“The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.” Alexander Hamilton. Federalist 47
In November 2020, America went to the polls. Or more accurately, 70% of them didn't, preferring to vote via the mail-in ballot system, because standing in line might kill them. What happened during that presidential election should have been foreseen; the vicious hostility, hoaxes and lies of his Democrat opponents had given the president and his allies plenty of warning and, when combined with well-honed, corrupt election infrastructures in big cities, the likelihood of fraud was obvious.
And so it has proved. Analysts of these events have always been careful to say that, while the startling anomalies and statistical impossibilities cannot be explained without widespread fraud, they can’t say whether it was enough to flip the election. Given that only 43,000 votes in a handful of states (the ones that mattered, naturally) decided the outcome and accepting that there wouldn't be much point in fraud unless you did enough of it to win, that observation, whilst technically correct, is also rather foolish; some unnecessary backside covering, as proving it would require the active assistance of those who conducted it.
Some facts:
Presidents fighting a re-election campaign who manage to increase their vote very rarely lose. Indeed, most presidents see their votes decrease and still win (Obama was down 3.5 million in 2012). Trump gained 11 million votes and lost.
Candidates who win Florida, Ohio and Iowa win the election. This was an unbroken trend for sixty years. Trump won them all, Ohio and Iowa by eight points, and lost.
There are 19 bellwether counties; win 15 of these and you win the election. Trump won 18, by large margins, and lost.
There were 27 'toss-up' House elections, where it was felt that either side could win. Trump's party won them all and gained 13 seats in the House of Representatives. On the day, they held all their Senate seats too. And yet Trump lost.
No candidate who polled more than 75% in his party primaries has ever lost a presidential election; Trump polled 94% and yet he lost.
Any one of those anomalies should prompt questions, but five of them? Plus the fact that Biden did worse that Obama and Clinton in big cities across the nation, apart from the ones in the battleground states. There are also hundreds of statements, statistical evidence, eye-witness testimony, all showing massive, wide-scale fraud. And yet there is no investigation, no-one is held to account for it and those who believe the 'conspiracy theory' belong to the tin foil hat brigade and are worthy of our scorn or, if we are feeling particularly generous, our pity.
It happened because the ruling elite engineered it and they are unlikely to investigate themselves. And they engineered it because they want to maintain their power in perpetuity and Trump was a threat to that. Now, of course, normal service can be resumed, but with a sense of urgency that was lacking in the last iteration of the left's vision, the Obama years. The election of Donald Trump and the huge number of votes he garnered were warning shots that were impossible to ignore.
Isn't it a natural impulse for those in power? They want to do stuff, whether from ideology or venality or both (because, ultimately, how many truly altruistic people can reach lofty heights in politics without making many compromises along the way?) and are prevented by the political process. Imagine if you held office, adhered to the prevailing orthodoxies, were financed by lobbying interests from business (whether openly or covertly through Political Action Groups). Further imagine that you are inoculated against media criticism, your next campaign will be financed by special interests and if, by some quirk of fortune, you are in danger of defeat at the ballot box, well, that can sometimes be fixed too. What checks and balances are still in operation? What downside is there for the corrupt if no-one is going to tell on them and no-one is going to punish them?
There is a certain impatience and arrogance about the Democrats, who are making no attempt to take anyone with them whilst they implement their agenda. They know that time is short; in 2022 there will be mid term elections and, traditionally, the party in power loses seats. They will sense that this is even more likely to happen to them, given the contempt with which they are treating the electorate, so time is of the essence. In the House, the Democrats have a 212-206 advantage while the Senate is locked at 50-50. Three Representatives and one Senator is all that stands between control of both houses and control of neither. Hence, 15 Executive Orders on day one.
They are making no effort to water down any of their progressive policies and no attempt is being made at bi-partisanship. It's in the vein of their last election campaign, or non campaign; persuasion is optional. You’d think that it will end in disaster; they don't seem to feel that and it didn't turn out that way in November, did it?
