Author: A.T.

. . . here, prior to tonight’s State of the Union.

The Republicans insist the state of our Union is awful — and not just because of the gridlock they themselves have caused.*

They say that “by any standard, Barack Obama has been a disaster for our country.”

That we have stupid, stupid leaders.

Even so, this might be worth noting:

We’ve added more net private sector jobs in the last 12 WEEKS than were added in the last 12 YEARS of Republican leadership.

More jobs in twelve WEEKS than in twelve YEARS. 

About 100,000 more — 851,000 versus 747,000.

Perhaps worth noting also?  Home prices are strong, gas is cheap, Detroit is booming, graduation rates are up, the stock market’s doubled, you can’t be denied health insurance for a pre-existing condition, and deaths from Ebola contracted here — the hysteria before the last election — remain zero.

The state of our Union would have been even stronger if the Republicans had not blocked the American Jobs Act, that would have put people to work revitalizing our crumbling infrastructure; blocked comprehensive immigration reform; blocked a hike in the minimum wage.

Let’s watch tonight — and do what we can to help this extraordinary president keep moving the ball down the field.

*It’s not equally the Democrats’ fault.  It’s not symmetrical.  Click here.

Friday I gave you a free sports-predicting app that pays you if you’re right.

Today, the rather fascinating history of political betting. (Hint: more accurate than Gallup.)  Which may lead you to bet real money at PredictIt — see the current odds on Trump, Cruz, Bernie, and Hillary — and/or at the Iowa Electronic Markets.

I give you today, also, this unusual bit of anthropology.  As the photo caption explains, “I spent 30 minutes talking to them to learn more about their culture until . . . ”

Well, click to find out.  (Thanks, Brian!)

I am so not into sports.

Once the Dodgers left Brooklyn, I lost interest — which, truth to tell, I only feigned in the first place.

Even as the starting left halfback on my high school’s varsity soccer team* I was right-footed.

But if I were into sports, I’d rush to download the DailyBracket app.

Not only is it free; it pays you if you win.  (No, really.)

Every day, you swipe left or right, depending on who you think will win each of five highlighted games.  If you get three or more right, you advance towards cash prizes ranging from $1 (that even I could easily win) on up past $50 and $100 and $10,000 all the way to $1 million (that no one, I’m pretty sure, will ever win).

Touch a game ball before you swipe and you get a little color to help you decide.

“A fan’s dream come true — finally, an app that gives you a nightly rooting interest with absolutely no risk involved.”  (But, I’m guessing, this being America, you’ll be offered ways to send money their way, as well . . . though only if you want to.)

Full disclosure: the genius behind this is a friend of mine.  And if you use 3MDR as your referral code, I’ll get 100 BracketBucks, good for swag in the Daily Bracket store.  I could really use another baseball cap.

Have a great weekend.

*It was a very small high school.

Hey — no guns at the Republican National Convention?  Really?  What better place to demonstrate the wisdom of open carry?  (Details here.)

Congress’s Benghazi hearings have now lasted longer, at 610 days, than its investigations into the Kennedy Assassination, Watergate, Iran-Contra, or 9/11.  (Latest finding here.)

This 3-minute Tea Party clip lauds a former Navy Seal for views you will find misinformed, hateful, and scary.  (I’m on their email list and get something like this every day.)

Warren K.: “I could not disagree more with Warren S.  Your piece was sarcastic, yes, but more than justifiably so. The language was strong, but the underlying facts even stronger. I feel pretty confident that more than a few of your Republican readers had to reconsider their position as they read it through.”

Tom Friedman posits an extremist who would run in 2020 from the right and left simultaneously, clearing the deck for dramatic changes that cry out to be made.  Unfortunately, he notes, for this to be anywhere near plausible, we’d have to find ourselves in dire straits.  As we were, for example, when Bush handed the nation to Obama.  But I digress.

