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April 2017

ENVIRONMENT AND JUNK SCIENCE, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Springtime Out of Paris Staying in Obama’s climate accord risks Trump’s energy plans.

By on April 27th, 2017

President Trump and his advisers are debating whether to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Climate Accords, and the issue is coming to a head. If he doesn’t want to topple his own economic agenda, Mr. Trump’s wisest course is to walk away from a pact that President Obama never put before the U.S. Senate.

Mr. Trump wants to revive growth and lift wages (see above), and a large part of that project is a bet on liberating U.S. energy production, notably natural gas and oil. Toward this end Mr. Trump issued an executive order in late March asking the Environmental Protection Agency to unwind Mr. Obama’s Clean Power Plan.

The Obama team finalized CPP in late 2015, and the rule was immediately challenged in court by 28 states. Notable among the Obama Administration’s legal defenses is that CPP is essential to fulfill the U.S. commitments to reduce carbon emissions under Paris. By the end the White House cited Paris as the legal justification for all its climate policies.

EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt is moving to repeal CPP and other Obama climate rules. Environmental groups will inevitably sue. If the U.S. remains in Paris, Mr. Pruitt will have to explain to the many Obama appointees on the federal bench that gutting CPP is a reasonable exercise of administrative power in light of the Administration’s continued fealty to Paris carbon reductions. This is the sort of logical inconsistency that a creative judge might seize on to justify blocking Mr. Trump’s EPA rules. By staying in Paris Mr. Trump may hand opponents a sword to kill his agenda.

The left is also pointing to Section 115 of the Clean Air Act, which gives EPA a mandate to regulate emissions that “may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare in a foreign country.” The catch is that EPA can only act if there is regulatory “reciprocity” among the nations involved. Such as the Paris accords.

Mr. Obama knew he was setting these carbon political traps as he rushed to commit the U.S. to Paris. His bet was that even a future GOP President would be reluctant to endure the international criticism that would follow withdrawal. And sure enough, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and National Economic Council director Gary Cohn are making precisely this argument for staying in Paris.

Then again, Candidate Trump promised to withdraw, and he can’t possibly be vilified for Paris more than he already has for everything else. His advisers have presented a way to short-circuit the supposed four-year process for withdrawing, which involves U.S. resignation from the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change.

This isn’t a question of science or diplomacy. For Mr. Trump, the question is whether he wants to put his economic agenda at the mercy of anticarbon warriors and federal judges.

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Trump’s Tax Principles A pro-growth outline that focuses on weak capital investment.

By on April 27th, 2017

“The Trump principles show the President has made growth his highest priority, and they are a rebuke to the Washington consensus that 1% or 2% growth is the best America can do. Now Mr. Trump has to show results. If anything close to his this reform can survive the political maelstrom, it will go a long way toward returning to the abundance of the 1980s and 1990s.”

The White House rolled out its tax principles on Tuesday, investing new energy in the first serious reform debate in 30 years. While the details are sparse and will have to be filled in by Congress, President Trump’s outline resembles the supply-side principles he campaigned on and is an ambitious and necessary economic course correction that would help restore broad-based U.S. prosperity.

Many voters heard Mr. Trump’s make-America-great-again slogan as a promise to raise their incomes and improve economic opportunities after a long stagnation. Eight years of 2% growth since the recession ended in 2009 is the weakest recovery in the postwar era, and the result has been rising anxiety and diminished expectations for millions of Americans.

Faster growth of 3% a year or more is possible, but it will take better policies, and tax reform is an indispensable lever. Mr. Trump’s modernization would be a huge improvement on the current tax code that would give the economy a big lift, especially on the corporate side. The reform would sharply cut the business income rate to 15% from 35%, while simplifying the code for individuals and cutting some marginal rates.

Though Mr. Trump’s proposal dabbles in some politically fashionable tax redistribution, at its core it is an exercise in growth economics. The cuts would be permanent and immediate, and the rates are low enough to enhance the incentives to work and invest.
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The plan also fits the economic moment, because a main source of U.S. malaise is poor business investment. Spending on the likes of new factories, equipment and software is soft, which in turn has undermined the productivity gains that produce more jobs, higher wages and higher living standards. Productivity growth in the 2000s and 2010s is only about half the average of the 1980s and 1990s.

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Linda Sarsour, the Stealth Jihadist : Edward Cline

By on April 27th, 2017

And from Brooklyn, yet, with an exaggerated Brooklyn accent, making a career of selling America her Islamic version of the Brooklyn Bridge.

