Boots & Sabers

The blogging will continue until morale improves...

Author: Owen

“Billionaire’s Tax” is Gateway to Wealth Tax

by | 0419, 23 Oct 2121 | | 0 Comments

Remember that the income tax was originally targeted at the very rich. Once we allow out government to tax unrealized gains, they will just keep moving the threshold down until middle class people are paying taxes on accumulated assets. That is the only way they will get to the amount of money that they want to spend.

Think of your house… if the value goes up by $50k over 10 years, you will have to pay taxes on that $50k even though you don’t sell the house. Oh, and you will also pay the capital gains tax when you do sell it.

Currently, wealthy Americans do not have to pay taxes on vast accumulations of wealth because they are taxed only once an asset is sold. Billionaires often borrow against their non-taxed assets, allowing them to spend enormous sums of money while effectively paying very low taxes relative to their income and worth.

Under the “Billionaire Income Tax” proposal, a summary of which was obtained by The Washington Post, the federal government would require billionaires to pay taxes on the increased value of assets such as stocks on an annual basis, regardless of whether they sell those assets. Billionaires would also be able to take deductions for any annual loss in value of those assets.

The plan would also set up a system for taxing assets that are not easily tradable, such as real estate. The tax would apply to billionaires and people earning more than $100 million in income three years in a row.

Harris to Smooth Things Over with the French

by | 2105, 22 Oct 2121 | | 0 Comments

Given her track record, I expect a major international incident to come out of this.

In addition to meeting with Macron, Harris will deliver a speech on Nov. 11 at the annual Paris Peace Forum and participate the following day in the Paris Conference on Libya. She will be joined by her husband Douglas Emhoff for the visit.

 

The scheduled meeting comes amid an effort by the Biden administration to soothe its relationship with the French which became strained by a U.S. deal announced last month to sell nuclear-powered submarines to Australia. The move by the U.S. undercut a more than $60 billion deal by a French defense contractor to sell diesel-powered submarines to Australia.

 

“They will discuss the importance of the transatlantic relationship to global peace and security and underscore the importance of our partnership on global challenges from COVID-19 and the climate crisis to issues affecting the Sahel and the Indo-Pacific,” Harris senior adviser Symone Sanders said in a statement.

Biden’s “Bipartisan” Negotiations

by | 2059, 22 Oct 2121 | | 0 Comments

Um, Joe… this is all negotiating with other Democrats. There’s not “bipartisan.”

That deal has not been easy in coming. Biden admitted some painful cuts to his programs at the town hall, but the lifelong politician, who campaigned on his ability to reach bipartisan deals, said some losses were inevitable.

 

“Hey look, it’s all about compromise. You know, it’s – ‘compromise’ has become a dirty word. But it’s bipartisanship and compromise still has to be possible,” Biden said Thursday.

5% Inflation Expected in UK

by | 1600, 22 Oct 2121 | , | 1 Comment

Yikes.

 

The Bank of England’s new chief economist has warned that UK inflation is likely to hit or surpass 5% by early next year.

Huw Pill told the Financial Times that the Bank would have a “live” decision to make at its next interest rate-setting meeting on 4 November.

 

It follows recent comments from Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey who said it “will have to act” on inflation.

 

The UK interest rate has been at a historic low of 0.1% since March 2020.

 

Recent data showed that inflation growth slowed to 3.1% in the year to September. However, it is expected to increase because of rising energy costs, higher wages to fill record vacancy numbers and supply chain disruption.

 

Mr Pill, who succeeded the Bank of England’s former chief economist Andy Haldane last month, said he would “not be shocked” to see inflation reach 5% or above in the coming months.

He told the Financial Times: “That’s a very uncomfortable place for a central bank with an inflation target of 2% to be.”

NIH Admits to Funding Gain of Function Research in Wuhan

by | 2149, 21 Oct 2121 | | 3 Comments

You have been lied to. Fauci should be prosecuted for going around US law and lying to Congress… but he won’t be. He’ll retire with a cushy pension that you paid for.

The National Institutes of Health has finally admitted to funding gain of function research on bat coronaviruses in it’s Wuhan laboratory despite Dr. Fauci’s denials to congress that no such research took place.

