I ain't voting for Kamalama Ding Dong. The Democrats are contemptous of ordinary Americans

 Four years ago, the Democrats nominated Joe Biden, a demented grifter, for President and dragged him over the finish line. This summer, the Dems threw Biden under the bus and will likely nominate Kamala Harris, a race-hustling idiot, to replace Biden. 

It has long been evident that the Democratic Party's insiders despise Americans and are picking our pockets while their donors get richer by the day. The Dems don't care about having a secure border, they don't care about urban crime, and they don't care about inflation. And Kamala Harris, the presumed Democratic Party nominee, is the poster child for the Democratic Party's arrogance, its intellectual vacuity, and its racism.

I ain't voting for Kamalama Ding Dong to be our next President. I'm not willing for America to giggle its way into the future under the leadership of a goofball. What do you think will happen if President Kamala cackles at Vladimir Putin like she cackles at the American people?

The Democrats have insulted working Americans for years while pandering to racial minorities. Apparently, they think minorities and transgendered athletes form an electoral base strong enough to wreck the country. I think they are wrong.

With the exception of Jewish kapo politicians who are undermining Israel in its life-or-death struggle with Hamas, I don't think a single Jewish American will vote for the Ding Dong. 

Although it will surprise Nancy Pelosi, a great many Hispanic Americans are alarmed by illegal immigration, and most of them don't like being labeled as Latinx, a wokedom insult to the Spanish language. She'll be surprised at the number of Hispanics who will vote for Trump in November. 

How about Asian Americans, who've been discriminated against by America's elite universities, most of which are infested with so-called progressive Democrats? Many Asian Americans will abandon the lunatic Democrat Party this November.

The Dems have bleated about their commitment to preserving American democracy while they rig the election process to nominate a fool who has never won a single primary election. They're about as democratic as the Russian KGB.

I don't believe Kamala will defeat Trump in November, but I won't feel sorry for her when she loses. Harvard will probably ask her to be its next president—that's another part-time job that pays good wages.

Note: I can't take credit for inventing the term Kamalama Ding Dong. I heard a television commentator use that term, but I can't remember who it was. The word appears in a Jestwire commentary.

Why won't Kamala let us in on the joke?

Joe Biden should pardon Rachel Maddow on humanitarian grounds

You can take it to the bank. Joe Biden will drop out of the 2024 presidential race. The New York Times editorial calling for Joe to step aside was the death knell for his reelection campaign, and everybody knows it.

Why doesn't Joe withdraw his candidacy to preserve his dignity and enjoy his golden years eating ice cream and clam strips at Rehoboth Beach? 

I'll tell you why. Family and friends in the Biden bunker fear what will happen to them if Dr. Dementus gets hold of the Justice Department. Trump might launch criminal investigations against the Lawfare crowd and Joe's relatives--the ones who reportedly have offshore banking accounts. Therefore, some of Biden's closest family members and advisers are urging him to hang on.

I think Biden's confidants would drop their efforts to keep Biden in the White House if Joe would issue blanket pardons to everybody who was complicit in Russiagate, the Hunter Laptop scandal, and the alleged Biden influence-peddling scam.

Obviously, Joe needs to pardon family members first. Jill, Hunter, Joe's children, and grandchildren should receive blanket pardons whether or not they did anything unlawful.

Then there are the lawyers who set up the Biden family's alleged money laundering scheme. They will want pardons. And Joe should pardon all those lawfare attorneys—Fani Willis, Alvin Bragg, Jack Smith, and others. 

On humanitarian grounds, Biden should also pardon all the people who are hysterical about the possibility of Trump becoming president again. They fear mass deportations, detention camps, paramilitary groups, death squads, and draconian restrictions on abortion.

Therefore, Biden should issue sweeping pardons to all of Trump's most vicious critics, including the ladies on "The View" and all the MSNBC commentators. I don't think any of these people did anything illegal. Still, a Biden Get-Out-Of-Jail card would ease their anxieties about possibly being sent to a concentration camp in rural Arkansas where they might be forced to pluck chickens.

Some of Trump's most paranoid fault finders may fear that a Biden pardon letter might get lost or misplaced when they need it most. For example, an MSNBC reporter might get arrested while her pardon letter was being laminated at Kinko's.

To alleviate this fear, Biden should offer to tattoo his pardon letter on the recipients' butts. 

