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 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.
Lately it seems like the insanity is getting more frequent and more intense as politicians continue to fail us all. Let’s look at just for of the latest examples of political class insanity:
1)We have often documented the greed and self-wealth generation that politicians are involved in. They have privileged access to information that regular Americans do not or they use their influence to direct government contracts and money to family members and friends.
For example, a number of years back, Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, delayed putting forth legislation that would tighten government control over credit card companies until after one fo them, VISA, went though their IPO. Pelosi and family netted almost half a million dollars since they were granted stock options in VISA and cashed them shortly after the IPO was done. If the legislation had been passed prior to the IPO, it is possible that Pelosi would have gotten far less from her options.
Her husband, Paul Pelosi, seemed to have the golden touch during the crazy days of covid. He bought and sold stocks that seemed to time the market perfectly given pending or possible legislation in Congress. The obvious two conclusions are that 1) he is a great stock picker or 2) he had inside information from his Speaker of the House wife on what covid-related government actions were coming down the pike.
But the Pelosi clan is not the only Washington family that have made themselves obscenely wealthy as a result of having a family member in Congress:
Diane Feinstein is a long time Washington insider as a result of being a Senator from California.
According to an organization called Unusual Whales, an entity that analyzes stock trades, some of Feinstein’s finely timed stock trades may account for a lot of her possible $200 million net worth.
Shortly after Feinstein reportedly attended some covid hearings in January, 2020, her husband sold between $1.5 and $6 million worth of Allogene Therapeutics stock and a few other stocks.
The stock market crashed very soon afterwards as a result of the covid pandemic.
In April, 2018, Facebook chairman, Mark Zuckerberg testified in front of the Senate Judicial Committee, a committee that Feinstein was a member of.
Feinstein praised Facebook and Zuckerberg at the hearing, possibly because her husband had bought $250,000 worth of Facebook stock a few months before.
In August, 2020, her husband bought $50,000 worth of College Reaction stock, a purchase that was never filed as required by law, an oversight for which Feinstein received no financial penalty.
In December, 2009, Feinstein and her husband bought $1 million worth of Amyris Biotechnologies, it was the ONLY stock transaction they made the entire year.
A few weeks later, the company was awarded a $24 million government contract and later on Feinstein introduced legislation that further benefited the company, talk about a lucky stock pick.
In July, 2011, the Post Office entered into an exclusive contract with the CB Richard Ellis Group, whose chairman just happened to be Feinstein’s husband.
Another classic political class tenet, “Do as I say, not as I do.” Insider trading apparently gets us in jail but gets politicians rich.
2)Anyone with a lick of common sense knows that Biden’s border policies have been a disaster. Millions of unvetted, unvacinated, and unknown foreigners have been pouring across the border during Biden’s first two years. And while many of them are probably just looking for a better life, this border chaos has had many other bad side effects:
The smuggling of illegal drugs, especially fentanyl, has boomed because of his lax policies, which will likely result in record overdose deaths of Americans when the next annual government report is tabulated.
Central and South American gang members have come over the border and are setting up ciriminal shops all across the country which will result in more American citizens being victims of these criminal gangs.
Illegal immigrants are dying everyday as a result fo his inane border policies, whether they are dying in the desert, drowning in rivers, being killed and raped by human traffickers, or dying in facilities in Mexico.
And another danger has just been justified at the border:
U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents just arrested an Afghan citizen at the southern border.
This single arrest is important because this person was on the FBI’s terror watch list.
Who knows that havoc he could have created from a death and destruction perspective if he had not been apprehended.
Congressman Darrell Issa summed up the disaster at the border quite nicely: "Biden's open borders. aren't just a gateway to 5 million illegals, record human and child trafficking, and the deadliest drug crisis in our history. Biden's reckless policy is also an open invitation to even the most wanted terrorists in the world to come to America.”
The good news is they got this guy. The bad news is how many terrorists like him did not get caught and have made it into the country for nasty deeds yet to be done.
3)We have made the contention a number of times in this blog that the nation can survive bad, corrupt, and ineffective Presidents, e.g. Nixon, Carter, Obama, Biden. The nation can survive bad Congressional members, a list too long to list here.
However, I am not sure we can survive a corrupted news industry, an industry that is supposed to be honest, trustworthy, and reporting all the facts and realities as it applies to politicians and government doings. Journalists and the press should be the watchdogs to make sure that corruption and criminal behavior is rooted out regardless of who is doing the deeds.
However, recent polls show that Americans have little faith that most of the country’s journalists and the news organizations they work for are doing the job that a democracy requires them to do:
According to Gallup polling, by the middle of last year confidence in national news organizations had reached an all time low.
50% of Americans believe strongly that the national news organizations actually intend to mislead, misinform, or persuade the public.
Only 16% have “quite a lot” or “a great deal” of confidence in newspapers.
Of the 16 American institutions polled in the confidence survey, newspapers ranked second to last.
But back in 1979, newspapers had a positive confidence level over 50% so the fall has been pretty dramatic over the past four decades.
Republicans had the lowest confidence in newspapers (5%), Independents had ther second lowest confidence (12%), and Democrats had the highest level of confidence but still a dismal at 35%.
The interesting thing is that confidence by Democrats in newspapers has actually decreased since a fellow Democrat, Joe Biden, came into office.
Separate Pew Research found that in a survey, 55% of journalists felt that every side does not always deserve equal coverage in the news while 76% of non-journalists in the survey felt that the news should cover both sides equally, a major gap from what is expected by Americans and what journalists think they deserve to hear.
Think about that 55% number: over half of journalists think that biased, slanted, unequal news reporting is okay. Again, the country will survive bad politicians, it will not survive as a free country when journalists feel they are entitled to control the flow of information according to their own perspectives and biases.
4)Not only has Biden failed at border security, among dozens of other things, he has also repeatedly failed at the handling of foreign affairs:
He has alienated Saudi Arabia which has driven the Saudis into partnerships with China which in turn is likely to endanger the petrodollar word which in turn will mean a massive inflation hit for Americans.
He has allowed China to cut major trade deals with countries like Brazil, in our hemisphere, which will also have bad ramifications for our economy.
He has failed miserably in bringing the Ukraine/Russian war under control and his weakness has strengthened China;s intentions in their quest to take over Taiwan.
His babbling often incoherent oral performances on the international stage have scared allies and emboldened enemies like Iran.
But he recently allowed his wife and granddaughter to get embarrassed on the international stage during the coronation of King Charles of England:
Rather than go himself and lead a blue ribbon contingent of Americans to represent the country, like previous Presidents had done for past coronations, he sent only his wife and granddaughter.
As a result, the Brits insulted him and the rest of us by seating this thin contingent, his wife and granddaughter, in the LAST row of the coronation ceremony.
According to Boston University historian Ariann Chemock: “Joe Biden clearly hasn’t made it a high priority, as past Presidents have done.”
According to Nile Gardner, a former aide to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher: “Leaders from across the world are attending today’s Coronation of King Charles III. Even the French President is there. Notably absent is Joe Biden, who could not be bothered. What message does this send to America’s closest ally? Biden is a petty, arrogant, sneering disgrace.”
A sneering disgrace? He could be describing most of Biden’s term in office so far, e.g. a leaky, dangerous border, out of control inflation, transportation problems, money laundering by the Biden family, the list of disgraces goes on and on.
Just a small, bitter taste of American politics today: a lazy President relative to a trusted foreign ally, a biased journalism industry that threatens our democracy, at least one terrorist coming over our leaky borders, and another Congressional member gets rich while not solving any national problem and without criminal prosecution. Insanity.
Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:
