Every month we devote posts to just general political class insanity that is running rampant through the country. The members of the American political class continue to show that they are incapable of operating any level of government in this country.
Even their best efforts are almost always inefficient and ineffective at resolving any problem facing Americans. They spend a great amount of time not trying to improve the lives of their citizens but continually ensuring their reelection and enriching themselves, their families, and their friends in the process, all at taxpayer expense.
1)We have often discussed the reality that almost every politician that goes to Washington ends up being very, very wealthy by the time they leave Washington. Be it misuse of campaign funds, donations under the table, using insider government information to make a killing in the stock market, making sure that their friends and family get in on government contracts, etc., being a Washington politician can be very rewarding financially.
But it is not just the actual politicians that usually gets rich:
Apparently Dixon Slingerland has been a prominent and important political fundraiser over the years, usually supporting Democratic Party interests.
He was a significant campaign donor to Obama and a mayor of Los Angeles.
Unfortunately for him, he was recently found guilty of embezzling funds from a non profit organization that he was in charge of to finance a very expensive lifestyle.
He was in charge of the Youth Policy Institute, a Federal taxpayer funded non-profit organization that was supposed to alleviate poverty in LA.
According to the Department of Justice, he used the Federal taxpayer money of his organization to fund a $6,000 dinner in New York City, hire a private $11,000 tutor for his family, bought almost $2,000 worth of computer equipment and software and in total misappropriated $600,000 from the non-profit.
He was sentenced to six months in jail, ordered to pay $750,470 in fines, and do 200 hours of community service.
His non-profit received millions of dollars over the years from the Federal government during which he was not bashful in granting himself an annual salary of $400,000.
He raised almost $750,000 for Obama between 2007 and 2012 and was a frequent Obama White House visitor.
The corruption of the political system does not start and end with the actual politicians, it involves those that know how to milk the system for untold billions of taxpayer dollars every year.
2)The political class in California, as we have often pointed out, has been a disaster for the residents and businesses in that state: sky high taxes, onerous business regulations, an out of control homelessness and crime situation, mass out-migration of residents and businesses for better quality of life, and wasteful and intrusive spending and legislation.
And despite having some of the richest industries in the world headquartered in their state, Hollywood and Silicon Valley:
The state government is facing a likely record budget deficit of about $68,000,000,000.
This is likely to create a need for severe budget cuts throughout the state government functions, cuts that are likely to drive even more people out of the state, further reducing the tax stream and enlarging the deficit.
In a recent report from the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO), the state government budget deficit is surging.
It has gone from $14.3 billion in June to over $54 billion now, i.e. the trend is not good.
According to the IRS, California lost $29 billion in tax revenue in 2021 which came on the heels of losing $18 billion in 2020 as people left the state and shrunk the state economy.
Between January, 2020 and July, 2022, the state had a net loss of 700,000 residents.
While the state government has $24 billion in cash reserves, those reserves are obviously not enough to cover this year’s $68 billion deficit and likely large budget deficits in the years to come unless drastic government budgets are shrunk.
We have often discussed the real possibility that one of several states (California Illinois, New York) could very well go bankrupt relatively soon as a result of getting themselves into a financial death spiral: high taxes and high business regulations drive out residents and businesses. This out-migration reduces the tax base which reduces the tax stream resulting in lower government revenue.
Rather than reduce government spending, state politicians raise taxes to compensate for the lower tax revenue which drives more residents and businesses out of the state, further reducing the tax stream. Eventually the state politicians reduce spending which reduces the quality of life and drives more people out of state and the death spiral is underway. Sounds like California is well underway of beating its rival states to bankruptcy court.
3)We recently discussed the reality that the scores on the ACT college entrance tests have been declining for ten straight years. We have also discussed the reality that the majority of Baltimore high school graduates were reading at the third grade level of below. A recent analysis of Chicago high schools found that not a single kid was performing at their expected average level of proficiency.
The bottom line is that the over $80 billion we as taxpayers pay every year for the Federal Department of Education has resulted in abysmal education performance in our public schools. Many other countries, who spend far less on a per student basis for education, educate their kids much better than we do. We are NOT getting value for the dollars we spend for education.
And if a New Jersey teachers union gets its way, our kids are going to continue to get an inferior education in that state:
The teachers’ union in that state wants to get rid of basic core competency of its state teachers.
The New Jersey Education Association (NJEA) wants to dump the “Praxis Core Academic Skills for Educators: Reading, Writing and Math.”
Yes, we currently do such a horrible job educating our kids now, let’s dumb down the teacher population.
The governor of the state, Phil Murphy, said that it was necessary to get rid of the competency test because it was “an unnecessary barrier” to hiring more teachers.
Nicki Neily, founder and president of Parents Defending Education, insisted that there were better options for overcoming the teacher shortage other than reducing entry standards: “Teachers should be able to pass a basic skills test before they’re tasked with educating children in those core subjects.”
Insanity. If teachers cannot pass a basic skills test how do we think that the kids in their classrooms will be able to pass a basic skills test? Taxpayers are paying more and more and getting less and less from today’s political class.
4)And while we have already discussed the reality that a long time political donor had been found guilty of misusing taxpayer funds for self enrichment, let us not forget that Washington politicians are still the premier self enrichment folks involved in government today:
An ethics watchdog group, the Foundation For Accountability and Civic Trust (FACT) has submitted an ethics complaint against ten Democratic Congressional lawmakers.
The complaint alleges these politicians used public resources for their own, partisan political purposes.
The accused include Democratic Representatives Nancy Pelosi of California, Cori Bush of Missouri, Jamaal Bowman of New York, Sean Casten of Illinois, Greg Casar of Texas, Maxwell Alejandro Frost of Florida, Ted Lieu of California, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, and Ritchie Torres of New York.
FACT maintains that the current law says that government sources and taxpayer wealth cannot be used for “campaign or political purposes” and that "official House photographs and video, government buildings, a Member’s official website and social media accounts, and anything created by government employees are strictly off-limits for such purposes.”
An example of the corruption was when Nancy Pelosi used a House of Representatives video on a campaign website for herself.
Kendra Arnold, Executive Director of FACT, expressed her concern in the press release, stating, "These violations are rampant and obvious, and clearly the OCE’s failure to act has encouraged continued violations. This failure has also incentivized these Members to use House proceedings for political campaigning rather than doing what is in the best interest of the country."
Another example where the rules are for ordinary Americans while those in the political class again consider themselves immune to the rules they impose on us.
Enough insanity for today: Washington politicians and their friends are still corrupt, California politicians are driving their state into financial ruin, and New Jersey dumbs down its teachers.
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If you agree that we need to deseat every member of Congress for their lack of success and accomplishment, then please consider going to the following petition link to help the cause:
https://www.change.org/p/deseat-congress-reset-freedom
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