Rachel Maddow is excessively worried about what might happen to her if Trump regains the White House. However, even Rachel would probably sleep better at night if she had a sweeping and all-encompassing presidential pardon tattooed for posterity on her rump.

What can Biden do to ease Rachel's anxiety about Donald Trump?

Kamala Harris is the real-world Furiosa after Immortan Joe's bad night

 Let me begin by admitting that I had a bad night. I had a cold that I might have taken Nyquil for, and I was suffering from prolonged jet lag from a trip to Florida a couple of years ago when I crossed into the Eastern Time Zone.

I have always enjoyed dystopian stories, so I settled into my Lazy Boy recliner and rented Furiosa to watch on my home TV. It only cost $25.

Furiosa is two and one-half hours long, but it seemed interminable. I got confused and lost the plot line. The movie is a story about a bewildering cast of people obsessed with the lust for power and a thirst for revenge. There was an old white guy named Immortan Joe, who appeared to be hooked up to an oxygen machine, and a young woman named Furiosa, who seemed to be attracted to chaos and never said anything coherent.  Furiosa may or may not have been a woman of color. Furiosa spent the whole movie plotting to kill Dr. Dementus, a strangely sentimental psychopath.  (Back story: Dr. Dementus received his doctorate from Delaware State University.)

When the movie ended, I switched on to CNN, which was breathlessly reporting that Joe Biden, an old white guy on oxygen, was being pushed out of the presidential race. Kamala Harris, CNN averred, remained fiercely loyal to Biden but was waiting in the wings to replace him to fight the epic election battle against Donald Trump, our present-day Dr. Dementus.

I'm embarrassed to confess that I got Furiosa and the CNN news coverage mixed up (head cold, jet lag, etc.). 

Then I realized that the CNN news coverage was really the trailer for the sequel to Furiosa. Kamala Harris is cast in the title role. Joe Biden will play the part of Immortan Joe. and Donald Trump signed on for the role of Dementus.

Furiosa has a host of minor players who will reappear in Furiosa II. Pete Buttigieg is cast as Bommyknocker Warboy, and Alejandro Mayorkas will play Pissboy and is already rehearsing.

Immortan Joe had a bad night.

If the New York Times ain't happy, ain't nobody happy: The Gray Lady throws Joe Biden under trhe bus

 Perhaps you've heard that old Southern aphorism: "If mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy."

Today, I'm modifying this ancient pearl of wisdom to reflect on the odds against Joe Biden winning a second term as the leader of the Free World: If the New York Times, a powerful voice in American politics, ain't happy, ain't nobody happy. 

And the New York Times is not happy. Less than 24 hours after Biden's dismal debate performance against Donald Trump, the Times editorial board swiftly and decisively called for Biden to drop out as the Democratic Party's nominee for President.

New York Times columnists Thomas Friedman, Paul Krugman, and Nicholas Kristof--the Democratic Party's Pretorian Guard--joined the chorus, advising Biden to step away from the vehicle.

Nevertheless, some media voices are sticking with Joe despite the glaring signs that he suffers from dementia. The going-down-with-the-ship camp bases its misplaced loyalty on one of two arguments. 

First is the Howdy Doody crowd. These are the commentators who say that Trump is so odious that a diminished  Biden is preferable. These people would vote for Howdy Doody over Trump.

A second group is sticking with Biden based on race. One writer pointed out that Biden's leading critics are white men over sixty. And we all know we can't trust those guys.

Which group will prevail? My view is this: The New York Times has decreed that Biden must glide down the exit ramp. Eventually, all of Biden's supporters will fall in line.

Why didn't Howdy Doody run for president?

A Zionist in Flyover Country

Like smallpox pustules, anti-Israel demonstrations broke out on college campuses all across America this spring. The first outbreaks appeared at the nation's most elite colleges but quickly spread to more modest institutions in the South and Midwest. Police arrested demonstrators at more than a dozen universities for trespassing or failing to disperse.

Some media commentators argue that the demonstrators have a First Amendment right to set up campgrounds on college campuses, ignoring well-settled constitutional principles articulated by the federal courts. Others debate the need for universities to divest themselves of any financial ties with Israel—an issue no one cared about six weeks ago.

