Commissioner of the Department of Finance Administration, Stuart McWhorter, reported last week that Tennessee revenues for August were $28.8 million more than the budgeted estimates.
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Almost every Democratic attorney general is suing the Trump administration over the president’s attempt to nix California’s ability to set strict emission standards.
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The U.S. Department of Interior announced over $170 million in grants funded without taxpayer dollars will be distributed to state parks and outdoor recreation projects in all 50 states.
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Uber, Lyft and DoorDash are prepared to spend a collective $90 million against a bill that would recognize their drivers as employees rather than independent contractors, the Associated Press reported Thursday.
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The Commissioner of the Tennessee’s Department of Finance Administration Stuart McWhorter announced August 15 that, while state tax revenues were below budget for the month of July, Tennessee will end fiscal year 2019 with a surplus of $636.1 million.
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For decades, American workers have watched as their ability to enjoy middle-class lifestyles erodes away. Conventional explanations abound. American industry in the immediate aftermath of World War II was uniquely unscathed, and with a near-monopoly on global manufacturing, it was able to pass much of the ample profits on to workers. It wasn’t until the 1970s that American manufacturers confronted serious foreign competition, and ever since, the competition has only become more intense.
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Prior research shows people in Nashville seldom use taxpayer-funded charging stations for electric cars, yet certain members of the U.S. Senate want to throw even more money on these devices nationwide.
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BERLIN – An envoy of U.S. President Donald Trump suggested on Friday that Chancellor Angela Merkel’s unwillingness to boost defense spending might give the United States no choice but to move American troops stationed in Germany to Poland.
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Democrats are hell-bent on reducing the living standards of ordinary Americans in order to protect the environment, but President Trump is demonstrating that it’s possible to be a responsible ecological steward without sacrificing the country’s prosperity.
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During a discussion Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Steve Gill and Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Gill and Leahy spoke to Metro Council at large candidate, Adam Dread about low early voter turnout and scooter safety and how it ties into the public’s concerns.
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During a specific interview discussion Monday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Steve Gill and Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Leahy talked to good friend and host of Fargo, North Dakota’s Point of View about Ilhan Omar’s alleged illegal immigration into the United States and her questionable political affiliations associated with her background. Towards the end of the segment, the three men dissected whether or not there was enough speculation to pursue a DOJ or US Attorney General investigation into Omar’s past. They also noted that this issue could potentially be investigated at the federal level. Leahy: Our good friend Chris Berg who is the host of Point of View at the top television affiliate in Fargo, North Dakota caught that clip and sent it to us. And Chris, welcome to the Tennessee Star Report. Our story on that has over six thousand Facebook shares. Berg: (Chuckles) Thanks for having me Mike. Great to have you and happy Monday. Leahy: So tell us about Ilhan Omar. Ilhan was from Somalia. Came to the United States when she was twelve. Lived in Virginia for a couple of years.…
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by Chris White Thousands of protesters in Puerto Rico are demanding Gov. Ricardo Rosselló resign over corruption charges and what many believe are misogynistic private messages he shared with officials. Protesters hurled bricks, glass and fireworks, at police Wednesday evening in Old San Juan, Puerto Rico. Police fired tear gas in response as they attempt to clear the streets. Authorities also shot rubber bullets into the crowd, which included celebrities such as Ricky Martin and award-winning actor Benicio Del Toro. People have lit up the streets for five consecutive days, urging Rosselló to resign in the wake of corruption charges and the leaking of a private correspondence between him and close associates. The messages reportedly include misogynistic and homophobic comments, as well as cynical comments about deaths following Hurricane Maria. Martin and the other celebrities asked participants to protest peacefully. “Puerto Rico, say present without fear. Let’s march in peace and remain firm and assertive,” he told NBC reporters Wednesday. “When Puerto Rico unites, we accomplish wonderful things and we can change the course of history.” Del Toro made similar comments. “I’m here in support of the people of Puerto Rico,” he said during the rally. Others flocked to…
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by Pedro Gonzalez The late Edward Abbey, an irascible and irreverent American environmentalist, took aim at the immigration ideologues in terms still relevant for our time: “The conservatives love their cheap labor; the liberals love their cheap cause.” In other words, if the Republican Party and the Democratic Party can silently agree on one thing, it is that immigration is good, and more is often better. But the latest report from the Federation for American Immigration Reform reveals just how costly inviting the world can be. The FAIR report reveals that “our economy is hemorrhaging much-needed cash each year as a result of money sent to other countries”—that is, remittances—“primarily by foreign-born workers in the United States,” to the tune of $150 billion. “The $150 billion a year sent out of the country each year is money that does not circulate through our own economy, support local businesses, create new jobs, or generate revenues for local, state, and federal governments.” But that massive figure, combined with the $50.1 billion in taxpayer dollars doled out as foreign aid by the U.S. government, is just the tip of the Third World iceberg. The line between charity and masochism has been long…
