually described as radicals. They are, in fact, the opposite.

Jensen Comment
And that is an illustration of how campus leaders are becoming gutless in protecting free speech that is not politically correct. The worst thing is the power that a single crazy has in turning the campus upside down. Students gather for protests when a crazy, possibly not even a student, throws a noose the the lawn or a redneck pickup drives through campus late at night showing a Confederate Flag. The football coach, following a secret ballot vote among players, who can and cannot be the next politically correct President of the University of Missouri.


Problem:
NY’s proposal to 63% pass rate in Algebra
Solution (following the lead of California)
make the test easier (or follow the lead in Massachusetts by dropping Common Core entirely)
http://hotair.com/archives/2015/11/30/nys-proposal-to-63-pass-rate-in-algebra-make-the-test-easier/

Joke of the Day
NY officials were supposed to grade the test on a curve, but they couldn't figure out how to make a curve.


Demanding That 10% of Faculty in Colleges and Universities be African American
Chronicle of Higher Education
November 30, 2015
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/11/30/student-activists-want-more-black-faculty-members-how-realistic-are-some-their-goals?utm_source=Inside+Higher+Ed&utm_campaign=a4aa6bbc5a-DNU20151130&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_1fcbc04421-a4aa6bbc5a-197565045

. . .

Student protesters on a number of campuses want to see many more black faculty members. But how realistic are some of their goals?

That approach is similar to one taken by the University of Pennsylvania in 2011, in which the central administration pledged $50 million for faculty diversity hiring and other initiatives. That amount was to be matched by individual colleges and schools.

Beyond that, Penn purposely avoided setting a specific diversity goal. That’s primarily because not meeting it might seem like a failure -- even if good was achieved.

“The challenge of a specific target like that is of course we’re talking about a finite pool of new Ph.D.s and new professional school graduates and continuing scholars,” Anita Allen, vice provost for the faculty, told Inside Higher Ed earlier this year. “I just don’t know that it’s wise to present those kinds of goals as being imperative to the real goal, which is making the faculty diverse and inclusive.”

Brown University, on the other hand, did establish a hard target earlier this year: doubling its percentage of underrepresented minority faculty by 2025, from 9 percent to 18 percent. Like Penn, Brown’s preliminary plan included hiring initiatives, as well as efforts at increasing the number of minority students in the Ph.D. pipeline to the professiorate. Funds also were earmarked for climate and mentoring programs to keep them in academe.

This month, in light of recent events, Brown President Christina Paxson announced additional elements to the diversity plan -- including support for undergraduates -- as well as the price tag, previously undisclosed: $100 million.

Brown’s updated plan was “profoundly informed, and substantially improved by, recent campus conversations about structural racism,” Paxson wrote in a letter to students, faculty and staff. “The deep pain that we have heard expressed by students of color in the past weeks and months -- a pain that has been affirmed by faculty and staff members who work closely with and care deeply about our students -- is very real.”

She added, “Although we cannot solve these problems globally, we can ensure that all members of our community are treated with dignity and respect, and are provided the opportunities they need to reach their full human potential. We can make sure that Brown is a place where these issues are acknowledged and better understood through the courses we teach and the scholarship we conduct. And we can prepare leaders who make significant positive changes in the world throughout their lives.”

How realistic are these goals? Penn proves informative. Even with its prestige and an arsenal of cash, progress has been steady but relatively slow -- at least compared to the Mizzou timeline. Between 2011 and 2013, the percentage of new hires who were underrepresented minorities grew from 9 to 14 percent. But the total percentage of underrepresented minorities on the faculty jumped just 1 percent, to 7 percent, from 2010-13. Minority professors over all increased from 13 percent in 2013 to 16 percent in 2014.

Part of the problem is that black students are underrepresented in a majority of Ph.D. programs and among Ph.D. holders.

While black people make up 14 percent of the U.S. population, they’ve earned roughly 6 percent of the research doctorates awarded to U.S. citizens and permanent residents each year since 2003, according to the National Science Foundation and other federal agencies' Survey of Earned Doctorates. While blacks hold a relatively high proportion of education doctorates, earning about 13 percent of such degrees awarded in 2013, they’re underrepresented in other fields. According to 2013 data, the most recent available, they earned 6 percent of life sciences doctorates, 3 percent of physical sciences doctorates and 5 percent of engineering doctorates. In the social sciences, blacks earned 7 percent of doctorates. It was 5 percent in history and about 4 percent in the humanities. In business, it was 9 percent.