Demonstrators seem to have forgotten that Israel went to war in Gaza because Hamas terrorists raped, tortured, kidnapped, and killed more than a thousand Israeli citizens in one day. They seem indifferent to the fact that Hamas still holds Israelis and Americans in captivity and that some of these prisoners have died in the underground tunnels of Gaza.

I am a Zionist. I believe that Israel has a right to peaceably exist as a nation among nations. Indeed, the United Nations endorsed Israel's right to exist when it recognized the Jewish state in 1948.

Hamas and its Iranian sponsors have called for the destruction of Israel and the genocide of the Jews. They are the Nazis of the twenty-first century. Anyone who supports their agenda in any way is no better than a Nazi collaborator.

Anti-Israel agitators demand a ceasefire in the Gaza war without even asking for an accounting of Hamas's hostages. Surely, they understand that a ceasefire benefits the terrorists and permits them to continue pursuing their maniacal agenda to kill every Israeli Jew.

In my opinion, the anti-Israel student protesters and the feckless college professors who support them fall into two categories. They are either anti-Semitic racists or willfully ignorant of the lessons that humanity should have learned from the Holocaust.

I have no respect for these fools. And I have no respect for our spineless President, who is too cowardly to stand with Israel in its hour of need. Joe Biden is our nation's Neville Chamberlain.

RFK Jr. needs Secret Service protection. Did his siblings ask President Biden for it?

 Robert F Kennedy Jr. is a serious candidate for president of the United States. So far, he's qualified to be on the ballot in nine states and hopes to be on every state ballot when the presidential election takes place in November.

The Biden administration has repeatedly denied RFK Jr.’s requests for Secret Service protection, which has placed a significant financial strain on his campaign. As a result, Kennedy is compelled to allocate campaign funds to cover his security expenses.

Early this month, six of RFK Jr.’s siblings publicly endorsed Joe Biden for president, even appearing at a Biden campaign event in Philadelphia. “[Biden]has us thriving again, believing again, behaving like good neighbors again,” Kerry Kennedy gushed, while five of RFK Jr.’s siblings smiled approvingly.

Did any of Kennedy's brothers and sisters ask President Biden to provide their brother with Secret Service protection? Did any of Biden’s Kennedy endorsers condition their support on a presidential promise to give their brother the personal security Biden enjoys?

Apparently not. RFK Jr.’s docile relatives performed for Biden’s dog and pony show without demanding Secret Service protection for their courageous brother.  

Perhaps that's understandable. After all, who could imagine a Kennedy being assassinated by political enemies?

Israel flies the flag of no quarter. Americans are morally obliged to back Israel's play

"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler," Albert Einstein observed. Indeed, it is a mark of intelligence to analyze a jumble of complicated information, come to a straightforward conclusion, and decide what to do.

Unfortunately, our intellectual elites rarely try to make things as simple as possible. Instead, they obsess about complexity and often conclude that a particular problem is so complicated that it is insolvable. Homelessness, for example, is a complex problem, so tangled and tricky that San Francisco can't figure out how to keep people from defecating in the streets.

Sometimes, however, our failure to grasp the essentials of a problem leaves us with moral paralysis. Overwhelmed by complexity and contradictions, we do nothing even when the proper course of action is so apparent that even a child can understand what we should do.

Israel is in an existential battle with Hamas. What Hamas terrorists did on October 7, 2023, is so horrendous that Israel is justified in doing almost anything to eradicate Hamas. Israel's existence is at stake. That's a simple fact.

Thus, Israel flies the flag of No Quarter.  In my view, the United States, Israel's only major ally, is morally obligated to back Israel's play. That moral obligation stems from the Holocaust.

Unfortunately, the Biden administration fails to grasp the simple morality of Israel's war aims. The U.S. sends weapons and munitions to Israel, but it joined the feckless call for a ceasefire that would weaken Israel and benefit Hamas.

Enabled by our misguided President, pro-Palestinian protest groups have sprung up on the nation's college campuses, revealing latent anti-semitism in academia.

Astonishingly, Senator Chuck Schumer, America's senior Jewish politician, is undermining Israel by meddling in the Jewish state's domestic politics. 

None of this underhanded and cowardly behavior will deter Israel from doing what it must do for its own survival, which is to annihilate Hamas.

In short, the unwillingness of America's political and intellectual elites to recognize the simple fact that Israel is fighting for its survival is morally indefensible and will only prolong the suffering of innocent Palestinians and Israelis.