In the first 100 days of this presidency, it is possible to discern two parallel strategies with which the Democrats plan to transform American society, permanently. The first is an effort to turn the US into a one party state and the second is a final assault on the middle class, law abiding citizens and anyone who doesn't agree with them. The first involves a subversion of institutions, an undermining of national security, voting systems and any norms that hinder their program. The second involves legislation, coercion, bribery and a vast expansion of the welfare state. In no particular order:
The 2020 Census
Every ten years, the US conducts a census, recording the number of people that live in the country. This has historically included everyone, whether they be citizens, non-citizens (but legally present) or illegal aliens. President Trump sought to change this, by requiring the Census deduct from the count those who were in the country illegally. These numbers were issued as estimates in December, prior to the planned publication of the report in January.
To nobody's particular surprise, the report was late; for the first time in history. And on January 20th, in one of his first acts, Biden signed an Executive Order that required illegal aliens to be re-included in the count. When the Census was finally issued in April 2021, the numbers were substantially different. This may seem unimportant, but there are consequences. The Census is used to calculate the distribution of Congressional seats and the allocation of Federal resources, which run into the billions.
States like New York, New Jersey and Illinois increased their numbers and states like Florida, Texas and Arizona lost numbers. The gains can be partially attributed to the addition of illegals but the losses have no legitimate cover. The gains favored the Democrats and the losses afflicted the Republicans. As it's a zero sum game (there are only so many Congressional seats), the Republican states gained less seats than they should have; only five. In the wider context, of course, the new rules favor states which are content to harbor illegal immigrants and penalize American citizens both financially and in terms of political representation.
HR1
The misleadingly named For The People Act, which will enshrine election fraud within the system. It won't have to be done under cover of darkness or with the aid of algorithms any more. It can be done in the open. It ensures insecure voting processes, and makes it easier to cheat by eliminating Voter ID, mandates mail in voting, will register tens of millions of illegal aliens to vote (who will overwhelmingly vote Democrat) and allow 16 and 17 year olds to also register. As it will be illegal (not just not required) to ask for ID, there is nothing to stop people voting twice or voting underage.
It also requires politicians to publish the identities of candidate donors; we can all see where that might end. It sets up a commission to redraw boundary lines (a further insurance if the Census isn't helpful enough), prohibits states from keeping paper ballots, thus ensuring that a proper audit would be impossible and sets up a commission to examine whether five US territories should be granted voting rights, but not statehood (no-one ever sets up a commission to recommend the status quo). As these territories are not viable entities without availing themselves of the largesse of the US taxpayer and the Democrats are the ones who are particularly fond of spending somebody else's money, that could mean up to 10 senators and 18 Electoral College votes to the blue party. Now can you see why they aren't bothering to ingratiate themselves with the electorate?
“It should suffice, however, to reveal how insane today’s Democrat Party is that every single House Democrat, save one, voted for this bill. This is a voting bill that only totalitarians seeking a uniparty nation could love.” (1)
Just to top it off, the bill is unconstitutional on its face; in other words, unlawful. The Feds are not in charge of elections, the states are and it would take a Constitutional Amendment to change that. We have entered such a post-truth zone that the governing party can put forward an illegal bill and expect to get away with it. Even if we ignore that problem, legislation requires 60 out of 100 senators to pass it... at the moment. And that brings us neatly to the next effort.
The Filibuster
In simple terms, the filibuster is a way of ensuring that primary legislation has at least some bipartisan support. It's a way of toning down extreme agendas, of ensuring that the minority party has a say. Whilst the House of Representatives (the lower house), has a simple majority rule, for most legislation to pass the Senate it needs 60 out of 100 senators to vote for it. At the present time, each party has 50 seats.
The filibuster, in modern times, refers to a process where a debate on a bill is not brought to a close and a vote is, therefore, not taken. Without a vote, a piece of legislation cannot be passed. It is a weapon used by the minority party to nuke legislation that it vehemently disagrees with. While this must be a hindrance to the majority party and creates opportunity for obstruction and mischief by the minority party, it is part of a system of checks and balances that, whilst no doubt imperfect, has proven useful to ensure radicalism is kept in check.
However, the Democrats are eager to remove it. Well, they are now but they weren't during the last administration when they availed themselves of it frequently and swore that it was sacrosanct. Now, of course, it stands in their way and needs to be abolished and, to that end, they are lying about the frequency of its usage and talking about 'reform' in order to keep their legislative program moving. As noted, the entire point of the filibuster is to ensure that legislation that does not command sufficient support isn't pursued. Rather than ameliorating their policies to obtain the necessary support, they seek to remove the obstacle that prevents one party rule. It's worth noting that this desire could equally well work against them if they lost control of the House and the Senate, but they seem unconcerned. I wonder why?
