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President Joe Biden says, “I know how to make government work!”
You’d think he’d know. He’s worked in government for 51 years.
But the truth is, no one can make government work.
Biden hasn’t.
Look at the chaos at the border, our military’s botched withdrawal from Afghanistan, the rising cost of living, our unsustainable and record-high debt …
In my new video, economist Ed Stringham argues that no government can ever work well, because “even the best person can’t implement change. … The massive bureaucracy gets bigger and slower.”
I learned that as a consumer reporter watching bureaucrats regulate business. Their rules usually made life worse for consumers.
Yet politicians want government to do more!
Remember the unveiling of Obamacare’s website? Millions tried to sign up. The first day, only six got it to work.
As vice president then, Biden made excuses: “Neither [Barack Obama] and I are technology geeks.”
Stringham points out, “If they can’t design a basic simple website, how are they going to manage half the economy?”
While bureaucrats struggled with the Obamacare site, the private sector successfully created Uber and Lyft, platforms like iCloud, apps like Waze, smartwatches, etc.
The private sector creates things that work because it has to. If businesses don’t serve customers well, they go out of business.
But government is a monopoly. It never goes out of business. With no competition, there’s less pressure to improve.
Often good people join government. Some work as hard as those in the private sector.
But not for long. Because the bureaucracy’s incentives kill initiative.
If a government worker works hard, he might get a small raise. But he sits near others who earn the same pay and, thanks to archaic civil service rules, are unlikely to get fired even if they’re late, lazy, or stupid.
Over time, that’s demoralizing. Eventually government workers conclude, “Why try?”
In the private sector, workers must strive to make things better. If they don’t, competitors will, and you might lose your job.
Governments never go out of business.
“Companies can only stay in business if they always keep their customer happy,” Stringham points out. “Competition pushes us to be better. Government has no competition.”
I push back.
“Politicians say, ‘Voters can vote us out.’”
“With a free market,” Stringham replies, “The consumer votes every single day with the dollar. Under politics, we have to wait four years.”
It’s another reason why, over time, government never works as well as the private sector.
Year after year, the Pentagon fails audits.
If a private company repeatedly does that, they get shut down. But government never gets shut down.
A Pentagon spokeswoman makes excuses: “We’re working on improving our process. We certainly are learning each time.”
They don’t learn much. They still fail audits.
“It’s like we’re living in ‘Groundhog Day,’” Stringham jokes.
When COVID-19 hit, politicians handed out almost $2 trillion in “rescue” funds. The Government Accountability Office says more than $100 billion were stolen.
“One woman bought a Bentley,” laughs Stringham. “A father and son bought a luxury home.”
At least Biden noticed the fraud. He announced, “We’re going to make you pay back what you stole!”
No. They will not. Biden’s Fraud Enforcement Task Force has recovered only 1% of what was stolen.
Even without fraud, government makes money vanish. I’ve reported on my town’s $2 million toilet in a park. When I confronted the parks commissioner, he said, “$2 million was a bargain! Today it would cost $3 million.”
That’s government work.
More recently, Biden proudly announced that government would create “500,000 [electric vehicle] charging stations.”
After two years, they’ve built … seven. Not 7,000. Just seven.
Over the same time, greedy, profit-seeking Amazon built 17,000.
“Privatize!” says Stringham. “Whenever we think something’s important, question whether government should do it.”
In Britain, government-owned Jaguar lost money year after year. Only when Britain sold the company to private investors did Jaguar start turning a profit selling cars that people actually like.
When Sweden sold Absolut Vodka, the company increased its profits sixfold.
It’s ridiculous for Biden to say, “I know how to make government work.”
No one does.
Next week, this column takes on Donald Trump’s promise: “We’ll drain the Washington swamp!”
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The Daily Signal publishes a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Heritage Foundation.
The post ‘Make Government Work’ appeared first on The Daily Signal.
There are many reasons why legal experts are questioning the legitimacy of the criminal prosecution of former President Donald Trump. But the major reason is that the main claim in Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s case—that Trump’s $130,000 settlement payment of a potential claim by Stormy Daniels was a campaign-related expense—is totally bogus.
