Category Archives: Business

NEW COLUMN: Trump Fends Off ‘Showboat’ Comey And The Federal Zombies

Business, Donald Trump, Russia, The State

“Trump Fends Off ‘Showboat’ Comey And The Federal Zombies” is the current column, now on American Thinker. An excerpt:

He pleaded the case of a loyal soldier, rather than forsake retired US Army lieutenant general Michael Flynn to the mercies of FBI director James Comey. And he asked for loyalty from the congenitally disloyal. You’ll agree: President Donald Trump is being indicted on technicalities and on personal style.

Distill the president’s unremarkable actions, subject to a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing, and it becomes clear that The establishment—for sensible people outside the beltway have dissociate from the Russia-collusion phantasmagoria—is indicting him on the plain, impolitic speech that catapulted Donald Trump from candidate to president.

Trump is “aggressive and oblivious to the rules of engagement,” fumed CNN’s sibilant Chris Cillizza, formerly of the Washington Post. Correct. But was the language of combat you deployed, Mr. Cillizza, a Freudian slip?

The president’s linguistic infelicities—a word salad, at times—have given the press popinjays and their Washington overlords the foothold needed to go after the president. Throw in the “bad” habits of a businessman he has retained. Trump transacts with everyone—Russians too. We voted for deals, not wars.

This is the sum and substance of President Trump’s offenses. That, and beating Hillary Clinton to the White House.

Proponents of free-markets understand how business operates. Statists don’t. To the statist, the Fake News fabricator and the stark raving mad Washington Post (WaPo), “Trump sitting next to Russian Ambassador Yuri Dubinin, at a luncheon hosted by Leonard Lauder, the oldest son of Estée Lauder,” in 1986, is incriminating evidence … of something.

The tidbit made it on to a sinister WaPo list, “Team Trump’s ties to Russian interests.” To the same statists, Trump “meeting with Russian businessmen, including a real estate developer,” in 2013, “while in Moscow for his Miss Universe competition,” is yet more circumstantial evidence of … something.

Citizen Trump was bringing a fun event to Russia! To members of the American media-military-congressional-industrial complex, being amicable with foreign interests is a foreign concept. At the same time, he did some business there. Inconceivable! Had Mr. Trump smuggled a dirty bomb into Russia, under the “clever” guise of pursuing commerce, his militant enemies stateside might forgive him today. The tools threatening President Trump with impeachment have one bag of tricks stuffed with power tools: they audit, indict, arrest, bomb, change regimes. They don’t make profitable business deals; they tax them. They don’t make peace; they wage war.

Prone to seeing faces in the clouds, the reporters—they’ve lost their minuscule minds—frame the act of putting in a kind word for “a good guy,” as Trump did in February 2017, for Gen. Michael Flynn, as an obstruction of justice. …

… READ the rest. “Trump Fends Off ‘Showboat’ Comey And The Federal Zombies” is the current column, now on American Thinker.

Elon Musk, Et Al.: The Corporate Arm Of The Deep State

Business, Donald Trump, Environmentalism & Animal Rights, Federalism, Government, Russia

“Elon Musk, Et Al.: The Corporate Arm Of The Deep State” is the current column, now on Townhall.com.  An excerpt:

… “Deep State” is no conspiracy theory. There’s nothing mythical about the Republican and Democratic career government workers, embedded like parasites in the bowels of the bureaucracy, the intelligence community, the military, and a like-minded media, who’ve risen on their hind legs to protect their turf and protest an agenda that leaves them out in the cold.

The anatomy and workings of the Deep State are, in my opinion, reflexive, rather than a matter of collusion and conspiracy. Simple psychology—human nature at its worst—sees government jobs and programs, war and welfare alike, protected in perpetuity and at all costs by the administrators of government jobs and programs.

Hidden or in plain sight, The State is geared toward increasing or maintaining its sphere of influence, never reducing it. Voters are paid lip service, provided their wishes coincide with the aims of this unelected, entrenched apparatus.

But when the popular will defies Deep State, that monster breathes fire.

The “technocratic elite” has a corporate extension. Engorged government bureaucracies are complemented by colossal corporate entities, whose virtue-signaling managers have occupied “the commanding heights of the economy, politics, and culture.” As Burnham warned they would.

The corporate element of this government-within-government superstructure (yes, the conservative Burnham had a Trotskyite beginning) has special access by virtue of its obscene wealth. Think the liver-spotted George Soros, who moves to overthrow governments in “lesser” countries. Think Apple’s Tim Cook, Microsoft’s Brad Smith, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Uber’s Travis Kalanick, or Google’s Sundar Pichai. They all sprang into action against Trump’s secession from the Paris Climate Accord. …

… READ THE REST. “Elon Musk, Et Al.: The Corporate Arm Of The Deep State” is the current column, now on Townhall.com.

UPDATE II (5/11): Weasel Words About The TRUMP Tax Plan

Business, Donald Trump, libertarianism, Private Property, Taxation

I thought I’d listen to some wise words from David Stockman about the Trump tax plan. Stockman is, after all, a hero of libertarians. Instead, I got an earful of weasel words.

I can’t listen to a “libertarian” prattle about “paying for tax cuts.” You’re no libertarian if you talk like this. Taxes are private property stolen. Tax cuts are private property returned to its rightful owners. Or, so we hope. “Paying for tax cuts”: These are weasel words.