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by Edward Ring In his final speech from the White House in January 1961, President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned the nation that the military had joined with the arms industry and had acquired unwarranted influence over American politics. His term for this alliance was the “military industrial complex.” Since that time, Eisenhower’s term has been co-opted by other critics of special interests pooling their resources to exercise a dangerous influence on America’s democracy; one example would be the so-called “homeless industrial complex.” This label has been around awhile, and has bipartisan origins. In 2012 a guest editorial appeared in the liberal Washington Posten titled “Dismantling the social services industrial complex.” In it, the author explains “an odd mirror image of this huge complex has emerged in the very ‘industry’ that seeks to feed, clothe and otherwise meet the needs of the poor and vulnerable in our society. It’s a social services-industrial complex, if you will, one that could prove even more difficult to subdue than its military counterpart.” In 2013, writing for Poverty Insights, author John Roberts asked “Is There a Homeless Industrial Complex That Perpetuates Homelessness?” And in January 2017, a former homeless activist published in the ultra-liberal Huffington Post an article entitled “The Homeless Industrial Complex Problem.” The…
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by Ethan Cai A jury found an electrical engineer and University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) professor guilty of exporting stolen U.S. military technology to China. UCLA adjunct professor Yi-Chi Shih was convicted June 26 on 18 federal charges, Newsweek reported, and could now lose hundreds of thousands of dollars, while also facing up to 219 years behind bars for numerous violations of the law. These include conspiracy to break the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), committing mail and wire fraud, lying to a government agency, subscribing to a false tax return, and conspiring to gain unauthorized access to information on a protected computer, according to a Department of Justice news release. Shih and co-defendant Kiet Ahn Mai tried to access illegally a protected computer owned by a U.S. company that manufactured semiconductor chips called monolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMICs). MMICs are used by the Air Force and Navy in fighter jets, missiles and missile guidance technology, and electronic military defense systems. The chips were exported to Chengdu GaStone Technology Company (CGTC), a Chinese company, without a required Department of Commerce license. Shih previously served as the president of CGTC, which made the Commerce Department’s Entity List in 2014 “due to its involvement…
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Certain electric vehicles emit 11 percent to 28 percent more carbon dioxide than their diesel counterparts, even though various U.S. politicians, including U.S. Republican Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, want taxpayer subsidies for such cars. According to a recent article on the Institute for Energy Research’s website, a study out of Germany found that electric vehicles in that country emit more carbon dioxide. The study considered the production of batteries as well as the German electricity mix in making this determination. But it’s not just electric cars in Germany. “A study in 2017 by researchers at the University of Michigan found that the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by electric cars varied wildly by country,” according to the Institute for Energy Research’s website. “The study found that an electric car recharged by a coal-fired plant produces as much carbon dioxide as a gasoline-powered car that gets 29 miles per gallon, which is a slightly higher efficiency than the 25.2 miles per gallon that is the average of all the cars, SUVs, vans, and light trucks sold in the United States over the past year. If the electricity comes from a natural gas plant, recharging a plug-in electric vehicle is akin to…
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by Edward Ring A special election is scheduled for September 10 in North Carolina’s 3rd Congressional District to replace former incumbent Walter Jones, the long-serving Republican who died earlier this year. The district is solidly Republican. Jones earned twice as many votes as his Democratic challenger in nearly every election since he first took office in 1995. But the district is interesting for another reason, one that every Republican strategist in America should study. It is one of 47 congressional districts in the United States where, in the 2018 midterm elections, a majority of nonwhite voters were projected to vote Republican. The following map, prepared by elections analyst Geoffrey Skelly at FiveThirtyEight, shows the congressional districts (red) where, if no one but nonwhite people voted, Republican candidates would still be likely to win. It’s hard to overstate the significance of these 47 congressional districts. They belie the smug certainty on the part of Democratic politicians and strategists across the United States who equate the demographic transformation of America with an inevitable and unbreakable Democratic majority. Take mass nonwhite immigration, higher birth rates for nonwhites, mix in identity politics and leftist, race-centric indoctrination against “white privilege,” and voila, America becomes…
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by Johnny Kampis A U.S. District Court ruling that said the Wire Act only applies to sports betting not only staves off a Department of Justice effort to end interstate online poker efforts, it will also help facilitate the growth of poker gaming across the country. Earlier this month, U.S. District Court Judge Paul Barbadoro in New Hampshire ruled on a challenge by the New Hampshire Lottery Commission that the 1961 Interstate Wire Act applies only to sports betting. Barbadoro said the opinion by the DOJ in November 2018 that the Wire Act applied to other forms of gambling is set aside. States were supposed to comply by June 14, but the district court ruling removes that obligation for now. That decision “represents just about the greatest win imaginable” for poker operators, wrote Mark Edelman in Forbes. Edelman, a law professor of Zicklin School of Business in New York City focusing on issues of gaming and antitrust, said the decision “clearly supports the legality of interstate poker compacts, paving the way for online poker’s further growth on a national or semi-national basis.” So far, Delaware, New Jersey, Nevada, Pennsylvania and West Virginia have legalized online poker, with the last two now attempting to…
