Justin Katz
Close readers will have noted that I did not propose to prove the accuracy of the Laffer curve; rather, my stated intention was to dispute Tom Sgouros’s argument that it can’t be accurate. To be honest, I find argumentation over Laffer to be somewhat of a distraction. Clearly, I’m ideologically predisposed to a preference for…
How quickly we could slide into tyranny! All it takes is a perceived need to reveal that human beings are very comfortable asserting government ownership and leveraging its power: What if Congress suddenly awoke from its spineless ho-hum existence and passed a law that stated that heretofore every American’s body would become the property of…
I just caught a few moments of Beyond the Politics with Bill Bennett, and on a question pertaining to the government’s tendency to usurp the powers of civil institutions, black leftist academic Cornel West argued that the two could enhance each other, “if its done right.” What’s needed to make the difference, according to West,…
On one level, Tom Sgouros’s attempted proof that the Laffer Curve can’t be accurate is rhetorically ludicrous: Let’s go to the numbers. The corporate tax is 9% of income and is paid by about 2,500 corporations. Not counting the companies who pay the $500 minimum (44,000 of them!), this tax raised $134 million in 2007.…
If, after all of the technicalities are applied, Stephen Alves returns to his seat in the Rhode Island Senate, Rhode Islanders ought to take it as a final straw: Yesterday, the court gave some insight into its decision. According to Craig Berke, spokesman for the state judiciary, the court withheld its decision on the Alves…
Same-sex marriage advocates can make erroneous emotional appeals to Americans’ sense of equality, but the pattern that Connecticut’s Supreme Court further solidified will have broad and oppressive consequences: Striking at the heart of discriminatory traditions in America, the court — in language that often rose above the legal landscape into realms of social justice for…
Have I mentioned that I’m glad to see Mark Steyn columns again? With his latest, I laughed: Gaze into the giant zero of the Obama logo, the hole in the star-spangled donut, the vast fathomless nullity that is the gaping keyhole to the door of utopia. To a sad shriveled Republican cynic, there’s nothing there…
This has been floating around my inbox for a few weeks because it’s worth noting, but I’m not sure how much there is to say about it: Saying that the Rhode Island Public Utilities Commission is not effectively doing its job of implementing and enforcing reasonable rates for consumers, Sen. John J. Tassoni Jr. (D-Dist.…
Soon-to-be-former Town Councilor Brian Medeiros (who isn’t running to maintain his seat) expresses a potentially alarming notion about governance: Government is supposed to help us all do things we can’t do individually. If he’s talking about communal defense against plausible military attack, then I’d agree. If he’s talking about making teachers into an unaccountable class…
John’s comment to my “Not a Trick Question, but Close” post is well worth a read: Let me use a real life, real RI example to rebut your argument. Let’s assume that your theoretical factory owner in fact owned a jewelry factory. Now let’s look at what happened to his economics over the past decade.…