Tea at Trianon: Biden's Economic Plan

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Friday, October 23, 2020

Biden's Economic Plan

From Fox Business:

Joe Biden's economic agenda could destroy millions of American jobs and crush the nation's slow-but-steady recovery from the coronavirus pandemic, according to new projections from President Trump's former economists.
The Democratic presidential candidate's plan would ultimately result in about 4.9 million fewer full-time employees and reduce the nation's GDP, the broadest measures of goods and services produced in the country, by more than 8% over the next decade, according to the report, which was authored by Casey Mulligan, a University of Chicago professor who previously served as chief economist of the White House Council of Economic Advisers; Kevin Hassett, also a former White House economist now at Stanford University's Hoover Institution; Timothy Fitzgerald and Cody Kallen.
A Biden presidency would translate into a loss of roughly $6,500 per household per year, the study shows.
The economists projected that Biden's plan to expand subsidies for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act; undo some of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and increase the taxation of corporates; and establish new environmental standards, reversing years of regulatory reform, would discourage Americans from working more and earning more.
The former vice president has unveiled a multitrillion-dollar agenda that would be funded in large part by higher taxes on wealthy U.S. households – which he describes as anyone earning more than $400,000 annually – and corporations. That includes higher income tax rates, an expansion of the payroll tax for Social Security, new tax credits and fewer deductions. (Read more.)

From The New York Post:

Now we learn that Biden has secretly been playing footsie with China.

The statement Wednesday night asserting that the former vice president was a willing and eager participant in a family scheme to make millions of dollars by partnering with a shady Chinese Communist firm is a singular event in a presidential race already overflowing with drama and intrigue.

The dynamite assertion, believable because it aligns with earlier information we know to be true, came in a statement by Tony Bobulinski, who describes himself as a former partner of Hunter Biden, Joe Biden and Joe’s brother Jim in the China scheme. Bobulinski unloads his bill of accusations in blunt but precise language and detail.
He confirms that he was one of the recipients of the May 13, 2017, email published by The Post eight days ago. That email, from another partner in the group, laid out cash and equity positions and mysteriously included a 10 percent set-aside for “the big guy.” (Read more.)

From The Washington Examiner:

Democratic insiders are plagued by a nagging case of political PTSD as Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden carries a lead into the final two weeks of a hard-fought White House campaign, confident in their party’s nominee but afraid to count President Trump out after the unlikely comeback he pulled off four years ago.

Logically, Democrats look at Biden’s position relative to Trump and are heartened. The former vice president leads the incumbent by 8.6 percentage points nationally. He tops Trump in key Rust Belt battlegrounds, is on offense in traditionally red Arizona and Georgia, and threatens in Iowa and Ohio — states the president won big in 2016. Compared to Hillary Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee, Biden is overperforming with key voting blocs that could decide the election.

But Democrats have been here before. Four years ago, Trump erased Clinton’s significant leads in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin in the final 10 days of the campaign and won a dogfight in Florida to score a sizable Electoral College victory.

Democratic strategists believe the polling data. But “scarred by 2016,” as one otherwise optimistic party insider put it, Democrats are bracing for the possibility that the race could tighten, either naturally or because of surprise developments. (Read more.)