Warren S: “Wow, harsh column yesterday!  Not sure what happened, but it sure was extreme.  I’ve been meaning to write to you for a while, so this seemed like a good time.  I give you the lion’s share of the credit for my dropping my Republican registration, my vote for Obama in 2008, and my now generally more center-leaning views.  But my observation is that your column has become a lot more shrill.  Yesterday’s is an example.  It’s your column and you get to do what you want with it, but my experience is that you get more with honey than you do with vinegar.  When you instead use name-calling, sarcasm, etc. I find it a turnoff.”

☞ Fair enough.  I appreciate the feedback and especially agree with the part I bolded.  So you won’t see columns like yesterday’s here often.  Yet it was factually true (no?) and presumably — though they wouldn’t frame it the way I did — a lot of Republicans are proud of, or at least pleased with, the party’s position on climate change, voting rights, and the rest.  Or else why would they still identify as Republicans?

(Long though yesterday’s laundry list was, there was lots I left off: shutting down the government; opposing the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau; thwarting universal background checks; preventing the refinancing of federal student loans . . . )

And that was ultimately the point: having some of my readers who identify as Republicans read through the list and realize that, well, they’re not proud to be associated with these things at all.

Proud Eisenhower Republicans, yes; Lincoln or Teddy Roosevelt Republicans, sure; Nixon or Ford or Rockefeller or Bloomberg or Bob Dole, Jack Kemp, Mitt Romney, or George Romney Republicans, fine.  But today’s Republicans?  I don’t think so.  “Temporary Independents” perhaps.  Until they get their party back.

Here’s a good piece that makes the same point without the sarcasm: “10 past Republicans who’d never make it in today’s crazy GOP.”  It’s three years old, but even then it highlighted Ted Cruz by way of contrast.  If anything, the GOP may have become even a bit crazier since 2013.

I’m proud to be a Republican because we’re standing up for religious liberty . . . against “political correctness” . . . and to make abortion rare (versus the Democratic mantra, “safe, legal, and rare”).

I’m proud to be a Republican because we’re making it harder for people to vote.  Watch Barack Obama and Al Sharpton lament the new laws we’ve passed, here.  (Like requiring Alabamans to go to the DMV to get new photo ID and then shutting down the DMV offices in black neighborhoods.  Good stuff!)

I’m proud to be a Republican because we are standing against higher wages for the working poor (and fighting to cut back food stamps for their children).

I’m proud to be a Republican because we’ve kept from extending Medicaid to the working poor. Why do they deserve healthcare?  What are we — Europe?  Canada?  England?  Japan?  Australia?  Russia?  Korea?  Cuba?  We know people don’t “deserve” health care.  Health care is not a “right.”  (When will Europe and the rest catch up to our level of concern for one another?  Our level of civilization?)

And speaking of civilization, we know that taxes are not the price we pay for civilization — taxes are the price we pay to maintain law and order, so that — along with the firearms we can now finally carry on Texas hips — no one can mess with us.  Or our stuff.

I’m proud to be a Republican because 58% of us in Congress deny the existence of climate change or, at least, oppose action to cut greenhouse gas emissions.  I’m proud that our science chairs, Smith and Inhofe, deny the science.  And that even many of our “moderates,” like Chris Christie, are unconcerned (adamantly, here, at 38:51).

I’m proud to be a Republican because the Justices we appointed produced the Citizens United and McCutcheon rulings that gave so much more power to the rich; and gutted the Voting Rights Act at the expense of the powerless.

I’m proud to be a Republican because we blocked the American Jobs Act that would have put people back to work revitalizing our national infrastructure.

And blocked the bipartisan Comprehensive Immigration Reform that passed in the Senate 68-32.

And blocked ENDA, that would have barred employment discrimination against gays.  Bad enough that they can marry.

I’m proud to be a Republican because the RNC has loads of cash while the DNC is millions in the red. (Their “little money” is going to Bernie and Hillary, while the big money, happily, skews Republican.)

We’ve got the House, we’ve got the Senate . . . we largely have the Court.

Later this year we can wrap up the rest and have it all.

