URLs du Jour — 2014-08-25

  • Kevin D. Williamson notes that Senator Rand Paul is spending part of the Congressional recess in Martha's Vineyard the Hamptons the Grand Tetons Guatemala, "performing eye surgeries on poor children who need care."

    Good news: Senator Paul is not the kind of doctor who will perform surgery on poor children who don't need care.

    It's easy to compare Senator Paul's vacation with those who preen endlessly about their superior caring and compassion. But Williamson goes on to make a subtler point: the "caring" politicians have no skills other than political ones.

    Politicians do not provide health care. Doctors, nurses, technicians, orderlies, pharmaceutical researchers, medical-device manufacturers, and junior senators from Kentucky volunteering in Guatemala provide health care. Politicians do not feed the hungry — farmers, grocers, long-haul truckers, and Monsanto feed the hungry. They neither sow nor reap. Barack Obama gives the impression of being a man who probably couldn’t change a tire, but we have persuaded ourselves — allowed ourselves to be persuaded — that such men must be central to our lives. The wheat farmer in Kansas or the contractor in Pittsburgh? All they do is keep the world fed and housed.

    At least Al Franken used to be able to write a good joke.

  • Speaking of Senator Paul, Ann Althouse is righteously peeved: "'Meet the Press" covered Rand Paul's pro bono eye surgery in Guatemala and larded it with impugnment of his motives." She quotes extensively from the MTP correspondent, Chris Jansing, noting her snarky unfairness and blatant bias throughout.

    Senator Paul has been doing this since 1996, so if it's all part of a sneaky plan, it's a real long-term one.

  • Behind the NYT paywall, but you can at least read the relevant subheadline: "Workforce Investment Act Leaves Many Jobless and in Debt." (You can also use the Google Trick: search for that string, then click through.) The WIA is a $3.1 billion Federal program, and there's no indication whatsoever that money is going anywhere but into the pockets of the government employees administering the program and those at the receiving end of the billions (typically private and public vocational schools).

    Instead, an extensive analysis of the program by The New York Times shows, many graduates wind up significantly worse off than when they started — mired in unemployment and debt from training for positions that do not exist, and they end up working elsewhere for minimum wage.

    So: a government program that not only spends a lot of money to hurt the people it was advertised as helping, but also wastes their time and misguides and lies to them about their job prospects. Wonderful.

    Oh yeah: The WIA was renewed earlier this summer with "broad bipartisan support": only three votes against in the Senate, six in the House.

    To repeat myself: If your local Congresscritter or Senator tries to tell you that the Federal Government needs more revenue to accomplish its lofty goals, you have my permission to call him or her a blithering idiot or a despicable liar. Or both.

  • Prof Bainbridge notes: "I genuinely don't understand the moral outrage over tax inversions". He quotes a host of petulant pundits and testy tweeters, basically saying: how dare Burger King buy Tim Horton's as a tax-mitigation scheme?

    Here's my question for anybody who's upset about tax inversions: Do you have an IRA? or a 401(k)? Did you take any deductions on your tax return last year? or any tax credits? If so, you used a perfectly legal "tax avoidance" strategy. Which is exactly what Burger King is considering.

    I hope that (unlike Walgreens) Burger King will stand up to the bullies.

  • Alan Dershowitz unloads on "J Street", a lobbying group that claims in theory to be pro-Israel, in practice anything but. The latest data point: J Street refused to join other organizations in a "Stand With Israel" rally in Boston last month.

    Initially J Street agreed to be a co-sponsor of this unity event, but then—presumably after receiving pressure from its hard left constituency, which is always looking to bash Israel and never to support it—J Street was forced to withdraw its sponsorship. The phony excuse it offered was that the rally offered “no voice for [J Street] concerns about the loss of human life on both sides” and no recognition of the “complexity” of the issues or the need for a “political solution.”

    J Street's PAC endorses political candidates, nearly all Democrats, including New Hampshire's Jeanne Shaheen, Carol Shea-Porter, and Annie Kuster. They really like Kuster and Shea-Porter: JStreetPac is (as I type) Annie's #1 contributor; "JStreet" and "JStreetPac" are Carol's #2 and #3 contributors respectively.

    Free advice: Were I running against them, I'd make a big deal about this.