Cromwell

THE PROPOSAL: Exempt tips from taxation.

RATIONALE: This is a progressive measure intended to provide relief to poor workers in service industries. The existing regulations are difficult to enforce in any event.

REBUTTAL: Income is income. Why should service providers get better treatment than manufacturing workers? Most genuinely poor workers don’t make enough money to pay income taxes, anyway. If the regulation isn’t written carefully, lawyers and doctors will soon be working for tips.

ANALYSIS: Most GOP members of Congress won’t like this one, but Trump was very vocal about it, and Harris agreed with him. That means it has a chance.

PROGNOSIS: There is a long and hot debate, but the proposal ultimately fails.

It is inarguable that Trump is crashing through guardrails to amass an unprecedented amount of power for the executive branch. But when and why were these guardrails created?

1. The largest group come from the Watergate era and represent a reaction to Nixon’s perceived abuses of power, although other presidents before him behaved in the same manner. These guardrails include requirements for financial disclosure forms, prohibitions on impoundment, and the independence of the DOJ.
2. Trump is trying to destroy the independence of a variety of agencies that were set up by statute during the Progressive Era and the New Deal. The Supreme Court mostly upheld their independence against allegations of a violation of the doctrine of separation of powers in the 1930s.
3. The civil service protections that Trump is ignoring date back to the late 19th century. They were designed to make government more professional and predictable.
4. Trump’s desire to use the military to round up and deport immigrants will at some point violate a statute that was passed in the late 19th century.
5. Trump’s use of emergency powers echoes actions by Lincoln during the Civil War, although the most important Supreme Court precedent on the subject comes from the Truman presidency.
6. His executive order on birthright citizenship ignores the language in the 14th Amendment, which also dates back to the end of the Civil War.
7. The abuse of the pardon power has its roots in the Constitution itself, which incorporated authority included in the English monarch’s prerogative.

THE PROPOSAL: Eliminate the cap on the SALT deduction.

RATIONALE: It is fundamentally unfair to tax someone on money he is legally required, by no fault of his own, to pay to another government. The cap was only imposed in an inappropriate effort to force wealthy people in blue states to vote against Democrats.

REBUTTAL: Eliminating the cap only benefits a bunch of wealthy people in blue states. It isn’t progressive.

ANALYSIS: The proponents of this reform have all the leverage they need; they can tank the entire bill if they don’t get what they want. Do they have the nerve to use it against their red state colleagues? TBD.

PROGNOSIS: Compromise. The cap is increased but not eliminated.

According to an article I read this afternoon, one of the DOGE employees who has infiltrated our government is a nineteen-year-old kid who identifies himself as “Big Balls” on the web. The article indicated that “Big Balls” leaked confidential information to a competitor of his company when he was a seventeen-year-old intern.

Just the person to whom you want to entrust vital taxpayer information. I guess that’s what Musk means by “meritocracy.”

THE PROPOSAL: Exempt all Social Security payments from income taxes.

RATIONALE: Why put money in one pocket and take it out of the other? Poor seniors need the income.

REBUTTAL: Poor seniors don’t have to pay taxes on Social Security under current law. The proposal only helps affluent seniors. The Social Security trust fund runs out of assets in a few years; this proposal would make the situation even worse.

ANALYSIS: This is a really stupid idea for the reasons listed above. I say that even though I would benefit from this proposal in the short run.

PROGNOSIS: This idea is going nowhere in Congress. It doesn’t have a constituency in the donor class.

To the Fox News crowd, Trump’s first month in office has been an unbroken series of victories. To be sure, the plight of fired federal workers alone is unlikely to create much of a backlash in the nation as a whole. But trouble is already brewing with a wide range of groups that expected better things from him:

1. CONSUMERS: Trump was elected to stop inflation. To that end, he has accomplished precisely nothing, and his tariffs will make things worse.
2. VETERANS: Cuts at the VA will make services worse, not better.
3. NATIONAL PARKS: Republicans benefit from them, too. Indiscriminate mass firings of NPS employees will damage services and hurt mostly red state communities that rely on visitors for revenue.
4. VIRGINIA REPUBLICANS: Mass firings of Virginia residents aren’t going to help the GOP candidate for governor get elected this year.
5. CAR COMPANIES: If the tariffs on Canada and Mexico are implemented, the supply chain will be disrupted, prices will soar, sales will plummet, and workers will be laid off.
6. HISPANICS: Mass deportations and huge cuts to Medicaid aren’t going to win any friends here.
7. UKRAINE SUPPORTERS: No explanation is necessary.
8. FARMERS: Deportations and tariffs are a disaster for American farmers–at least until Trump starts writing checks to them to compensate them for the losses he will be imposing on them.

The real test of the Trump presidency will come when his polls crater and the judicial system resists him. Will he back down or double down with even more authoritarian tactics? TBD.

Patrick Henry viewed the American Revolution as a war against an overweening central authority, not an effort to establish a new nation. He turned down an invitation to participate at the Convention because he disagreed with the mission; he later led the fight against ratification. What if he had decided to go to Philadelphia? He was the foremost orator of his age; would that have made a difference?

If he had broken his promise to keep the proceedings secret, maybe. Otherwise, no. The Founding Fathers were hardheaded politicians; it is unlikely that they would have been swayed by speeches, however eloquent.

The notion of a strong political partisan at the head of the FBI is scary and dangerous. But Patel isn’t just a partisan; he’s a Trump supporter with boundless loyalty to his boss. That means he is a danger, not just to the left, but to wayward members of the GOP as well.