Here’s a quick tutorial on why Bragg doesn’t have a legal leg to stand on—call it “Federal Campaign Finance Law for Dummies 101”—an apropos title, given what’s going on.
Daniels claims that she had a sexual encounter with Trump in 2006, fully 10 years before the 2016 presidential election, which Trump denies. For the payment, Daniels agreed to sign a nondisclosure agreement, which is a standard provision in many settlement agreements of personal injury cases and other claims.
Bragg contends that Trump falsified business records, a misdemeanor, when this payment was listed as legal expenses instead of a campaign expense.
Supposedly, according to Bragg, that converted the misdemeanors into felonies because Trump was concealing another crime. That other crime, according to prosecutors, is a violation of Section 17-152 of New York law, which makes it a misdemeanor to “promote … the election of any person to public office by unlawful means.”
Besides the fact that it’s very strange to allege that the commission of a misdemeanor for the purpose of covering up the commission of another misdemeanor is enough to allege a felony, the only plausible theory that Bragg is pushing for the alleged “unlawful means” was a violation of federal law by concealing a campaign-related payment.
With me so far?
But Trump was running for president. The raising and spending of money for campaigns for president and Congress is governed by federal law, the Federal Election Campaign Act, not state law. Any wrongdoing related to federal campaign financing falls under the enforcement authority of federal officials, not a local prosecutor like Bragg.
In fact, the Federal Election Commission, on which I served as a commissioner, has civil enforcement authority and the U.S. Department of Justice has criminal enforcement authority over violations of this law.
For the nuisance-value settlement payment to Daniels to fit within Bragg’s rickety legal structure, it would have to be a crime under federal law. In other words, it would have to be considered a campaign-related expense that was falsely reported under the Federal Election Campaign Act.
If you want an example of such a violation, just look at the $113,000 civil penalty the Hillary Rodham Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee agreed to pay in 2022. They listed the payments for the opposition research that formed the basis for the infamous Steele dossier, which fabricated the entire Trump-Russia collusion hoax, as legal expenses instead of opposition research.
But opposition research on the opposing candidate is obviously a campaign-related expense under applicable federal law, so the FEC had authority to investigate and enforce the law against this deception.
That’s not the case with the Daniels’ payment. For starters, the incident in question that led to the payment is alleged to have happened 10 years before the 2016 campaign. More importantly, the payment fails the test the FEC applies to determine whether an expense is campaign-related.
Under federal law and corresponding regulations, the FEC applies the “irrespective test” to “differentiate legitimate campaign and officeholder expenses from personal expenses.” As the FEC explains on its website, under the irrespective test, “personal use is any use of funds … to fulfill a commitment, obligation, or expense of any person that would exist, irrespective of the candidates’ campaign.”
In other words, if the expense would exist even if the individual were not a candidate, then it’s personal and not a campaign expense.
The payment to Daniels clearly fails that test. Trump was a celebrity long before he ran for office, and celebrities get these kinds of nuisance claims all the time. In fact, the prosecution’s first witness in the New York case, David Pecker, said he had helped settle similar claims to avoid legal costs and embarrassment by suppressing stories for numerous other celebrities, including Arnold Schwarzenegger and Tiger Woods.
The easiest way to understand this test is to take the example of a personal injury claim.
Candidate A has a car accident several years before he runs for Congress that injures another driver. After the campaign has started, the candidate decides to settle the personal injury claim made by the other driver by paying that driver $130,000 in exchange for a nondisclosure agreement.
Settling and paying the claim may help the candidate in his campaign by avoiding personal embarrassment. But that doesn’t make it a campaign expense. It’s a claim that would exist even if the candidate were not running for office and is thus considered a personal expense under federal law.
Daniels’ claim is also a personal claim that existed long before Trump ran for the presidency and, given his celebrity status, would have continued to exist even if he never ran for president.
That’s no doubt why neither the FEC nor the Justice Department ever filed an enforcement action against the Trump campaign or Trump personally over the payment; specifically, because it was not a campaign-related expense.