 

The admission came in a letter addressed Kentucky congressman James Comer on Wednesday, in which NIH’s principal deputy director Lawrence A. Tabak refers to a ‘limited experiment’ conducted to test if ‘spike proteins from naturally occurring bat coronaviruses circulating in China were capable of binding to the human ACE2 receptor in a mouse model,’ at the Wuhan lab.

US Intelligence Focused on Global Warming as China Surprises World By Launch of Hypersonic Nuclear Missile

by | 2144, 21 Oct 2121 | | 0 Comments

Defund the CIA.

Climate change will lead to growing international tensions, the US intelligence community has warned in a bleak assessment.

The first ever National Intelligence Estimate on Climate Change looks at the impact of climate on national security through to 2040.

 

Countries will argue over how to respond and the effects will be felt most in poorer countries, which are least able to adapt.

 

The report also warns of the risks if futuristic geo-engineering technologies are deployed by some countries acting alone.

The 27-page assessment is the collective view of all 18 US intelligence agencies. It is their first such look-ahead on what climate means for national security.

Fighting for our children

by | 0732, 21 Oct 2121 | , , | 4 Comments

Here is my column that ran in the Washington County Daily News on Tuesday:

The outrage that so many parents and community members are feeling is the realization that many of our government schools no longer consider themselves accountable to the people.

 

Throughout Wisconsin, and the rest of America, we are witnessing an eruption of outrage and activism by parents who are angry with their local school districts and the people who run them for indoctrinating children with critical race theory. This latest advancement of Marxism in our schools, however, is only the latest manifestation of a much deeper issue.

 

The real source of the outrage is our collective realization that the people who run our government schools no longer consider themselves accountable to the communities they are supposed to serve. Too many of our school administrators, teachers, and board members just want parents to shut up, pay their exorbitant taxes, and blindly accept what their children are being taught. It is an all-out assault on small “r” republicanism. When the pandemic began and we knew so little about the latest virus, parents wholeheartedly supported their local government schools as they made difficult decisions in what everyone thought was the best interest of the children.

 

Eighteen months later, we know much more about the virus, the minimal risk to children, and the incredible damage that many of the virus mitigation methods do to children. Despite this, too many schools have persisted in damaging children despite the clear science and the protestations of parents. The refusal of government schools to follow their community’s direction on virus mitigation was a shock for many parents. The entire purpose of having an elected board of community members run our government schools is so that the school district will reflect the collective will of the local community. Not only have many school districts refused to acquiesce to that collective will, school administrators, teachers unions, and the board members who serve them have treated the community with contempt for daring to challenge the mental and moral supremacy of officialdom.

 

The infusion of CRT into the curriculum of many schools was another revelation for parents. CRT is a postmodern radical racist ideology that has its roots in the Marxist dogma of dividing people by arbitrary characteristics. Marx divided people by economic class. CRT divides people by race. In both cases, they eschew the rights and liberties of individuals in favor of collective reward or punishment. They are ideologies that erode individualism as a means to subjugation.

 

CRT put a name to something that has been happening in too many of our government schools for some time. Now that parents are objecting and the term “CRT” has become politically toxic, some schools are changing the name to “social emotional learning,” “culturally responsive teaching,” or just infusing the ideology throughout the curriculum without assigning it a name. Fortunately, many parents are already onto the game and are trying to hold their local school board accountable.

 

In Mequon, an intrepid band of parents rallied the community to recall four members of the School Board who have been ignoring the community on issues from virus mitigation to the efforts to radicalize the children through the curriculum. Importantly, the parents in Mequon, now awakened, are pointing out that while the school board and administrators have been focused on botched virus responses, radical curriculum, and shaming parents, the school district’s education performance has been declining for years. This is true of almost every government school district in Wisconsin. While school administrators and board members focus on turning out a generation of woke radicals to fuel the leftist revolution, parents just want educated kids who are equipped to go get their American dream.

 

The outrage that so many parents and community members are feeling is the realization that many of our government schools no longer consider themselves accountable to the people. They consider themselves to be autonomous institutions whose purpose is to transform the bigoted, inequitable, individualistic society around them. Their hubris fuels their derision of the people they are supposed to be serving.