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by Michael Bastasch U.S. crude oil imports from the Saudi Arabian-led OPEC fell to a 30-year low, according to the latest federal figures. OPEC imports fell to 1.5 million barrels per day in March, which is the lowest level since March 1986, the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported Thursday. EIA said OPEC imports fell “as domestic crude oil production has increased.” “Americans are no longer dependent on foreigners for their energy, and Americans are getting good jobs producing that oil and gas right here at home,” Dan Kish, a distinguished senior fellow at the Institute for Energy Research, told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “The threat against American energy security has shifted from OPEC to the halls of Congress, where members talk of the Green Raw Deal and carbon taxes that could torpedo our energy miracle,” Kish said. The last time Americans were this independent from OPEC oil former President Ronald Reagan was in office and Halley’s Comet was visible in the night’s sky. EIA also noted that U.S. sanctions on Venezuela drove imports to a record low, including periods when the U.S. took no oil from it. The U.S. also imported less from Iraq. Other OPEC members shipped…
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by Pedro Gonzalez On a Sunday afternoon in May, Etta Nugent found Marco Cobos, a Mexican national, at her doorstep in Houston after his truck had broken down nearby. Cobos knocked and Nugent, described by friends as “gentle soul” and a “good Christian woman,” answered. When Cobos asked her to help him fix his truck, the septuagenarian politely declined, citing her age. Feeling entitled to a different answer, Cobos forced his way into Nugent’s home and stabbed her in the chest. He proceeded to show himself to kitchen to look for “more knives,” he told prosecutors, while his victim lay grievously wounded. As Nugent attempted to flee, Cobos killed her in her home of 50 years, across the street from St. Francis de Sales Catholic Church where she had worshiped for most of her life. With cash stolen from the house, Cobos drove Nugent’s car to an auto parts store to buy a new battery for his truck. He stopped for food before returning to Nugent’s home, where he ate and lounged for hours, helping himself to Nugent’s credit cards, even paying his phone bill with one of them. Nugent’s horrific fate has become all too common in an America…
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by Kenneth Blackwell If you like unnecessarily long lines, surly clerks, and terrible service, then you’re probably going to love the latest idea to come from the fevered minds of some of the most radical Democrats in Congress. Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, both of whom identify with the extremist “democratic-socialist” wing of the Democratic Party, have teamed up on a proposal to “help” lower-income Americans by authorizing the United States Postal Service (USPS) to offer banking services such as checking and savings accounts. Wonderful. Just as email and private delivery companies were finally liberating us from our longstanding dependence on that inept and inefficient government-mandated monopoly, the Democrats are trying to create brand new reasons to subject Americans to the ordeal of interacting with the postal service. The ostensible reason for turning the USPS into a quasi-bank is that many rural and low-income areas are underserved by traditional banks. Expanding access to basic financial services such as checking accounts is certainly a worthy goal, but it’s difficult to imagine a worse way to achieve it — encouraging people to deposit their savings with the DMV might do the trick, but that’s not under the federal government’s purview, so…
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by Michael Bastasch Australia’s left-wing Labor Party decided to make tackling climate change the centerpiece of its electoral strategy. It lost in a major election upset Saturday. The election results present a warning to U.S. Democrats pushing costly global warming policies at the national level. “Every time liberal politicians try to impose their climate change agenda on the electorate they get rebuffed at the polls,” Tom Pyle, president of the free-market American Energy Alliance, told The Daily Caller News Foundation. The Labor Party made tackling climate change the centerpiece of its effort to retake Australia’s legislature from the conservative Liberal-National Coalition, which opposes climate taxes and supports coal power. Exit polling projected a Labor win, according to BBC. Labor saw climate change as a winning ticket after record summer heat, alarming Great Barrier Reef headlines and intense storms battered Australia in the last year. “It is not the Australian way to avoid and duck the hard fights. We will take this emergency seriously, and we will not just leave it to other countries or to the next generation,” Labor Party leader Bill Shorten said in mid-May before ballots were cast. At the end of the day, however, a surge of support from…
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A member of the House Ethics Committee, Representative Mike Carter (R-Ooltewah) issued a statement calling for the resignation of Glen Casada as House Speaker after participating in a confidential advisory opinion process. All aspects of a House Ethics Committee advisory opinion are confidential, according to Representative Matthew Hill (R-Jonesborough), Deputy Speaker and Chair of the House Ethics Committee, who said in an exclusive statement to The Tennessee Star that, “Per House rules, an advisory opinion and any information related to it is kept confidential.” The advisory opinion was requested by House Speaker Glen Casada (R-Franklin) as part of an action plan he issued May 8 that, as he put it, “seeks to provide clarity on what has transpired, as well as ensure that I am doing everything within my power to prevent future missteps.” In the lengthy statement published by Times Free Press, Carter retreated from his previous position that a decision not be made until all the facts were known and the investigation completed, because he feels moved to call for the resignation of Speaker Casada based on the facts that he now knows. Carter’s statement came after participating in an individual meeting as a member of the…
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by Edward Ring When government fails, public-sector unions win. When society fragments, public-sector unions consolidate their power. When citizenship itself becomes less meaningful, and the benefits of American citizenship wither, government unions offer an exclusive solidarity. Government unions insulate their members from the challenges facing ordinary private citizens. On every major issue of our time; globalization, immigration, climate change, the integrity of our elections, crime and punishment, regulations, government spending, and fiscal reform, the interests and political bias of public-sector unions is inherently in conflict with the public interest. Today, there may be no greater core threat to the freedom and prosperity of the American people. In the age of talk radio, the Tea Party movement, internet connectivity, and Trump, Americans finally are mobilizing against the uniparty to take back their nation. Yet the threat of public-sector unions typically is a sideshow, when it ought to occupy center stage. They are the greatest menace to American civilization that nobody seems to be talking about. Ask the average American what the difference is between a government union, and a private sector union, and you’re likely to be met with an uncomprehending stare. That’s too bad, because the differences are profound.…
