Tidbits Political Quotations
To Accompany the March 14, 2019 edition of Tidbits
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/tidbits/2019/Tidbits031419.htm            
Bob Jensen at
Trinity University




My Latest Web Document
Over 400 Examples of Critical Thinking and Illustrations of How to Mislead With Statistics --
-
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/MisleadWithStatistics.htm

Animated  Visualization of the United States’ Exploding Population Growth Over 200 Years (1790 – 2010) ---
A Visualization of the United States’ Exploding Population Growth Over 200 Years (1790 – 2010)

USA Debt Clock --- http://www.usdebtclock.org/ ubl

In September 2017 the USA National Debt exceeded $20 trillion for the first time ---
http://www.statedatalab.org/news/detail/national-debt-surpasses-20-trillion-for-the-first-time-in-us-history

Human Population Over Time on Earth ---
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PUwmA3Q0_OE 



 

While a move is underway to destroy the American Dream of rags to riches (by taxing away the riches) the Chinese dream is on the rise.
The Chinese Dream
How a Chinese billionaire went from making $16 a month in a factory to being one of the world's richest self-made women with an $8.3 billion real-estate empire
---

https://www.businessinsider.com/worlds-richest-self-made-woman-wu-yajun-net-worth-2019-2

Top 50 Billionaires in China ---
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Chinese_by_net_worth

Jensen Comment
The question for students to debate is why a supposed communist country allows so many billionaires to rise up from poverty.
That's supposed to happen in the USA where a child growing up in deep poverty (think Oprah Winfrey or Howard Shultz) became a multi-billionaires.
But is it also supposed to happen under communism? If so, why?

 

 


Wikiquote from Wikipedia --- https://www.wikiquote.org/

 

History will prove former President Donald Trump was correct about Mexico one day funding an impenetrable wall --- to keep out over 2 billion starving green immigrants seeking to enter Mexico from the north.
Bob Jensen

 

The Young Left’s Anti-Capitalist Manifesto: Its goal is to remake our economic system — and the Democratic Party ---
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-young-lefts-anti-capitalist-manifesto/

 

"In Praise of Cheap Labor," by Paul Krugman, Slate, March 21, 1997 ---
https://slate.com/business/1997/03/in-praise-of-cheap-labor.html

 

Corruption in general has a deleterious effect on the readiness of economic agents to invest. In the long run, it leads to a paralysis of economic life. But very often it is not that economic agents themselves have had the bad experience of being cheated and ruined, they just know that in this country, or in this part of the economy, or this building scene, there is a high likelihood that you will get cheated and that free riders can get away with it. Here again, reputation is absolutely essential, which is why transparency is so important. Trust can only be engendered by transparency. It's no coincidence that the name of the most influential non-governmental organization dealing with corruption is Transparency International.
A Conversation with Karl Sigmund:  When Rule of Law is Not Working
https://www.edge.org/conversation/karl_sigmund-when-the-rule-of-law-is-not-working

Mortgage Backed Securities are like boxes of chocolates. Criminals on Wall Street and one particular U.S. Congressional Committee stole a few chocolates from the boxes and replaced them with turds. Their criminal buddies at Standard & Poors rated these boxes AAA Investment Grade chocolates. These boxes were then sold all over the world to investors. Eventually somebody bites into a turd and discovers the crime. Suddenly nobody trusts American chocolates anymore worldwide. Hank Paulson now wants the American taxpayers to buy up and hold all these boxes of turd-infested chocolates for $700 billion dollars until the market for turds returns to normal. Meanwhile, Hank's buddies, the Wall Street criminals who stole all the good chocolates are not being investigated, arrested, or indicted. Momma always said: '"Sniff the chocolates first Forrest." Things generally don't pass the smell test if they came from Wall Street or from Washington DC.
Forrest Gump as quoted at http://newsgroups.derkeiler.com/Archive/Rec/rec.sport.tennis/2008-10/msg02206.html

It is not that machines are going to replace chemists. It’s that the chemists who use machines will replace those that don’t ---
Derek Lowe

Gallup: Americans Say No. 1 Problem is 'Government,' No. 2 is 'Immigration' ---
https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/michael-w-chapman/survey-americas-no-1-problem-government-no-2-problem-immigration

 

12 inspiring quotes from Martin Luther King Jr.---
https://www.businessinsider.com/inspiring-martin-luther-king-jr-quotes-2017-1

 

21 oustanding Warren Buffet quotations ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/warren-buffett-21-best-quotes-2019-2

 

The Atlantic:  The Swiftly Closing Borders of Europe ---
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/12/europe-france-italy-immigration-border/578179/

Italian Minister tells NGO Italy doesn’t want migrants: “Our ports are closed!” ---
https://voiceofeurope.com/2018/12/italian-minister-tells-ngo-italy-doesnt-want-migrants-our-ports-are-closed/#.XB6WCZMs_Xo.twitter

The enemy is fear
We think it's hate
But, it's fear

Gandhi

 

13 of the (alleged) most famous last words in history ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/famous-last-words-in-history-2017-10

21 of Michelle Obama's most inspiring quotes on work, success, and relationships ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/michelle-obama-most-inspiring-quotes-advice-becoming-2019-1

 

19 unforgettable quotes from legendary Marine Gen. Jim 'Mad Dog' Mattis, who quit as Trump's defense secretary ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/general-mattiss-best-quotes-2016-11

 

Here are the Ten Best Pieces of Advice from 2018 Commencement Speakers ---
Click Here

Sometimes the grass is greener on the other side because it's been fertilized with more bullshit.
Anonomous

 

The Lucretius Problem is a mental defect where we assume the worst case event that has happened is the worst case event that can happen ---
https://www.fs.blog/2015/04/lucretius-problem/

 

The worst form of inequality is to try to make unequal things equal.
Aristotle

 

The Economic Ignorance of Bernie Sanders ---
http://reason.com/archives/2018/08/09/the-economic-ignorance-of-bernie-sanders

 

How many times have we heard ‘free tuition,’ ‘free health care,’ and free you-name-it? If a particular good or service is truly free, we can have as much of it as we want without the sacrifice of other goods or services. Take a ‘free’ library; is it really free? The answer is no. Had the library not been built, that $50 million could have purchased something else. That something else sacrificed is the cost of the library. While users of the library might pay a zero price, zero price and free are not one and the same. So when politicians talk about providing something free, ask them to identify the beneficent Santa Claus or tooth fairy.
Walter Williams

 

Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.
Eric Hoffer.

 

The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.
Winston Churchill

 

Shoot for the space in between, because that's where the real mystery lies.
Vera Rubin
https://www.brainpickings.org/2016/12/28/remebering-vera-rubin/?utm_source=Brain+Pickings&utm_campaign=f053a9c4e2-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2017_01_07&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_179ffa2629-f053a9c4e2-234390133

 

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

There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.
Leonard Cohen

In honor of his centennial, the Top 10 Feynman quotations ---
https://www.sciencenews.org/blog/context/top-10-richard-feynman-quotations

Thomas Sowell (controversial conservative black economist) --- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Sowell
The 30 Best Thomas Sowell Quotes ---
https://pjmedia.com/lifestyle/the-30-best-thomas-sowell-quotes/

Be brave enough to start a conversation that matters.
Margaret Wheatley
Even conversations that are not politically correct.

That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves.
Thomas Jefferson

Why, we grow rusty and you catch us at the very point of decadence --- by this time tomorrow we may have forgotten everything we ever knew. That's a thought isn't it? We'd be back to where we started --- improvising.
Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (Act I)

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

Babe Ruth, Historic Home Run Hitter
What's sad is to witness what Syria has become because nobody gave up earlier.