Photo Credit: Jack Guez/Getty Images

Wages are up, grocery prices are going down, and inflation is under control! Paul Krugman slings Joe Biden's bullshit

 President Biden issued a statement a few days ago assuring us that the economy is robust and we're all getting richer. Here is what he said:

Inflation is down two-thirds from its peak, and annual core inflation is the lowest since May 2021. Wages are rising faster than prices over the last year and since the pandemic. Prices for key household purchases like gas, milk, eggs, and appliances are lower than a year ago. Inflation is down, while unemployment has remained below 4% for the longest stretch in more than 50 years.

In short, Americans have become wealthier since Joe Biden took office. Unfortunately, many Americans are so fuckin’ dumb that they don't realize how prosperous they are.

New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, chief spear carrier for the progressive left, asked why Americans are so down on the economy. Why are they ignoring "fancy statistics" showing that "America is doing pretty well"?

Krugman thinks many Americans have been duped by "the false narrative that the economy is doing badly."

I hate to break it to you, Paul, but that's bullshit. You may not know this, but millions of Americans living on fixed incomes in flyover country do their own grocery shopping. I'm one of those people. Every time I go to the grocery store, I am shocked by the price of food and paper goods.

Property and auto insurance costs have also spiraled upward, rising 26% over last year. Homeowner's insurance costs have risen, too—by 11%.

Krugman urges Democrats to argue that Biden inherited a damaged economy "and led us through the aftermath to a much better place."

I think that's bad advice. If the Democrats want to win this year's presidential election, they need to fall back on the political tactics that have worked so well in the past: race-baiting, ballot harvesting, and frivolous litigation.

 

Paul Krugman: Slinging Joe Biden's bullshit
Photo credit: Leigh Advisory

Pickled pig lips cost $22 a jar: Bidenomics and the inflated cost of food

I'm shocked by food prices every time I go to the grocery store. Coffee is $11 a pound at my grocery store, two pounds of bacon cost $20, and a loaf of bread sells for five or six bucks. A jar of pickled pig lips costs $22!

President Trump says food costs have gone up 40,  50%, and even 60% under Bidenomics. The Biden administration and the mainstream media say that's nonsense. However, most experts agree that food prices have increased by about 25% over the last four years.

Food prices are insignificant for the wealthy, but food makes up 31% of a low-income family's budget. For people living on the bottom rung of the economic ladder, the rising cost of food causes real suffering.

I grew up in a family clawing its way into the middle class. My mother tried to keep our food costs down by buying foods that were cheap. I ate a lot of baloney as a kid, a lot of Velveeta cheese, a lot of Spam, and beef liver. Our refrigerator never held real butter or cheddar cheese. Those foods were too expensive.

As my parents became more prosperous, our diet changed. We stopped eating Spam and ate more beef. I discovered cheddar cheese.

Biden's spinmasters say inflation is under control, and the New York Times agrees. But America’s poor know better. When pickled pig lips cost $22 a jar, that's a sign that food prices are out of control.

Economists say inflation is a time when the rich steal from the poor. This is such a time. The restaurants are packed with wealthy people eating steaks while folks living off their Social Security checks struggle to buy food. 

Has E.J. Dionne Sold His Soul to the Deep State?

E.J. Dionne, a Washington Post columnist, wrote a disingenuous commentary a few days ago that appeared in my local newspaper. Dionne takes Americans to task who believe we are faced with two equally bad choices in this year's presidential election.
Dionne argues that Biden is by far the better candidate. In his mind, Americans must choose between Trump, "who stokes and exploits their anger," and Biden, "who is trying to solve their problems."

Dionne can reasonably argue that Americans should choose Biden over Trump in November's election. Without a doubt, Trump is a deeply flawed candidate. Nevertheless, Dionne's arguments in favor of Biden are nonsense.

Deonne says Biden has sought "compromise to protect our southern border," which is unadulterated bullshit. Everyone knows that millions of illegal immigrants are flooding across the Mexican border and that Biden has done nothing to stem the flow. Everyone understands that our open border is directly responsible for the epidemic of fentanyl overdoses--100,000 deaths last year.