According to the survey, 2,167 black citizens or residents earned research doctorates in 2013. Compare that number to 130 -- that's how many full-time black faculty members Kevin Eagan, interim managing director at the Higher Education Research Center at the University of California at Los Angeles, says Mizzou alone would need to hire in the next two years to meet the 10 percent demand.

Or consider another stat: of the 128 new faculty members Mizzou hired in 2013, according to IPEDS, just 14 were black, Eagan said.

Beyond supply, there are concerns about retention among minority faculty members in higher education. Griffin’s own research suggests that female and minority Ph.D.s in biomedical fields are more likely than others to lose interest in faculty careers while earning their doctorates.

A missing piece of the puzzle is “whether the black graduates of doctoral programs actually want to stay in academia, despite their abilities and commitment to their communities,” Griffin said, noting that interest in academic careers among underrepresented minority women in particular still wanes in relation to their peers even when controlling for scholarly productivity, prestige of program and quality of advisers. “Something is happening to career interests in graduate school that we must address to see change.”

Climate is one area of concern. There is a growing literature on the experiences of faculty of color that suggests that they face many challenges in terms of how they and their work are perceived in the tenure and promotion system, Griffin said. And they may also be subject to stereotypes and microaggressions -- subtle slights based on race -- which are at the heart of many of the student protests

Continued in article

Reviewing Trends in U.S. Minority Business Doctoral Completions (part 1)
AACSB February 7, 2015
http://aacsbblogs.typepad.com/dataandresearch/2014/02/reviewing-trends-in-us-minority-business-doctoral-completions-part-1.html#sthash.lRpqwOEL.dpuf

Are U.S. business PhD programs increasing the proportion of minority graduates? That was a question posed to me recently and explored in the charts below. No doubt the findings will be of interest to supporters of and participants in The PhD Project, an innovative program established by the KPMG foundation in 1994 with the mission to increase the proportion of PhD graduates who are considered African-American, Hispanic-American, and Native-American. AACSB, along with several other organizations, has been a steadfast supporter of The PhD Project and its goal to strengthen management education by increasing the diversity of qualified faculty for business schools.

Data from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) provided by the National Center for Education Statistics helps to shed light on trends with respect to the business doctoral completions for these groups over the past two decades – from 1994 (the start of The PhD Project) to 2012 (the most recent available data set).

The following graph illustrates completions, as a percentage of total completions, for the aforementioned minority groups from 1994 to 2012, at all schools in the United States (including non AACSB-accredited schools). - See more at: http://aacsbblogs.typepad.com/dataandresearch/2014/02/reviewing-trends-in-us-minority-business-doctoral-completions-part-1.html#sthash.lRpqwOEL.dpuf

. . .

The slope of the trendline for African-Americans at U.S. AACSB-accredited schools is far less steep than at all U.S. schools. A potential reason for this difference can likely be accounted for (in part) by the increase in PhD accessibility through the rise of certain non AACSB-accredited schools, such as University of Phoenix, Walden University, Argosy University, and Capella University. -

See more at: http://aacsbblogs.typepad.com/dataandresearch/2014/02/reviewing-trends-in-us-minority-business-doctoral-completions-part-1.html#sthash.lRpqwOEL.dpuf

Jensen Comment
Probably the best-known effort over two decades of trying to get more minority (especially African American) accounting and business Ph.D. graduates is the Ph.D. Project of the KPMG Foundation ---
http://www.kpmgfoundation.org/~/media/Sites/kpmgfoundation/pdf/KPMG_2014_annual report_s.pdf

The PhD Project Association Changing the face of business school faculties

Twenty years ago, many of the fledgling PhD Project’s earliest supporters in academia – the same deans and professors who most wanted it to succeed – were doubtful that it could ever achieve its ambitious objectives.

The task of diversifying the faculty of American business schools – where minorities were almost non-existent in front of the classroom – seemed too daunting. Besides, they noted, other such efforts had tried and failed.

But they pitched in energetically and enthusiastically to join KPMG Foundation and its allies in launching the program. Today, each one of them is delighted to admit how wrong they were back in 1994.