 

It is incredibly important that the people in Mequon and elsewhere reclaim their local government school boards for their communities. Education is the key to success for each child and every moment wasted is a moment taken from that child’s future. Teachers can model respect, dignity, and personal responsibility while teaching a full curriculum of reading, mathematics, economics, finance, civics, history, literature, geography, science, art, mechanics, technology, and all of the other subjects that compose a well-rounded education. Time is the most precious commodity a school has and there is not a moment to waste on divisive indoctrination.

San Francisco Shuts Down Restaurant for Refusing to Become Vaccine Enforcers

by | 1702, 20 Oct 2121 | , | 3 Comments

This is fascism.

The popular burger chain In-N-Out is sizzling mad after San Francisco shut down its indoor dining for refusing to check customers’ vaccination status.

 

The company’s Fisherman’s Wharf location – the only In-N-Out location in San Francisco – was temporarily shut by the Health Department on Thursday for declining to enforce the state’s stringent coronavirus restrictions.

 

Authorities said the burger chain had refused to bar clients who couldn’t show proof of vaccination to dine indoors, as required by a city-wide mandate that came into effect on August 20.

Karens Sue Schools Because Their Kids Got Sick

by | 0655, 20 Oct 2121 | , , | 6 Comments

Unless these parents are also forcing masking, distancing, etc. on their kids in every other aspect of life, I don’t see how they can even prove that their kid got COVID at school. But imagine what kind of hell schools will be if they become liable for every kid who catches any kind of illness in their walls.

The parents in Waukesha and Fall Creek each filed federal lawsuits against their respective school boards after their children tested positive for COVID-19. The lawsuits claim the children got sick after they were exposed to another sick child while in school, and blame their children’s’ illness on the districts’ lack of mitigation strategies.

 

Both cases are seeking an order to force the districts to comply with COVID-19 guidance from the CDC.

 

The lawsuits are being funded by the Minocqua Brewing Company Super PAC. The Super PAC and the brewery, which has politically branded beers, are owned by Kirk Bangstad, who ran unsuccessfully last November for the Assembly District 34 seat against incumbent Republican Rob Swearingen. He started a Super PAC in January targeting Republican federal and state officials.

Lawless Portland

by | 1343, 18 Oct 2121 | , | 3 Comments

And some people were saying that passing concealed carry legislation would bring on the days of the Wild West. As it turns out, following leftist policies does that.

At least 100 self-proclaimed anarchists tore through Portland, setting dumpsters aflame, smashing windows and causing $500,000 in damage, but police stood idle because of a new state law that restricts how law enforcement can respond to riots.

 

The city just reached the ‘grim’ milestone of 1,000 shootings through 2021 in what has been a year of destructive protests, violent street clashes and a police staffing crisis.

 

Now police say a recently passed law ties their hands even further as it prohibits police from using crowd control techniques like pepper spray or tear gas. Instead, law enforcement agencies are told to rely on follow-up investigations to hold rioters accountable.

 

[…]

 

Residents frustrated by the violence last Tuesday questioned whether that meant anything goes now in Portland.

 

‘Does that mean we are now like a lawless city? Anybody could come in and just bash around and do all the damage that they want without any repercussions whatsoever?’ Linda Witt asked during the meeting with police.

Yes. Yes it does. And a majority of the folks in Portland voted for it.

Wisconsin Ends Fiscal Year With Surplus

by | 1325, 18 Oct 2121 | | 1 Comment

Give it back to the people who paid excess taxes.

Madison, Wis. – Wisconsin concluded Fiscal Year 2021, which ended on June 30, 2021, with a positive balance of $2.58 billion.  In addition, the state increased its Budget Stabilization Fund (“Rainy Day” Fund) to a record-high $1.73 billion according to the new Annual Fiscal Report released by the Wisconsin Department of Administration (DOA) today.

China Launched Nuclear-Capable Hypersonic Missile

by | 1033, 17 Oct 2121 | , | 3 Comments

American intelligence asleep at the switch again. China is reaching parity with America’s technical capabilities and they have five times as many people. As their economy destabilizes, their totalitarian instinct will be to start a war to rally the people. We are in a very dangerous time.

China secretly tested a nuclear-capable hypersonic missile which orbited the globe in a terrifying display of military strength which left the US stunned.

 

A report from the Financial Times, which cited five unnamed intelligence sources, said the Chinese military launched the Long March rocket in August carrying a hypersonic glide vehicle around the globe before cruising towards its target, which it missed by about two dozen miles.