You know what would have led to enforcement actions? If Trump had actually claimed this was a campaign-related expense and had used campaign funds to make the payment, I have no doubt he would have been prosecuted by the feds for the illegal use of campaign funds to pay a personal expense.
That’s what former Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., D-Ill., went to prison for after he pleaded guilty in 2013 to spending $750,000 on personal expenses.
Keep in mind that Bragg’s entire manufactured case of 34 counts of falsifying business records depends entirely on the legitimacy of his contention that the settlement payment should have been listed as a campaign-related expense.
It shouldn’t because it wasn’t.
And all of the other testimony from the prosecution’s witnesses about this payment and other settlement payments that are obviously intended to blacken the character of the former president and prejudice the jury doesn’t change the fact that none of these payments were campaign-related expenses. Period. End of story—or at least it should be.
The post Trump’s NY Prosecution Is a Bogus Case by a Bogus Prosecutor appeared first on The Daily Signal.
“How far we have fallen with the standards for government,” Peter Schweizer says of the apparently coordinated efforts to prosecute Donald Trump before the 2024 elections.
The post Peter Schweizer: Biden’s ‘Sinister but Brilliant’ Campaign Strategy Is Lawfare appeared first on Breitbart.
A Mexican Senator from the Morena Party drew widespread condemnation after he organized the ritualistic killing of a chicken as an "offering to a rain god." The incident took place in one of the courtyards of Mexico’s federal senate building.
The post VIDEO: Chicken Sacrificed As ‘Offering to Rain God’ at Mexico’s Senate appeared first on Breitbart.
At least 13 financial institutions are being investigated for colluding with the federal government to spy on Trump supporters.
The post Nolte: Report Says 13 Banks Helped Feds Spy on Trump Supporters appeared first on Breitbart.
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The weekend murder of two political candidates in Mexico marks the current political cycle as one of the bloodiest in recent decades. Criminal organizations and their political allies appear to be flexing their muscles to eliminate opposition.
The post 30 Candidates Killed During Mexico’s Current Electoral Season appeared first on Breitbart.
Mexican immigration authorities are trying to cover up the heavy-handed tactics that they used against a group of migrants who were protesting prior assaults by authorities against them. As part of their coverup, authorities are claiming that they were the ones who were assaulted by migrants.
The post EXCLUSIVE: Photos Prove Mexican Cops Assaulted Migrants During Protest, Then Denied It appeared first on Breitbart.
On Thursday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Your World,” Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank President Neel Kashkari stated that stimulus spending was “a contributor to the high inflation that we’ve seen.” And “the spending on infrastructure, the spending on new chip
The post Minneapolis Fed Pres: Biden Spending on Chips, Infrastructure ‘Is Inflationary’ and There Are ‘Cross-Purposes’ appeared first on Breitbart.
Mexico’s government continues to suppress information about the raging cartel violence that plagues one of its main border cities. The lack of information is further worsened by a gag order of sorts placed by organized crime on local news outlets in the city of Matamoros, Tamaulipas.
The post Mexican Government, Media Silent as Shootouts, Kidnappings Plague Border City appeared first on Breitbart.
Mexico has been crushing Texas farmers and border communities by not releasing water from its dams as part of an international agreement signed in 1944. The ongoing issue, worsened by sustained droughts has pushed a Texas county to issue an emergency declaration.
The post Mexico Crushing Texas Border Farmers by Refusing to Honor Water Treaty appeared first on Breitbart.
Brussels authorities shuttered the National Conservatism Conference on Tuesday, sending police to block entry to the conference and announcing that those inside would be permitted to leave but not to return.
However, the action was not the result of any public disturbances or threats. It was a political action by left-progressive politicians who do not like the views being ventilated at the conference—and who fear the increasing success of nationalist and conservative ideas in European politics.
Initial coverage of the incident is posted here and here, with no doubt more to come. And see this article by Ayaan Hirsi Ali on the incident.
I am a trustee of the Edmund Burke Foundation, which is sponsoring the conference, and I have been chairman of its regular “NatCon” conferences in the U.S., U.K., and Europe for the past five years.