Dionne also commends Biden for sending aid to Ukraine when, in fact, our government provoked Russia to invade Ukraine when it helped overthrow a popularly elected pro-Russia Ukrainian president in 2014. Although Dionne will probably not admit it, Ukraine is losing that war, and continued American military aid will only lead to more casualties for both Russians and Ukrainians.

In my mind, Dionne’s essay is more offensive for what he didn’t say than for what he said. Dionne said nothing about Biden’s dementia, which has gotten so bad that a five-year-old child could diagnose him. Dionne failed to mention credible evidence that Biden and his family sold Joe Biden’s influence to countries hostile to America.

Incredibly, Dionne says our government “has performed well” under Biden, when in fact, Biden has weaponized federal law enforcement, stoked inflation, and diminished our national security and America's standing around the world.

In essence, Dionne argues that Americans must choose “between a normal human being and a self-involved, spiteful madman.” But Biden is not a normal human being. Alternatively, if he is a normal human being, then America is a nation of clinically demented criminals.

Dionne admits that he's spent his career in the mainstream media, which, he says "takes on the essential work of informing the public about what is going on in the world with a sense of fairness and a dedication to the truth . . ."

And that is the heart of the matter. The mainstream media is not dedicated to the truth; it has sold its soul to the Deep State. Unfortunately, Dionne has marinated so long in the Deep State's vile brew of mendacity that he can't see what is obvious to Americans living in the Heartland--our President is cognitively diminished and up to his elbows in corruption.

Photo credit: The Australian

 

Help Me, Obi-Wan Nikki Haley: You're My Only Hope

Until yesterday afternoon, I was depressed about this year's presidential election. It seemed inevitable that Americans would be forced to choose between Joe Biden and Donald Trump as our next President. Both men are highly unattractive. Biden is a crime boss who has dementia, and Trump's flaws are too numerous to summarize briefly.

Then, the political landscape changed in an instant. Governor Ron DeSantis dropped out of the presidential race yesterday afternoon, and now Americans have three stark choices for our country's next President.

We can choose Joe Biden--or, more likely—the mystery candidate who will replace him when he drops out of the presidential race next summer for health reasons.

We can back Donald Trump, the runaway favorite Republican nominee. He's the odds-on favorite among conservative voters.

Or we can vote for former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley—the last remaining Republican to challenge Donald Trump for the Republican nomination.

If I get the opportunity, I will vote for Nikki Haley. She is eminently qualified to be the President of the United States, and for me, her chief attraction is that she is not Trump or Biden.

I have been disappointed by dark-horse presidential candidates in the past. I supported Bernie Sanders in 2016 and later realized he's just another political hack. I once thought Elizabeth Warren would make a good president because of her stance on student loans and corporate greed. But she's just another political hack who never did anything substantive to help working-class Americans,

I'm throwing my support to Nikki Haley. To borrow a line from Star Wars, Help us, Obi-Wan Nikki Haley. You're our only hope.

Fooling All of the People Some of the Time: Retired People, Working-Class Families, and Peope Living on Fixed Incomes are Suffering Under Bidenomics

 You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

Abraham Lincoln

How are Americans doing under Bidenomics? According to President Biden, we're all doing fine. This is what the President said just a few days ago:

Today’s report shows that we ended 2023 with inflation down nearly two-thirds from its peak and core inflation at its lowest level since May 2021. We saw prices go down over the course of the year for goods and services that are important for American households, like a gallon of gas, a gallon of milk, a dozen eggs, toys, appliances, car rentals, and airline fares. Despite what many forecasters predicted a year ago, inflation is down while growth and the job market have remained strong. 

 Of course, that's total bullshit, and Americans all know it--at least all the Americans who do their own grocery shopping. Week after week, I go to my local grocery store and am shocked at the price of nearly everything. 

I know, however, that I am more fortunate than many of my fellow Americans. I'm retired, but I don't depend solely on Social Security to pay my bills. However, one out of seven retired Americans live almost totally on their monthly Social Security checks. And the average Social Security check is only about $1700.

Who can live on that? Nobody. 

President Biden is about to demonstrate the truth of one of Abraham Lincoln's most famous observations. Biden fooled millions of people during the 2020 presidential campaign by hiding his cognitive decline and his family's influence-peddling racket. The obsequious mainstream media pitched a wild yarn about Bidenomics that has fooled some Americans to this day. Incredibly, almost a third of Americans believe Sleepy Joe is doing a good job managing the economy.

