RUTHFULLY YOURS

The Trump trade isn’t dead yet. While the wheels of legislation turn slowly in Washington, the real economy continues to send encouraging signals about the potential for robust growth. And workers are enjoying higher wages. The National Federation of Independent Business report on hiring at small firms, due out later today, will show an average seasonally adjusted increase of 0.16 workers per firm. NFIB Chief Economist William Dunkelberg calls this “a solid showing.”

The report contains more good news for workers at small businesses. Not only are more of them employed, but they’re making more money. Mr. Dunkelberg writes in a draft of today’s release: “The net percent of owners reporting that they raised worker compensation remained at the highest levels observed since when 64.7 percent of the adult population was working (compared to about 60 percent today after being stuck in the 58 percent range from 2009 to 2014). Owners then and now are increasing compensation to attract and/or hold critical employees.”

Let’s hope that this demand from employers pulls more discouraged Americans back into the workforce. Small businesses will be needing them, according to another NFIB finding. A seasonally adjusted net 16% of small businesses plan to create new jobs, “up 1 point and a very strong reading,” writes Mr. Dunkelberg.

Based on these encouraging data, Mr. Dunkelberg expects an increase of more than 200,000 jobs when the U.S. Department of Labor issues its March employment report for the whole economy on Friday morning.

This is solid but not spectacular job growth. Such a monthly reading was cause for celebration during the dreary Obama era, and the “secular stagnation” crowd figures this is about as good as it gets. But it’s not. While today’s NFIB report is encouraging, it’s also a reminder that if Mr. Trump and U.S. workers want Reagan-style growth, the economy still needs Reagan-style tax cuts.

President Trump’s nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to succeed the late Justice Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court is heading for a final showdown Friday, in what is emerging as likely the most high-stakes partisan battle yet during the first 100 days of the Trump administration.

On Monday, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved the selection by a party-line vote of 11-9, and sent the nomination to the full Senate floor for final action. The Democrats have decided to launch a filibuster in an effort to block the Gorsuch nomination from receiving an up-or-down vote. Democrat Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) declared Sunday, “We call it the 60 vote standard,” to ensure that “you get a mainstream justice.” Of course, there is no such “standard.” Justices who received less than 60 votes in the past were still confirmed. And the fact that Judge Gorsuch voted 99 percent of the time with the other judges on his federal appeals court means nothing to the ideologues who oppose him. For the Left, “mainstream” means only a judge’s willingness to bend the Constitution to suit the progressives’ social justice agenda.

The Democrats appear to have lined up enough votes to make their filibuster stick, placing them on a collision clause with the Republican majority. If the Democrats do not budge, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) is on course to lead his party majority to adopt the so-called “nuclear option” and change the Senate rules, eliminating the 60 vote filibuster barrier for Supreme Court nominations. A simple majority can then proceed on an up-or-down vote to confirm Judge Gorsuch. In addition to the 52 Republicans voting in favor, 3 Democrats so far have also indicated their intention to vote for Judge Gorsuch – Senator Joe Donnelly of Indiana, Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, and Senator Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota. A fourth Democrat, Michael Bennet of Colorado, said he would not vote to support the filibuster.

The Democrats’ desperate gambit will not succeed. “What I’m telling you is that Judge Gorsuch is going to be confirmed,” said Senator McConnell on Sunday. “The way in which that occurs is in the hands of the Democratic minority.”

The Democrats conveniently ignore the fact that Republicans did not stand in the way of former President Barack Obama’s first two choices for Supreme Court seats – Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. Instead, like spoiled brats, the Democrats are still sore that the Republicans would not consider Obama’s choice of Judge Merrick Garland during Obama’s last year in office, with a presidential election looming. They wanted to preemptively change the ideological balance of the Supreme Court by giving the seat of conservative originalist Scalia to a liberal replacement, without giving the voters a chance to weigh in first. More than a year later, they are taking out their wrath on President Trump’s first Supreme Court nominee, justifying their obstructionism with the bogus claim that the seat Judge Gorsuch would be filling was “stolen” from them.

On Tuesday, in a National Review Online column, I contended that the reported involvement of former national-security adviser Susan Rice in the unmasking of Trump officials appears to be a major scandal — it suggests that the Obama White House, of which she was a high-ranking staffer, abused the power to collect intelligence on foreign targets, by using it to spy on the opposition party and its presidential candidate.

It should come as no surprise that the defense Ms. Rice and Obama apologists are mounting is heavily reliant on a fact that is not in dispute: viz., that the intelligence collection at issue was legal.

I anticipated that line of argument a week ago. The issue is not technical legality, it is monumental abuse of power.

To analogize, if a judge imposed a 20-year jail term on a man for passing a marijuana cigarette to a second man, the sentence would be perfectly legal — a distribution of a Schedule I narcotic drug controlled substance calls for a sentence of up to 20 years’ imprisonment, see 21 U.S.C. §841(b)(1)(C). Nevertheless, the sentence would also be an outrageous abuse of judicial power. A judge who did such a thing would be unfit — worthy of condemnation, if not impeachment.