My colleagues and I have strong views on such urgent issues as uncontrolled immigration; the corruption of schools and cultural institutions by race and gender ideologies; the transfer of government authority from nations to international bureaucracies; and the erosion of freedoms of speech, religion, and inquiry. These are the central issues on the agenda at this week’s conference in Brussels.
All of our conferences are carefully planned to include top-tier conservative thinkers, writers, scholars, activists, and political figures, and to provide a good mix of speeches, panel discussions, and debates (with a few brave souls on the Left to keep us sharp).
Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts, who agrees with some NatCon positions but disagrees with others, has given terrific addresses at earlier conferences and has been received with enthusiasm and appreciation. Several other Heritage friends are at this week’s Brussels conference, although I have had to miss it myself because of commitments in the U.S. (now to my special regret!) (The Daily Signal is Heritage’s news and commentary outlet.)
That an earnest gathering of political officials, activists, and thinkers should be bullied by a mayor and sequestered by the police is, of course, outrageous and worthy of severe condemnation. And few liberal as well as conservative leaders have issued critical statements.
But there is a larger meaning to the incident. It demonstrates that forthright, unapologetic conservatism is gaining serious momentum in Europe as well as the U. S.—and that the progressive Left, in its desperation to stop us, is increasingly willing to employ means that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago.
Unfortunately, the progressives’ effort to anathematize national conservatives as a “far right” threat to democracy and civil order is being adopted by others who should know better. Some on the moderate left and right are portraying the Brussels “controversy” as a case for standing on principle for freedom of speech—even for those with so-called deplorable ideas and values, as if NatCons were Nazis marching through Skokie. Thanks for your support, guys, and have a nice free-speech day yourself.
The incident is actually the latest example of establishment timorousness and liberal decay. Two fancy Brussels venues, Concert Noble and a Sofitel hotel, abruptly canceled the NatCon conference at the insistence of city officials before the no-nonsense Tunisian owner of the Claridge event hall agreed to host us, refused to back down, and treated us to warm hospitality to compensate for the hostility of the city fathers.
This gentleman is in today’s avant-garde. The progressive strategy of meeting conservative ascent with shallow demagoguery and forceful suppression, rather than forthright argument or reform of their ruinous policies, is coming in for a richly deserved political reckoning.
The post Brussels Authorities Shut Down Conservative Conference, Afraid of Conservatism Gaining Momentum in Europe appeared first on The Daily Signal.
Several sanctuary cities and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are expected to secure $300 million in American taxpayer dollars for resettling migrants across the United States on behalf of President Joe Biden's administration.
The post Sanctuary Cities, NGOs Resettling Migrants for Biden Administration Secure $300M in Taxpayer Dollars appeared first on Breitbart.
On Friday’s broadcast of CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street,” BlackRock CEO Larry Fink stated that it will be difficult to reach 2% inflation and one reason is “We have a trillion dollars of fiscal stimulus in the CHIPS Act, the
The post BlackRock’s Fink: Spending in ‘Inflation Reduction Act’ Will Make It Harder to Lower Inflation appeared first on Breitbart.
Nigel Farage said the British people should be called on in a referendum to decide if the UK remains in the European Court of Human Rights.
The post Brexit 2.0? Farage Calls for Referendum on UK’s Membership in Deportation-Blocking European Court appeared first on Breitbart.
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Back on May 30, 2023, after then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy cut a deal with President Joe Biden to suspend any limit on the federal debt through all of 2024, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer praised the deal as an act of “responsible” government.
“Again, nobody got everything they wanted,” said Schumer, “but this bill is the responsible and prudent and necessary way forward.”
At the close of business on the day Schumer made this statement, the federal debt was $31,463,988,658,765.75.
At the close of business on April 8 of this year, the debt was $34,608,412,560,642.47.
In just over 10 months since Biden and McCarthy made their deal, the debt has increased by more than $3 trillion ($3,144,423,901,876.72).
