Category Archives: Politics
Bokbluster Weekend NATO Editon
Last week President Obama assured member nations that NATO would defend them. Meanwhile, terrorists frolicked by the pool at the abandoned American Embassy in Tripoli.
Not NATO
On Friday Ukraine signed a ceasefire agreement with Russian separatists. Ukraine isn’t a NATO member. The only American military assistance it received where Meals Ready to Eat. Still it was making progress against the separatists. That is until Russian tanks invaded.
The beheading of two Americans seems to have concentrated the country’s attention on the use of military force. Even Rand Paul wants to wipe out ISIS. He says he’s always been in favor of war if it’s in the national interest. How far does the national interest go?
Pretty far, according to Robert Kagan and Victor Davis Hanson. They both made the same point that when you withdraw military power bad guys fill the vacuum.
Brett Bair interviewed three CIA contractors who were on the ground in Benghazi when Ambassador Stevens was killed. They say their station chief told them to stand down. Eventually they defied orders and fought the terrorists, some of whom may now be poolside in Tripoli.
Degrade and Destroy
Last week President Obama said he didn’t have a strategy for dealing with ISIL, the Islamist terror concern occupying large swaths of Iraq and Syria.
Degrade and Destroy
This week he said he would “degrade and destroy” those same head sawing barbarians. Moments later he dialed that back, saying he would reduce ISIL to a “manageable problem“.
Just to keep things interesting Joe Biden vowed to chase them to the gates of hell.
Daniel Henninger of the WSJ (you should get a one-time pass) thinks Obama believes America’s real enemies are the unmanageable, “ideologically rigid, anti-science” congressional Republicans.
Attack Rabbit Presidency
President Obama doesn’t have a strategy. The Washington Post editorial board calls him the “can’t do president“.
One thing the president can do is raise funds. He’s spending his holiday week-end doing just that for Democrats. He’s not alone on the fundraising circuit. Jimmy Carter will be hosting Hamas at a dinner in Detroit with the Islamic Society of America.
Beware the Attack Rabbit
Jimmy Carter’s troubled presidency jumped the shark when an attack rabbit evaded security and tried to whack him in a fishing boat. John Kass in the Chicago Tribune thinks Obama has reached the bunny hop threshold. (Here’s a link but you may have to subscribe.)
Climate Shame
The president is going it alone on a climate plan. Well, not exactly alone. He’s working it out with the UN. It’s just that Congress won’t be involved.
Name and Shame
The idea is to hammer out a plan for carbon reduction for the entire “international community”. But without Senate approval the agreement won’t have the force of law (see Kyota). If the plan isn’t legally binding what keeps it from being a toothless piece of paper? It will be a “politically binding” agreement. International Community members will be shamed into compliance.
Economic Patriotism
President Obama’s favorite billionaire is making a run for the border. Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway will finance Burger King’s purchase of Canadian donut dynamo, Tim Hortons.
Economic Patriotism
As a Canadian operation, Burger King will still have to pay US corporate taxes on earnings inside the United States. But earnings outside the US will only be taxed at the rate of the country where they occur. US companies have to pay taxes in the countries where they operate and also must pay IRS the difference between those rates and the US rate. The Obama administration calls this economic patriotism.
Burger King’s move is called a tax “inversion”. Matt Levine gives a great explanation in this Bloomberg article.
The US corporate rate, including state and local taxes comes to about 40%. That’s the highest in the world outside the Islamic State jizya. Roberto A. Ferdman provides a nice chart in the Washington Post showing the tax rates of the 34 OECD countries.
The nominal corporate tax rate in the U.S., which combines national, state, and city-level tax rates, is nearly 40 percent—the highest across all 34 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) member countries. Canada’s, by comparison, is just over 26 percent.