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California businessman John Loar is leading a charge to build another taxpayer-funded sports stadium in Nashville – this time for Major League Baseball. Loar and other baseball boosters plan to travel to New York City to meet with Major League Baseball, WSMV said. “What intrigued me about Nashville is just the growth, the corporate growth,” said John Loar, who is leading the efforts, earlier this year. “With the existing sports teams and just the music element to it, it has the Las Vegas vibe without the gaming.” The group, called Music City Baseball LLC, wants to build a stadium in a mixed-use project near Nissan Stadium, home of the Tennessee Titans, or the PSC Metals scrapyard. Loar has previously discussed finance options with public officials, according to a story by Ballpark Digest. That publication said his venture is called Music City Equity Group. Montreal, Portland and Las Vegas also are interested in pursuing baseball franchises, Ballpark Digest said. As The Tennessee Star reported last September, the Metro City Council decided to pay $275 million for a new soccer stadium instead of using the Titans’ Nissan Stadium, which itself needs $300 million in upgrades. Who is the man leading the…
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NASHVILLE, Tennessee – Victory has finally been achieved for Governor Bill Lee’s Education Savings Accounts program, as both chambers of the Tennessee General Assembly finally adopted the same version of proposed legislation by narrow margins. The final adoption of the Governor’s most significant education initiative, the Tennessee Education Savings Account Pilot Program Act, came with its share of wrangling. After weeks of hearings on the legislation, carried by Speaker Pro Tem Bill Dunn (R-Knoxville) in the House and Senate Education Committee Chair Senator Dolores Gresham (R-Somerville), navigating the numerous committees and negotiating with the Administration, the two chambers eventually passed two different versions of the legislation last week. Passage on the House floor, though, was drama filled as a 40-minute pause was taken in order to break a 49 to 49 tie by flipping the vote of Representative Jason Zachary (R-Knoxville) by taking Knox County out as one of the participating counties. Following the refusal by both bodies of the Tennessee General Assembly to back away from their respective versions of the Education Savings Account bills HB 0939 and SB 0795, on Tuesday the Speakers each appointed five members to a Joint Conference Committee. Senate members of the Joint…
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A new group calling itself the “Ohio Consumers Power Alliance” has formed in response to House Bill 6, a controversial piece of legislation that many consider being a bailout of FirstEnergy’s two Ohio-based nuclear plants. Under House Bill 6, the state would effectively subsidize the plants with taxpayer dollars through a new “Ohio Clean Air Program.” “The mission of the Ohio Consumers Power Alliance is to educate and mobilize our state’s energy consumers around opportunities to diversify Ohio’s energy portfolio and keep rates low,” Rachael Belz, director of the Ohio Consumers Power Alliance, said in a statement. She called House Bill 6 a “creative approach used to blatantly disguise a consumer-funded bailout of two old, uneconomical nuclear plants as a comprehensive energy policy.” “Our members remains staunchly opposed to rewarding FirstEnergy’s bad business decisions by allowing them to dig deep into the pockets of Ohio ratepayers to cover the bill with no end in sight,” Belz said. “We also remain deeply disappointed in our leaders for continuing to reject energy innovation and job growth while keeping Ohio firmly planted in the dark ages of the status quo.” Belz was one of many opponents to testify against the bill, which…
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President Donald Trump vowed to fight for gun rights as he addressed the National Rifle Association on Friday and implored members of the group — struggling to maintain its influence — to rally behind his re-election bid. Speaking to the group for his third straight year, Trump declared himself a “champion for the Second Amendment.” “It’s under assault,” he said of the constitutional right to bear arms. “But not while we’re here.” And he told the thousands in the crowd: “You better get out there and vote,” saying of the 2020 election, “It seems like it’s a long ways away. It’s not.” The nation’s largest gun rights organization was pivotal to Trump’s victory in 2016. But three years later, the group is limping toward the next election divided and diminished. It’s a reversal that has stunned longtime observers and gun control advocates and raises questions about the one-time kingmaker’s clout heading into 2020 as Trump and Vice President Mike Pence headline the group’s annual convention in Indianapolis on Friday. “I’ve never seen the NRA this vulnerable” said John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety, a nonprofit that advocates for gun control measures. In the months after Trump’s election,…
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by Michael Bastasch A Tesla Model 3 is touted as a zero-emissions car by government regulators, but it actually results in more carbon dioxide than a comparable diesel-powered car, according to a recent study. When the CO2 emissions from battery production is included, electric cars, like Teslas, are “in the best case, slightly higher than those of a diesel engine, and are otherwise much higher,” reads a release from the German think tank IFO. “It’s better read as a warning that new technologies aren’t a climate-change panacea. Recall the false promises about corn and cellulosic ethanol,” The Wall Street Journal editorial board wrote of the study. Driving a Tesla Model 3 in Germany, for example, is responsible for 156 to 181 grams of CO2 per kilometer, compared to just 141 grams per kilometer for a diesel-powered Mercedes C220d — that includes emissions from producing diesel fuel. IFO looked at electric car production in Germany, which is heavily reliant on coal power. Electric car emissions in other countries depend on their energy mix, but Germany is the world’s third-largest electric car maker. China and the U.S. are the first- and second-largest electric car producers, respectively. China gets 65 percent of…