To put this in perspective, the total federal debt did not top $3 trillion for the first time until fiscal year 1990—214 years after the nation was founded in 1776.
Schumer and his colleagues in the current Congress borrowed more money in less than one year than their pre-1990 predecessors did in more than two centuries.
What is the fiscally “responsible” Schumer talking about now? He is bragging about how he is spending federal money on pet projects in New York state.
In the seven days from April 2 through April 8, Schumer’s Senate office posted eight press releases announcing projects that would funnel $79,174,581 in federal funding to New York.
His communications staff was especially busy on April 2.
The first press release they put out that day said that Schumer and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., had “secured $3,822,000 for critical local projects.”
“This nearly $4 million in federal funding makes vital investments in the Capital Region’s top-notch educational institutions, helping give students the equipment and hands-on training they need,” Schumer said.
The second press release they put out that day said Schumer and Gillibrand “secured $3,000,000 for the Syracuse University and CenterState CEO in the Fiscal Year 2024 appropriations bills to upgrade facilities at the Syracuse University’s South Side Innovation Center and prepare local small business to succeed in the semiconductor industry through CenterState CEO.”
The third press release they put out that day said Schumer and Gillibrand “personally secured $1,000,000 for Binghamton University to purchase state-of-the-art advanced packaging equipment for its Nanofabrication Laboratory (NLAB) in Fiscal Year 2024 appropriations bills as a Congressionally Directed Spending request to bolster workforce training for advanced chip manufacturing in cleanroom environments.”
A fourth press release they put out that day said Schumer and Gillibrand “secured $1,200,000 in the Fiscal Year 2024 appropriations package for DAY ONE Early Learning Community, a preschool in Poughkeepsie that serves low-income children and families.”
A fifth press release published that same day said Schumer and Gillibrand “announced $5,633,581 through the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Great Lakes Environmental Justice Grant Program to develop and implement the Western New York Environmental Justice Grant Program for underserved communities in Lake Erie and Niagara River’s watershed.”
Two days later, on April 4, Schumer “announced $1,559,000 from Fiscal Year 2024 appropriations bills to support vital semiconductor and healthcare workforce training programs and higher education infrastructure upgrades in Rochester.”
Four days after that, on April 8, Schumer declared that he was “proud to deliver a whopping $39 million to help rehabilitate the South Grand Island Bridges and bolster resilient infrastructure needed to maintain these vital corridors for Western NY.”
That same day, he also announced that a “whopping nearly $24 million from our Bipartisan Infrastructure & Jobs Law to bolster flooding mitigation on Cortlandt’s Route 6 will drive our communities towards a safer and more resilient future.”
Who is going to pay for these projects in Schumer’s home state?
Federal taxpayers in New York, of course, will carry some of the burden—but so, too, will taxpaying workers in Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Kansas, Oklahoma, Idaho, Alaska, and every other state in the union.
Because the federal government is continuing to run a massive deficit—it was $828.135 billion through the first five months of this fiscal year—not only will current taxpayers fund such projects but so, too, will future generations who will be required to pay the interest on the money the federal government borrows to fund them.
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The Daily Signal publishes a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Heritage Foundation.
The post Chuck Schumer’s $79 Million Week appeared first on The Daily Signal.
Reform UK has continued its rise in the polls, climbing to a record high as Rishi Sunak's Tories continue to haemorrhage support.
The post Farage-Founded Reform UK Surges to Record Level of Support as Sunak’s Tories Flounder appeared first on Breitbart.
An illegal alien has been sentenced to six months in prison in Bedford County, Virginia, for sex crimes with a 15-year-old girl who arrived in the United States as an Unaccompanied Alien Child (UAC).
The post Illegal Alien Accused of Abducting, Sexually Assaulting Migrant Girl Freed into U.S. appeared first on Breitbart.
Police Scotland was overwhelmed by a flood of approximately 8,000 hate speech reports during the first week of the new speech restrictions.
The post Police Scotland ‘Can’t Cope’ With Flood of Hate Speech Reports as 8,000 Flood in During First Week of Draconian Law appeared first on Breitbart.
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