In the academic world, diversity means black leftists, white leftists, female leftists, and Hispanic leftists. Demographic diversity conceals ideological conformity.--Sowell
Monster Pirate game last night.
The backyard was beautiful. Jupiter really bright.
According to the Wall Street Journal, former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick has persuaded Nike to scrap plans to sell a shoe featuring the 13-star version of the American flag, known as the Betsy Ross flag. Kaepernick informed Nike that the 13-star version of the flag constitutes an “offensive symbol” due to its connection to an age of slavery. Nike agreed, and the shoe has been pulled.
The Revenue Act of 1913, which gave us our federal income tax structure we enjoy today, started out with the intention of only targeting roughly 3% of all income earners with a 1% marginal rate, but of course has expanded drastically since then. Oppression from little acorns grow.
Not much support--or talk--about the ACA during the debate, perhaps for good reason. Adjusted for inflation, consumer out-of-pocket expenditures on health care have been roughly flat since 2007. Obamacare didn’t make them go up, but it didn’t really reduce them, either. The rate of growth in health-services spending has risen substantially since 2013, when Obamacare’s main provisions took effect. And since someone has to pay for all that new spending, premiums have also risen at about the same pace as before Obamacare. So much for saving the average American family $2,500 a year.
The rate of Americans without health-care insurance is now within a percentage point of where it was in the first quarter of 2008, a year before Obama took office. Yet in 2008, the unemployment rate was more than a full percentage point higher than it is now. Given how many people use employer-provided health insurance, the uninsured rate ought to be markedly lower than it was back then.
Meanwhile, the various proposals that were supposed to streamline care and improve incentives have produced fairly underwhelming results.
Let's expand this show to Medicare-for-All.
If those magnanimous wealthy guys who want to raise taxes on themselves (rather than donate money to the government) think this is such a good idea, why do they put so much money in tax-free foundations?
The world’s most valuable public companies are five American technology firms: Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, Alphabet, and Facebook. And one reason Big Tech is so big is that it’s so important in our daily lives. Research suggests consumers would have to be paid hundreds or thousands of dollars a year to give up search or social media. And a new Federal Reserve study finds internet services have increased consumer welfare by nearly $2,000 a year annually since 2004.
But they are in the hotseat because of political grievance. Here is the president Wednesday on Fox Business, talking about America’s tech titans: “I’ll tell you what, they should be sued because what’s happening with the bias — and now you see it with that executive yesterday from Google. The hatred for the Republicans … These people are all Democrats, it’s totally biased toward Democrats.”
The government knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men.
On this day in 1776, the Second Continental Congress, assembled in Philadelphia, formally adopted Richard Henry Lee’s resolution for independence from Great Britain. The vote was unanimous, with only New York abstaining.
The Sequence To Independence
The Declaration of Independence came 442 days after the first volleys of the American Revolution were fired at Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts. It was a long time coming.
The first major colonial opposition to British policy came in 1765 after Parliament passed the Stamp Act, a measure to raise revenues for a standing British army in America. Under the banner of “no taxation without representation,” colonists convened the Stamp Act Congress in October 1765 to vocalize their opposition to the tax. With its enactment in November, most colonists called for a boycott of British goods, and some organized attacks on the customhouses and homes of tax collectors. After months of protest in the colonies, Parliament voted to repeal the Stamp Act in March 1766.
It was a while before the next problem, the result of the British effort to aid the faltering East India Company. Parliament enacted the Tea Act in 1773 which greatly lowered its tea tax and granting the Company a monopoly on the American tea trade. Many colonists viewed the act as another example of taxation tyranny. In response, militant Patriots in Massachusetts organized the “Boston Tea Party,” which saw British tea valued at some 18,000 pounds dumped into Boston Harbor.
Parliament, outraged by the Boston Tea Party and other blatant acts of destruction of British property, enacted the Coercive Acts, also known as the Intolerable Acts, in 1774. The Coercive Acts closed Boston to merchant shipping, established formal British military rule in Massachusetts, made British officials immune to criminal prosecution in America, and required colonists to quarter British troops in their homes. The colonists subsequently called the first Continental Congress to consider a united American resistance to the British.
In April 1775, Thomas Gage, the British governor of Massachusetts, ordered British troops to march to Concord, Massachusetts, where a Patriot arsenal was known to be located. On April 19, 1775, the British regulars encountered a group of American militiamen at Lexington, and the first shots of the American Revolution were fired.