And "because they're nonstate actors, it's hard for us to get the satisfaction of [Gen.] MacArthur and the [Japanese] Emperor [Hirohito] meeting and the war officially being over," Obama observed, referencing the end of World War II. 
President Barack Obama when asked if the USA of the future will be perpetually engaged in war.
http://www.businessinsider.com/obama-on-americans-being-resigned-to-live-in-a-perpetual-war-2016-7

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

And many writers have imagined for themselves republics and principalities that have never been seen or known to exist in reality; for there is such a gap between how one lives and how one ought to live that anyone who abandons what is done for what ought to be done learns his ruin rather than his preservation: for a man who wishes to profess goodness at all times will come to ruin among so many who are not good.
Niccolo Machiavelli

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

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

Today, humanity fabricates 1,000 times more transistors annually than the entire world grows grains of wheat and rice combined  ---
https://www.realclearenergy.org/articles/2018/12/11/energy_and_the_information_infrastructure_part_3_the_digital_engines_of_innovation_jevons_delicious_paradox_110368.html

I learned long ago never to wrestle with a pig. ... You get dirty and besides the pig likes it ---
George Bernard Shaw

You can get a lot farther with a smile and a gun than you can with just a smile.
Al Capone

21 quotes from self-made billionaires that will change your outlook on money ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/self-made-billionaire-quotes-that-will-change-your-outlook-on-money-2016-12

 

The Best Advice from 2018's Celebrity Commencement Speakers ---
https://moneyish.com/heart/the-best-advice-from-2018s-celebrity-commencement-speakers/

 

The Economist:  A new kind of left-wing doctrine is emerging. It is not the answer to capitalism’s problems ---
https://www.economist.com/leaders/2019/02/14/millennial-socialism?cid1=cust/ednew/n/bl/n/2019/02/14n/owned/n/n/nwl/n/n/na/202273/n

 

Fed up cystic fibrosis patients are threatening to move out of Britain since the health service won't cover a $272,000 drug ---
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-26/they-can-t-get-their-meds-so-they-re-moving-to-scotland?cmpid=BBD022619_BIZ&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&utm_term=190226&utm_campaign=bloombergdaily

 

2020 Democrats are divided over whether to give reparations to black Americans ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/2020-democrats-divided-over-reparations-black-americans-2019-2

 

'Why shouldn't I like him?' Trump piled praise on Kim Jong Un in his first interview since their summit collapsed ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-praises-kim-jong-un-vietnam-summit-2019-3
What's to be gained by screaming insults about the volatile Kim Jong Un while he holds a trigger on nuclear weapons and may start nuclear war in a temper tantrum.

 

Kalashnikov, the maker of the AK-47, has invented an explosive kamikaze drone; Its aim is to “democratize bombs” so they’re affordable for smaller armies, apparently ---

https://www.engadget.com/2019/02/26/kalashnikov-kamikaze-drone/?utm_campaign=the_download.unpaid.engagement&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=70296560&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8C254ogpqcUXuBnjM9myyb0mNwHr-efaaNNPmITRYKqUL1qxH1y17t3C_aaodlHJ5AJ5WXu_XNjhTIDsca3xfQbqmH7Q&_hsmi=70296560

Jensen Comment
Add this to the list of the Malthusian ways of solving the world's overpopulation problem
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malthusianism
It will not only make smaller armies more lethal, it will also make them targets for revolutionaries and criminals. Like the AK-47, this will keep revolutions in Africa and elsewhere forever ongoing. There can be no stability wth all those AK-47s and lethal drones. And the thought of these in the hands of terrorists is really scary. Think of the power grid, brimming flood control dams, overcrowded bridges in our largest cities and on and on and on. And then there's Trump's crumbling wall as caravans of 100,000+ people reach the border.

 

The Chinese Dream
How a Chinese billionaire went from making $16 a month in a factory to being one of the world's richest self-made women with an $8.3 billion real-estate empire
---
https://www.businessinsider.com/worlds-richest-self-made-woman-wu-yajun-net-worth-2019-2

 

Questions About Reparations ---
https://townhall.com/columnists/kurtschlichter/2019/02/28/i-have-some-questions-about-the-democrats-reparations-plan-n2542292?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=02/28/2019&bcid=b16c6f948f297f77432f990d4411617f&recip=17935167

 

"People think police should be reformed; They need to be killed."
A University of California at Davis English professor's tweet five years ago that police officers "need to be killed" has resurfaced in the wake of the shooting death of a local police officer ---

https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/education/article226810084.html?elqTrackId=6607d33448cc43849dfb9efc8b2828b9&elq=70b916774ece4d78a34b0cd93bb8b989&elqaid=22375&elqat=1&elqCampaignId=11021

 

Pelosi Continues to Criticize Green New Deal: 'Not What We Hope to Achieve' ---
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/laurettabrown/2019/02/27/pelosi-continues-to-criticize-green-new-deal-not-what-we-hope-to-achieve-n2542325?utm_source=thdailypm&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl_pm&newsletterad=&bcid=b16c6f948f297f77432f990d4411617f&recip=17935167

 

NYT:  Intelligent, Bright and Merciless: A North Korean Official’s Take on Kim Jong-un
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/27/world/asia/north-korea-kim-jong-un-defector.html

 

How to Mislead With Statistics
Three reasons why people fall for politicians’ lies about statistics ---

https://theconversation.com/3-reasons-why-people-fall-for-politicians-lies-about-statistics-110014
Jensen Comment
A reason for being misled (related to letting emotions rule) is hoping that the politician will become powerful enough to make the lie come true. For example, many people are falling for statistics cited and the promises made by promises of guaranteed income for everybody in the USA (think AOC and Kamela Harris). Nancy Pelosi warns of the hazards of believing those lies.
“You have to make decisions that you’re going to reach certain goals, and some of our goals we think are achievable
Nancy Pelosi (when criticizing Alexandria's Green New Deal and Basic (Guaranteed) Income
Click Here

 

Would you like to run a company having to fight NYC politicians and labor unions? Think extortion and kickbacks!
Andrew Cuomo and other Democrats are begging Jeff Bezos to reconsider New York for HQ2 after Amazon abruptly announced plans to ditch the city ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/nyc-governor-cuomo-asks-amazon-reconsider-decision-ditch-hq2-2019-2

Jensen Comment
By the way, Amazon had much more planned than warehouses in NYC. Many high-end technology jobs were going to be created in NYC for Amazon's new high-tech ventures.

Alexandria's (AOC) Economics:  Because poor and middle class families in East Palo Alto and San Jose were displaced by soaring home prices in Silicon Valley, the high-end technology companies in Silicon Valley should never have been allowed to exist.

 

That includes $7 billion in sales taxes and excise taxes, which are those paid on specific items like gas sales and vehicle registrations. Undocumented immigrants, like everyone else, pay for highway repairs, state courts, police, and firefighters. They also paid about $1.1 billion in state income taxes and $3.6 billion in property taxes that year — money that funds public schools, garbage collection, and other city services.

https://www.vox.com/2019/3/1/18241692/undocumented-immigrants-pay-state-local-taxes

Jensen Comment
 Look at how California's $3.2 billion share from 10 million undocumented California migrants (about a fourth of the state population) contributes to the $140 billion general fund.
Extrapolating from this we could hardly save our states by opening the borders to billions of undocumented immigrants from all over the world.

 

Can't Oregon’s troubled pension system just file for bankruptcy?
https://www.statedatalab.org/news/detail/cant-oregons-troubled-pension-system-just-file-for-bankruptcy

 

Where has $850m gone? NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio's wife can't account for staggering amount of taxpayer money...

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3731505/posts
Jensen Question
Why did she get this money in the first place?

 

New York City Experienced Worst Decline in Restaurant Jobs since 9/11 After $15 Minimum Wage Win ---
https://fee.org/articles/new-york-city-experienced-worst-decline-in-restaurant-jobs-since-911-after-15-minimum-wage-win/

 

February Delivers Another Humiliating Ratings Month for Far-Left CNN ---
https://www.breitbart.com/the-media/2019/02/27/february-delivers-humiliating-ratings-month-far-left-cnn/

 

More than 300 store closures are announced in a single day as the retail apocalypse rips through JCPenney, Gap, and Victoria's Secret ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/jcpenney-gap-and-victorias-secret-announce-300-store-closures-2019-2
Why aren't they just relocating to Queens in NYC now that Amazon left a "gap."?