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by Christopher Roach The Mueller Report was released last week. Undoubtedly it will be discussed much more than it is read. Many of the salient facts were already well-known, including Russian efforts to sow chaos and division among Americans during the 2016 presidential election using “active measures.” This sophisticated propaganda and narrative-making tools find their origins in the Soviet KGB. While some are pleased to deem President Trump a potential Russian agent because of his stated hopes for better relations with Russia and his tongue-in-cheek calls for Russia to find Hillary’s missing emails, it was clear long before last week that the Russian influence and hacking operations were not directed chiefly to aid his election. One can assume that Russia, like nearly every other observer, presumed Hillary would win. Consistent with this, the report states: “The [Russian Internet Research Agency] conducted social media operations targeted at large U.S. audiences with the goal of sowing discord in the U.S. political system.” Thus, they created fake grassroots organizations “(with names such as “Being Patriotic,” “Stop All Immigrants,” “Secured Borders,” and “Tea Party News”), purported Black social justice groups (“Black Matters,” “Blacktivist,” and “Don’t Shoot Us”), LGBTQ groups (“LGBT United”), and religious…
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by Bill Wirtz For months, young climate marchers have taken over Europe and the US. Now we know what they actually want – and it’s exactly what we thought it would be. Why They March If you’re unfamiliar with the “Youth4Climate” or “Fridays for Future” movement, it’s probably because, despite having existed in the United States since earlier this year, the phenomenon is more widely covered in Europe. Sixteen-year-old Greta Thunberg skips school in protest on Fridays, demanding that politicians do much more to fight against climate change. Reporters have latched on to her appeal, making her the poster child of a (very) young environmentalist generation. For weeks now, newspapers have been inundated with pictures of large protests for climate action, featuring the funniest signs and leading politicians to describe it as inspirational. Up until now, it wasn’t entirely clear what the climate marchers were actually hoping to achieve. For the most part, activists would merely bemoan the fact that politicians and the rich are standing idly by as the planet moves towards its inevitable collapse in 12 years. But with Greta getting closer to the age of 18, when she would officially be allowed to run for parliament…
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by Michael Bastach Massachusetts Senator and 2020 presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren unveiled her plan for the 640 millions of acres controlled by the federal government. Warren’s “plan for public lands,” released Monday, includes banning coal, natural gas and oil production, and making all national parks free to visit. Warren’s goal is to tackle climate change while spurring economic development on federal lands. “It is wrong to prioritize corporate profits over the health and safety of our local communities,” Warren wrote in a Medium post announcing her plan. Warren says she wants to “make public lands part of the climate solution – not the problem.” “That’s why on my first day as president, I will sign an executive order that says no more drilling — a total moratorium on all new fossil fuel leases, including for drilling offshore and on public lands,” she wrote. That’s a complete one-eighty from the Trump administration’s agenda of promoting natural resource development. Warren also set a goal of getting 10 percent of U.S. electricity generation from renewable energy on public lands and waters. “My administration will make it a priority to expedite leases and incentivize development in existing designated areas, and share royalties from renewable generation with states and…
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by Rick Manning The office discussions at Americans for Limited Government are lively with voices often raised over various interpretations of what the news of the day means. While none of us are economists and we don’t even belong to the Holiday Inn Rewards Program, we still have extended and sometimes loud discussions on the meaning of different economic events. Last week, a future recession signal was hit when the interest rate paid by a three-month Treasury bond went higher than the interest rate paid for a 10-year Treasury bond. Wait, don’t go away, this is really easy. It is logical that the interest rate investors would seek for a short term debt would be low, while investors would seek a higher return for parking their money in a ten-year investment. After all, the three-month bond goes away rapidly so if interest rates rise higher than what you are earning on your investment, you are not stuck with a loser for long (in this case a maximum of 3 months.) But if you buy a 10-year bond which only pays 2.4 percent interest as was the case on March 29, when the three-month bond is paying 2.4 percent, it…
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by Michael Bastasch Thousands of students will skip school Friday over global warming as part of an international movement backed by adult activists and based on a misreading of the latest United Nations climate report. In the U.S., strikers are calling “for the Green New Deal, for a fair and just transition to a 100% renewable economy, and for ending the creation of additional fossil fuel infrastructure,” according to the Youth Climate Strike website. Young activists say “inaction has left us with just 11 years to change the trajectory of the worst effects of climate change.” Isra Hirsi, the teenage daughter of Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar, is one of the protest leaders. Her mother joined the planned strike for Washington, D.C.and tweeted in support of the climate protests, “We need to listen to the wisdom of our kids!” Monied environmental organizations are supporting the strikers, and The New York Times said “grown-ups should listen” to children protesters. So, what exactly are these children saying? “The rest of my life is literally on the line,” 17-year-old activist Feliquan Charlemagne told The Washington Post. “I’m going to have to grow up in this if we don’t take action and don’t turn…