The first check I wrote this year was for $25.34 to cover a four-page IRS “notice of intent to seize your property” for the tax year 2005 — ten years ago — with interest calculated quarterly, at rates ranging from 8% down to 3%, yet somehow totaling only 7 cents.  “For a detailed calculation of your interest, call 800-829-0115.”  Which I plan to do, because I think Uncle Sam short-changed himself.

Then again, as this notice related not to my taxes but to $25.27 apparently due on the long-since-dissolved trust that my dad, who died in 1983, set up for my mom, who died in 2011 — and as it was addressed to their attorney not me (he faxed it over) — I’m not sure what property the IRS contemplated seizing.

Still, I am one of those who does not hate the IRS; who thinks taxes are the price we pay for civilization; and who can only imagine how hard Congress has made the IRS’s job — and how gleefully it has underfunded that job.  So off went the check.

The second “check” I wrote this year was in fact a gigantic charge put through here to help support the core infrastructure that everyone assumes someone else will pay for – yet without which the Tea Party wins.

(Jeb would have been bad enough. Nice man, horrible governing priorities.  But Cruz?  Horrible man, horrible governing priorities.)

The whole world is at stake — the Court for the next 30 years; war and peace;* potentially catastrophic climate change;** stuff like that.

And the two parties could not be further apart.

What a year 2016 is likely to be.

Here’s hoping reason and good will prevail.

Happy New Year!

*Dick Cheney told us New Year’s morning that, yes, had he to do all over again, he would still have invaded Iraq.

**Chris Christie is adamant [here, at 38:51] that it’s not a crisis, should not be of much concern.

Whether or not Pluto’s a planet, you can’t tell me this photo isn’t amazing.  (Thanks, Tom!)  New Horizons left Earth almost exactly ten years ago and now sends this back.

If you or anyone you know has not yet got health care coverage, here‘s a four-minute video of encouragement.  Open enrollment runs through January 31.  Visit healthcare,gov.

Did you see last week’s column on Evenwel ?  Not to be tedious, but the case so threatens to shift — yet more! — clout to the already wealthy and powerful that I wanted to plug it again.

Hue, dear reader!

Cry!

And consider this additional argument, based on the Fourteenth “equal protection” Amendment (“No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States”):

(1) Certainly, children and felons are citizens, yes?

(2) Not counting them in drawing legislative districts gives them (and the others in their district) less political power per capita and thus abridges their privileges.  No?

Q.E.D., as we used to say in geometry class.

By way of illustration, imagine one district comprised entirely of 30,000 seniors living on golf courses (whose folks had been able to buy them out of felony marijuana-possession charges when they were at Dartmouth).  They get one representative.  And another district with 90,000 citizens, two-thirds of them children and felons.  Under Evenwel, they, too, would get just one representative — a third the representation per capita.  A third is not equal.  Neither is three-fifths.

And yet this is what the Republicans seek from the Supreme Court — just as they sought (successfully) to have the Court gut the Voting Rights Act and sought (successfully) to have the Court grant corporations and wealthy donors more influence on election outcomes. Hurrah for the rich and powerful — in America, the pendulum swings ever more their way.

And while I’m reprising stuff from last week, if you didn’t have a chance the first time: here again, the President’s Top Ten List for 2015 — with reason to be proud . . . and hopeful for 2016.  

Happy New Year!

Both important!

Both compelling!

Both about justice — and the truth coming out in the end . . . way too late.

Both true.

(And both lamenting, by implication, the decline of investigative journalism.)

On the off-chance you’ve not already . . .

See Spotlight!

See The Big Short!

Run, don’t walk.

Most people are troubled by our crumbling infrastructure, widening inequality, and massive underemployment.  What if we could make a dent in all three?

What we should have done, of course, way back in 2011 when the President called a joint session of Congress to make the case for it, was put people back to work rebuilding America. Especially because long-term interest rates then were so incredibly low — the perfect time to finance public works that should last a century. We still should do that.

But our Republican friends blocked it, so I have this different idea.  What if we:

1. Launched a massive 15-year infrastructure program funded by . . .
2. A 1% property tax — but only to the extent the value of your home exceeds $1 million.  So right off the bat, 98% of Americans would be untouched. (The average home these days: about $180,000.)