The Republicans who voted for him are going to regret it. I’m looking at you, Mitch; America deserved better from you.

Back in 2016, I posted an item about a future agreement in which Trump and Putin would divide Europe into spheres of influence. It was intended to be satirical. Given today’s conditions, it might well be a prophecy.

Viktor Orban has enjoyed playing Putin against the EU for a long time. I wonder how he’s going to feel about becoming a vassal to his right-wing populist soul mate. How much financial support is he going to get from Russia?

Trump, of course, wants desperately to keep his tax cuts. The problem is that under the current rules, they have to be paid for, at least in part. Most House Republicans have identified Medicaid as the primary source for offsetting spending cuts. As Steve Bannon has correctly noted, however, plenty of MAGA voters rely on Medicaid for their health insurance. A painful decision consequently is in the offing.

Trump doesn’t do tradeoffs; hence, the Obamacare repeal fiasco in his first term. Instead of giving firm direction, he will send out mixed messages in an effort to avoid being blamed by his supporters for the outcome. As a result, the GOP leaders in Congress will have to figure this one out on their own.

There are enough moderates in the House to make this process exciting. It is by no means certain that any large taxing and spending bill will have the votes to pass. Pull up a chair and grab some popcorn; the chaos is about to begin.

The delegates to the Constitutional Convention promised to keep the proceedings secret. Amazingly enough, they kept their word. There were no leaks, and the final product came as a complete surprise to the public.

Can you imagine what would happen today? The delegates would spend half their time posting on social media. Trolling and grandstanding would be the order of the day. The public would be in a constant uproar. And nothing would get done.

I was a Hamilton fan long before it was cool; I even made a point of visiting his grave the first time I went to NYC. I viewed him as the father of American democratic capitalism. To some extent, I still do.

But my enthusiasm for Hamilton has cooled somewhat over the last few decades. Hardly anything he did after he left office does him any credit. His writing style doesn’t endear him to modern readers, and some of his intrigues, starting with his days in the Continental Army, are distasteful. But the biggest revelation to me was that his ideas on finance largely came from Robert Morris, and to go even further back, from the English Whig Party, circa 1695. Hamilton would have fit in quite nicely as part of the Whig Junto in that era.

What about Jefferson? The analogy is imperfect due to different conditions in England and America, but Jefferson’s views about low taxes on land, minimal central government, effective rule by the local gentry, an unambitious foreign policy, and a tiny military make him sound a lot like an early 18th century Tory.

I was watching a You Tube video about Sulla, the reactionary Roman dictator, yesterday. Sulla is best known for marching on Rome, murdering hundreds of political opponents, and imposing political “reforms” that took power from the plebs and returned it to the patricians, including himself.

The guy who made the video clearly wanted to show the contemporary relevance of Sulla and his reactionary politics, so he showed a tweet from a prominent political figure saying that perhaps America needed its own Sulla. The individual in question was Elon Musk.

In my “Fork in the Road” post a few days ago, I asked Elon whether he would double down on authoritarian politics when he and Trump become unpopular. I guess he has already tipped his hand.

Madison is frequently described as the “Father of the Constitution.” But is that true? Is his claim better than Hamilton’s?

Let’s check the record:

1. PRE-CONVENTION: Both men attended the Annapolis meeting which resulted in the request for the Convention. Both men supported the request; Hamilton provided the written justification for it. ADVANTAGE: Even.
2. CONVENTION: Madison’s contribution is easy to overstate; after all, he left Philadelphia disappointed with the final result. No single individual dominated the proceedings, which ended with a series of compromises, some of them fairly grubby. However, Madison’s notes are our only written record, and he was the author of the Virginia Plan, which at least got the discussion moving in the right direction. Hamilton’s contributions to the debates were brief and undistinguished. ADVANTAGE: Madison.
3. RATIFICATION: Both men were authors of the Federalist Papers. Hamilton wrote more of the essays; Madison’s are generally more memorable. Both men were instrumental in obtaining the approval of their state for the final document. Madison’s role in defeating Patrick Henry and winning the support of Virginia, however, was probably the turning point in the ratification process. ADVANTAGE: Even.
4. IMPLEMENTATION: Madison, as Speaker of the House, pushed through the initial legislation necessary to set up the government. He also provided early drafts of the amendments that went into the Bill of Rights. Hamilton was primarily responsible for creating the financial framework for the new republic; it was his vision of America’s future, not Madison’s or Jefferson’s, that prevailed in the long run. ADVANTAGE: Even.

The bottom line here is that I would give a slight edge to Madison, but it’s closer than more people realize.

By all accounts, Pierre Poilievre is a bit of a Trump clone. He expresses himself pungently on social media; he rails against wokeness and Canadian elites; he is suspicious of immigrants; he loves fossil fuels; and he wants to cut taxes and regulations. Sound familiar?

Given the boundless unpopularity of the current Liberal government, Poilievre is likely to be the next Canadian PM. But he has a problem; while Elon Musk is talking him up on X, Trump is threatening to annex Canada. Trump wants vassals, not allies. As a result, Canada’s relationship with America is now the biggest issue in the campaign, and the Conservatives are no longer a sure bet.

As I’ve noted many times before, agreement on ideological issues such as immigration and wokeness is not a guarantee that reactionary nationalist governments will cooperate on other issues. Poilievre will have to go the extra mile to prove to the Canadian public that he will stand up to Trump and make Canada, not America, great again. Musk may be eating his words before he knows it.