[This year’s Virginia gubernatorial election reminds me both dreadfully and hilariously of the 2016 election for POTUS. We have limousine liberal Terry McAuliffe running against Trump acolyte Glenn Youngkin. It is a close race coming up to the wire due to unforced errors on the liberal side. VA could be turning from black and blue to purple again.]
Former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe handed his Republican gubernatorial opponent Glenn Youngkin a campaign ad on a silver platter during a Tuesday debate by stating that he would not allow parents to tell schools what to teach their children.
McAuliffe, a Democrat who is seeking a second, nonconsecutive term as Virginia governor in November’s off-year election, proudly acknowledged Tuesday that he vetoed legislation while governor that would have alerted parents when there was sexually explicit content in instructional materials.
“I’m not going to let parents come into schools and actually take books out and make their own decision,” McAuliffe said. “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.”
By mid-Wednesday, Youngkin, a first-time candidate and former co-CEO of the Carlyle Group, turned McAuliffe’s statement into a campaign ad. It contrasted McAuliffe’s words with complaints from parents speaking about sexually explicit content in school materials.
“You believe school systems should tell children what to do. I believe parents should be in charge of their kids’ education,” Youngkin said during the debate.
Culture wars over “critical race theory” and transgender policy have taken hold in school board fights across the state, fueling Republican organizing power. In Northern Virginia’s Loudoun County, a blowup at a school board meeting earlier this year led to two arrests.
McAuliffe’s position may also run counter to Virginia law, Youngkin’s campaign noted. A state law reads: ‘A parent has a fundamental right to make decisions concerning the upbringing, education, and care of the parent’s child.’…”
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
Politically speaking, no one can blow a sure thing better than a limousine liberal. McAuliffe could still win though, because Glenn Youngkin is a total toad. However, that did not stop Trump from winning in 2016. Which reminds me that prior to 2016 POTUS election President Obama seemed like no big deal, a bit of a disappointment in absence of a glimpse into our alternatives. After 2016 then Obama was the greatest POTUS of the 21st century. Likewise, my opinion of Ralph Northam has risen substantially of late.
… Democratic governor Phil Murphy is running for a second term against former Republican state legislator Jack Ciattarelli. …
… Ciattarelli has given Donald Trump a wide berth (reciprocated, so far, by the former president)… This hasn’t kept Murphy from trying to tie the Republican to his party’s lord and master; Ciattarelli is still having to explain a November 2020 postelection rally where he appeared next to signs reading “Stop the Steal” (he claims he thought the rally was about the 2021 race). …
Similar deal in NJ. Incumbent Dem Murphy vs Ciattirelli, former
GOP state legislator, now in a close race. NJ, it’s your call.
Ciattarelli has given Donald Trump a wide berth (reciprocated, so far, by the former president)… This hasn’t kept Murphy from trying to tie the Republican to his party’s lord and master; Ciattarelli is still having to explain a November 2020 postelection rally where he appeared next to signs reading “Stop the Steal” (he claims he thought the rally was about the 2021 race). And while Ciattarelli has not opposed COVID-19 vaccines or masking, he has opposed mandates for vaccines and for masking of children. …
Ciattarelli (GOP) has given Donald Trump a wide berth (reciprocated, so far, by the former president), and defeated two very Trumpy opponents in the June GOP primary. This hasn’t kept Murphy (Dem) from trying to tie the Republican to his party’s lord and master; Ciattarelli is still having to explain a November 2020 postelection rally where he appeared next to signs reading “Stop the Steal” …
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
It is no easier to sell Thorstein Veblen to capitalists that it is to sell Karl Marx to capitalists, but Groucho – maybe easier sell to capitalists. OTOH it is easier to sell Thorstein Veblen to the US working class than it is to sell Karl Marx to the US working class. Also, it may be easier to sell Karl Marx to academics and public intellectuals than it is to sell Thorstein Veblen to academics and public intellectuals, because Marxists would only murder most academics and public intellectuals whereas realists would simply find them irrelevant.
Ron (RC) Weakley (A.K.A., Darryl For A While At EV) says:
My endorsement of the thinking of dead people, including Veblen, is always limited, with the exception of Keynes so far at least. Their time was then and our time is now. There is no bridge across the boundaries of time that can accommodate the growth in population and technology with its attendant complexity in both problems and solutions. Likewise, moral compasses sit on the shifting sands of time without stabilizing them against the tides of change. OTOH, if one is to broker a sale, then one will need a buyer. If one is to mass market, then one will need lots of buyers.
… Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California told Democrats they were on “the verge of something major,” according to two people familiar with her comments, who disclosed the private remarks on condition of anonymity. She called the legislation “transformative, historic and bigger than anything else.”
The caucus concluded shortly before 10:30 a.m. Ms. Pelosi and Representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington, the chairwoman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, are set to meet this afternoon as talks continue over the plan, according to an aide.
Leaving the caucus meeting, Ms. Pelosi said “there’s not that much more time — we have to have decisions largely today, a little bit into tomorrow, so we can proceed.” Asked about what was left on the negotiating table, she said, “I think it’s pretty self-evident.”
The White House and congressional leaders hope for a deal on the expansive plan this week, before President Biden leaves on Thursday for a trip that includes a United Nations climate conference in Glasgow …
… Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California told Democrats they were on “the verge of something major,” according to two people familiar with her comments, who disclosed the private remarks on condition of anonymity. She called the legislation “transformative, historic and bigger than anything else.”
The caucus concluded shortly before 10:30 a.m. Ms. Pelosi and Representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington, the chairwoman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, are set to meet this afternoon as talks continue over the plan, according to an aide.
Leaving the caucus meeting, Ms. Pelosi said “there’s not that much more time — we have to have decisions largely today, a little bit into tomorrow, so we can proceed.” Asked about what was left on the negotiating table, she said, “I think it’s pretty self-evident.”
At the White House, Jen Psaki, the press secretary, acknowledged that the package would not contain everything that President Biden originally wanted, but she argued that it was still well worth supporting.
“The alternative to what is being negotiated is not the original package, it is nothing,” she said, warning against letting “the perfect be the enemy of the historic.”
The White House and congressional leaders hope for a deal on the expansive plan this week, before Mr. Biden leaves on Thursday for a trip that includes a United Nations climate conference in Glasgow …
Democrats scrambled on Tuesday to determine how to pay for their sprawling spending plan as lawmakers expressed growing doubts about the feasibility of a new tax on billionaires and a proposal to make banks turn over more information about their customers’ accounts to the Internal Revenue Service. …
Democrats have been considering applying a more stringent version of capital gains taxes on the billionaire class and a new corporate minimum tax on the “book income” that companies report to their investors but not the Internal Revenue Service.
On Tuesday afternoon, Senators Ron Wyden of Oregon, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Angus King, an independent from Maine, unveiled legislation aimed at ensuring that companies that report profits to shareholders but have little or no tax liability still pay a minimum amount in federal income taxes. The proposal would require companies with more than $1 billion of book income — the earnings that firms report each quarter to shareholders — pay a tax rate of at least 15 percent on those profits.
The lawmakers said the tax would apply to about 200 companies, including Amazon, and that it would raise “hundreds of billions” of dollars in tax revenue over a decade. …
Enacting the proposal would allow lawmakers to get more tax revenue from big companies without raising the corporate tax rate. The Biden administration proposed raising the corporate rate to 28 percent from 21 percent, but moderate Senate Democrats including Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona have been reluctant to raise rates on individuals or corporations.
But Ms. Sinema threw her support behind the corporate minimum tax in a statement on Tuesday, saying it “represents a commonsense step toward ensuring that highly profitable corporations — which sometimes can avoid the current corporate tax rate — pay a reasonable minimum corporate tax on their profits, just as everyday Arizonans and Arizona small businesses do.”
Another plan to raise revenue by increasing taxes on billionaires was running into problems on Tuesday. Lobbyists familiar with the discussion said that Senate Democrats were struggling with the complexity of the new billionaire tax and were considering introducing a version of a surtax for millionaires that House Democrats introduced this year …
Senate Democrats rushed on Tuesday to nail down the details of a groundbreaking tax on billionaires’ wealth, part of an elaborate menu of tax increases to finance a significantly scaled-back bill that would strengthen the social safety net and address climate change.
Democrats’ plans to pay for about $1.5 trillion in social policy and climate spending could prove to be the most innovative components of the party’s domestic legislation, a top priority, which was once envisioned as a transformative cradle-to-grave initiative to vault a stagnant working class into prosperity. Now, even as President Biden and his allies cut down the plan to ensure it can pass even with Democrats’ razor-thin edge in Congress, they are toiling to agree on new tax policies that could have far-reaching consequences.