However, it only needs a majority decision to abolish the filibuster and, with the Vice President's casting vote, the Democrats can do it provided all of them vote for it. I suspect that the only reason it hasn't happened yet is that at least one of their number has indicated their opposition. But the Left won't give up on it, because it is the vital blockage in the legislative system. As long as they have a majority in the lower chamber, there will be no obstacle there. But there is little point in proposing radical legislation if you can't make it law.
Washington DC Statehood
The seat of the federal government is not a state; it is a district governed directly by Congress. There are sound reasons for this, inasmuch as the government should not be beholden to any particular state, which may (would) attempt to unduly influence it. Indeed, in 1987, the Department of Justice concluded the following:
“Efforts to admit the District of Columbia to the union as a state should be vigorously opposed.”(2)
There is, nonetheless, a movement within (you've guessed it) the Democrat party to award DC statehood, citing unfairness due to the fact that the residents pay federal taxes and are eligible for the draft and so forth and should therefore enjoy the same rights as everyone else. Of course, as already noted, this hasn't stopped the blue party from claiming an entirely different type of representation is appropriate for other US territories. Nonetheless, if one adopts a policy of pure self interest and are unabashed by glaring inconsistencies and moral turpitude, it all makes perfect sense.
The fact that DC residents receive well over twice the federal tax dollars (per capita) than any mere state and the additional inconvenience of the need for a Constitutional Amendment, might be thought to mitigate against the Democrats' chances of success, but if the filibuster goes and the Constitution is ignored, all things are possible.
“While the average U.S. resident took $2,000 more than he or she paid in taxes pre-COVID (the reality of our nation’s spending problem), the average D.C. resident took in almost $59,000 – for D.C. in total, that’s $41 billion more than it pays in taxes.”(3)
Why are they doing this? For the usual reasons; DC is a Democrat stronghold which voted 91% for Hillary Clinton and 92% for Biden and two more Senators and additional House Representatives would be gladly welcomed. Do not be at all surprised to find that judgements rendered in 1987, on a Constitution that had been in existence for over 200 years at that point, suddenly have no weight 30 odd years later. It would hardly be the first time the US Constitution has been flagrantly ridden over and remember: to the Democrats, anything that advances their cause, no matter how egregious, is to be actively promoted.
The Electoral College
America has a unique system for electing its President. The states set their own election rules and they are granted a certain number of congressional representatives, split between the two chambers. Big states get more representatives (in the lower chamber) than small states; for example, California has 53, whilst Vermont has 1, but each of the fifty states appoints two senators to the upper house, regardless of population size.
The Electoral College is the method by which they do so and each state is apportioned votes in the presidential elections that pretty much tally with the congressional vote numbers. Whoever wins the state gets the votes (apart from Maine, but that's another story). There has been ongoing debate about the usefulness of this arrangement, but it is constitutional and it promotes the dispersion of power between the states and thus provides a bulwark against federal tyranny, which was part of the reason for its creation; it's another one of those pesky checks and balances and it requires politicians to calibrate their message such that it appeals to all parts of the US, rather than just to the big cities and big states, which would be all that would be required to win a nationwide popular vote.
Needless to say, another Constitutional Amendment would be necessary were the College to be done away with. And, despite what seems to be an arcane system, why would anybody want to do away with it? And who would want to do such a thing? What would replace it?The second question can be answered in the same way as all the others – the Democrats. As to the why; well, they want to replace it with the popular vote. And the reason they want to do that is, in concert with other integrated reforms and the existing network that enables them to cheat with impunity, they have calculated that they will win every time.
Packing the Supreme Court
The Democrats are deeply upset that the Supreme Court is nominally made up of six conservative judges and three progressives. Before any further discussion, it is worth noting that the court's sole job is to rule on the constitutionality of cases which is chooses to take. Liberals tend to be people who do not favor a constitutional approach to the law and want to 'progress' beyond it. Polite society likes to refer to them as providing a view that can bring the constitution 'up to date', which rather ignores the entire purpose of it. There is a difference between applying the principles of the Constitution to modern innovations which would be otherwise unaddressed and fundamentally redrawing it while pretending not to. Judicial activism of this sort has been a continual bane and the choice of which cases are worthy of review has also been inconsistent. In any event, an argument could be made the selection of conservative judges should be a requirement, as a commitment to be Constitution is in the job description. This is not an argument that could be made with liberals.