At the close of fiscal 2014, as The PhD

Project celebrated its 20th anniversary, the number of African-American, Hispanic American and Native American professors in the business disciplines had more than quadrupled – from 294 in 1994 to 1,253.  Another 311 were in the pipeline, pursuing their PhD.

“The idea of diversifying the faculty at business schools to many seemed like a more or less hopeless endeavor,” observes Dr. Scott Cowen, President Emeritus of Tulane University. “Thanks to the relentless and deliberate work of The PhD Project, we now know that it can be done.”

The PhD Project consists of two linked and essential elements: an outreach, marketing and educational campaign to attract and inform minorities who may wish to trade in their successful careers in business for a new career in academia; and a peer support and professional development program to ensure that those who do so will successfully complete the lengthy and rigorous business doctoral program. 

Thanks to this support and development, which centers around annual meetings each summer of all current doctoral students and continues online throughout the year, PhD Project participants significantly outperform the general population of doctoral students. About 90% of PhD Project doctoral students complete their doctoral program; the general population’s completion rate in business programs is about 70%. Today, PhD Project professors teach, conduct research and mentor the next generation of business students – both majority and minority – at dozens of . . .

Jensen Comment
Read on about KPMG's Accounting Minority Doctoral Program Scholarships to over 300 recipients ---
http://www.kpmgfoundation.org/~/media/Sites/kpmgfoundation/pdf/KPMG_2014_annual report_s.pdf
Note that the Foundation did more for many of these recipients than just provide them with annual funding. An effort was made to provide customized help in individual circumstances to help students continue in selected AACSB accredited doctoral programs.

Note that the KPMG Foundation's Minority Doctoral Program Scholarships are funded by various accounting and business firms in a joint effort to provide more minority role model faculty in college and university business schools. Selected AACSB-accredited doctoral programs have cooperated in affirmative action admission and mentoring of scholarship recipients.

The KPMG Foundation restricts funding to African American, Hispanic, and Native American applicants. The proportion of Asians in USA and Canadian accounting and business doctoral programs soared without affirmative action funding and accommodation. This coincided with replacing the accounting content of accounting doctoral program curricula with vastly increased mathematics and statistics content that has led the Pathways Commission to seek more diversity of content in accounting doctoral programs.

A White-Collar Profession:  African American Certified Pubic Accountants Since 1921
Author:  Theresa A. Hammond
University of North Carolina Press, 2002
https://books.google.com/books?id=2v4PjpT2ZvsC&pg=PA214&lpg=PA214&dq=AACSB+%22African+American+Faculty%22&source=bl&ots=p0K5blFKQD&sig=rnSMH3u75zi-cEwJ6t86WO8K-Io&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjN4o65irjJAhUDLSYKHdNUAxQQ6AEILDAD#v=onepage&q=AACSB%20%22African%20American%20Faculty%22&f=false


"The Consumer Bureau Cover-Up:  The feds knew their data showing racial bias was false but sued anyway," The Wall Street Journal, December 9, 2015 ---
http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-consumer-bureau-cover-up-1449707193?mod=djemMER

. . .

This illegal guessing game of name-that-race underscores how much antidiscrimination law has become a political shakedown, and how the consumer bureau is a lawless body that needs to be reined in if it can’t be eliminated.

Bob Jensen's Fraud Updates ---  http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudUpdates.htm 


Tim Cook Believes Money Will Be a Thing of the Past ---
http://finance.townhall.com/video/draft-n2080333?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl

On November 22, 2015 CBS Sixty Minutes ran a module showing that the Kenya economy is better off by having virtually eliminated cash. Wages are paid and financial transactions (consumer and business) by telephone calls on cheap cell phones (no need for smart phones). Citizens of Kenya, even the poorest people on the streets, no longer need bank accounts or cash.

This was made possible in Kenya because the banking system did not put up a fight. In virtually every other nation of the world the banking systems will prevent an economy without cash. Criminals who deal in black markets and the underground economy will also fight tooth and nail politically to prevent what happened in Kenya from happening elsewhere in the world. The fear is that there will become records of transactions, and this scares the pants off of criminals, including our unethical members of Congress and drug kingpins. Of course that does not mean that money laundering has been entirely eliminated in Kenya. Clever crooks can beat any economic and banking system.