 

The incident has left US intelligence officials stunned, sources say, as it shows ‘China has made astonishing progress on the development of its hypersonic weapons’.

The Great Resignation

by | 1911, 16 Oct 2121 | | 0 Comments

Interesting. My observation in the labor market is that companies are desperate for people and are offering incredible incentives. A lot of people are quitting crappy jobs for good jobs or good jobs for great jobs.

The number of Americans quitting their jobs has hit record highs over the past several months in a phenomenon economists have been calling the “Great Resignation.” In August, 4.3 million U.S. workers — almost 3 percent of the entire American workforce — voluntarily left their positions, the highest number since the Bureau of Labor Statistics began tracking “quits” in 2020.

 

Workers are quitting at high rates in every industry, but the trend has been especially pronounced for frontline businesses like restaurants, hotels, retail stores and health care providers. Recent quit rates are a stark contrast to early in the coronavirus pandemic, when the number of quits plummeted to the lowest levels in a decade, as COVID-related business closures put millions of Americans out of work.

 

[…]

 

Rather than offering one reason so many Americans are quitting their jobs, experts mostly believe the Great Resignation is the result of a variety of forces coming together. Something not on that list is employer vaccine mandates, which don’t appear to have caused a significant number of people to quit.

 

One of the most common explanations is that workers are simply burned-out. The high quit rates in customer-facing jobs and health care suggest that people in these fields have become exhausted after 18 months of extra hours, confrontations over COVID mitigation rules and fear of catching the virus. Many white-collar workers, on the other hand, may be eager to maintain some of the elements of pandemic-era work that benefitted them — like remote work and flexible hours — and willing to move on as their employers transition back to the office.

 

Others see the Great Resignation as the sign of a major shift in the power dynamic between workers and their employers. Labor Bureau data doesn’t track whether people quitting are finding another position, but record levels of job openings mean prospects for quitters have never been higher. While many have struggled financially during the pandemic, a large share of Americans have actually increased their savings — meaning they have more of a cushion to absorb a job transition. These factors mean workers have greater freedom to leave unsatisfying jobs to pursue something that suits them better.

Texas Abortion Law Remains in Effect

by | 0725, 15 Oct 2121 | , | 0 Comments

The process continues.

The law, which went into effect on Sept. 1, was briefly paused after a federal judge issued a temporary injunction last week barring its enforcement. Days later, the law was reinstated after a panel of judges on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a temporary administrative stay.

 

In the latest development of the high-profile case, the court rejected the Justice Department’s request to again halt Texas’ ability to enforce the law. In a 2-1 order Thursday night, a panel of judges granted Texas’s request to continue to stay the preliminary injunction while it pursues its appeal.

 

The court’s order did not detail its reasoning behind the ruling, which is expected to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Heating Costs Soar

by | 0829, 14 Oct 2121 | | 76 Comments

Back to Carter’s America, but worse… turn down the thermostat… wear a sweater… pay more money… it’s your contribution to the socialist paradise.

Wisconsin residents could be paying hundreds of dollars more to heat their homes this winter because of a global energy crunch that has sent natural gas prices to the highest level in a decade.

The federal Energy Information Administration on Wednesday forecast steeply higher heating bills for all U.S. households, regardless of the weather. The Midwest is expected to be hardest hit, with some households spending up to 69% more.  

[…]

Alliant Energy and Madison Gas and Electric have not calculated the bill impacts, though both utilities recommend cost-saving measures such as turning down the thermostat, changing furnace filters and sealing window and door openings.

Parents Are Stupid and Shouldn’t Have Any Say in What Their Kids Are Taught In School

by | 2305, 13 Oct 2121 | , | 8 Comments

That’s pretty much this guy’s message.

Parents have an important role in the education process, no doubt, but when it comes to what is being taught, that should be left up to elected and appointed professionals that have a background in education and actual experience with teaching. Just because a parent disagrees with something doesn’t make what they disagree with inappropriate for the classroom.

 

Parents tend to let their personal views cloud what they think should and should not be taught in schools. Being an educated person means that you are a well-rounded person. A well-rounded person learns about many different topics and perspectives.

 

Parents that are demanding to have a say in what is and isn’t taught need to think about the consequences of their demands.