Those with $1 million homes would be taxed nothing.

Those at $1.2 million would be chipping $2,000 a year into the Infrastructure Fund — 1% of the $200,000 above $1 million.

Those with $3 million condos would be chipping in $20,000.

If you bought this lovely 5-bedroom condo on East 22nd Street, you’d be chipping in $710,000.

But do you know what?  When you compare the hardships such homeowners would endure with the hardships many of their ancestors did — the ones who built the infrastructure we’ve neglected — a 1% “mansion tax” on values above $1 million doesn’t seem all that onerous.  (Even so, they should get thank you notes with each annual payment.  Seriously!  We should look for every opportunity to thank people for the contribution they make to our well-being, whether it is by cleaning our motel-room toilets or by chipping in $710,000 to rebuild our infrastructure.)

Refinements:

Maybe it’s a $1 million exemption on your first home, but just $500,000 on second, third, and fourth homes.

And maybe the same tax applies to your first, second, third, and fourth boats.

And definitely the thresholds should rise with inflation, so the tax doesn’t begin to bite more and more people.

But here’s the refinement I love: to avoid bureaucracy and appeals and all the rest, homeowners would self-appraise.  And the reason it would work is that once you appraised your home for tax purposes each tax year, investors would be allowed to buy it from you at 20% above your appraisal.

Most homeowners — 98% of them — would opt out of the appraisal altogether: they’d just check a box: “$1 million or less, no tax due.”  If anyone wanted to buy their home for $1.2 million (20% above the minimum threshold), they’d presumably feel as though they won the lottery — though they could turn it down, as explained below.

But if you valued your $2 million home at $1 million, to avoid the tax, someone could grab it from you for $1.2 million.  So you wouldn’t.

If you valued it at $2 million, they’d have to pay $400,000 over market to buy it — so they wouldn’t.

If you valued it anywhere near fairly, you’d never have to worry about being bought out.  (Why would an investor want to overpay by 20%?)

And there could be two “escape” clauses, just in case:  You could “get out of” a forced sale by providing a licensed, arm’s-length appraisal showing that your valuation was fair; or by paying (say) triple the tax due on that appraised value.

There are roughly vaguely 3 million American homes worth more than $1 million . . . most of which, presumably, hover not far above the million-dollar mark, but enough of which are in the $3 million – $6 million range, let alone a lot higher, that a back-of-the-envelope guess puts the revenue from such a tax at (even roughlier, vaguelier) $50 billion a year (when you count the second homes and boats).  That’s just a small down-payment on what we need to invest in infrastructure — but every $500 billion per decade helps.

Investment in infrastructure would provide a lot of jobs that can’t be outsourced, dealing with our underemployment problem . . .

. . . thereby tightening the labor market a bit, giving a little boost to wages (thus addressing our inequality problem) . . .

. . . and making our economic infrastructure more productive and competitive (helping us all).

And it’s just nice when your sewage doesn’t back up, your kids attend modern schools, and your bridges don’t collapse.

The overall notion is that as a nation, the balance between public and private consumption has for the last 30 years skewed a little too much toward private consumption.  Not a lot too much, necessarily, but even 2% a year (say) really mounts up over 30 years — 2% that we should have been spending publicly (via taxes) on infrastructure but instead spent privately (via MasterCard) on things we don’t need quite so many of or quite so large.

Which is why we’re where we are today.

(This home has 25 bathrooms.  This bridge collapsed.)

Ronald Reagan and the Republicans have demonized taxes and spending on anything but war — and they didn’t even tax us to pay for war, as throughout history used to be the custom. Instead, they slashed tax rates on the rich and borrowed to make up the difference, ballooning our National Debt, even as they let our infrastructure slowly decay.  Now they want to eliminate the estate tax on billionheirs, decreasing the funds available to invest in infrastructure while increasing inequality.

But I digress.

A 1% mansion-and-yacht tax to finance infrastructure revitalization.  Good plan?  Bad plan?  Refinements to my refinements?  Thoughts?