But Lincoln was right: you can't fool all the people all the time.  Now, we are in the 2024 presidential primary season, and Biden is about to see that millions of Americans have figured out that they are losing ground economically. Retired people, people living on fixed incomes, and working-class families by the millions are going to vote for Donald Trump or Nikki Haley.

Our Year for Living Dangerously: 2024 Predictions and Premonitions from Flyover Country

 In late December or early January, pundits and commentators make predictions for the new year. This year, I’m going to join in that tradition from my home on Lake Mary in Southern Mississippi.

I’m making three predictions for 2024. I’m also sharing three premonitions about the coming year. I feel certain that my 2024 predictions will come true. I hope my premonitions will not come true, but I fear they will.

 

Prediction number one: Joe Biden won’t be the Democratic nominee for President in 2024.

 

I agree with James Howard Kunstler that Joe Biden will not be on the ballot for the presidential election in November. Biden will participate in most primaries, and he will easily collect enough delegates to capture the Democratic Party’s 2024 presidential nomination, but someonne else will be the Democratic Party's nominee.

As Kunstler has suggested, I think Biden will disclose that he has a serious medical condition sometime next summer. For the good of the country, he will say, he is stepping down from the presidential race and releasing his delegates to someone else.

Who will that person be? I don’t know and you don’t know, but someone living on Martha’s Vineyard knows. The Democratic nominee won’t be a person who participated in the Democratic primaries. After Biden steps aside, the Democratic Party’s Super Delegates will nominate someone who skipped the primaries. Credible speculation says it will be Michelle Obama.

 

The mainstream media pretends that Biden is a serious candidate for another term as President, but no one believes that. His declining health is evident to everyone. Biden has some sort of cognitive disability, which is steadily getting worse. 

Moreover, the Republicans are finding evidence that the Biden family took bribes from foreign countries and stashed the money in offshore bank accounts. If substantiated, those charges could led to an  impeahment trial during Biden's second term. 

 

I think Biden will pardon himself and his entire family (including his grandchildren) before leaving office. He will then shuffle off the world stage and live the remainder of his days in an opulent and secure memory care facility. 

 

Prediction number two: Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee for President in November. 

 

Within weeks, the Supreme Court will overrule decisions by various state officials to keep Trump off the presidential ballot for allegedly participating in an insurrection. You can take that to the bank.

 

Trump is also facing criminal charges in various jurisdictions. I think he will beat those charges. Alternatively, any convictions against him will be overturned by the appellate courts.

 

Thus, Trump will be the Republican nominee for president, and he will face an opponent chosen by the Democratic Party’s Super Delegates.

 

Prediction number three: Americans will regret our involvement in the Ukraine war.

 

Ukraine is losing its war with Russia. It will never regain the Donbas or reoccupy Crimea. Meanwhile, the NATO countries are more and more ambivalent about their support for Ukraine. Russia has the stamina for siege warfare and prolonged fighting. The western nations do not.

 

Eventually, Ukraine and Russia must reach a settlement, and that settlement will require Ukraine to give up some territory. The longer the West waits before coming to that conclusion, the more people will die in this foolish and unnecessary war.

 

Now here are my premonitions for 2024—premonitions I hope will not come to pass.

 

Premonition number one: Urban violence. I fear an outbreak of violence in our cities during the summer of 2024, which will peak during the Republican and Democratic Party conventions. I also fear anti-Israel protests will become larger and more disruptive and will invite more violence.

 

Premonition number two. Rampant inflation. In spite of our government’s effort to deceive the American people, inflation in this country is out of control and is getting worse. In particular, the rising cost of food and housing will cause millions of Americans to suffer before the year is out. 

 

Premonition number three: Terrorists will cross our southern border and kill hundreds of Americans.

 

Illegal immigrants are entering the United States at the rate of 10,000 people a day, and they are not all coming from Latin America. A significant number of border crossers come from the Middle East and some are on the government’s Terrorist Watch List. No nation can absorb those numbers indefinitely without endangering its sovereignty.

2024 may be the year in which PresidentJoe Biden's insane boder policy enables terrorists to cross our southern border and commit a wanton and spectacular act of murder.  I hope not.

