What Policies Democrat Candidate's Have Announced They Will Pursue. Anther Rant. Bibi Pulls It Off.

A view from runway 3, Sedona airport.

Another Rant. (See 1 below.)
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We have along way to go and a lot of water will flow under the bridge but so far the announced Democrat candidates seem to favor the following policies (not in any particular order nor complete):

a) Get rid of The Electoral College.
b) Allow 16 year old's to vote.
c) Allow abortions after full term birth.
d) Have socialism replace capitalism.
e) Raise taxes and the minimum wage.
f)) Shut down oil/gas pipeline development.
g) Adopt green energy policies that will cost an enormous amount of money and will return us to the 18th century in terms of transportation.
h) Offer free college education.
i) Allow the government to determine your health care and eliminate current health insurance policies.
j) Re-introduce more government red tape, rules and regulations.
k) Allow sanctuary cities to continue to defy Federal Law..
l) Favor citizenship for illegal immigrants and be less restrictive about their physical entry.
m) Select liberal judges who are more likely to make rulings based on sought  outcomes rather than based on interpretation of the Constitution.
n) Restrict gun ownership.
o) Pursue Trump's release of tax returns and continue to reject the Mueller Report's conclusions.
p) Allow anti-Semitic  Muslim Representatives to maintain their positions on important committees and downgrade our relationship with Israel.
q) Seek reparations for Native Americans and Black Americans.
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Bibi pulls it off. (See 2 and 2a  below.)

And:

Now Trump's Deal of The Century! (See 2b below.)
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Dick
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1) So much for talk of a recession. The jobs report was very good, with strong job growth, lowest unemployment claims in 49 years, less than 1% of labor force unemployed more than one week, good wage growth, and U6 staying relatively low. Mortgage rates are now back around 4% just as the spring selling season opens, and refi and sales are up materially as a result. Housing is back. Inflation remains low at 1.5%. Hours worked ticked up a tiny bit. The stock market is headed to a new record high. Rates are back to a more normal curve and no longer inverted. The semiconductor index has been moving up, which is a leading indicator by one to two quarters for increases in the PMI. If the China deal does happen, it is possible that 2019 might be the one of the best years on record for the stock market. Contrast that to all the negative blather out of the pundits and press in December. We will see what happens in May.

The two things holding back even faster job growth are lack of skilled people, and opioids. If we did not have an opioid crisis, job growth would be higher. Instead of kids getting jobs, 70,000 are going to die this year. But just ask a Democrat, and they tell you drugs do not come across the border except at ports of entry. The cartels would never consider smuggling them where there is no wall and almost no agents to catch them. If one soldier dies in combat in Afghanistan it is front page. When 190 kids die each day in the US it is never mentioned. Then they claim the border is a make believe crisis. Thanks to the teachers unions the kids coming out of school are not well prepared for the jobs to be filled. The US ranks around 34th in the world as to what kids get taught, and so we have unskilled, unemployed kids on drugs, and so lower job growth. It is as simple as that. The data are readily available -this is not  a political statement. The issue is not money nor teacher salaries. It is union rules restraining hours and efforts by teachers, and refusal of unions and Dem mayors and governors to allow more charter schools. If bad teachers could be fired, and there was merit pay, and no union constraints, kids would be big beneficiaries. Even the kids graduating college are unprepared for many jobs because they get indoctrinated with nonsense classes, not taught skills and how to think objectively and clearly.  There is now a class at one university titled -Angry White  Male Studies- a sure winner at a job interview. This sort of crap is not unique today on campus. They are not taught to work hard. This is a major problem that is not being addressed by universities which are wedded to left wing ideology instead of providing a great educational and useful experience. What is occurring on campus today is harming the nation and the economy long term.