The Sixty Minutes module called The Future of Money is at
http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/the-future-of-money/

The first nation to issue paper money will be among the first to take it away
Sweden has declared war on cash --- http://www.businessinsider.com/sweden-has-declared-war-on-cash-2015-12


Question
What big reasons for the reduction of crime in the USA did Lind and Lopez miss below (except that it falls generically point five below)?

Why did crime plummet in the United States?
Edited by Dara Lind and German Lopez
Vox
December 10, 2015
http://www.vox.com/cards/crime-rate-drop

1. There's about half as much violent crime in the US as there was 25 years ago

2. The theory: putting more people in prison helped reduce crime

3. The theory: putting more police on the streets prevented crime

4. The theory: broken-windows policing prevented serious crime

5. The theory: police have gotten better at detecting and preventing crime

6. The theory: more guns, less crime

7. The theory: the economy got better and crime got less appealing

8. The theory: crime is harder because people don't carry cash as much anymore

9. The theory: people aren't committing crimes because they're inside playing video games

10. The theory: gentrification is taking over crime-ridden neighborhoods

11. The theory: people are committing fewer crimes because they're drinking less alcohol

12. The theory: psychiatric pills reduced violent and criminal behavior

13. The theory: less crack use led to less crime

14. The theory: America's gangs have gotten less violent

15. The theory: the US population is just aging out of crime

16. The theory: legal abortion is preventing would-be criminals from being born

17. The theory: lead exposure caused crime, and lead abatement efforts reduced it

Jensen Comment
Except for having so many repeated episodes my favorite TV show is called Forensic Files about real crimes and real criminals. I think it appeals to me because I like to see the bad guys get caught and punished.

What I think led to less crime, especially violent crime, in the past 25 years is forensic science. Exhibit A is DNA technology that got a whole lot better in the past 25 years, especially when being able to find a criminal from a microscopic bit of evidence like a drop of blood on a shirt that's been in storage for 20 years. It took a while but now potential criminals are deterred by the high probability of making some miniscule mistake that leads to indisputable evidence --- a strand of hair or a spec of fluid. Forensic science can get much more out of crime scenes and autopsies.

What also is leading to reduced crime is video surveillance. We are witnessing less police abuse with all the video detection. We are also witnessing less street crime, store crime, and maybe even bank robberies because of 24/7 video surveillance. We now even have some cars that dial 911 automatically after an accident. Last week a woman who committed a hit and run was captured because her car dialed 911 and the police traced the car.

What we still have, however, is far too much white collar financial crimes that are punished way too lightly unless they are violent. Hold up a victim on the street with a knife for $5 and you can get 20 years in tough prison. Steal $30 million from Enron (think Andy Fastow) and you get six years in Club Fed ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/fraudconclusion.htm#CrimePays

When it is stated that there is "less crime" than in the 1980s much depends on what you mean by "less crime."
We may have fewer incidents of crime but millions more victims in this age of technology where hundreds of millions of identities are stolen. There are millions of more victims to scams. Exhibit A is the IRS that is losing billions to identity theft. Exhibit B are credit card holders and their banks that get ripped off in identity theft.

My wife had 15 spine surgeries, some of which were paid for, in part, Medicare supplemental insurance from Blue Cross Anthem. A short time ago hackers stole the medical records of over 80 million Anthem customers, including my wife. Now a couple of years later we are getting phone calls from scammers trying to sell her a back brace. They don't really sell back braces. What they want is a credit card order from us so they can get our credit card number. They will never ship a product. They found out about her spine condition from the stolen Blue Cross Anthem hacked data. The hackers were probably from China or Russia. The hackers then sold the medical record data to scammers here in the USA or Nigerians. And we become potential victims due to the Anthem hacking. If we don't fall for the scam we have to put up with all the robo-dialing interruptions.

My point is that massive databases vulnerable to sophisticated hackers greatly increased the number of crime victims. So I don't think there is less crime. There are just different kinds of crimes in the 21st Century.