 

At best, parents dictating what teachers teach could lead to dangerous inaccuracies in the many facets of education. At worst, it could poison our students’ minds with nonsensical dribble.

Government Indoctrination Centers Drive Passion in Republican Base

by | 2301, 13 Oct 2121 | , , | 3 Comments

I’m heartened to see communities trying to take control of their schools back. I hope they are successful

But the issue that transformed Yoder, a stay-at-home mother, from a reliable voter to the kind of person who brings three young children to an evening campaign rally was not her Christian values or her pocketbook.

 

It was something even more personal, she said: what her children learn in school.

 

“The past year has revealed a ton to me,” Yoder, 41, said as she waited in this northern Virginia exurb for a speech by Glenn Youngkin, the Republican candidate for governor. “The more I’ve listened and paid attention, the more that I see what’s happening in schools and on college campuses. And the stuff I see, I don’t want corrupting my children.”

Appleton considers a transportation utility fee

by | 0807, 12 Oct 2121 | | 3 Comments

My column for the Washington County Daily News is online and in print. I sound a warning bell about a push for a new kind of tax. Here’s a part:

The city of Appleton was one of the first municipalities in Wisconsin to implement a wheel tax. Now, in what might be the start of a new tax trend, they are considering implementing another new tax after finding that the wheel tax is not generating enough tax money to cover their spending.

 

[…]

 

What is a transportation utility fee? Invented in Fort Collins, Colorado, in 1984, a transportation utility fee is based on the rationale that the transportation infrastructure functions as a public utility like the water, sewer, or electricity systems. As a utility, users of the transportation system are charged based on their consumption of the system. Also, conveniently for the taxing authority, utility fees are not subject to the same strictures as taxes and can be implemented with more impunity by the local government.

 

Unlike water, sewer, and electricity, however, there is not a good way to actually measure the consumption of the transportation infrastructure without tracking each individual’s movement on the roads. Absent the technical, political, or cultural feasibility of always having the government tracking everyone’s movements (that might be coming), a government that wishes to implement a transportation utility fee must use proxy distinctions to divvy up the fee.

 

[…]

 

If we are to treat our transportation infrastructure as a utility, then we must also rescind all of the other taxes and fees that are levied to pay for our transportation infrastructure. Our transportation infrastructure is either a utility to be funded through user fees or it is a public good to be supported through general taxes. It cannot be both.

Harris’ Spacey Video

by | 2343, 11 Oct 2121 | | 0 Comments

This entire administration is stage managed by a foreign firm.

The video was produced by a foreign film production company, Canada’s Sinking Ship Entertainment. The production cost remains unknown.

 

Children who took part in the event appeared to be delighted to be there. They were child actors who tried out to be in the videos, California station KSBW reported.

 

Monterey resident Trevor Bernardino, 13, told the station he was a space enthusiast who tried out for the role – only to be gobsmacked when he learned he would be traveling to Washington, DC to take part in the video. He tried out by sending in a monologue and the providing three questions he would ask a world leader.

 

‘Then after that, like a week later my agent called me and was like ‘Hey Trevor you booked it,” he said.

 

He was one of five teens who participated. He was joined by Derrick Brooks II, another child actor, Emily Kim, likewise a child actor, Zhoriel Tapo, a child actor and aspiring journalist who has interviewed former First Lady Michell Obama, and Sydney Schmooke.

 

NASA astronaut Shane Kimbrough took part from the International Space Station.

 

Harris tweeted out the video on October 7.

Empty Shelves in America

by | 1223, 11 Oct 2121 | , | 16 Comments

Bare shelves in the land of plenty? Biden’s America.

Stores across America have empty shelves thanks to a series in supply chain problems that are prolonging inflation and could stretch into the new year, with some retailers like Costco and Walmart limiting the amount of toilet paper people in fear that they may soon run out.

 

More than 60 cargo ships are waiting to dock in California, carrying hundreds of thousands of containers, and may be stuck for months in a traffic jam after arriving from China and Asia.  Millions of dollars of American goods are still sitting in warehouses in China, awaiting shipment.

 

There are similar problems with homegrown goods that can’t be transported quickly enough by truckers or on freight trains.

Login | Register

Archives

Categories

Pin It on Pinterest