Overall, things are going along very nicely now in the economy. Good job growth, and a renewed growing GDP now that December and the winter are behind us. Q1 will be lousy, but Q2 will show improvement. While corporate earnings will be much slower growth than in 2018, they will still be solid and growing. Comparing earnings growth rates to 2018 is a false notion, and ignores that there is continued solid growth. The economy is generally stable and growing with wages rising, and inflation low. That is great at this stage of the cycle. Once the China deal is signed, things will pick up more. A big worldwide cloud will go away. The stock market is close to a new record high, and when China is signed, it will achieve even higher levels as the US economy continues to pick up better growth over the rest of the year. China has at least stabilized, and the EU may have bottomed for the moment. Central banks acted quickly this time to stop raising rates, and to keep liquidity flowing.  Real risks remain.  The EU is going to continue to be a mess with a very weak economy, political dysfunction, and a very weak banking system.  Brexit is now a fiasco, with no solution in sight. In the US, there is a risk of too much debt in some corporations, student debt is out of control, government employee pensions and healthcare liabilities are killing state and local budgets, and there is the generally weak world economy, but if there is a China deal, that will help China stabilize and possibly grow again, which is good for the rest of the world. The huge demographic and structural issues in China remain a serious problem, but at least with a deal with the US, they have a chance to deal with those problems in a better way. China is key to the world economy now, similar to the US economy. A China US deal will be very good for everyone. It will also go a long way to assure peaceful coexistence between China and the US for the long term. With a deal, the last thing China wants is a military confrontation with the US. 

The Dems, and Ray Diallo can talk about inequality, people left behind, and the need for better wages, but all Trump needs to do is compare the Obama years of negative real wage growth, high minority unemployment, and slow GDP growth, with his three years, and the Dems have nothing to say but platitudes. All of these political blather comments intentionally leave out that many who are low wage get certain entitlements like earned income credits, Medicaid, housing subsidies, food stamps, etc. Studies show that with these add-ons, their real cash income is nearly equal to many middle class people. A new study shows that if the minimum wage is raised to $15 nationally as Dems propose, there will be greater unemployment among low income workers who get laid-off, and more petty crime as those people seek ways to get money. In Seattle, an academic study showed it led to lower employment among affected low income workers since higher costs of labor led to layoffs. In NYC, the minimum wage is about to go up. 75% of restaurants say as a result they will lay off staff.  We have inequality of wealth because of the Obama no growth years, and we are in a period in history where technology advances are changing the world, and some are getting very wealthy by making that happen. If Jeff Bezos gave 90% of his wealth to poor people it would not make a dent, but he would have little incentive to continue to build AMZN and the hundreds of thousands of jobs he has created. Langone used his personal wealth he earned to create free tuition for NYU med school. The wealthy do more for creating good paying jobs, and helping low wage people and students than the government ever could. I have yet to hear a single Dem tell us what specifically they would do different to make the economy better, and to lower unemployment, and push wages higher without creating inflation and layoffs, which would damage the lower income people they claim to want to help. How do higher taxes, much higher minimum wage, and much more regulation build economic growth.  They tried that under Obama for eight years, and we went nowhere. Real family income declined. The press talks about 40% don’t have $400 for an emergency. Who came up with that stat. Like many numbers quoted by the press and Dems, it sounds like some uncorroborated data that fits the narrative for the election, but probably has no basis in truth. I wish some reporter would ask the Dems to tell us the source of that number. Trump can pound them on not moving to approve the new NAFTA deal and immigration reform, and the radical socialist policies with higher taxes, and government running healthcare.  If he and the Republicans can come with a real healthcare plan that covers low income people, and requires pre-existing coverage, then the Republicans will have a good chance to retake the House.

Note that almost every Dem candidate refused to attend AIPAC this year, but every one of them went to the Al Sharpton event. The same Dems who could not bring themselves to vote for a resolution condemning anti-Semitism. Sharpton as you may recall is of Tawana Brawley fame with the false accusations. Sharpton who did not pay $4 million of income tax. Sharpton who hangs with Farrakhan. Sharpton who was encouraged by Obama in over 100 meetings at the White House to “keep it up” as to big street protests. 

Now educated blacks who are in business, and one who runs a major university in NYC, are openly attacking the bartender from the Bronx for killing AMZN, and all the good paying jobs for minorities that Amazon was committing to. Some are already pushing for her to be replaced. There is a lot of real dirt on her, plus illegal campaign finance. It is possible she will face real competition in 2020. I suspect the Dems would be thrilled if she was gone. She is the gift that keeps giving for Republicans.