 

Bernie Sanders still doesn't pass the comander-in-chief test for the 2020 election ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/bernie-sanders-still-doesnt-pass-comander-in-chief-test-2019-3

 

Sugar’s Sweetheart Deal is Welfare for the Rich
John Stossel
http://reason.com/blog/2019/02/26/stossel-sugars-sweetheart-deals
 

The Washington Post Issues Correction for Failures In Covington Catholic Kids Coverage ---
Click Here

 

More than 4,300 stores are closing in 2019 as the retail apocalypse drags on — here's the full list as of March ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/stores-closing-in-2019-list-2019-3

 

Fed Up: Democrats to Vote on Resolution Condemning Ilhan Omar's Continued Anti-Semitism ---
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2019/03/04/ilhan-omar-n2542557?utm_source=thdailypm&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl_pm&newsletterad=&bcid=b16c6f948f297f77432f990d4411617f&recip=17935167

 

For The First Time In Recorded Weather History (132 Years), The Temperature Never Reached 70 Degrees In February In L.A. ---
https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2019/03/for-the-first-time-in-recorded-weather-history-132-years-the-temperature-never-reached-70-degrees-in.html

 

The New York Times:  Border at ‘Breaking Point’ as More than 76,000 Migrants Cross in a Month ---

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/05/us/border-crossing-increase.html
That extrapolates to nearly a million a year before we attract millions more with free medical care, housing, education, food stamps, and guaranteed income.
The good news is that, with exponential growth, there will soon be enough to bury the Republican party forever. Exhibit A is California.

 

California Is Ground Zero for the Welcoming Migrants, Resisting the Wall, and Defeating Republicans ---
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/03/california-governor-gavin-newsom-warring-trump/584029/

 

The mother of soak-the-rich congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said that she was forced to flee the Big Apple and move to Florida because the property taxes were so high ---
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/ocasio-cortezs-mom-moved-to-florida-to-escape-nycs-property-taxes

 

ACLU blasts Democrats' election bill as unconstitutional ---
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/mar/4/hr-1-democrats-election-reform-bill-unconstitution/

 

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez laid into Nancy Pelosi and Democratic leadership after they condemned Ilhan Omar's Israel comments

https://www.businessinsider.com/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-defends-ilhan-omar-democratic-criticism-2019-3

 

Ocasio-Cortez: U.S. Should Not Have Authorized Use Of Force Against 9/11 Perpetrators (and she's a representative of NYC)
https://www.dailywire.com/news/44233/ocasio-cortez-us-should-not-have-authorized-use-ryan-saavedra?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=benshapiro
She offers no alternative to stemming the tide of repeated terrorist attacks by those same perpetrators like Bin Laden. The Trade Tower attack was the worst terrorist attack in history.
Presumably there would be no stopping ISIS from beheading all the Christians and other infidels in the world.
She's becoming Trump's biggest asset for re-election.

 

Jerry Falwell invited Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to Convocation after heated Twitter interaction ---
https://www.liberty.edu/champion/2019/03/jerry-falwell-invited-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-to-convocation-after-heated-twitter-interaction/?elqTrackId=babac56315804a03ba4f1d326b6713a0&elq=df55aff1f3864a3c99acec60f6ab5753&elqaid=22440&elqat=1&elqCampaignId=11065

 

North Korea food production 'lowest for a decade': UN ---
https://sg.news.yahoo.com/north-korea-food-production-lowest-decade-un-024216129.html

 

U.S. GOVERNMENT MEDIA NETWORK FIRES JOURNALISTS OVER REPORT CRITICAL OF SOROS ---
https://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2019/03/u-s-government-media-network-fires-journalists-for-report-critical-of-soros/

 

Illegal Aliens Arrested in Workplace Raid Sue Fed Agents for Racial Profiling ---
https://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2019/02/illegal-aliens-arrested-in-workplace-raid-sue-fed-agents-for-racial-profiling/

 

Why does ‘fixing’ Michigan pensions stick it to workers?
https://www.statedatalab.org/news/detail/why-does-fixing-michigan-pensions-stick-it-to-workers

 

The Washington Post:  Hillary Clinton’s claims about voter suppression in Georgia and Wisconsin/ 4 Pinocchios (for lying) ---
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3732815/posts

 

Senator Rubio and 23 Democrats Urge U.S. Asylum for Venezuela’s Population ---
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/03/08/democrats-urge-u-s-asylum-venezuelas-population/

In 2016 the population of Venezuela was estimated to be 32 million, more than all 50 USA states other than California having a population of 39+ million ---
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_territories_of_the_United_States_by_population
Their status would be "temporary." Yeah right! Like the "temporary" Cuban refugees living in the USA since 1965. Now that's a good way to vote Trump out of office.

 

Finland's entire government resigns after breakdown of agreement on welfare state reform ---
https://www.foxnews.com/world/finlands-entire-government-resigns-after-breakdown-of-agreement-on-welfare-state-reform
Migrants are not welcome in Finland, and those that sneak in are transported to the Swedish border where they are also no longer welcome.

 

Rookie Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar, fresh off igniting an intra-party uproar with comments widely viewed as anti-Semitic, took a swipe at former President Barack Obama, saying in an explosive interview the 44th president's message of "hope and change" was a "mirage" and blasting his administration's drone and border detention policies ---
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/rep-ilhan-omar-slams-barack-obamas-message-of-hope-and-change-as-a-mirage

 

NYC teachers speak out about their horrific experiences in class ---
https://nypost.com/2019/03/07/nyc-teachers-speak-out-about-their-horrific-experiences-in-class/

 

Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has shot down a new amendment introduced by Republicans, that would require gun sellers to notify ICE when illegal aliens attempt to buy guns, saying the bill is "xenophobic ---
https://neonnettle.com/news/6742-pelosi-claims-bill-to-prevent-illegal-aliens-buying-guns-is-xenophobic-

 

 

Why California's Income Tax is Scary
Bryce Harper Will Save Tens Of Millions In Taxes By Spurning California Teams ---
https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2019/03/bryce-harper-will-save-tens-of-millions-in-taxes-by-spurning-the-dodgers-and-giants.html

 

France scrapped a more extreme version of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's income tax plan for millionaires because it was making so little money (and making high earners move out of France) ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/france-scrapped-extreme-version-alexandria-ocasio-cortezs-tax-plan-millionares-2019-3

 

There's a possibility that New York City may go bankrupt ---
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/03/deep_blue_new_york_city_looking_at_bankruptcy_after_a_mere_fiveyear_socialist_hog_wallow.html

 

The Democrat-controlled House of Representatives voted on Friday to defend local governments that choose to allow illegal aliens to vote in their elections ---
https://www.dailywire.com/news/44440/breaking-democrat-house-votes-favor-illegal-ryan-saavedra

 

California's Economic Troubles ---
https://medium.com/@byrnehobart/peak-california-7cf97baecaf0

 

Larry Summers:  Has Economics Failed Us? Hardly ---
http://larrysummers.com/2019/01/24/36810/#more-36810
Jensen Comment
In a way it failed us by becoming increasingly political and divisive. Some economists no longer reflect in academic spirit to arguments that are politically incorrect in their opinions.
Exhibit A is the way they cherry pick. For example, some economists argue reasonably about the benefits of undocumented workers to the nation's workforce without discussing the disaster of totally open borders with hordes (think tens of millions) of poor and often sickly pouring in for free handouts, free health care, free education, etc. At the other extreme some economists praising capitalism gloss over the dangers of anti-competitive behavior and negative externalities.
Ive commenced a new Web document on how to think critically about economists and other data analysts ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/MisleadWithStatistics.htm

 

 

 

 




 

Washington University Women in Law Resource Center ---
https://onlinelaw.wustl.edu/blog/women-law-infographic/

 

Click! The Ongoing Feminist Revolution --- www.cliohistory.org/click

 

The Guardian:  German academics and authors call for end to 'gender nonsense'  ---
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/08/german-academics-and-authors-call-for-end-to-gender-nonsense

 

How women wage war – a short history of IS brides, Nazi guards and FARC insurgents ---
https://theconversation.com/how-women-wage-war-a-short-history-of-is-brides-nazi-guards-and-farc-insurgents-113011

 

Atria Institute on Gender Equality and Women's History: Collection Highlights ---
https://institute-genderequality.org/library-archive/collection-highlights/

 

The Coordinating Council for Women in History --- https://theccwh.org/

 

Jewish Women's Archive: Encyclopedia --- https://jwa.org/Encyclopedia

 

Bob Jensen's threads on women ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#Wome

 

 


Guess how Nate Silver ranks the 16 Democratic candidates for the 2020 presidential election as of March 2019?
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/is-beto-orourke-overrated-or-underrated/

Jensen Comment
The winner to date (Kamela Harris) is also the one who promises to spend the most on green initiatives, free health care, guaranteed income for all Americans, rent subsidies, and on and on and on.
The betting odds place her ahead of Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden at this point in time.

How To Think About Taxing And Spending Like A Swede ---
https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2019/03/how-to-think-about-taxing-and-spending-like-a-swede.html

Europe has less inequality and more social mobility because its taxation schemes reach deeper into society (especially the middle class) and do more for everyone.