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by Michael Bastach Former Republican Ohio Gov. John Kasich said that while the Green New Deal might not be the right answer to global warming, “it’s asking the right question.” “But for all those problems, the Green New Deal is serving an important purpose by provoking a more vigorous level of public debate,” Kasich wrote in a USA Today op-ed published Monday. “We’ve finally reached a tipping point.” The Green New Deal, introduced by Democratic New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Democratic Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey in February, calls for sweeping changes that achieve “net-zero” emissions in 10 years. Some Democratic 2020 hopefuls endorse the bill, but many moderate Democrats are hesitant to embrace it on worries it’s not feasible to fundamentally transform society so quickly. Republicans oppose the bill’s massive government takeover of the economy. Kasich, who’s mulling a 2020 presidential run against President Donald Trump, wants moderates in both parties to come up with an alternative to the Green New Deal. “It’s time for free-market moderates on both sides of the aisle to come up with answers of their own,” Kasich wrote in his op-ed, embracing carbon pricing, fuel economy mandates and subsidies for electric vehicles. Kasich’s op-ed comes after the…
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by Michael Bastasch A rhetorical brawl over climate change broke out on the Senate floor as Democrats chided Republicans for criticizing the Green New Deal without proposing an alternative plan. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and other GOP Senate colleagues took to the chamber’s floor to criticize the Green New Deal, ahead of a planned vote on the sweeping resolution to massively expand government control in the name of climate change. Democrats, however, are trying to turn the tables on Republicans to side-step being tied to the Green New Deal. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer chided GOP lawmakers for not offering their own climate policies. Schumer even interrupted GOP Texas Sen. John Cornyn to ask whether he believed “climate change is real” and ask him to say what policies he’s for, instead of what he’s against. “We know what he’s not for, what is he for?” Schumer said while Cornyn spoke on the Senate floor. “I’m not for socialism,” Cornyn responded. “I’m not for Washington, D.C., thinking they know better than what my constituents know.” I've been looking all over for it, but I still can't find the Republican plan to tackle climate change. When will they tell us…
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by Michael Bastasch Democratic Washington Governor Jay Inslee has entered the 2020 presidential race as the candidate who has what it takes to unite Americans around one goal: fighting climate change. But while Inslee pushes for a Green New Deal-like economic plan, the Democratic governor has failed to implement major climate policies in his own state. “His climate policy has failed with the legislature, failed with the courts and failed with the voters,” said Todd Myers, environmental policy director at the free-market Washington Policy Center. “There’s not a single metric where Washington state is going the right direction on climate change,” Myers told The Daily Caller News Foundation in an interview. Inslee launched his presidential campaign Friday with a video making clear that fighting climate change would be the central focus of his campaign, though he’s also come out for abolishing the Senate filibuster and statehood for D.C. and Puerto Rico. “So [climate change] can’t be on a laundry list,” Inslee told Vox in an interview published Friday. “It can’t be something that candidates check the box on. It has to be a full-blooded effort to mobilize the United States in all capacities.” To that end, Inslee’s campaign website…
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by Andra Constantin Following the State of the Union address, I found the state of the nation surreal. I kept skimming past articles about the Democratic Party’s proposed economic stimulus packages, collectively known as the Green New Deal. They propose to fund unsustainable sectors like solar panels – which are already heavily government-backed – by targeting more self-sufficient industries, like meat production. In order to earmark raiding the cookie jar of productive businesses to fund those that aren’t paying for themselves, Democrats have to demonize the target in order to implement punitive measures such as meat taxes. I know the Green New Deal is based on non-truths and artfully doled misinformation, like the deforestation myth, but most people believe we are losing forest land in this country to the meat industry. That’s one of the lies told to them by our leaders in order to take advantage of the public support and vote. They need a mob to rob. A Bad New Deal How did we get to this choke point of punishing meat consumption, as one NJ radical animal rights activist senator proposes, in the form of a tax? I think I recognize a pendulum swinging back at me.…
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by Michael Bastasch Over the last decade, the U.S. has been the largest cutter of carbon dioxide emissions in the “history of energy,” said Fatih Birol, the executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA). “In the last 10 years, the emissions reduction in the United States has been the largest in the history of energy,” Birol said at a press conference in Washington, D.C., Thursday, standing alongside U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry. “Almost 800 million tons, and this is a huge decline of emissions,” Birol said, before going on to praise Perry for pushing carbon capture technology. Birol’s remarks reinforce a major Trump administration talking point — that greenhouse gas emissions are being driven down through innovation, not taxes and regulation. Experts say U.S. emissions cuts have largely been driven by a boom in natural gas production, which has supplanted coal-fired generation. The Trump administration has been cutting regulations on oil and natural gas production and plans on withdrawing from the Paris climate accord. “Like Dr. Birol has said many times, without carbon capture, any planned climate target is impossible to meet,” Perry said at the press conference. “We believe that you can’t have a serious conversation about…
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Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) will have to reexamine his budget proposal “line by line” after Thursday’s budget forecast came up $492 million short of November’s estimated $1.5 billion surplus. It’s only been nine days since Walz unveiled his first budget proposal for the 2020-2021 biennium, which capped out at $49.5 billion. But after Thursday’s announcement, Walz will need to do some trimming. “Minnesota’s budget and economic outlook has weakened since November. The projected balance for the upcoming biennium is $1.052 billion, which is $492 million less than the November forecast,” Minnesota Management and Budget revealed in a press release. “Slower projected economic growth and lower observed collections compared to prior estimates result in a reduced revenue forecast throughout the budget horizon,” it adds. During a Thursday press conference, Walz acknowledged that he’ll need to “go back through line by line” with his commissioners, but insisted that “today’s forecast validates the approach we proposed in our One Minnesota budget.” “Our budget looks to the future—with investments in education, health care, and community prosperity—and that’s exactly what we need to do when facing slower economic growth,” he wrote on Twitter. Today's forecast validates the approach we proposed in our #OneMinnesota budget. Our…