Everyone with half a brain has fallen for Linda Sarsour’s stealth jihad in a hijab. But not me. Never me. Virtually every time I see her photo flashing the ISIS symbol of a finger pointed in the air (to Allah, he’s the greatest, don’t you know?), I want to reciprocate with a middle finger. And I do, even if it’s to a picture of her carefully made-up mug.

Nathaniel Zelinsky writes in Foreign Affairs that the gesture refers to thetawhid, “the belief in the oneness of God and a key component of the Muslim religion.” More specifically, though, it refers to their fundamentalist interpretation of the tawhid, which rejects any other view, including other Islamic interpretations, as idolatry. Zelinsky writes that when ISIS uses the gesture, it is affirming an ideology that demands the destruction of the West, as well as any form of pluralism. For potential recruits around the globe, it also shows their belief that they will dominate the world.

Sarsour to say the least, is not a nice person. Daniel Pipes published a long list of Sarsour’s publicity stunts and consummate narcissism and alleged achievements in a long post in March 2010.

Mar. 8, 2011 update: Sarsour has tweeted a stunningly crude and vicious attack on two anti-Islamist leaders: “Brigitte Gabriel= Ayaan Hirsi Ali. She’s asking 4 an a$$ whippin’. I wish I could take their vaginas away – they don’t deserve to be women.”

Feb. 8, 2015 update: Sarsour just can’t get enough of her alleged beauty. Her remarks (ignorant typo left as is) on this Instagram picture: “Blue is a power color. Maybe your born with it, Maybe it’s Maybelline, I praise the lord that I am born with it. #media #womenarebetterateverything #women.” Oh, and what to make of the infantile feminism, “women are better at everything”?

Sep. 9, 2014 update: Sarsour squealed “hate crime” when a street person in Brooklyn accosted her on Sep. 3, winning national attention for her plight and the alleged problem of anti-Muslim bias. For example, the mayor of New York, Bill de Blasio, wrote her a tweet: “New Yorkers stand with you, @lsarsour. Our city will never condone such glaring acts of bigotry and intolerance.”

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FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

What’s the Best Way for Trump to Persuade China to Up the Pressure on North Korea? A ChinaFile Conversation –

By on April 27th, 2017

China’s President Xi Jinping called U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday morning urging American restraint in reaction to North Korea. Tensions between the United States and North Korea have risen to new levels ever since Pyongyang’s April 16 failed missile test. Top U.S. officials have repeatedly warned Pyongyang against more provocations—a warning Pyongyang does not seem likely to heed. “We’ll be conducting more missile tests on a weekly, monthly and yearly basis,” a high-ranking North Korean official recently told the BBC. After that, Trump’s number two, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, said that “The president and I have great confidence that China will properly deal with North Korea,” adding a reminder that Trump had earlier said. “if China is unable to deal with North Korea, the United States and our allies will.” Meanwhile, China’s trade with North Korea in the first quarter of 2017 has actually increased, by a whopping 37.4 percent from the same period last year. Will Beijing start enforcing sanctions? How can the U.S. persuade China to push Pyongyang to denuclearize—a stated goal of both great powers? —The Editors
Comments
Michael Swaine

The Chinese clearly believe that events regarding North Korea are escalating to a dangerous level. And they have sent some signals that they are today even less happy with Pyongyang than before and notably concerned about Trump’s bottom line and willingness to use force. As a result of these two factors, and Xi’s recent positive conversations with Trump, the Chinese are arguably already willing to support more onerous sanctions, to a point. It is highly unlikely that they are going to shut off all economic intercourse with North Korea (and certainly not indefinitely) in the hopes of forcing denuclearization talks. It could just as easily lead to conflict. They do not want to take such a high risk. This ever-cautious stance was also indicated by Xi’s phone call to Trump on Sunday evening Washington time in which he reportedly yet again urged the president to exercise restraint and seek to engage the North Koreans.

Trump could of course try to escalate pressure or incentives on Beijing by threatening some type of kinetic strike (e.g., against any North Korean missile launches), or offering various trade incentives, or even a reduction in arms sales to Taiwan (thus violating the Six Assurances), but these are unlikely to prove possible politically or to prove successful. And a full-blown attack on North Korean missile and nuclear sites would only generate war and result in a catastrophic failure of U.S. policy beyond anything yet seen.

The real question is: What is Trump’s game plan if something less than a full-court press on sanctions (either with or without China) fails in the near term, neither stopping missile or nuclear testing nor bringing Pyongyang back to the table for denuclearization talks? What then?

The Chinese are not the key to solving this problem. But the U.S. does need their active cooperation in any way forward, to stand any reasonable chance of “success.” They could play a positive role in pressuring and/or encouraging Pyongyang to avoid actually deploying a nuclear-armed missile of any range, which should be the near- to medium-term goal, followed by a freeze. Temporary Chinese suspensions of oil and other trade could be used to achieve such goals. The Chinese might agree to that, on a limited basis.