In the recent rush of proposals to tax the rich, Democrats have forgotten — or never really cared to learn — an important lesson: The countries that have been most successful at reducing poverty and inequality have not done it by taxing the wealthy and giving to the poor.

Take Sweden, a country often cited by progressives for its extensive social programs. Sweden has very low poverty and inequality, and economic mobility is significantly higher than it is in the United States; a poor Swede is much more likely to become middle class than a poor American is.

We can learn from Sweden, but the lesson is not what many people think. Rich Swedes do get taxed at high rates, but so does everyone else: The average American worker’s total tax burden is 31.7 percent of earnings, compared with 42.9 percent for the average Swede. The Swedes actually tax corporations less: 19.8 percent, compared with 34.2 percent in the United States in 2017, the last year for which we have comparative data — and yes, that’s after all the loopholes and deductions have been accounted for. The American rate will be lower after the 2017 tax bill, but it’s still unlikely to be as low as Sweden’s. ...

Continued in article

In 1979 the highest marginal tax rate on individuals was 87% which proved to be a disaster;
In 1990 is was down to 65%
In 2002 it was further reduced to 56% and that covers a lot more services (think health care) than income taxes fund in the USA
Marginal Tax Rate Declines in Sweden and the Rest of the World ---
http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/MarginalTaxRates.html

The fleet of Democratic Party candidates are active in promoting $100+ trillion dollar government spending but are  vague or silent on taxation.
What these candidates don't like is how Nordic countries tax the middle class ---
http://reason.com/blog/2019/03/06/low-tax-socialists-medicare-for-all-gnd

Consider how taxation works in the nordic countries that many American socialists describe as their models. Yes, taxes are high on the rich. But as the Tax Foundation noted during Sanders' last presidential campaign, they are also high on the middle class. The 70 percent top marginal tax rate floated by Ocasio-Cortez would apply to income earned over $10 million, affecting only about 16,000 Americans each year. In countries like Denmark, Sweden, and Finland, marginal tax rates of near 60 percent hit earners deep into the middle class. Denmark's 60 percent marginal rate applies to income over 1.2 times the national average, which in the U.S. would hit earners making just $60,000 a year—not exactly millionaires and billionaires. These countries also typically rely on value-added taxes that are inherently regressive, placing a bigger burden on the poor and middle class than on the rich.

Highest Marginal Tax Rate Declines in the Rest of the World ---
http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/MarginalTaxRates.html


The New York Times' David Brooks:  ‘Medicare for All’: The Impossible Dream ---
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/04/opinion/medicare-for-all.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

Jensen Comment
This is one of the more sensible articles about Medicare-for-All. I recommend reading it carefully.

In my viewpoint the estimated cost of slightly over $3 trillion per year is greatly underestimated.

Firstly, it underestimates the extra cost added by covering long-term care (think nursing homes) that is not presently covered in Medicare.

Nursing Homes --- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nursing_home_care
How to Mislead With Statistics (distortions)
Median prices per month for nursing homes in all 50 states ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/nursing-home-private-room-monthly-median-price-by-state-2019-3#10-delaware-10950-per-month-1

Secondly, it ignores the attraction that free medical care will have in attracting millions and millions of sick people, especially older people in need of free nursing homes,  to enter into the USA.

The New York Times:  Border at ‘Breaking Point’ as More than 76,000 Migrants Cross in a Month ---

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/05/us/border-crossing-increase.html
That extrapolates to nearly a million a year before we attract millions more with free medical care, housing, education, food stamps, and guaranteed income.
The good news is that, with exponential growth, there will soon be enough to bury the Republican party forever. Exhibit A is California

 

Let's face facts
We've lost the wars on both drugs and "undocumented immigration." Exhibit A is California that's surrendering in fighting both wars.

Face recognition software is now illegal in the sanctuary city of San Francisco where police are duty-bound to protect "undocumented" migrants from being deported.

 

How do you deport a helpless person dropped off and lying 10 feet inside the USA border?

 

Critics say Pritzker’s progressive tax plan for Illinois relies on faulty math ---
https://www.statedatalab.org/news/detail/critics-say-pritzkers-progressive-tax-plan-relies-on-faulty-math
And what business would start up in Illinois or move to Illinois unless forced for some reason to do so?
Kiss economic growth goodbye.

How To Think About Taxing And Spending Like A Swede ---
https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2019/03/how-to-think-about-taxing-and-spending-like-a-swede.html
In 1979 the highest marginal tax rate on individuals was 87% which proved to be a disaster;
In 1990 is was down to 65%
In 2002 it was further reduced to 56% and that covers a lot more services (think health care) than income taxes fund in the USA
 

The fleet of Democratic Party candidates are active in promoting $100+ trillion dollar government spending but are  vague or silent on taxation.
What they don't like is how Nordic countries tax the middle class ---
http://reason.com/blog/2019/03/06/low-tax-socialists-medicare-for-all-gnd

Consider how taxation works in the nordic countries that many American socialists describe as their models. Yes, taxes are high on the rich. But as the Tax Foundation noted during Sanders' last presidential campaign, they are also high on the middle class. The 70 percent top marginal tax rate floated by Ocasio-Cortez would apply to income earned over $10 million, affecting only about 16,000 Americans each year. In countries like Denmark, Sweden, and Finland, marginal tax rates of near 60 percent hit earners deep into the middle class. Denmark's 60 percent marginal rate applies to income over 1.2 times the national average, which in the U.S. would hit earners making just $60,000 a year—not exactly millionaires and billionaires. These countries also typically rely on value-added taxes that are inherently regressive, placing a bigger burden on the poor and middle class than on the rich.

Highest Marginal Tax Rate Declines in the Rest of the World ---
http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/MarginalTaxRates.html


NYC teachers speak out about their horrific experiences in class ---
https://nypost.com/2019/03/07/nyc-teachers-speak-out-about-their-horrific-experiences-in-class/

This is way beyond talking out of turn — today’s public school students are hellions who attack educators, shout X-rated bile and make bomb threats with impunity, teachers told The Post.

“If I had a dime for every time I was told to suck something, I’d be a millionaire,” said a female Jamaica, Queens, high school teacher.

“They know the system. They can say whatever they want to us and get away with it, but we can’t say a thing to them.”

When teachers use what little leverage they have, the kids do their best to get the educators in hot water.

“You can’t even tell a student that they aren’t going to pass a test or a class anymore because they will go to an administrator and complain that you made them feel uncomfortable and we’ll get written up,” she added.

 Continued in article

Jensen Comment
Amazon is fortunate not to have to hire such kids after they "graduate" so disrespectfully from high school. The question is why are they allowed to "graduate" in the first place?


A clandestine lab in Oregon churned out over 10,000 fake Social Security cards, drivers' licenses, and immigration documents ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/feds-forgery-operation-produced-over-10000-fake-documents-2019-3

Jensen Comment
That's just a drop in the bucket compared to high-quality fake documentation you can buy in Mexico.

The New York Times:  Border at ‘Breaking Point’ as More than 76,000 Migrants Cross in a Month ---

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/05/us/border-crossing-increase.html
That extrapolates to nearly a million a year before we attract millions more with free medical care, housing, education, food stamps, and guaranteed income.
The good news is that, with exponential growth, there will soon be enough to bury the Republican party forever. Exhibit A is California

 

Let's face facts
We've lost the wars on both drugs and "undocumented immigration." Exhibit A is California that's surrendering in fighting both wars.

Face recognition software is now illegal in the sanctuary city of San Francisco where police are duty-bound to protect "undocumented" migrants from being deported.

 


 

The Horrible Experience of Trying to Report a Sexual Assault in Europe --- especially in the "happiest countries in the world"

 

Jensen Comment
I've subscribed to Time Magazine for decades and have been saddened how it became politicized over the past three decades sinking ever deeper into cherry picking and leftist leanings. Thus I was quite shocked by the following 2019 article. Rapes have become much more common in all of Europe accompanying the rise of immigration to a point where German police, in fear of stirring political unrest, no longer use the terms "rape" or "sexual assault." Many (most?) such assaults go unreported in the media and the official statistics reported by German police only use the term "assault" rather than sexual assault.

 

What is ironic is that the Nordic Countries often come out on top of rankings in terms of "happiness countries." Those citizens and visitors increasingly being raped in Denmark, Norway, and Sweden are not likely to be very happy. Perhaps the happiest citizens are the rapists who are either not punished at all for rapes or are given light sentences in country club prisons. Sometimes rapists are deported only to return in a few months. They have little fear from law enforcement.