Connecticut Auditors Raise Questions About Pension Calculations ---
http://www.ctnewsjunkie.com/archives/entry/auditors_raise_questions_about_pension_calculations/

Financial State of the States Report on September 2015 ---
http://www.truthinaccounting.org/library/doclib/TIAFSOS9-2015.pdf

SINKHOLE STATES WITH THE WORST TAXPAYER BURDENS

Massachusetts
Kentucky
Illinois
Connecticut
New Jersey

SUNSHINE STATES: 5 BEST TAXPAYER SURPLUSES

South Dakota
Utah
Wyoming
North Dakota
Alaska

STATES WITH THE HIGHEST TAXPAYER BURDEN

New Jersey (Highest)
Connecticut
Illinois
Kentucky
Massachusetts
Hawaii
California
New York
Michigan
Delaware
Pennsylvania
Louisiana
Vermont

. . .

While the financial condition of most states appears to have improved as a result of a change in how unfunded pension debt is calculated, the financial condition of four of the five worst states, identified as "Sinkhole States" (New Jersey, Connecticut, Illinois, and Kentucky), continued to deteriorate. Massachusetts is the only sinkhole state that improved from its 2013 Taxpayer Burden during 2014, but only by a modest $600 per taxpayer.

 

 


Question
In the 1980s the Republican party was pro-immigration versus Democratic Party resistance in amidst heavy labor union lobbying against immigration.
In the 21st Century the roles are reversed with the Republicans resisting immigration while the Democratic Party is all in favor of more and more immigration.
Given the continued labor union protectionism why the reversal in party preferences?

A Stanford University Answer
"The Serious Side of the Donald Trump Phenomenon," by Neil Malhotra and Yotam Margalit, Stanford University Graduate School of Business, November 2, 2015 ---
http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/insights/serious-side-donald-trump-phenomenon?utm_source=Stanford+Business&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Stanford-Business-Issue-75-11-15-2015&utm_content=alumni

Jensen Comment
I think the change in preferences was mainly a delayed reaction to the 1965 Immigration Act when both political parties began to realize that the overwhelming number of immigrants coming in annually leaned toward the Democratic Party and shunned the Republican Party.

My point is that conservatism is dying out in large measure due to the 21st Century of immigrant political preferences ----
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_to_the_United_States

A Boston Globe article attributed Barack Obama's win in the 2008 U.S. Presidential election to a marked reduction over the preceding decades in the percentage of whites in the American electorate, attributing this demographic change to the Immigration Act of 1965.

. . .

Immigrants differ on their political views; however, the Democratic Party is considered to be in a far stronger position among immigrants overall.]


 

 

 

 




  •  


    Finding and Using Health Statistics --- http://www.nlm.nih.gov/nichsr/usestats/index.htm

    Bob Jensen's threads on economic statistics and databases ---
    http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob1.htm#EconStatistics

    NYT:  "The deductible, $3,000 a year, makes it impossible to actually go to the doctor," said David R. Reines, 60, of Jefferson Township, N.J.
    Robert Pear, Many Say High Deductibles Make Their Health Law Insurance All but Useless ---
    http://www.cnbc.com/2015/11/14/new-york-times-digital-many-say-high-deductibles-make-their-health-law-insurance-all-but-useless.html

    Obamacare:  Health insurers lost a total of $2.5 billion, or on average $163 per consumer enrolled, in the individual market in 2014
    Anna Wilde Mathews, The Wall Street Journal, November 1, 2015 ---
    http://www.wsj.com/articles/health-laws-strains-show-1446423498?mod=djemCFO_h&alg=y 

    Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell announced recently that she expects 10 million people to be enrolled in health-care coverage through ObamaCare’s exchanges by the end of next year. What she didn’t mention was that in March of last year the Congressional Budget Office predicted that 21 million people would be enrolled in 2016—more than double the new estimate.
    Andy Puzder --- http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-slow-motion-implosion-of-obamacare-1446417104?mod=djemMER

    The uninsured “also know they can receive medical care at the emergency room. And if they fall ill, they can always purchase insurance during the next enrollment period, because ObamaCare eliminated existing conditions as a justification for denying coverage. Our employees are smart enough to figure this out. Of our company’s 5,453 eligible employees, only 420 enrolled,” reports Mr. Puzder.
    James Freeman --- http://www.wsj.com/articles/obamacares-failure-a-case-study-1446466932

    We're old enough to remember when advocates for the Affordable Care Act promised that it would "bend the cost curve" and reduce expensive hospital visits, particularly at emergency rooms. So far, the opposite is occurring.
    James Freeman, "There Goes Another ObamaCare Argument," WSJ, August 6, 2014 ---
    http://online.wsj.com/articles/there-goes-another-obamacare-argument-1407242712?tesla=y&mod=djemMER_h&mg=reno64-wsj