Abuses of power are offenses against the public trust. They often overlap with a criminal offense, but they are not the same thing as a criminal offense. For example, a politician who accepts money in exchange for political favors commits both the crime of bribery and an impeachable offense of corruption. The jurors in the bribery case need not find that the politician breached his public trust; they need only find an intentional quid pro quo — payoff in exchange for favor. By contrast, the breach of public trust is central to the impeachment case: To remove the pol from office, there would be no need to prove the legal elements of a criminal bribery charge beyond a reasonable doubt, but it would have to be demonstrated that the politician is unfit for office. If it is a petty bribe, a prosecutor might ignore it, but the public should want to throw the bum out.

This is why a “high crime and misdemeanor” — the constitutional standard for impeachment — need not be an indictable criminal offense. It may be a chargeable crime, but it need not be one.

A famous example (though one not much remarked on during the last several years) is the second article of impeachment against President Richard M. Nixon. It alleged (my italics):

Using the powers of the office of President of the United States, Richard M. Nixon, in violation of his constitutional oath faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in disregard of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has repeatedly engaged in conduct violating the constitutional rights of citizens, impairing the due and proper administration of justice and the conduct of lawful inquiries, or contravening the laws governing agencies of the executive branch and the purpose[s] of these agencies.

One hundred years ago on April 6, the United States declared war on Germany and entered World War I. It was an event that changed America, and the world, forever.

America’s entry into that war was the result of the dream of one man, President Woodrow Wilson. In the light of America’s experiences in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, it’s easy to retrospectively dismiss our participation in World War I as the first egregious exercise in Wilsonianism — an act of high-minded liberal idealism and moralism leading to disaster rather than redemption.

Yet seeing this centennial exclusively through that lens is a mistake. Whatever else it was, America’s role in what was then the world’s bloodiest and most destructive war signaled the emergence of the U.S. as the arbiter of a new world order, one that would be built around America’s economic strength, military power, and moral authority as promoter and defender of democracy and freedom. Assuming that role and burden has caused the U.S. a good deal of trouble and brought considerable cost, much of it in human lives — but far less cost, one has to argue, than if the U.S. had stayed out of World War I and evaded a responsibility we still carry today, however reluctantly: that of the superpower of freedom.

It’s worth remembering how we got into the war in the first place. America, and President Wilson, had worked hard to stay out of the conflict that had broken out in the summer of 1914, pitting France, Britain, Italy, and Russia against Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Turkey. In just two and half years, it had all but consumed the heart of Europe, leaving more than 10 million dead and pushing three long-lasting empires — Habsburg, Ottoman, and Romanov — to the brink of dissolution.

Wilson’s personal view had been that staying out of war meant preserving America’s role as the beacon of the future, of a peaceful and harmonious world in which war would be a thing of the past — and even possibly negotiating a final peace once the combatants finally exhausted themselves.

But Imperial Germany was unwilling to leave America alone. It knew that although America was officially neutral, the Allies were steadily buying from U.S. factories the food and other supplies they needed to stay in the war. Germany’s resumption of all-out submarine warfare in February 1917 aimed at sinking neutral shipping (it had been suspended after Wilson’s protest over the sinking of the Lusitania in May 1915, which killed 128 Americans) was meant to sever the transatlantic supply line between America and Britain. German experts figured that cutting this supply line would lead to German victory in six months, regardless of what Wilson did in response to German torpedoes’ killing more Americans.

In case the Americans did take military action, however, Germany came up with another plan, one that proved to be disastrous: offering to give Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona to Mexico, if Mexico joined with Germany in opening a second front on America’s southern border. The gist of that plan was contained in a telegram that was intercepted by British naval intelligence and passed on to Wilson; that telegram, and the sinking of three American vessels in three days in late March, finally tipped Wilson’s hand. The man whose reelection campaign slogan in 1916 had been “He kept us out of war” now asked Congress on April 2 to enter that war, by declaring war on Germany. Four days later, Congress enthusiastically agreed.

In Trump’s Cabinet, those whom we expect to fight for us are getting sidelined while Obama holdovers take the reins.

The news of the week is that Trump’s second pick as national security adviser, Army lieutenant general McMaster, has kicked Steve Bannon off the National Security Council. The W.H. is spinning it to the effect that Bannon’s job there is over, since he doesn’t need to keep an eye on Flynn. Or because Susan Rice has been outed. Or something. There’s a lot more to this story, with McMaster emerging with more power. This is not good news.

The Deep State operatives in the Obama administration knew what they were doing when they targeted retired lieutenant general Mike Flynn, President Trump’s first pick as national security adviser. Flynn was one of the strongest, most honest voices in Washington on the threat of Islam’s jihadi ambitions. Although President Trump declared what happened to Flynn “very unfair,” he fired him anyway and appointed Lt. Gen. McMaster, a Bush-Obama squish on Islam.

McMaster’s first act on heading the Trump national security team was to order staff not to use the term “radical Islamic terror.” He claims that ISIS is “un-Islamic.” And he even urged President Trump not to say the words “radical Islamic terrorism” in his speech before Congress. Trump ignored the advice.