 

Time Magazine:  Denmark Is Supposed to Be a Land of Gender Equality. That's Why I Speak Out About My Rape ---
Click Here

by Kirstine Holst

. . .

 

As I have found out first hand through my experience of trying to navigate the justice system over the last year and a half, women and girls are being failed by dangerous and outdated laws. Rape is often not reported through fear of not being believed, stigma and a lack of trust in the justice system. Even when it is, the barriers to justice can prove insurmountable. The reason for the low conviction rates lies in deeply-entrenched biases within the justice system, and lack of trust in that system contributes to under-reporting.

 

. . .

But the worst aspect of the entire experience was the focus by the police, the lawyers and the judge on whether there was evidence of physical violence: on whether I had resisted, rather than whether I had consented.

Although I had told my rapist many times to stop, I was repeatedly asked questions about the physical evidence that I had resisted.

This focus reflects the fact that Danish law still does not define rape on the basis of lack of consent. Instead, it uses a definition based on whether physical violence, threat or coercion is involved or if the victim is found to have been unable to resist. The assumption that a victim gives her consent because she has not physically resisted is deeply problematic since “involuntary paralysis” or “freezing” has been recognized by experts as a very common physiological and psychological response to sexual assault.

 Continued in article

Jensen Comment
It saddens me that, while there's a highly-publicized effort to get victims of rape in the USA to report such crimes to the police, there's also an effort to lighten the punishments and become more like happiest nation in the world --- Denmark.
The only difference between the USA and Europe regarding deportations is that deported criminals in Europe return in a few months while in the USA they're back in a matter of weeks.

 


 

How Democrats Want To Tax The Rich ---
https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2019/03/how-democrats-want-to-tax-the-rich.html
 


 

California's Senator Kamala Harris --- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamala_Harris

 

How to Mislead With Statistics
Presidential Candidate Kamala Harris Promises Basic (Guaranteed)  Income for All:   Every person in the USA should file a tax return --- it's like Dialing for Dollars where more than 80% of the people in the USA win extra cash--

https://www.harris.senate.gov/news/press-releases/harris-proposes-bold-relief-for-families-amid-rising-costs-of-living
 

Jensen Comment
The missing variable here is how to pay for her "unlimited" spending programs.
Senator Harris promises refundable "tax credits" to Americans who make less than $100,000 --- those taxpayers who currently only pay 20% of of the USA's income taxes. People making over $100,000 pay 80% of the nation's income taxes. Nearly half of all people filing income tax returns currently pay zero income taxes. Many more don't currently  file tax returns at all such as children in college and folks working in the tax-free $2 trillion underground economy ---
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyphillipserb/2016/05/13/americans-who-make-more-than-100000-pay-80-of-federal-income-taxes/#669a5e3c3ff4

 

Under her proposal more than 80% of the people in the USA could  receive a basic tax-free income. Every person should file a tax return --- it's like Dialing for Dollars.
 

This is not the negative income tax that Milton Friedman once proposed. Friedman wanted to replace the safety nets (Medicaid, welfare, food stamps, housing subsidies, etc.) with a negative income tax. Kamala's basic income proposal, however, gives cash back in addition to increasing all safety nets with her added proposal for rent relief ---
https://reason.com/blog/2018/07/20/new-kamala-harris-bill-asks-federal-taxp
Also, those that are able can work tax free in the $2 trillion underground economy for added cash.

 

In addition she proposes no spending limits on the green initiative plus free health care, student loan forgiveness, free college, and cash reparations to African and Native Americans. All told she's promising social and environmental spending of over $100 trillion or much more ---
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/kamala-harris-dismisses-concerns-about-green-new-deal-price-tag-its-not-about-a-cost

She's promising unlimited government spending to be assured of winning the USA presidency.
It just might work since most millennials don't have clue about economics!
 

The missing variable here is how to pay for her "unlimited" spending programs. The math just doesn't work out even if we tax 100% of the income of high earners. Remember that existing entitlements for Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, Aid for Disable Persons, etc. add another $100+ trillion.

 

A hundred  trillion here and a hundred trillion there --- pretty soon were talking Venezuela or Zimbabwe.
Where's Paul Krugman when we need him most?

 

How to Mislead With Statistics
Three reasons why people fall for politicians’ lies about statistics ---

https://theconversation.com/3-reasons-why-people-fall-for-politicians-lies-about-statistics-110014
Jensen Comment
A reason for being misled (related to letting emotions rule) is hoping that the politician will become powerful enough to make the lie come true. For example, many people are falling for statistics cited and the promises made by promises of guaranteed income for everybody in the USA (think AOC and Kamela Harris). Nancy Pelosi warns of the hazards of believing those lies.
“You have to make decisions that you’re going to reach certain goals, and some of our goals we think are achievable
Nancy Pelosi (when criticizing Alexandria's Green New Deal and Basic (Guaranteed) Income
Click Here

 


 

.


The Washington Post:  The Virginia agreement with Amazon is tougher than you might think
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2019/03/the-culture-and-polity-that-is-arlington-virginia.html

The agreement says Amazon needs to occupy 64,000 square feet of office space by July 31, 2020, in order to qualify for the 15 percent payment. The required amount of space increases to 252,800 square feet by July 31, 2021, and to 5.576 million by July 31, 2034, the last year of incentive payments.

Jensen Comment
And Alexandria is correct:  The price of real estate will go up in the surrounding area as higher income workers flock to the region. At this certainty is also recognized and belatedly accepted  by New York politicians begging for Amazon to reconsider Queens.
When I was a student at Stanford in the 1960s San Jose was mostly comprised of ticky tack low cost houses. Now these have been torn down, and San Jose is one of the more expensive places to live in the USA. Does San Jose want to turn the clock back even though times are tough for housing its teachers, firefighters, police, etc.? I don't think so! If California can build free housing for the homeless it can also impose taxes to build housing for public workers. Rent controls only make matters worse according to Econ 101 ---
 

Here's what left-leaning Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman says about rent control ---
https://www.nytimes.com/2000/06/07/opinion/reckonings-a-rent-affair.html

. . .

The analysis of rent control is among the best-understood issues in all of economics, and -- among economists, anyway -- one of the least controversial. In 1992 a poll of the American Economic Association found 93 percent of its members agreeing that ''a ceiling on rents reduces the quality and quantity of housing.'' Almost every freshman-level textbook contains a case study on rent control, using its known adverse side effects to illustrate the principles of supply and demand. Sky-high rents on uncontrolled apartments, because desperate renters have nowhere to go -- and the absence of new apartment construction, despite those high rents, because landlords fear that controls will be extended? Predictable. Bitter relations between tenants and landlords, with an arms race between ever-more ingenious strategies to force tenants out -- what yesterday's article oddly described as ''free-market horror stories'' -- and constantly proliferating regulations designed to block those strategies? Predictable.

And as for the way rent control sets people against one another -- the executive director of San Francisco's Rent Stabilization and Arbitration Board has remarked that ''there doesn't seem to be anyone in this town who can trust anyone else in this town, including their own grandparents'' -- that's predictable, too.

None of this says that ending rent control is an easy decision. Still, surely it is worth knowing that the pathologies of San Francisco's housing market are right out of the textbook, that they are exactly what supply-and-demand analysis predicts.

But people literally don't want to know. A few months ago, when a San Francisco official proposed a study of the city's housing crisis, there was a firestorm of opposition from tenant-advocacy groups. They argued that even to study the situation was a step on the road to ending rent control -- and they may well have been right, because studying the issue might lead to a recognition of the obvious.

So now you know why economists are useless: when they actually do understand something, people don't want to hear about it.

 


How to Mislead With Statistics
The USA Spends $23 Billion More on White Districts than Black Districts  (proportions versus totals) ---
https://leaders.edweek.org/profile/angela-ward-supervisor-race-equity-programs-cultural-proficiency/?cmp=eml-enl-eu-news1&M=58762398&U=2290378&UUID=b16c6f948f297f77432f990d4411617f

Jensen Comment
That there is still segregation in some school districts is a sad thing, but almost no districts are entirely white anymore so some progress has been made. Where this study is misleading is that it implies that more tax money is spent on white children per pupil. That is misleading in several respects. Instead it states the obvious. More money is spent in aggregate on white children mostly because there are so many more white children. Blacks only account for about 13% of the USA population, and Latinos are from mixed races with some being white (usually when descended from Europeans and colored (when descended from natives). Also in black districts (think New Orleans and Memphis) white children are often sent to private schools not funded by taxpayers. The study should've reported the proportion of taxpayer money spent per pupil.