Among them is a measure Senate Democrats presented on Tuesday that would impose a 15 percent minimum tax rate on corporations based on the profits they report to their shareholders, not what they show to the Internal Revenue Service.
The billionaires’ tax and the corporate minimum tax faced skepticism among House Democrats, who questioned their feasibility, and both were likely to encounter legal and constitutional challenges. For the first time, billionaires would face a tax on the unrealized gains in the value of their liquid assets, such as stocks, bonds and cash, which can grow for years as vast capital stores that can be borrowed off to live virtually income tax-free. …
President Biden will go to the Capitol on Thursday to announce a “framework” agreement for a social safety net and climate change bill that would most likely bolster support for child care and early childhood education while coaxing the economy away from fossil fuels.
Details were still unclear on the precise shape of the package, but people familiar with his plans said the president, who delayed his departure for a trip to Europe to nail down an accord on his domestic agenda, would use a 9 a.m. meeting at the Capitol to rally House Democrats around the emerging deal.
He was pushing to convince liberal members that a final compromise was close enough to allow them to support a separate, $1 trillion infrastructure bill that has already passed the Senate.
One of the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said Mr. Biden expected the plan would secure the support of every congressional Democrat. But at least one lawmaker involved in the talks had been told as of Thursday morning that two crucial holdouts, Senators Joe Manchin III of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, had yet to commit to voting for it, according to another person briefed on the discussions, who also spoke on the condition of anonymity. …
The proposal to fund the president’s sprawling spending plan mostly turns up the dial on more conventional tax policies, while trying to curb maneuvers that allow tax avoidance.
President Biden’s new plan to pay for his climate change and social policy package includes nearly $2 trillion in tax increases on corporations and the rich. But many of the more contentious and untested proposals that Democrats have been considering in recent weeks were left on the cutting-room floor.
The latest proposal reflects the reality that moderate Democrats are unwilling to back certain ideas aimed at raising money, including taxing the unrealized capital gains of billionaires and giving the Internal Revenue Service more insight into the finances of taxpayers. Ultimately, the package of tax increases mostly turns up the dial on more conventional tax policies, while adding some new wrinkles to curb maneuvers that allow tax avoidance.
“I think in terms of who they’re targeting, they did decide to target the larger population of very rich people and not just get the money from a very small group of superrich people,” said Howard Gleckman, a senior fellow at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center.
Instead of a wealth tax or a special tax on billionaires, Mr. Biden rolled out a new “surtax” on income for multimillionaires and billionaires. It would effectively raise the top tax rate on ordinary income to 45 percent for the highest earners. …
Making corporations pay more.
Borrowing a page from his campaign playbook, Mr. Biden wants to impose a 15 percent minimum tax on profitable companies that have little to no federal tax liability. Many profitable companies are able to reduce or eliminate their tax liability through the use of tax credits, deductions and previous losses that can carry over. The new tax would apply to companies with more than $1 billion in so-called book income — profits that firms report to their shareholders but not to the I.R.S. …
White House and Treasury Department officials have spent months pushing a proposal to narrow the $7 trillion gap in taxes that are owed by individuals and businesses but not collected. The administration initially wanted to invest $80 billion in additional enforcement staffing at the I.R.S. and require banks to hand over more information about the finances of their customers.
Under the new proposal, the I.R.S. would get more money to ramp up audits of people making more than $400,000. …
Reducing the deficit, maybe.
Mr. Biden said on Thursday that his plans were “fiscally responsible” and claimed that the proposals, if enacted, would reduce the country’s budget deficit.
The $2 trillion of proposed tax increases would more than offset the $1.85 trillion in spending on housing, child care and climate initiatives. …
If John Steinbeck were traveling with Charley today, then where would he go?
[This year’s Virginia gubernatorial election reminds me both dreadfully and hilariously of the 2016 election for POTUS. We have limousine liberal Terry McAuliffe running against Trump acolyte Glenn Youngkin. It is a close race coming up to the wire due to unforced errors on the liberal side. VA could be turning from black and blue to purple again.]
https://www.yahoo.com/now/mcauliffe-says-parents-shouldn-t-173500644.html
“
Former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe handed his Republican gubernatorial opponent Glenn Youngkin a campaign ad on a silver platter during a Tuesday debate by stating that he would not allow parents to tell schools what to teach their children.