McMaster and Bannon clashed big in mid-March, with Bannon and Jared Kushner winning that round.

Perhaps part of the answer is here – the Deep State at the CIA is working to push out Trump’s anti-jihad appointees and replace them with Obama holdovers. McMaster is cooperating.

From the Weekly Standard, as reported on Frontpagemag.com, about that clash three weeks ago:

Over the weekend, a personnel dispute within the National Security Council between the national security advisor, H.R. McMaster, and senior White House aides Jared Kushner and Steve Bannon was eventually brought to President Trump himself. As Politico reported Tuesday evening, Trump overruled McMaster, who had sought to move the NSC’s senior director of intelligence programs to another position, reportedly after “weeks of pressure from career officials at the CIA.” Some of those CIA officials, THE WEEKLY STANDARD has learned, were pushing for one of their own to take the job in Trump’s White House.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-man-who-knows-too-much-1491434758

Politicians aren’t always as dumb or cynical as they sound, but you wouldn’t know that from Wednesday’s confirmation hearing for Scott Gottlieb. Democrats criticized the nominee to run the Food and Drug Administration for the “conflict of interest” of knowing too much about the industries he’d regulate.

Washington Senator Patty Murray and other Democrats devoted most of the morning to agitating about Dr. Gottlieb’s “unprecedented financial entanglements” because he has consulted for various companies and invested in health-care start-ups. Rhode Island’s Sheldon Whitehouse flopped in with a strange remark about “dark money operations,” which is an amusing way to describe financial disclosures available on the internet.

Bernie Sanders, never one to be hamstrung by knowledge, tweeted Wednesday that it was a “disgrace” to have an FDA commissioner who has taken money from drug companies. These are the same committee Democrats who pummeled Betsy DeVos for not having enough experience in public education.

Dr. Gottlieb disclosed his work in accordance with government rules and will liquidate his investments. He agreed to recuse himself for a year on decisions relevant to his past interests. He also promised Wednesday to follow directives from the Health and Human Services ethics office, and to be an “impartial and independent advocate for the public health.”

The irony of the claim that Dr. Gottlieb can be bought by the industry is that pharmaceutical companies won’t be thrilled by some of his priorities. One is increasing generic drug competition: On Wednesday he offered a tutorial in how companies exploit regulatory barriers to competition for their commercial advantage. Sounds like something ol’ Bernie should like.

Another ugly charge is that Dr. Gottlieb won’t address the opioid crisis because he has worked with companies that produce painkillers. Yup—he wants to take a pay cut and subject himself to bureaucratic hassles so he can peddle pills to addict more Americans. Who writes this stuff? In fact, Dr. Gottlieb called opioid abuse “a public emergency on the order of Ebola and Zika” and suggested an “all-of-the-above” strategy that would include inventing less addictive painkillers and better patient care.

Dr. Gottlieb has written lucidly about how FDA can unleash innovation without compromising public safety, which he rightly calls a “false dichotomy.” Democrats once believed in expertise, and if they cared about delivering cures for patients as much as they fret that someone is making a profit, they’d confirm Dr. Gottlieb in a millisecond.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-fda-rules-made-a-15-drug-cost-400-1491434230

The theory is that generic drugs should be less expensive than the original. By the time a generic hits the market, the drug’s patent has expired, allowing competition from companies that didn’t spend millions of dollars to develop it. As more options become available, prices are supposed to drop. But because of quirks in America’s regulatory system, it doesn’t always work out this way.

In 2009 the Food and Drug Administration approved a new version of colchicine, which treats symptoms of gout. Prices rose from 25 cents to $6 per pill. Two years later, the agency approved a new hydroxyprogesterone, which helps prevent premature births. It went from $15 to $400 an injection. In 2014 the FDA approved a generic of the man-made hormone vasopressin. Prices jumped from $11 to $138 for an injection.

What explains the counterintuitive price increases? All these prescription drugs fall under a category known as DESI drugs, named for their inclusion in an FDA program called Drug Efficacy Study Implementation. These drugs came to market before 1962, when getting FDA approval for a drug required proving its safety but not its efficacy. Such drugs, manufactured under expired patents, are used by millions of Americans today.

But once the FDA approves a new-drug application for a DESI drug, the existing drug can be pulled from the market. The “new” drug is treated as a material advance because it underwent testing for safety and efficacy—even though the DESI version was proved safe and effective over decades of actual use. The developer of the new drug may also get a new period of market exclusivity that lasts three years.

This makes little sense. Market exclusivity should let pharmaceutical companies recoup their often enormous investments in genuinely new drugs. Giving monopoly protection for what is essentially a generic version of a DESI drug merely enriches sharp-dealing companies while injuring patients.

Another reason generics often face no competition was described by Scott Gottlieb, President Trump’s nominee for FDA commissioner, in these pages last year. He noted that a generic-drug application can cost as much as $15 million. This high upfront cost is part of why would-be manufacturers of generics often pass on the opportunity to compete against branded drugs with smaller markets. This has allowed many pharmaceutical companies to raise prices with impunity. CONTINUE AT SITE