 

 

Nearly Half of Undergraduates Are Students of Color. But Black Students Lag Behind ---
https://www.chronicle.com/article/Nearly-Half-of-Undergraduates/245692?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en&elqTrackId=4b25b4445cd449deab2ac48c46f77478&elq=e53c5591cbc9463eaa6a81d8ee5ad6fd&elqaid=22249&elqat=1&elqCampaignId=10942

The key data points in the American Council on Education's new report on race and ethnicity in higher education come as no surprise: College-student populations are growing more diverse, yet achievement gaps persist among different racial groups.

Still, the poor outcomes for black students in particular are glaring.

All students of color now make up more than 45 percent of the undergraduate population, compared with less than 30 percent two decades ago, the association's report found. Nearly one-third of graduate students are now people of color. Hispanic students have shown the most growth; they are enrolling in and completing college at levels never seen before.

Black students, too, represent a larger share of the undergraduate- and graduate-student population than 20 years ago, and a larger share of the students who earn degrees. But black students who began college in the fall of 2011 had higher dropout rates and lower six-year completion rates — 46 percent at public institutions, 57 percent at private institutions — than any other racial group.

The gender gap for black students is wider than it is for any other group, as nearly two-thirds of black undergraduates, and more than two-thirds of black graduate students, are women. Black male students pursuing bachelor's degrees were the most likely among any demographic group to drop out after their freshman year.

Black undergraduates also owed 15 percent more than other students after graduation: an average of $34,010, compared with $29,669 for all students. One-third of black students accumulated more than $40,000 in debt after graduation, versus 18 percent of students over all.

Even with a bachelor's degree, black graduates between the ages of 25 and 34 had lower salaries than other graduates of a similar age, and their unemployment rate was two-thirds higher, on average.

Continued in article

Jensen Comment
The phrase "color" is somewhat ambiguous in the USA --- especially since Latinos are multiracial, particularly in terms of origins from Europe versus darker native heredity ---
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_the_United_States#Race_and_ethnicity
It would seem that "whites" are now underrepresented in undergraduate enrollments in the USA.

According to the 2010–2015 American Community Survey, the racial composition of the United States in 2015 was:

Race

Population (2016 est.)

Share of total population

Total

318,558,162

100%

One race

308,805,215

96.9%

  White

233,657,078

73.3%

  Black or African American

40,241,818

12.6%

  American Indian and Alaska Native

2,597,817

0.8%

  Asian

16,614,625

5.2%

  Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander

560,021

0.2%

  Other races

15,133,856

4.8%

Two or more races

9,752,947

3.1%

  White and Black or African American

2,525,509

0.8%

  White and American Indian and Alaska Native

1,884,407

0.6%

  White and Asian

1,956,740

0.6%

  Black or African American and American Indian and Alaska Native

318,302

0.1%

Population distribution by race 1940-2010 (in %)

Hispanics are shown like part of the races. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, decennial census of population, 1940 to 2010.[47]

Years

1940

1950

1960

1970

1980

1990

2000*

2010*

White

89.8

89.5

88.6

87.5

83.0

80.3

75.1

72.4

Black or African American

9.8

10.0

10.5

11.1

11.7

12.1

12.3

12.6

American Indian and Alaska Native

       

0.8

0.8

0.9

0.9

Asian and Native Hawaiian
and other Pacific Islander

       

1.5

2.9

3.8

5.0

Some other race

       

3.0

3.9

5.5

6.2

Two or more races

           

2.4

2.9

Sum (%)

99.6

99.5

99.1

98.6

100

100

100

100

*Data are shown for the White, Black or African American, American Indian and Alaska Native, Asian and Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander, and Some other race alone populations.

 


 

While a move is underway to destroy the American Dream of rags to riches (by taxing away the riches) the Chinese dream is on the rise.
 

The Chinese Dream
How a Chinese billionaire went from making $16 a month in a factory to being one of the world's richest self-made women with an $8.3 billion real-estate empire
---

https://www.businessinsider.com/worlds-richest-self-made-woman-wu-yajun-net-worth-2019-2

 

Top 50 Billionaires in China ---
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Chinese_by_net_worth

 

Jensen Comment
The question for students to debate is why a supposed communist country allows so many billionaires to rise up from poverty. That's supposed to happen in the USA where a child growing up in deep poverty (think Oprah Winfrey or Howard Shultz) became a multi-billionaires. But is it also supposed to happen under communism? If so, why?

 




Bob Jensen's threads on health care ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Health.htm

NYT:  Choosing the Right Health Savings Account ---
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/07/your-money/health-savings-account-hsa.html


Medicare:  What's very significant about the numbers $85,000 and $170,000?
Medicare beneficiaries can see their premiums go up if their income rises, although for some that increase will be only temporary ---
https://www.kiplinger.com/article/retirement/T039-C001-S003-how-changes-in-income-affect-medicare-premiums.html



The New York Times' David Brooks:  ‘Medicare for All’: The Impossible Dream ---
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/04/opinion/medicare-for-all.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

Jensen Comment
This is one of the more sensible articles about Medicare-for-All. I recommend reading it carefully.

In my viewpoint the estimated cost of slightly over $3 trillion per year is greatly underestimated.

Firstly, it underestimates the extra cost added by covering long-term care (think nursing homes) that is not presently covered in Medicare.

Nursing Homes --- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nursing_home_care
How to Mislead With Statistics (distortions)
Median prices per month for nursing homes in all 50 states ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/nursing-home-private-room-monthly-median-price-by-state-2019-3#10-delaware-10950-per-month-1

Secondly, it ignores the attraction that free medical care will have in attracting millions and millions of sick people, especially older people in need of free nursing homes,  to enter into the USA.

The New York Times:  Border at ‘Breaking Point’ as More than 76,000 Migrants Cross in a Month ---

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/05/us/border-crossing-increase.html
That extrapolates to nearly a million a year before we attract millions more with free medical care, housing, education, food stamps, and guaranteed income.
The good news is that, with exponential growth, there will soon be enough to bury the Republican party forever. Exhibit A is California

 

Let's face facts
We've lost the wars on both drugs and "undocumented immigration." Exhibit A is California that's surrendering in fighting both wars.

Face recognition software is now illegal in the sanctuary city of San Francisco where police are duty-bound to protect "undocumented" migrants from being deported.

 

How do you deport a helpless person dropped off and lying 10 feet inside the USA border?

The fleet of Democratic Party candidates are active in promoting $100+ trillion dollar spending programs (green new deal, Medicare-for-All, guaranteed income, rent subsidies, etc.) buy vague or silent on taxation.
What they don't like is how Nordic countries tax the middle class ---
http://reason.com/blog/2019/03/06/low-tax-socialists-medicare-for-all-gnd

Consider how taxation works in the nordic countries that many American socialists describe as their models. Yes, taxes are high on the rich. But as the Tax Foundation noted during Sanders' last presidential campaign, they are also high on the middle class. The 70 percent top marginal tax rate floated by Ocasio-Cortez would apply to income earned over $10 million, affecting only about 16,000 Americans each year. In countries like Denmark, Sweden, and Finland, marginal tax rates of near 60 percent hit earners deep into the middle class. Denmark's 60 percent marginal rate applies to income over 1.2 times the national average, which in the U.S. would hit earners making just $60,000 a year—not exactly millionaires and billionaires. These countries also typically rely on value-added taxes that are inherently regressive, placing a bigger burden on the poor and middle class than on the rich.

 

 


Politico:  Progressives want a government-managed single payer insurance program to replace (in two years) all USA private sector medical insurance companies  ---
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/02/26/house-democrats-medicare-for-all-1189139

Here's one of the problems as they also plan to cut back on what hospitals, drug companies, physicians earn in the USA ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/highest-paying-job-in-every-us-state-2019-2
 

Related to the above problem is will be the shortage of physicians and hospitals to serve the expected increase in services expected by wider coverage and the attraction of hordes undocumented immigrants primarily coming to the USA for needed medical services like dialysis and transplants.

How do you attract more students to become physicians (especially in rural USA) when you plan to cut back on what physicians earn with caps on billings and higher taxes on the earnings of physicians.