UPDATED 5/3:
Larry Kudlow, Stephen Moore (he wrote a book praising the Bush ‘ownership society,’ more candidly known as the mortgage bubble), anyone?

Corporate America, on the other hand, will benefit big time:

Reduction of rates, but no restructuring of the tax code:

Corporate America über alles.

This seems related, don’t you think?

UPDATE II (5/11):

Mainstream Media, don’t tell America. Trump Admin strikes a trade deal with China to boost exports & benefit the US!

UPDATED II (4/24): Why The H-1B Visa Racket Should Be Abolished, Not Reformed

Business, Free Markets, IMMIGRATION, Labor, libertarianism, Paleolibertarianism, Technology, Welfare

“Why The H-1B Visa Racket Should Be Abolished, Not Reformed” is the new column, trending on Townhall.com. An excerpt:

Billionaire businessman Marc Cuban insists that the H-1B visa racket is a feature of the vaunted American free market. This is nonsense on stilts. It can’t go unchallenged.

Another billionaire, our president, has ordered that the H-1B program be reformed. This, too, is disappointing. You’ll see why.

First, let’s correct Mr. Cuban: America has not a free economy, but a mixed-economy. State and markets are intertwined. Trade, including trade in labor, is not free; it’s regulated to the hilt. If anything, the labyrinth of work visas is an example of a fascistic government-business cartel in operation.

The H-1B permit, in particular, is part of that state-sponsored visa system. The primary H-1B hogs—Infosys (and another eight, sister Indian firms), Microsoft, and Intel—import labor with what are grants of government privilege. Duly, the corporations that hog H-1Bs act like incorrigibly corrupt rent seekers. Not only do they get to replace the American worker, but they get to do so at his expense.

Here’s how:

Globally, a series of sordid liaisons ensures that American workers are left high and dry. Through the programs of the International Trade Administration, the Export-Import Bank, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, the International Monetary Fund, and other oink-operations, the taxpaying American worker is forced to subsidize and underwrite the investment risks of the very corporations that have given him the boot.

Domestically, the fascistic partnership with the State amounts to a subsidy to business at the expense of the taxpayer. See, corporations in our democratic welfare state externalize their employment costs onto the taxpayers.

So while public property is property funded by taxpayers through expropriated taxes; belongs to taxpayers; is to be managed for their benefit—at least one million additional immigrants a year, including recipients of the H-1B visa, are allowed the free use of taxpayer-supported infrastructure and amenities. Every new arrival avails himself of public works such as roads, hospitals, parks, libraries, schools, and welfare.

Does this epitomize the classical liberal idea of laissez faire?

Moreover, chain migration or family unification means every H-1B visa recruit is a ticket for an entire tribe. The initial entrant—the meal ticket—will pay his way. The honor system not being an especially strong value in the Third World, the rest of the clan will be America’s problem. More often than not, chain-migration entrants become wards of the American taxpayer.

Spreading like gravy over a tablecloth, this rapid, inorganic population growth is detrimental to all ecosystems: natural, social and political.

Take Seattle and its surrounding counties …

… READ THE REST. “Why The H-1B Visa Racket Should Be Abolished, Not Reformed” is now trending on Townhall.com.

UPDATE (4/22): A poignant observation on Townhall.com, where the column is now trending:

Carry ann • 4 hours ago

This article is spot on. The insane importation of h1b workers from India by Microsoft and Amazon has changed the Seattle area beyond recognition. The author’s contention that each visa is just a meal ticket to move the whole clan over is spot on. Everywhere you look in this area, trees are being cut down to make room for more development. All new homes now have 3 levels, with a finished basement intended for the grandparents who moved here to take care of the grand kids while both parents work, since Obama also allow the spouses of H1bs to work. Indians are taking over all the jobs in this area. Every new home buyer is either Indian or Chinese, both move the whole clan over. All the schools here are now at least 50% Asian, some are 90% Asian, esp. the elementary schools.
We need a 20 year moratorium on immigration, not just the H1b but its close cousins, H2b, H3, H4, J1, OPT, L1 and the EB5 all need to be cancelled for 20 years. Immigration is the colonization tactic of the 21st century. The US is being colonized by the third world. Most of the Mexicans and Asians are wildly liberal and vote Democrat, esp. the Indians. Republicans are dead if they continue to allow this stream of migration. They need to wise up in a hurry and stop this third world invasion.

UPDATE II (2/24):

On Ricochet.com, Jamie Lockett responds:

“Wouldn’t the real libertarian response to this be an immigration system unregulated by government and depended on economic necessity?”

MY REPLY: “A clear-thinking libertarian addresses reality. Would I like to see a world governed by private property? Indeed. Until that happens—if—I am obliged to address the reality I addressed in the column and call out the bluff of the H-1B visa by pointing to the existence of the 0-1 visa. I am not advocating for these systems; I’m illustrating how the immigration industry—corporations, lawyers, lobbyists and other clientele—stick it to American workers. I hope you are not suggesting that instead of addressing reality, I pontificate about my purist preferences.”

Robert McReynolds, aka JamieLockett: “Well, I don’t think I could of said it any better really.”