June 17, 1775 Major General William Howe defeated the Americans at Bunker Hill, the first time the Americans stood and fought. It was a Pyrrhic victory. 140 colonists were killed and 271 wounded. 226 British were dead and 828 wounded. The vast majority of Rebel deaths came from bayoneting the wounded in the field by British soldiers, furious at their losses. The behavior of the British soldiers enraged the colonists and tipped most away from reconciliation with the crown and into separation. Historian Richard Ellis says that the Battle at Bunker Hill scarred Gen. Howe, one of the crown's elite generals. Never again would he be comfortable with assaulting rebel fixed positions and he yearned for reconciliation--a feeling many believe hampered his generalship, especially in the siege of New York.
In January 1776, Thomas Paine published Common Sense, an influential political pamphlet that convincingly argued for American independence and sold more than 500,000 copies in a few months. In the spring of 1776, support for independence swept the colonies, the Continental Congress called for states to form their own governments, and a five-man committee was assigned to draft a declaration.
On July 2, 1776, the Continental Congress voted to approve a Virginia motion calling for separation from Britain. The dramatic words of this resolution were added to the closing of the Declaration of Independence. Two days later, on July 4, the declaration was formally adopted by 12 colonies after minor revision. New York approved it on July 19. On August 2, the declaration was signed.
The American War for Independence would last for five more years. Yet to come were the Patriot triumphs at Saratoga, the bitter winter at Valley Forge, the intervention of the French, and the final victory at Yorktown in 1781. In 1783, with the signing of the Treaty of Paris with Britain, the United States formally became a free and independent nation.
Under America’s first governing document, the Articles of Confederation, the national government was weak and states operated like independent countries. The debate over the power of a unifying federal government went on until 1787 when a convention was held in Philadelphia presided over by George Washington. There delegates devised a plan for a stronger federal government with three branches–executive, legislative and judicial–along with a system of checks and balances to ensure no single branch would have too much power. It was signed on September 17, 1787. The Bill of Rights–10 amendments guaranteeing basic individual protections such as freedom of speech and religion–became part of the Constitution in 1791.
The first presidential election electing Washington was held from Monday, December 15, 1788 to Saturday, January 10, 1789, five years after the Treaty of Paris.
Monster Pirate game last night.
The backyard was beautiful. Jupiter really bright.
According to the Wall Street Journal, former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick has persuaded Nike to scrap plans to sell a shoe featuring the 13-star version of the American flag, known as the Betsy Ross flag. Kaepernick informed Nike that the 13-star version of the flag constitutes an “offensive symbol” due to its connection to an age of slavery. Nike agreed, and the shoe has been pulled.
Now, I'm trying to be open minded about this. A company can pursue whatever path it choses. On the other hand, I do not want people, especially dumb ones, making sweeping historical and cultural generalizations about me or us.
The Revenue Act of 1913, which gave us our federal income tax structure we enjoy today, started out with the intention of only targeting roughly 3% of all income earners with a 1% marginal rate, but of course has expanded drastically since then. Oppression from little acorns grow.
Not much support--or talk--about the ACA during the debate, perhaps for good reason. Adjusted for inflation, consumer out-of-pocket expenditures on health care have been roughly flat since 2007. Obamacare didn’t make them go up, but it didn’t really reduce them, either. The rate of growth in health-services spending has risen substantially since 2013, when Obamacare’s main provisions took effect. And since someone has to pay for all that new spending, premiums have also risen at about the same pace as before Obamacare. So much for saving the average American family $2,500 a year.
The rate of Americans without health-care insurance is now within a percentage point of where it was in the first quarter of 2008, a year before Obama took office. Yet in 2008, the unemployment rate was more than a full percentage point higher than it is now. Given how many people use employer-provided health insurance, the uninsured rate ought to be markedly lower than it was back then.
Meanwhile, the various proposals that were supposed to streamline care and improve incentives have produced fairly underwhelming results.
Let's expand this show to Medicare-for-All.
If those magnanimous wealthy guys who want to raise taxes on themselves (rather than donate money to the government) think this is such a good idea, why do they put so much money in tax-free foundations?
The world’s most valuable public companies are five American technology firms: Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, Alphabet, and Facebook. And one reason Big Tech is so big is that it’s so important in our daily lives. Research suggests consumers would have to be paid hundreds or thousands of dollars a year to give up search or social media. And a new Federal Reserve study finds internet services have increased consumer welfare by nearly $2,000 a year annually since 2004.