With physicians the problem is huge because of the long ordeal it takes to become a licensed specialist and the likelihood of early burnout.
I'm especially aware of this problem because one of our top regional hospital general surgeons, frightfully overworked, in these mountains just flamed out before reaching the age of 50.



Support for Medicare-for-All will evaporate once voters become aware that confiscating the wealthy and high earners will only pay a tiny fraction for the cost and that, when combined with other progressive programs like the green initiative, guaranteed income, student loan forgiveness, housing subsidies, free college, cash reparations to African and Native Americans, etc. the price tags aggregate way over $100 trillion on top of the existing $100+ trillion in contracted entitlements for Medicaid, Medicare, Veterans Benefits, Social Security, Disability Payments, unfunded pensions, etc.

 

How to Mislead With Statistics
Three reasons why people fall for politicians’ lies about statistics ---

https://theconversation.com/3-reasons-why-people-fall-for-politicians-lies-about-statistics-110014
Jensen Comment
A reason for being misled (related to letting emotions rule) is hoping that the politician will become powerful enough to make the lie come true. For example, many people are falling for statistics cited and the promises made by promises of guaranteed income for everybody in the USA (think AOC and Kamela Harris). Nancy Pelosi warns of the hazards of believing those lies.
 

The Democratic Party is Split
“You have to make decisions that you’re going to reach certain goals, and some of our goals
we think are achievable
Nancy Pelosi (when criticizing Alexandria's Green New Deal and Basic (Guaranteed) Income Medicare-for-All)
Click Here



Added Jensen Comment

I suspect progressives will eventually make medical schools much cheaper. However, this will not solve the problem since these same progressives also want to tax what physicians make at 70+% and put severe caps on what they can charge for medical services (makes me think of rent control disasters).  It's like making physicians pay their own fees
https://www.businessinsider.com/highest-paying-job-in-every-us-state-2019-2


 

What progressives can't do much about is to take what discourages medical students the most --- the years of ordeal it takes to master their crafts. 

One almost certain solution for the USA will be what my biologist colleague calls the "French solution" --- which Jagdish tells us is also the "Indian solution." Physicians commence medical school within one year out of high school (or in some instances zero years after high school).  Medical students don't have "waste" 3-5 years as undergraduates. Johns Hopkins has a small experimental program something like the French solution.

 

Another possible help to physicians that progressives are divided over is malpractice insurance and lawsuit pots of gold. The Canadians virtually cut the lawyers out of the equation (except in outlier instances) that makes malpractice insurance in Canada almost nothing compared to the USA. Medical boards in Canada pay victims for damages but no punitive damage awards. 

Amazingly, however, the State of Texas passed a constitutional amendment severely capping punitive damages. The NYT reported that almost immediately medical school graduates started seeking jobs in Texas.

 

What will make malpractice insurance relief difficult is that most of our USA federal and state legislators are lawyers. It amazed me that the lawyers in Texas let the punitive-damage pot of gold slip through their fingers in the Lone Star State.

The WSJ reports that progressive support for eliminating private sector medical insurance companies is waning due to the massive cost of replacing it with a government bureaucracy.

Physicians and hospitals have barely had a chance to fight but will fight tooth and nail if Medicare-for-All ever becomes a threat to them. 

 

The real test is Bernie Sanders. 
He still favors eliminating the private sector in medical insurance and ignores the fact that even Medicare and Medicaid outsource insurance claims to the private sector
that's currently geared up with the trained employees and software to process such claims

 

It's not so much that Bernie Sanders is a threat as the threat that hordes of socialists are also elected to the House and Senate if Bernie becomes wildly popular. The reason progressives like Bernie are currently vague about funding Medicare-for-All is that they know that they will lose millennial support once it's revealed that middle income and maybe even poor people will be taxed for their medical coverage or copays will be charged (as they are in many other nations like Canada). 

Or some nations like Germany greatly limit what's covered in the national plan, thereby forcing those who can afford it to buy secondary medical insurance from the private sector to pay for better services (like not having to wait years for a knee or hip replacement)

 

Animated  Visualization of the United States’ Exploding Population Growth Over 200 Years (1790 – 2010) ---
A Visualization of the United States’ Exploding Population Growth Over 200 Years (1790 – 2010)

USA Debt Clock --- http://www.usdebtclock.org/ ubl

In September 2017 the USA National Debt exceeded $20 trillion for the first time ---
http://www.statedatalab.org/news/detail/national-debt-surpasses-20-trillion-for-the-first-time-in-us-history

Human Population Over Time on Earth ---
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PUwmA3Q0_OE 


These surprising spending truths could upend your retirement ---
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/05/these-surprising-spending-truths-could-upend-your-retirement.html

Jensen Comment
One of the real surprises is how medical costs alone pretty well eat up Social Security Income, especially the costs Medicare (it's not free), Medicare Supplements (ours are really expensive), and expenses that aren't covered like dentists and eyewear and the many drugs not fully covered by Medicare D. Congress sneaked in a surprise surcharge for Medicare for persons having taxable income of $85,000 or joint return income of $170,000.

If you take out long-term nursing insurance, premiums recently doubled. Nursing homes can be really, really, really expensive if you want one that's halfway decent. Insurance companies must charge enough to cover their losses.

Be sure to vote for a Democratic candidate since they all promise free long-term nursing care for 330 million citizens and all resident non-citizens. At current prices that alone adds trillions more to the estimated $32 trillion cost of Medicare-for-All. The problem is that none of them have a clue how to pay for Medicare-for-All.

Nursing Homes --- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nursing_home_care

How to Mislead With Statistics (distortions)
Median prices per month for nursing homes in all 50 states ---
https://www.businessinsider.com/nursing-home-private-room-monthly-median-price-by-state-2019-3#10-delaware-10950-per-month-1

Jensen Comment
Firstly I might note that Medicare does not pay for long-term nursing care whereas Medicaid does pay for long-term nursing care, and this leads to a scramble by heirs to drain off parent or grandparent assets five or more years before those older folks come into need of long-term care. However, Medicaid caps of monthly care result in most of those "poverty" cases to be put in low-standard nursing facilities well below the median prices in each state. Also it's a crap shoot predicting if and when those folks will need long-term care.

Long-term care insurance has always been expensive and is often limited in terms of what it will pay per month. To add pain to misery the premiums almost doubled recently because insurance companies were losing so much money on long-term care insurance do to such factors as exploding prices of nursing homes and increased demand for nursing home care relative to supply --- due mostly to the bubble of aging baby boomers ---
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_boomers

One of the things greatly increasing the new Democratic bill for Medicare-for-All to over $30 trillion is that it proposes adding extremely expensive long-term care coverage to everybody in the USA (including millions of undocumented immigrants) ---
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/02/26/house-democrats-medicare-for-all-1189139

Now what's so misleading about the median prices reported by state?
https://www.businessinsider.com/nursing-home-private-room-monthly-median-price-by-state-2019-3#10-delaware-10950-per-month-1

Firstly, averages (whether mean or median)  should be accompanied by variance and skewness distribution information. Skewness at the low end for cheap and substandard nursing homes in particular brings down those averages such that heirs wanting better care for their elders can expect to pay much more than the medians reported in this study.

Prices can also vary greatly in terms of services provided. My granddaughter is a licensed pharmacist for a nursing center in Bangor, Maine. Many nursing homes cannot afford pharmacists, expensive therapists, and expensive recreational facilities. The quality of available physicians also varies a great deal such when a nursing home in the boondocks is very far away from physicians. I suspect this is one of the factors that greatly increases the cost of nursing care in Alaska where, I suspect, that there's a shortage of physicians in most of the state.

Most nursing homes also offer a menu alternative services that vary with varying patient needs. This distorts medians reported in the above study ---
https://capitalretention.com/jimmy-buffett-long-term-care/

Insurance considerations ---
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2019/03/04/nursing-home-cost-care-makes-planning-ahead-important/3004694002/


ACLU --- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_Liberties_Union

Ira Glasser --- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ira_Glasser

March 10, 2019:  CBS Sixty Minutes Showed How ACLU Claims of Bipartisanship and Not Supporting Political Candidates Have Become a Wink-Wink Sham --- as confirmed by Ira Glasser,  the long-time former Director of the ACLU ---

And the main reason for becoming partisan is the ACLU's want of money from progressives

. . .