     


     

    How The Senate Just Changed The Obamacare Debate Forever ---
    http://townhall.com/columnists/nicholashorton/2015/12/10/how-the-senate-just-changed-the-obamacare-debate-forever-n2092170?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=

    Last week, with little fanfare, the U.S. Senate passed a bill to begin dismantling Obamacare. Some pundits have spun the move as little more than “political posturing” or a toothless act that simply fulfills the campaign promises of a newly elected GOP majority. The truth is that this Senate vote is much bigger than Obamacare supporters would like you to believe. In fact, the Senate vote has literally changed the Obamacare debate forever.

    The Senate bill repealed the employer and individual mandates, repealed the Cadillac and medical device taxes, eliminated exchange subsidies, and removed the federal government’s authority to run the Obamacare exchanges. All good things.

    But what may be the most significant—and least discussed—change is sure to send shockwaves through all 50 state capitals: the U.S. Senate voted to repeal Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion entirely.

    To paraphrase Vice President Joe Biden, “This is a big freaking deal.”

    For the 20 states that have rejected Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, the Senate vote brings vindication. Speaker Paul Ryan has been warning states for years that Medicaid expansion funding won’t last. Even President Obama has proposed slashing expansion funding. These states heeded those warnings and, as a result, their fiscal future is more secure.

    For states like Kentucky and New Hampshire that are poised to rollback their expansions entirely, the Senate vote is confirmation they’re on the right track. It’s no longer a question of if expansion funding will be cut but when. The sooner these states can extricate themselves from the Obamacare expansion nightmare, the better.

    And for the 30 states that fell for the false promise of endless “free” money from D.C., this vote should be a wakeup call.

    Medicaid expansion has been an unmitigated disaster. It has increased government dependency greater and faster than anyone predicted, leaving state taxpayers on the hook for far higher costs than they anticipated.

    . . .

    States should start locating the exits, not rearranging the deck chairs, because regardless of what happens when the bill reaches the White House, the Senate has fundamentally changed the Obamacare debate forever.

     

    Jensen Comment
    In my opinion most these changes will be put on hold until after the 2016 election. President Hillary Clinton most likely will fight these changes tooth and nail. Much depends upon the 2016 elections of Senate and House members. Irrespective of the 2016 election outcomes, however, Washington is going to have to deal with the runaway costs and frauds of Obamacare, Medicare, and Medicaid. A 200% marginal tax rate the top 10% of the taxpayers would not solve these problems despite election promises of some Presidential candidates.

    Bob Jensen's universal health care messaging --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Health.htm

    Reminder: Obamacare is Hurting Real People ---
    http://townhall.com/tipsheet/guybenson/2015/12/11/reminder-obamacare-is-hurting-real-people-n2092233?utm_source=thdailypm&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl_pm&newsletterad=


    From the CFO Journal's Morning Ledger on December 4, 2015

    The special excise on high-cost health plans known as the “Cadillac tax” isn’t set to go into effect until 2018, but lawmakers have already taken steps to prevent it from kicking in. Even so, with a veto threat in the air from President Obama, its ultimate fate remains uncertain, Kimberly S. Johnson and Maxwell Murphy report. In a 90-10 vote, Senators voted for the inclusion of an amendment axing the tax as part of a larger bill that would make deep cuts to stipulations in the Affordable Care Act.

    If measures to eliminate the tax are unsuccessful, CFOs will have big decisions to make in the coming years regarding company benefit plans, and many companies will likely struggle to renegotiate union contracts. In some cases, companies are shifting to consumer-driven plans, or high-deductible plans that pass more costs and responsibility for their health-care choices to employees. The Kaiser Family Foundation in August estimated the tax will affect roughly a quarter of companies in its first year, nearly doubling over 10 years. That is because the costs of health care are generally expected to grow at quicker clip than will the penalty thresholds.


    "UnitedHealth’s ObamaCare Reckoning:  Insurers are learning that the law was a Faustian bargain," The Wall Street Journal, November 22, 2015 ---
    http://www.wsj.com/articles/unitedhealths-obamacare-reckoning-1448232440?mod=djemMER