Long term, what is needed is a dialogue with Beijing, Seoul, and Japan about the future of the peninsula and a revived Structural Framework-type arrangement, presenting Pyongyang with a very stark choice between isolation and irrelevancy or security and development.
Bruce Klingner

There is a stark dichotomy between how Trump administration officials privately describe the recently completed North Korea policy review and the impression one gets from the blustery, swaggering public threats of preemptive attack. The policy that has been blessed by the interagency process includes emphasis on restrengthening the U.S. military to reverse degradations in capability resulting from defense budget cuts and an augmentation of ballistic missile defense.

What is likely to be the most striking difference from the Obama Administration will be a willingness to actually use existing legal authorities to more vigorously impose sanctions on North Korea and Chinese violators. While Obama talked a good game on sanctions, he only timidly and incrementally enforced U.S. laws. U.S. bureaucrats privately comment that they have long had lists of sanctionable entities but were prevented by senior Obama officials from targeting them.

Trump’s declarations before and after his summit with Chinese President Xi Jingping reflect the adage about March weather, “coming in like a lion and going out like a lamb.” In the run-up to the summit, President Trump vowed to press China to “solve” North Korea, vowing to use Chinese trade with the U.S. as leverage to force greater Chinese action against North Korea.

Yet, after the summit, Trump quickly flip-flopped, abandoning his strong rhetoric and instead proclaiming President Xi Jinping was “going to try very hard” on North Korea and that “I think he wants to help us with North Korea.” Trump acknowledged that his softer position on China was due to its perceived help on North Korea, asking, “Why would I call China a currency manipulator when they are working with us on the North Korean problem?” Trump continued to heap praise on China, declaring that “Nobody’s ever seen such a positive response on our behalf from China.”

It is disturbing that the president so quickly abandoned his strong rhetoric and pledges to increase pressure on Beijing to fully implement required U.N. sanctions and no longer turn a blind eye to prohibited activities taking place on its soil. The Trump administration’s intent to enforce U.S. laws, including imposing secondary sanctions on Chinese violators, is now on hold pending Beijing fulfilling pledges made privately during the summit.

Trump would benefit from reviewing China’s previous pledges to “do more” on North Korea. After each of North Korea’s previous nuclear and missile tests, some U.S. experts have assessed that Beijing had hardened its position toward North Korea, ended its unconditional support to Pyongyang, and predicted that some forthcoming provocation (now long since passed) would trigger even more decisive action by China.

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

George Soros: “The Gravedigger of the Left” By Dr. Mária Schmidt*

By on April 27th, 2017

* The full version was posted on April 25, 2017, in English, on About Hungary, and the original Hungarian, A Baloldal Sírásója, on Látószög.http://campaign.r20.constantcontact.com/render?m=1101941066390&ca=db7af234-2239-45d6-ae7a-6167894243ce

George Soros, his global Open Society Foundations and the hundreds of other organizations also funded by him are noisily and sometimes violently demonstrating against policies and governments who fail to accede to his agenda. There are lawsuits and Congressional investigations into his activities in the United States. In Hungary, the government is passing new laws to curtail his foundations and his Central European University’s operations.

To balance Soros’s version of what’s taking place in Hungary, read excerpts* from an article written by Dr. Mária Schmidt, the director general of the House of Terror Museum, and the XXI Century Institute, in Budapest:

“When George Soros appeared in Hungary in 1984, the Soviet rule still appeared solid and indestructible. Six years later, in 1990, when the Communists were toppled by God’s grace, Soros had already recruited a broad circle of supporters and proposed to take over Hungary’s complete sovereign debt and, in exchange, asked for Hungary’s industry, that is, the bulk of the country’s national wealth. His offer was turned down by JózsefAntall, our first, democratically elected prime minister.

The pundits, who had by that time been promoted to positions of moral authority by Soros, launched a sweeping media campaign urging the government to repay the substantial debt accumulated by the communists and not even think of requesting a debt waiver or even rescheduling. Meanwhile, keeping debt servicing in mind, those same pundits wanted and urged Hungary to be the only country in the region where no re-privatisation took place. That is, they opposed the idea of returning nationalized property to the original owners. Instead, they favored privatization, a process already launched by communist comrades. That position created a common ground for the former democratic opposition, i.e. SZDSZ and those former comrades who had been the beneficiaries of wild privatization. This is how the fullest and fastest privatization possible became one of the main demands of the post-communist camp. It is an established fact by now that privatization in this wild form, just as in its later incarnations, meant the bargain sale of public wealth.

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