Do you notice there are no more of the major protests by blacks that we saw regularly under Obama and Holder. No more constant criticism of cops in the press. No more terror attacks here, or in Europe. Now we have the head of NATO going public in front of Congress to praise Trump for forcing a major change in spending and strengthening NATO to confront Russia. The Dems must have been cringing when he addressed Congress.

A bit of advice. My parents both lived to 100. They became of adult age just before the depression and lived through that, WWII, and many tough times in their lives, including a period of unemployment in their fifties. At age 99 my mother advised “Life is tough, you know, but over time things work out, so just get through the tough times.” She was at peace with the world and her life.
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2) As the electoral smoke clears
From: Douglas Altabef 

It has been an intense last 24 hours, but there is some clarity that has now emerged from an election that was largely a personal referendum on the Prime Minister, rather than being about hot button issues on which there was disagreement. In reality, for the biggest issue, security, there was very little disagreement at all.

Here are some takeaways:

1. Bibi will end up looking masterful for his decision to go to elections.  His decision to go to elections was correct, in that he is likely to end up with a bigger coalition than he started off with. His decision to push for the unity of the Religious Zionist parties, for which he drew much criticism, was counter-intuitively brilliant in that it allowed the United Right to cross the threshold.

2. Latest data show Likud in a tie with Blue and White at 35 seats each. Interestingly, the last poll before the Election also showed a tie, but at 30 seats each. One of the biggest takeaways is that this was the Americanization of the Israeli electoral process, meaning that the two major parties were able to cannibalize their respective bases in order to bulk themselves up. 

3. The big loser on the Right is the New Right Party led by Bennett and Shaked. At this moment, they are about 4,000 votes short of coming across the threshold, which could happen with the counting of the soldiers' votes. But it would be a real loss to the Right and to the country to not have them involved.

4. The big loser on the Left is the Labor Party which received only 8 mandates. This represents a spectacular and tectonic collapse and, together with Meretz's just barely passing the threshold, is an amazing testimony to the crashing of the Left on the national scene. The two Left parties underpolled the two Hareidi parties, Agudah and Shas, and only moderately outpolled the two Arab parties.

5. President Rivlin will have no choice but to give Bibi the first chance to put together a government, and Bibi will have a lot of latitude in doing so, None of the small parties in his coalition can put too much pressure on him, especially if the New Right passes the threshold. One ace in the hole for Bibi is that he can woo some Likud refugees in the Blue and White coalition and seek to bring them into his coalition. This will not include Gantz himself, but there are others there who might make a switch.

6. As one pundit told me, it took an effort, but Gantz managed to make Lapid look good in comparison to himself. Gantz ran a poor, amateurish campaign, and you are likely to see Lapid pull himself away from Blue and White in short order.

7. One of the first orders of business for the new coalition will be to pass a law precluding indictments and trials of sitting MKs and Ministers. Query how the Court deals with that.

8. Bibi will not have to give away as many Ministerial positions to other parties as was assumed, and the decisions on this count might be factored through the prism of the succession to Bibi, However, it is a fool's errand to try to predict how much longer the PM wants to stay in office, especially if he believes that Trump is likely to be re-elected.

9. In the closing days of the campaign Bibi articulated support for sovereignty, victory, non-compliance with Disengagement and dividing Jerusalem, and other themes near and dear to the Right. Whether and to what extent he follows through on these remains to be seen. The Deal of the Century is coming and it might very well be that Bibi has communicated his red lines to Trump. Equally importantly, he might be inclined to follow through unilaterally on some of the proposals in the Deal that would award Israel certain parts of Judea and Samaria. In other words, he might propose annexing them, to "take them off the table."

10. Lastly, Israeli democracy is alive and well. There are always those who see ruination over the horizon, or disaster around the corner. Much of that is anger at a reality that the observer/commentator doesn't like. But amazingly, we can still disagree with each other without fear of demonization, and the patriotism of the other guy is not being questioned.One of the sweetest aspects of Election Day is that it is a day off. The beaches and parks were crammed on a beautiful day. That love of life is the ultimate vote of the Israeli People. We remain optimistic, hopeful, and proud of our country.