But they are in the hotseat because of political grievance. Here is the president Wednesday on Fox Business, talking about America’s tech titans: “I’ll tell you what, they should be sued because what’s happening with the bias — and now you see it with that executive yesterday from Google. The hatred for the Republicans … These people are all Democrats, it’s totally biased toward Democrats.”
The government knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men.
On this day in 1776, the Second Continental Congress, assembled in Philadelphia, formally adopted Richard Henry Lee’s resolution for independence from Great Britain. The vote was unanimous, with only New York abstaining.
The Sequence To Independence
The Declaration of Independence came 442 days after the first volleys of the American Revolution were fired at Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts. It was a long time coming.
The first major colonial opposition to British policy came in 1765 after Parliament passed the Stamp Act, a measure to raise revenues for a standing British army in America. Under the banner of “no taxation without representation,” colonists convened the Stamp Act Congress in October 1765 to vocalize their opposition to the tax. With its enactment in November, most colonists called for a boycott of British goods, and some organized attacks on the customhouses and homes of tax collectors. After months of protest in the colonies, Parliament voted to repeal the Stamp Act in March 1766.
It was a while before the next problem, the result of the British effort to aid the faltering East India Company. Parliament enacted the Tea Act in 1773 which greatly lowered its tea tax and granting the Company a monopoly on the American tea trade. Many colonists viewed the act as another example of taxation tyranny. In response, militant Patriots in Massachusetts organized the “Boston Tea Party,” which saw British tea valued at some 18,000 pounds dumped into Boston Harbor.
Parliament, outraged by the Boston Tea Party and other blatant acts of destruction of British property, enacted the Coercive Acts, also known as the Intolerable Acts, in 1774. The Coercive Acts closed Boston to merchant shipping, established formal British military rule in Massachusetts, made British officials immune to criminal prosecution in America, and required colonists to quarter British troops in their homes. The colonists subsequently called the first Continental Congress to consider a united American resistance to the British.
In April 1775, Thomas Gage, the British governor of Massachusetts, ordered British troops to march to Concord, Massachusetts, where a Patriot arsenal was known to be located. On April 19, 1775, the British regulars encountered a group of American militiamen at Lexington, and the first shots of the American Revolution were fired.
June 17, 1775 Major General William Howe defeated the Americans at Bunker Hill, the first time the Americans stood and fought. It was a Pyrrhic victory. 140 colonists were killed and 271 wounded. 226 British were dead and 828 wounded. The vast majority of Rebel deaths came from bayoneting the wounded in the field by British soldiers, furious at their losses. The behavior of the British soldiers enraged the colonists and tipped most away from reconciliation with the crown and into separation. Historian Richard Ellis says that the Battle at Bunker Hill scarred Gen. Howe, one of the crown's elite generals. Never again would he be comfortable with assaulting rebel fixed positions and he yearned for reconciliation--a feeling many believe hampered his generalship, especially in the siege of New York.
In January 1776, Thomas Paine published Common Sense, an influential political pamphlet that convincingly argued for American independence and sold more than 500,000 copies in a few months. In the spring of 1776, support for independence swept the colonies, the Continental Congress called for states to form their own governments, and a five-man committee was assigned to draft a declaration.
On July 2, 1776, the Continental Congress voted to approve a Virginia motion calling for separation from Britain. The dramatic words of this resolution were added to the closing of the Declaration of Independence. Two days later, on July 4, the declaration was formally adopted by 12 colonies after minor revision. New York approved it on July 19. On August 2, the declaration was signed.
The American War for Independence would last for five more years. Yet to come were the Patriot triumphs at Saratoga, the bitter winter at Valley Forge, the intervention of the French, and the final victory at Yorktown in 1781. In 1783, with the signing of the Treaty of Paris with Britain, the United States formally became a free and independent nation.
Under America’s first governing document, the Articles of Confederation, the national government was weak and states operated like independent countries. The debate over the power of a unifying federal government went on until 1787 when a convention was held in Philadelphia presided over by George Washington. There delegates devised a plan for a stronger federal government with three branches–executive, legislative and judicial–along with a system of checks and balances to ensure no single branch would have too much power. It was signed on September 17, 1787. The Bill of Rights–10 amendments guaranteeing basic individual protections such as freedom of speech and religion–became part of the Constitution in 1791.
The first presidential election electing Washington was held from Monday, December 15, 1788 to Saturday, January 10, 1789, five years after the Treaty of Paris.
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