Conclusion

 

I hope 2024 will be the year when Americans take prudent steps to protect our security, our culture, and our way of life. I hope this is the year Americans will stop electing crooks and madmen to public office and quit sending their children to universities that promote racism.

 

I fear, however, that America will continue along its downward path toward financial and social collapse. If Americans don’t do something this year to remove the crooks from public office, reform our education system, and get our financial house in order, the days of American greatness will be over.

 

 

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows: Preventing the wrong people from running for President

Why Doesn't the Federal Government Just Cancel All Student Debt? To Find the Answer, Take a Look at Our National Balance Sheet

 When Joe Biden was running for President, he said he would cancel $10,000 of every college borrower's student debt if Congress consented. But Congress hasn't acted.

Senators Elizabeth Warren and Charles Schumer have urged President Biden to cancel $50,000 of every borrower's federal student loans, saying he has the executive power to do so. But that hasn't happened either.

Why not? Given the hardship that student debtors are experiencing--especially since the COVID crisis began--why not just wipe the slate clean and cancel all $1.7 trillion in federal student debt?

In my opinion, President Biden and most members of Congress would like to cancel all student debt. After all, there are about 45 million student borrowers, and canceling their student loans would make them all very happy. 

But Congress can't do that, and neither can President Biden. And here's why.

Student loans are carried on the nation's balance sheet as assets. As of September 30, 2020, the United States held almost $6 trillion in assets, and about a quarter of that amount is listed as outstanding student loans. 

As of September of last year, total national liabilities amounted to roughly $32 trillion, resulting in a national debt of around $26 trillion (give or take a few trillion).

Thus, if Congress simply wiped out all those student loans or President Biden canceled them through executive action, the nation's balance sheet would look significantly worse than it already does.  Instead of holding total assets of $6 trillion, our government would have only a little more than $4 billion.

Simply put, the federal government pretends that all that student-loan debt--closing in on $2 trillion--will be paid back.  And that fiction cannot be maintained if Congress wipes out all student debt or allows large numbers of distressed debtors to discharge their student loans in bankruptcy 

If you are a student-loan debtor, you have benefited from the moratorium on making monthly loan payments--a moratorium that won't be lifted until May 2022.

But just because you haven't made any student-loan payments over the past two years, don't get your hopes up that Congress will simply forgive all federal student debt.  It won't do it because it can't do it. The Federal government's balance sheet simply can't take the hit.

Joe Biden wants Congress to give all student borrowers $10,000 in debt relief: Too little? Too much?

 This week, Joe Biden called on Congress to give all student borrowers $10,000 in debt relief on their federal student loans.  "It should be done immediately," Biden said.

Senators Elizabeth Warren and Charles Schumer say Mr. Biden's plan is not bold enough. They want him to use his executive powers to give all student borrowers $50,000 in debt relief.  Senator Schumer said that relief of that magnitude would wipe out all federal student-loan debt for 75 percent of college borrowers and provide at least partial relief for 95 percent. 

So--is Biden's proposal too little or too much?

As I have said for years, a flawed relief plan is better than no relief plan. I support any congressional or presidential action that would grant some relief to the nation's 45 million student-loan debtors, who collectively owe $1.7 trillion in college loans. If $10,000 in debt relief is the only arrow in Mr. Biden's quiver, I say he should let it fly.

But both the Biden plan and the Warren-Schumer proposal are flawed. First of all, a $10,000 write-off of each individual's student debt will do almost nothing for the nearly 9 million borrowers in income-based repayment plans. Their debt grows larger by the day because the loan payments aren't large enough to pay off the accruing interest.

Moreover, Mr. Biden wants Congress to approve the deal, which will take weeks, if not months.  After all, the student-loan catastrophe is a political hot potato that Congress might not want to pick up.  

The Warren-Schumer proposal is far more comprehensive than Biden's. As Senator Schumer said, this would eliminate all (federal) student-loan debt for most Americans. But Warren and Schumer want Biden to take this action on his own hook.  Does he have the authority to forgiveness $50,000 in student loans for millions of debtors?  

Who knows?  Ultimately, a federal court would have to rule on that question.

As Senator Schumer averred, a $50,000 Christmas present would relieve most recent college graduates of all their federal student-loan obligations. For those folks, their college degree would turn out to be free--or almost free. That would make many young Americans very happy, and most of those who bothered to vote cast their ballots for Joe Biden.