McAuliffe, a Democrat who is seeking a second, nonconsecutive term as Virginia governor in November’s off-year election, proudly acknowledged Tuesday that he vetoed legislation while governor that would have alerted parents when there was sexually explicit content in instructional materials.
“I’m not going to let parents come into schools and actually take books out and make their own decision,” McAuliffe said. “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.”
IN VIRGINIA GOVERNOR’S RACE, GOP SEES HARBINGER OF 2022 SUCCESS
By mid-Wednesday, Youngkin, a first-time candidate and former co-CEO of the Carlyle Group, turned McAuliffe’s statement into a campaign ad. It contrasted McAuliffe’s words with complaints from parents speaking about sexually explicit content in school materials.
“You believe school systems should tell children what to do. I believe parents should be in charge of their kids’ education,” Youngkin said during the debate.
Culture wars over “critical race theory” and transgender policy have taken hold in school board fights across the state, fueling Republican organizing power. In Northern Virginia’s Loudoun County, a blowup at a school board meeting earlier this year led to two arrests.
McAuliffe’s position may also run counter to Virginia law, Youngkin’s campaign noted. A state law reads: ‘A parent has a fundamental right to make decisions concerning the upbringing, education, and care of the parent’s child.’…”
IOW, reality gets a bruising.
Politically speaking, no one can blow a sure thing better than a limousine liberal. McAuliffe could still win though, because Glenn Youngkin is a total toad. However, that did not stop Trump from winning in 2016. Which reminds me that prior to 2016 POTUS election President Obama seemed like no big deal, a bit of a disappointment in absence of a glimpse into our alternatives. After 2016 then Obama was the greatest POTUS of the 21st century. Likewise, my opinion of Ralph Northam has risen substantially of late.
If you want to empower Trump, you should vote for Youngkin.
Otherwise, it’s got to be McAuliffe. VA, you decide.
(A similar situation in NJ. To empower Trump, vote for the little known GOP challenger. Otherwise, vote for the Dem incumbent. Your call, NJ.)
NJ Governor’s Race Is Getting Interesting
Similar deal in NJ. Incumbent Dem Murphy vs Ciattirelli, former
GOP state legislator, now in a close race. NJ, it’s your call.
New Jersey Governor’s Race
Likewise in NJ.
NJ Governor’s Race Is Getting Interesting
Likewise in NJ. (Link won’t post.)
Ciattarelli (GOP) has given Donald Trump a wide berth (reciprocated, so far, by the former president), and defeated two very Trumpy opponents in the June GOP primary. This hasn’t kept Murphy (Dem) from trying to tie the Republican to his party’s lord and master; Ciattarelli is still having to explain a November 2020 postelection rally where he appeared next to signs reading “Stop the Steal” …
It is no easier to sell Thorstein Veblen to capitalists that it is to sell Karl Marx to capitalists, but Groucho – maybe easier sell to capitalists. OTOH it is easier to sell Thorstein Veblen to the US working class than it is to sell Karl Marx to the US working class. Also, it may be easier to sell Karl Marx to academics and public intellectuals than it is to sell Thorstein Veblen to academics and public intellectuals, because Marxists would only murder most academics and public intellectuals whereas realists would simply find them irrelevant.
I.e., irrelevance is a fate worse than death to the irrelevant.
My endorsement of the thinking of dead people, including Veblen, is always limited, with the exception of Keynes so far at least. Their time was then and our time is now. There is no bridge across the boundaries of time that can accommodate the growth in population and technology with its attendant complexity in both problems and solutions. Likewise, moral compasses sit on the shifting sands of time without stabilizing them against the tides of change. OTOH, if one is to broker a sale, then one will need a buyer. If one is to mass market, then one will need lots of buyers.
Democrats met to discuss the social policy bill as they press for an elusive deal
Democrats met to discuss the social policy bill as they press for an elusive deal
Democrats’ tax plans remain in flux
(It looks like the Dems will propose something major after all)
by tapping billionaires’ unrealized gains and by ensuring that the biggest companies cannot avoid income taxes altogether
Biden plans to announce a framework for his social policy and climate bill
How Biden’s $2 Trillion in Tax Increases Target Companies and the Rich