But Shakir's team also got involved in two governor's races, leading to complaints they violated their own policies.

In Kansas, then-secretary of state Kris Kobach, a President Trump ally who the ACLU had sued several times alleging voter suppression, was in a tight 5-way race for governor.

 

Announcer: Kris Kobach took an oath to uphold the constitution, and then, as secretary of state, he was held in contempt of court for refusing…

The ACLU ran tv ads and sent mailers critical of Kobach's record.

 

ACLU ad continues: ...threatening children with disabilities. Regardless of who you vote for on November 6th, we the people must demand that politicians respect the rule of law. The ACLU does not endorse or oppose candidates.

Lesley Stahl: Here's what I smile at.

 

Faiz Shakir: Yes.

 

Lesley Stahl: You have that ad. You tell the voters of Kansas all the things that you strongly disagree with about him. And then at the bottom it says, "We don't endorse candidates."

Faiz Shakir: Yes, that's right. We are also advertising to people that we are a nonpartisan organization, that we don't endorse and oppose candidates. So when you watch an issue--

 

Lesley Stahl: It's like a wink thing. Ha, ha, we don't endorse--

 

Faiz Shakir: I don't think it is a wink thing.

 

In the Georgia governor's race, the ACLU ran an ad touting Democrat Stacey Abrams' record on criminal justice. 

Mom: We were so destroyed as a family.

Ira Glasser: They ran an ad which you could show to a thousand people and a thousand people would say, if you asked them, "Oh, that's a political ad for Stacey Abrams."  

Ira Glasser spent 34 years at the ACLU -- 23 of them as executive director. He believes the ACLU's involvement in candidate races has crossed the line into partisanship, and he's concerned enough about it to speak out.

Ira Glasser: I think it's strategically weakening its mission. The best strategy of protecting civil liberties is not to be partisan.  

Lesley Stahl: The current leadership of the ACLU would say what they're really doing is just telling you where Stacey Abrams stands on issues and where her opponent--

Ira Glasser: No, but that's not what they're doing.  There's nobody could look at that ad and not think it was a campaign ad for Stacey Abrams. It was. Look, we are living in a time now where Trump has made it a cultural habit to say-- to do something and then, while you're doing it, deny that you're doing it. So the fact that they deny it is just dissembling, it's just-- it's just, you know-- dishonest.

Lesley Stahl: Ira Glasser says that this is a key principle of the ACLU not to get involved with candidates. He thinks you crossed a line.

David Cole: He's welcome to his views and we'll defend his right to have his views. Look, the people who get elected have tremendous power to decide whether the government is going to respect civil liberties or violate civil liberties. And so why would you not ask the citizenry to think about that issue when they are choosing who they want in office?

Anthony Romero: It would be almost malpractice if in this moment we said, "Oh, we're not gonna engage the political process because we're afraid of being called partisan." When our issues are at play, like immigrants' rights, and voting rights, and reproductive rights, and LGBT rights, we have an affirmative obligation to step up.

But Glasser says they're stepping up too much, putting progressive politics ahead of traditional civil liberties concerns -- like the presumption of innocence.

Case in point: the ACLU's decision to oppose Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court nomination based on Christine Blasey Ford's allegation of sexual assault and Kavanaugh's response. The ACLU bussed and flew in large numbers of women to Capitol Hill to lobby key senators and ran an ad in four states, insinuating Kavanaugh's guilt by association.

--ACLU Ad--

Announcer: We've seen this before, denials from powerful men.

Bill Clinton: I did not have sexual relations with that woman.

Bill Cosby: I've never seen anything like this.

Brett Kavanaugh: I categorically and unequivocally deny the allegation against me by Dr. Ford.

Announcer: America is watching. Oppose the confirmation of Judge Kavanaugh.

Lesley Stahl: We've heard criticism that the ACLU would oppose someone on an unproven charge. You're usually defending people when there's an unproven charge.

David Cole: Right. And if the question was whether Brett Kavanaugh should go to jail, we would have defended him. But the question was not whether he should go to jail. The question was whether he should be appointed to one of the most powerful positions in government for life.

Lesley Stahl: This wasn't a criminal trial, it wasn't even a civil trial. It was a job interview.

Ira Glasser: I agree with the fact that it was a job interview and not a criminal trial but we're talking about the ACLU taking out a million dollars' worth of ads arguing that an accusation was the equivalent of a finding of guilt. For the ACLU, of all organizations, to be complicit in-- in the national pastime now of converting accusations into convictions without a trial-- [MAKES FACE]  

Lesley Stahl: Ira Glasser, who had your job for many years.

Anthony Romero: A great director.

Lesley Stahl: He has said that the changes that have come about recently under your leadership are shortsighted and may undermine the credibility of this organization.

Anthony Romero: I think he gets it wrong. We're more relevant now than we've ever been. We're more impactful than we've ever been. I think that's a sign of our success that we are willing to take kind of on new tactics and new strategies, even as we remain true to the core principles.

On election night in November, all the voting rights measures the ACLU fought for passed. And in Kansas, Kris Kobach was defeated. But victory didn't silence the criticism.

Three ACLU state affiliates have gone on record opposing what one called the "abandonment of non-partisanship," and "turning the ACLU into an advocacy organization."

Lesley Stahl: Do you see yourself now as a critic of the ACLU?

Ira Glasser: No, I see myself as a critic of some of what the ACLU is doing. The ACLU probably still does more good work on issues I care about than any organization in America. But I think they are undermining the sacred importance of their primary mission, and there's nobody else to do it.

Political director Faiz Shakir recently announced his departure from the ACLU. His new job. Bernie Sanders' campaign manager.

Produced by Shari Finkelstein. Associate producer, Jaime Woods.

Announcer: ACLU does not endorse or oppose candidates.

Yeah Right! No That's Yeah Left!

 




Reports of elder financial exploitation have increased ---
Financial elder fraud reports quadruple; amount reaches $1.7 billion
https://www.mcknightsseniorliving.com/home/news/financial-elder-fraud-reports-quadruple-amount-reaches-1-7-billion/

Current and past editions of Bob Jensen's blog called Fraud Updates --- http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudUpdates.htm
 




Bob Jensen's Tidbits Archives ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/tidbitsdirectory.htm 

Bob Jensen's Pictures and Stories
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Pictures.htm

Summary of Major Accounting Scandals --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accounting_scandals

Bob Jensen's threads on such scandals:

Bob Jensen's threads on audit firm litigation and negligence ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Fraud001.htm

Current and past editions of my newsletter called Fraud Updates ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudUpdates.htm

Enron --- http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudEnron.htm

Rotten to the Core --- http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudRotten.htm

American History of Fraud --- http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudAmericanHistory.htm

Bob Jensen's fraud conclusions ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudConclusion.htm

Bob Jensen's threads on auditor professionalism and independence are at
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Fraud001c.htm

Bob Jensen's threads on corporate governance are at
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/Fraud001.htm#Governance 

 

Shielding Against Validity Challenges in Plato's Cave ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/TheoryTAR.htm

·     With a Rejoinder from the 2010 Senior Editor of The Accounting Review (TAR), Steven J. Kachelmeier

·     With Replies in Appendix 4 to Professor Kachemeier by Professors Jagdish Gangolly and Paul Williams

·     With Added Conjectures in Appendix 1 as to Why the Profession of Accountancy Ignores TAR

·     With Suggestions in Appendix 2 for Incorporating Accounting Research into Undergraduate Accounting Courses

Shielding Against Validity Challenges in Plato's Cave  --- http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/TheoryTAR.htm
By Bob Jensen

What went wrong in accounting/accountics research?  ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/theory01.htm#WhatWentWrong

The Sad State of Accountancy Doctoral Programs That Do Not Appeal to Most Accountants ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/theory01.htm#DoctoralPrograms

AN ANALYSIS OF THE EVOLUTION OF RESEARCH CONTRIBUTIONS BY THE ACCOUNTING REVIEW: 1926-2005 ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/395wpTAR/Web/TAR395wp.htm#_msocom_1

Bob Jensen's threads on accounting theory ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/theory01.htm

Systemic problems of accountancy (especially the vegetable nutrition paradox) that probably will never be solved ---
http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudConclusion.htm#BadNews

Bob Jensen's economic crisis messaging http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/2008Bailout.htm

Bob Jensen's threads --- http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/threads.htm

Bob Jensen's Home Page --- http://faculty.trinity.edu/rjensen/