2a)

Netanyahu’s Remarkable Achievement

Editorial of The New York Sun

The likelihood that Prime Minister Netanyahu will be given the mandate to form the next government in Israel is a remarkable achievement. It ratifies not only his own leadership but also the historic shift to the right in Israel over the past generation. It augurs well for Israel’s relations with America, which has been one of the bright spots in the eras of both Mr. Netanyahu and President Trump.

Mr. Netanyahu’s victory — if it holds — is all the more remarkable for the fact that it was achieved while he is facing a likely trial for corruption. Imagine, we’re tempted to suggest, the romp he could have made of this election if he did not have the cops on his tail. Then again, too, maybe the “American disease” of using criminal law to fight political battles invited such cynicism that it actually helped him.

No doubt we’ll get a better sense of that in the weeks ahead. Just as we will of the one feature of this vote that disappointed us — namely the apparent failure of Naftali Bennett, the education minister, and Ayelet Shaked, the minister of justice, to win places in the 21st Knesset. From the remove of our editorial rooms they are two of the most attractive figures in the Israeli lineup.

One of the things we liked about the Bennett-Shaked démarche was their attempt to marry — we’re talking only in the political sense — in a new party a religious-Zionist faction (Mr. Bennett) and a more secular, juridical faction (Ms. Shaked). In the cold light of dawn it looks like they lost both sets of followers and would have done better had they nursed their causes in league with Mr. Netanyahu.

It’s not immediately clear, at least on this side of the ocean, what, if anything, will become of the remnant of Rabbi Meir Kahane’s rightist movement. Mr. Netanyahu triggered the leftists here in America by indicating he’d be prepared to work with them in a coalition. In the event, it may not be necessary for him to include the United Right party, of which Mr. Kahane’s followers were themselves but a part.

As for the Left, it was the big loser in this election. The once towering Labor Party — which over the years handed up such leaders as David Ben Gurion*, Golda Meir, and Yitzhak Rabin — is now reduced to something like six seats in the 120-person Knesset. Only a few years ago, that would have been unthinkable. No doubt it reflects, in part, the modern, capitalistic, free-market state Israel has become.

That Israel can digest politically such changes is a testament to the vibrancy of its democracy. Democracy itself may not be Israel’s primary virtue (it is, after all, the Jewishness of Israel that is its unique and defining feature). Yet the decision of the founders of the modern state of Israel to strive for a democratic system has at least helped to secure Israel’s standing among the nations.

The next test in that long quest may yet prove to be President Trump’s peace plan, which recent reports from the White House suggest could be unveiled as early as June. No reason to rule out entirely the possibility that it could work. Yet it could also be the undoing of what has just been ratified. If the Palestinian Arabs reject the peace plan, as they have all plans heretofore, then what?

One possibility is that Mr. Netanyahu could be cornered into accepting what the Palestinian’s reject and that, in turn, his coalition with right-of-center parties could unravel. He could — and with good reason — turn to a national unity government so as to be able to go to the guns. This is not to say that war is inevitable. It is just to say that one election is never the end of the drama of Israel and to underline the glory of the fact that the latest chapter was written in the voting booth.

________

* Ben-Gurion’s party, Mapai, was part of what, in the late 1960s, emerged as the Labor Party.

2b)

Anticipating Trump's "Deal of the Century"

By Daniel Pipes

President Trump's peace plan for the Palestinian-Israeli conflict surfaced two years ago and to this day – remarkably – only he and a handful of aides know its precise details. A stream of leaks, however, contains enough internal consistency that their collation, supplemented by conversations with administration officials, provides a plausible outline of the plan's contents.

These suggest the plan boils down to a grand exchange: The Arab states recognize Israel and Israel recognizes Palestine, both with capital cities in Jerusalem. This approach builds on elements forwarded by Egypt's President Sisi in 2016, the Obama administration in 2009, the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative, and even my 1990 symmetry plan.