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More state spending, an education bond, climate change, and the expansion of Medicaid are some of the highlights from North Carolina Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s annual State of the State address. Gov. Cooper’s speech, which was broadcast on the his Facebook page, started by discussing the devastation Hurricane Florence caused the state and how “resilient” North Carolinians are. “First, we must be determined to help our state recover stronger and smarter than ever,” said Cooper. He went on to say that his administration is “determined to help North Carolinians recover, and we’re making progress.” But the governor’s words on storm recovery ring a bit hollow. While Cooper did talk at length about Hurricane Florence, once again Hurricane Matthew victims seem to be forgotten. The failings of the Cooper administration’s Hurricane Matthew efforts have even caught the attention of The New York Times, who noted that North Carolina was a “slow spender” when it came to the federal funds allotted for Matthew’s victims. As recently as last month, more problems arose with a recovery effort contract. Cooper’s speech segued from Hurricane Florence into climate change. “We’ve seen violent weather threaten every corner of our state, and scientists agree climate change is making…
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NASHVILLE, Tennessee – In front of a standing room only committee room, the House Health Committee passed the Heartbeat Bill by an overwhelming majority of 15 for and 4 against, straight along party lines. The bill, sponsored in the Tennessee House by Representative Micah Van Huss (R-Van Huss) as HB 0077, establishes the viability of a pregnancy when a fetal heartbeat is detected and bans an abortion once the fetal heartbeat is detected. The bill passed through the House Health Subcommittee last week, moving on to the full House Health Committee Tuesday. The hearing of Van Huss’s HB 0077 in the House Health Committee coincided with a previously scheduled Planned Parenthood Day on the Hill, complete with a bus from Knoxville. Pro-life grassroots advocates showed up as well, so that the room appeared to be about equally split, based on outward displays, between those representing two sides of the issue. Despite 14 of the 19 House Health Committee members having signed on to the bill as co-sponsors prior to the meeting, making it fairly obvious the bill would pass, discussion on the bill lasted nearly three-quarters of an hour before a roll call vote was eventually taken. Discussions went back…
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In early November, word began to leak that Amazon was serious about choosing New York to build a giant new campus. The city was eager to lure the company and its thousands of high-paying tech jobs, offering billions in tax incentives and lighting the Empire State Building in Amazon orange. Even Governor Andrew Cuomo got in on the action: “I’ll change my name to Amazon Cuomo if that’s what it takes,” he joked at the time. Then Amazon made it official: It chose the Long Island City neighborhood of Queens to build a $2.5 billion campus that could house 25,000 workers, in addition to new offices planned for northern Virginia. Cuomo and New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, Democrats who have been political adversaries for years, trumpeted the decision as a major coup after edging out more than 230 other proposals. But what they didn’t expect was the protests, the hostile public hearings and the disparaging tweets that would come in the next three months, eventually leading to Amazon’s dramatic Valentine’s Day breakup with New York. Immediately after Amazon’s Nov. 12 announcement, criticism started to pour in. The deal included $1.5 billion in special tax breaks and grants for the…
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U.S. Steel Corp. will restart construction on an idled manufacturing facility in Alabama, and it gave some of the credit to President Donald Trump’s trade policies in an announcement Monday. Trump’s “strong trade actions” are partly responsible for the resumption of work on an advanced plant near Birmingham, the Pittsburgh-based company said in a statement. The administration’s tariffs have raised prices on imported steel and aluminum. The manufacturer also cited improving market conditions, union support and government incentives for the decision. Work will resume immediately, the company said, and the facility will have an annual capacity of 1.6 million tons (1.5 million metric tons). U.S. Steel said it also will update other equipment and plans to spend about $215 million, adding about 150 full-time workers. The furnace is expected to begin producing steel in late 2020. The 16,000-member United Steelworkers praised the decision to resume work, which followed an agreement with the union reached last fall. “This decision paves the way for a solid future in continuing to make steel in Alabama and the Birmingham region,” Leo W. Gerard, the president of the international union, said in a statement. U.S. Steel shut down its decades-old blast furnace at Fairfield Works…
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by Julie Kelly The first contest of the 2020 primary season is one year away and the Democratic Party’s agenda now is coming into sharp focus: An income tax rate upwards of 70 percent, a Green New Deal that would send America back to the Stone Age, postpartum baby-killing, and the elimination of federal control over our southern border are just a few of the lowlights. Sprinkle that message with a heavy dose of anti-Semitic, anti-Christian, anti-white, anti-male rhetoric and voila! – Democratic presidential contenders are ready to swarm Iowa and New Hampshire. But another destructive sideshow now animates the Democrats ahead of next year’s elections: The multi-pronged, unprecedented and possibly unconstitutional investigation into President Trump. To satisfy the bloodlust of the party’s rank-and-file, still bitter about losing the 2016 presidential election and gobsmacked that Trump somehow remains in office, congressional leaders are seeking vengeance in the hearing rooms of Capitol Hill. Since taking the helm of powerful House committees last month, Democratic chairmen are wasting no time in probing every crevice of Trump World; no one, including the president’s family members, will be spared. Hundreds of New Investigations The government’s formal investigation into Donald Trump began in July 2016, when Barack Obama’s FBI launched a counterintelligence probe…