But there are moral hazards to the Warren-Biden scheme that are not inconsequential.  I think it is a mistake to allow college graduates to walk away from their student loans while doing nothing to force the universities to bring their costs down. 

Giving a few million Americans a get-out-of-jail-free card on their student loans will only encourage the universities to continue charging too much for a college degree and perhaps even tempt them to raise prices further. What do tuition costs matter if the government is going to step in from time to time and give students a free ride on their loans? 

And once the feds step in once with a $50,000 bailout, students will get it into their heads that they will do it again. So why worry about those student loans? How will kids pay the rent on their luxury student housing?

No. It would be much better for Congress to pass legislation--with the next President's support--that would give distressed debtors easier access to the bankruptcy courts. Let the bankruptcy judges sort out who is really broke and deserves debt relief.

Regardless of what Congress or the next president does, the student-loan scandal will not be fixed overnight.  It is the huge friggin' elephant in the room that has blighted millions of Americans' lives.

But I think it would be a mistake for our national leaders to wipe out perhaps a trillion dollars of student debt and leave the taxpayers stuck with the bill. 

Americans have grown skeptical about the value of a college experience at universities mired in sexual-assault scandals (Penn State, UCLA, Baylor, Michigan State, LSU, etc.). They wonder why our elite schools harbor so many blowhard professors who teach students nothing more than most of them are victims of societal bigotry.

Ain't there at least some good things about American society--its culture, literature, democratic values, respect for human rights--some American virtues worth studying and nurturing?

If not--if America is in the toilet and worthy of nothing but contempt, why must students spend four or five years in college and borrow $50,000 or $60,000 to get a bachelor's degree in cynicism? Didn't they learn to be cynics in high school?

Massive student-loan forgiveness is now a mainstream idea: Even Al Jazeera is on board

Around 45 million Americans owe a total of $1.6 trillion in student loans, and approximately 20 million of those debtors are not paying them back.  Betsy DeVos, President Trump's Education Secretary, admitted more than a year ago that only one out of four student borrowers was paying down principal and interest on their federal loans. "In the commercial world," DeVos observed, "no bank regulator would allow this portfolio to be valued at full, face value."  

So why not just forgive all this festering debt--debt that is preventing struggling Americans from buying homes, having children, or saving for their retirement?

That notion is now a mainstream idea in American politics. Senator Bernie Sanders got the ball rolling when he called for wiping out all this debt.  Senator Elizabeth Warren proposed something slightly less radical--forgiving student debt up to $50,000.  And Joe Biden, the Democrats' presumptive nominee for the Presidency, wants to forgive all debt owed by individuals who attended a public university or a historically black college (HBCU).

Even Al Jazeera, an Arabic-focused news organization, based in Qatar, wants to forgive all federal student loan debt.  America is experiencing its worst economic crisis since the 1930s, Al Jazeera reporters pointed out, and the U.S. needs to prioritize relief  for "people, not profit." Al Jazeera calls for canceling all student loan debt, which would "help those hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic to "rebuild their futures."

Writing off all federal student debt is not a crazy idea, especially, as I just said, a bunch of it isn't being paid back anyway. But does Congress have the political will to do it? I don't think so.

After all, the straightforward solution to this crisis would be to simply allow overwhelmed debtors to discharge their student loans in bankruptcy. Bills have been introduced in Congress that would accomplish just that, but those bills have gotten nowhere. 

I've said this before, and I will repeat it. Congress should allow insolvent Americans to file for bankruptcy and discharge their student loans like any other consumer debt: credit cards, car loans, and business obligations. 

And all Congress needs to do to accomplish this sweeping reform is to remove two words from the U.S. Bankruptcy Code: "undue hardship." It is the "undue hardship" language, after all, that the federal courts have interpreted so harshly, and which has denied bankruptcy relief to millions of honest student-loan debtors.

Of course, if Congress abolished the "undue hardship" standard, it would need to appoint a lot more bankruptcy judges to deal with a torrent of bankruptcy filings. And the judges would need to make sure that people who have the financial wherewithal to repay their loans don't fraudulently apply for bankruptcy relief.

In my view, calls to wipe out all student debt are irresponsible because politicians know this is never going to happen. Bankruptcy reform provides an orderly and fair way to give unfortunate student debtors a fresh start while guarding against fraud.