These prior plans either had Israel go first or called for simultaneous steps; in contrast, Trump's has the Arab states initiate, with Israel responding. This change prompted Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority (PA) immediately to reject the "deal of the century" when he met with Trump in May 2017; one report noted that "Abbas has long feared such a plan" and "vehemently opposed" it.

Despite that reaction, the purported deal contains many elements favorable to the Palestinians:

• Palestine consists of Areas A and B on the West Bank in their entirety and parts of Area C; in all, it will constitute 90 percent of the West Bank;
• The capital is within or near Jerusalem's expansive municipal boundaries, perhaps in an area stretching from Shuafat to Isawiya, Abu Dis, and Jabal Mukaber;
• An international body oversees a joint PA-Israeli administration governing Jerusalem's Holy Basin (including the Old City);

No formal definition of the Holy Basin exists. Here is one version, that of the Geneva Initiative's Shaul Arieli.

• A joint PA-Jordan body controls Jerusalem's Islamic sanctuaries;
• Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon give more rights to their Palestinian residents;
• Jewish residents in smaller West Bank towns are relocated;
• A land passage connects the West Bank and Gaza;
• Gaza joins Palestine when the PA regains control of it;
• Washington organizes a gigantic economic aid package (perhaps $40 billion, or roughly $25,000 per Palestinian resident of the West Bank) for the PA;
• Palestinians enjoy temporary access to select Israeli seaports and airports until foreign funds build exclusive PA facilities.

In exchange, the Palestinians apparently will be asked to accept several limitations:

• Continued Israeli military control over Palestine's borders, its air and sea access, and the Jordan Valley;
• Legal recognition by the U.S. government (and perhaps annexation by Israel) of larger Jewish towns amounting to 10 percent of the West Bank;
• Giving up the "right of return" for Palestinians living outside Israel in favor of compensation;

Assuming this outline to be correct in the essentials, it raises three main worries. First, the benefits to Israel are illusory. Its peace treaties with Egypt (signed 40 years ago) and Jordan (25 years ago) led not to significant trade, friendly diplomatic relations, or an increase in human contact. Rather, they intensified anti-Zionist sentiments among Egyptians and Jordanians while improving their governments' arsenals. The same pattern of heightened hostility also followed other Arab diplomatic agreements with Israel – Lebanon in 1983, the PLO in 1993; why should Saudi or Bahraini recognition be otherwise? In other words, Arab state recognition hardly benefits Israel and could hurt it.

Ending the Palestinian claim to a "right of return" is Israel's other illusory benefit. Just recall the farcical 1990s non-change of the PLO charter to drop its call for Israel's destruction to anticipate the hollow theatrics ahead.

Second, despite the Palestinians gaining real and irreversible benefits (money, territory, legitimacy), they with certainty will continue their century-old pattern of rejecting Israel through campaigns of delegitimization and violence, as has been the case since the first Palestinian-Israeli agreement in 1993. That's because Shimon Peres' discredited "New Middle East" idea, that enriching and rewarding Palestinians makes them peaceable, underlies the reported Trump plan. Long experience, however, shows that these benefits makes them more inclined to eliminate the Jewish state. In brief, the PA will pocket "Palestine" and intensify its anti-Zionism.

Third, should Israelis complain to Trump about that delegitimization and violence, he will likely respond with annoyance: The Palestinian-Israeli conflict is now "off the table" and they should move on. Should they persist, his predictable rage will damage not just Israel but also the anti-Tehran campaign and anti-Islamist efforts in general.

In short, the reported plan repeats the great miscalculation of traditional Palestinian-Israeli diplomacy by asking too little of Arabs and too much of Israelis. I predict that it will fail, just as did those of Clinton, George W. Bush, and Obama.

Therefore, Americans concerned about Israel, Iran, and Islamism need to prepare for the imminent unveiling of what could be a problematic plan. Yes, so far, Trump has been "the most pro-Israel president ever" but, as the Bible reminds us, "put not your trust in princes."

Mr. Pipes (DanielPipes.org, @DanielPipes) is president of the Middle East Forum.

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