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MINNEAPOLIS, Minnesota–Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) officially declared her candidacy for President of the United States Sunday during a snowy rally on the banks of the Mississippi River in Minneapolis. Several of her Minnesotan colleagues spoke before her, including Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan (D-MN) and Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN). Klobuchar’s Senate counterpart, Sen. Tina Smith (D-MN), touted Klobuchar’s record of supporting Planned Parenthood, and criticized Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh for his alleged failure to adequately address Klobuchar’s line of questioning during his confirmation process. Prince, naturally, was invoked several times throughout the event and one of his former collaborators, DJ Dudley D, emceed the occasion. https://twitter.com/AGockowski/status/1094671348801175552 “Hey, if Prince could do that halftime show in all that rain, I can do this in this snow,” Klobuchar joked. Despite the blizzard-like conditions, Klobuchar managed to attract a massive crowd that was estimated at around 9,000 people. She began her address by thanking her “amazing and incredible team and staff for putting this together.” Leading up to her announcement, Buzzfeed News and Huffington Post released separate reports detailing Klobuchar’s abusive behavior toward her staff, which included claims that she “yelled, threw papers, and sometimes even hurled objects.” Klobuchar’s speech “We are gathered…
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Conservative Tilman Goins, who served as a Republican State Representative from Morristown for three terms ending in 2018, has been named as Deputy Commissioner and Chief Operating Officer for the State Department of Veterans Affairs. Goins will report to another former legislator, Courtney Rogers from Sumner County, who was appointed as Commissioner of Veterans Affairs by Governor Bill Lee late last year. Rogers was one of only a couple of grassroots-connected conservatives who was selected to serve in Governor Lee’s Cabinet. Her appointment was cheered by conservative Republicans at the time as an indication that Lee was perhaps responding to criticism of his early appointment of moderate Republicans, anti-Trumpers, and Democrats to top spots in his Administration. Nevertheless, those who saw Rogers’ selection as a positive sign were disappointed when there were no other solid and consistent conservatives who “made the cut” as Lee rounded out his Cabinet-level appointments. Goins announced that he would not seek reelection in February of 2018. Goins has a long history of public service, having served on active duty in both the US Marine Corps and the US Army, and as a Hamblen County Commissioner before being elected to the State Legislature. Goins was first…
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by Daniel Davis President Donald Trump delivered his State of the Union address Tuesday night, and Heritage Foundation experts weighed in with analysis of the president’s policy proposals. Here’s what they had to say. Immigration Economy Law Defense & Foreign Policy Life Energy & Infrastructure Health Care Education Immigration A Call for Robust Border Security President Donald Trump’s remarks on immigration tonight reflected a commonsense, principled approach to the immigration problem that his opponents refuse to acknowledge in their obsession with opposing anything he does. Trump also made a fundamental point that his opponents refuse to recognize when he said, “We have a moral duty to create an immigration system that protects the lives and jobs of our citizens.” He pointed out the sharp divide that exists between the public and the Washington establishment when he said, “No issue better illustrates the divide between America’s working class and America’s political class than illegal immigration. Wealthy politicians and donors push for open borders while living their lives behind walls and gates and guards.” Referring to the impasse between the president and Congress over border security, Trump was right when he said this was a “moral” issue and that “the lawless…
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President Donald Trump delivered his second State of the Union address Tuesday night in front of a bitterly divided Congress. His address touched on a number of sensitive issues, including the southern border wall, and the recent pro-abortion legislation passed in New York. He began, however, with a call for unity, urging Congress to “govern not as two parties, but as one nation.” “The agenda I’m laying out this evening is not a Republican agenda, or a Democrat agenda. It’s the agenda of the American people,” Trump said. “Victory is not winning for our party. Victory is winning for our country.” Trump called illegal immigration a “moral issue,” saying the “lawless state of our southern border is a threat to the safety, security, and financial well-being of all Americans.” “We have a moral duty to create an immigration system that protects the lives and jobs of our citizens. This includes our obligation to the millions of immigrants living here today who follow the rules and respected our laws. Legal immigrants enrich our nation and strengthen our society in countless ways,” Trump said. He went on to claim that the issue of illegal immigration “illustrates the divide between America’s working class…
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Ohio Taxpayers could be stuck with a $1 billion nuclear cleanup bill if one national energy company has its way. The U.S Department of Justice, along with the “U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Office of the Ohio Attorney General, acting on behalf of the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, and the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection,” are all jointly fighting to make sure that doesn’t happen. FirstEnergy, one of the nation’s largest investor-owned utilities, maintains the subsidiary; FirstEnergy Solutions (FES). That subsidiary actively managed three nuclear power plants, three coal plants, two natural gas plants, and three wind plants. A majority of these plants are based on Ohio with nuclear plants in Oak Harbor and Perry, a gas plant on Lorain, and a wind plant in Blue Creek. While only one of the coal plants is located in Ohio, in Stratton, the other two rest just outside Ohio’s borders in West Virginia and Pennsylvania. As a result, they too employ many Ohioans. In March, FES announced that all three nuclear power plants would be shuttered within the next five years, laying off 2,300 workers. After attempting, and failing,…
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