The number of justices is set at nine, via the Judiciary Act of 1869. There is no valid reason to increase the number of justices, unless you are a Democrat and therefore don't like the mix. During the election campaign, the blue party was deliberately opaque when questioned about whether they would 'pack' the court by adding justices, were they to win. Of course, dodging questions gives rise to the impression that you would indeed pack the court given the chance, or at the very least consider it. And, so it has come to pass. Biden has set up a commission to look at the question (because, in an incisive piece of analysis, the system is”getting out of whack”) and, judging by its left leaning make-up and the very fact of its existence, it will undoubtedly recommend 'reform'. As if to underscore the point, House Democrats have already introduced a bill to do just that, before any deliberations have even occurred.
Once Congress is fixed with extra Democrats and the filibuster is gone, top cover will be required should anybody challenge the unconstitutionality of at least three of the current bills making their way through Congress. What better way to ensure compliance than to load the review body with partisan, liberal activists; preferably from some minority group?
Immigration
American politicians of every stripe, but particularly those of a Democrat persuasion, like to say that there are roughly 11 million illegal immigrants in the US. In fact, they've been saying that for at least fifteen years which is when the number was calculated.(4) Given that it is not in the interests of said illegal immigrants to be found by anyone carrying a clipboard (unless they happen to be from a large manufacturer offering minimum wages), I suspect the number was higher even back then. But it's certain to be much higher now, possibly twofold.
The most natural course of action then, for an incoming president, would be to make it easier to cross the border illegally, because more of the same is clearly needed. To that end, Biden signed six Executive Orders on his first day in office, attempting to erase border and immigration laws by personal fiat, despite the fact that such orders are not able to override congressionally approved legislation. One of these orders was for 14,000 illegal immigrants to be immediately released from custody, thus meaning that the 10,000 of them with criminal convictions were dispersed into the continental interior.
Not content with that, there are currently three bills making their way through the legislative process, all concerning immigration. Over the next ten years, with increased illegal immigration adding to those already present in the country, it is estimated that 37 million illegal immigrants will be given Green Cards under these prospective laws.(5) In the meantime, it will provide more low cost labor to unscrupulous business interests and exacerbate the downward pressure on wages for American born workers. Of course, the best way to counter that would be to legislate for a $15 minimum wage, thus forcing even more businesses to the wall.
Combined with HR1, it is a blatant attempt to legalize the status of millions of people who have broken federal law in order to immigrate to the US. It is, at its most basic, rewarding law breakers by making them US citizens. By the same token, it is penalizing legal immigrants and existing American citizens. There is no way around those conclusions. Is it even possible that a majority of Americans consent? Legal immigrants, on the whole, do not favor illegal immigrants and, even among the half of the country that is allegedly Democrat, there will be a sizeable minority who are in favor of secure borders. So, why would Democrats want this? Because they calculate that these are all extra votes for them and they would largely be correct as turkeys don't generally vote for Christmas.
Are you starting to see how all of this fits together? All of the actions described thusfar are overt attempts to consolidate power regardless of precedent, the Constitution or the law. They don't seem to care much about hiding their intentions. They dress it up a bit, enough to give themselves a fig leaf of credibility (in their own eyes, at least), by misnaming bills, parading their humanitarian crocodile tears and erroneously claiming that the public wants them to pursue policies that they were far from open about prior to the election. But it's not hard to see what's happening. This is the strategy number one. Strategy number two aims to either bribe the masses or subdue them. Firstly, they want your guns.
Gun control
The Second Amendment of the Constitution says, in part, that
“the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”(6)
It is notable that two different verbs are used, to keep and to bear. It is also worth observing that the word 'infringe' has a wide meaning and includes not acting in a way that limits someone's rights or freedom. There is no doubt that this right has already been infringed in many states, as courts have interpreted the Amendment as allowing citizens to keep arms only and legislated against the right to carry, or bear, outside the home. But Biden intends to go much further, but not by repealing the amendment. He prefers death by regulation, by trampling all over the second part of the the above quotation.
As well as Executive Orders, there are bills, naturally. You would think that, as a prerequisite for gun control, a case would need to be made. This case would, presumably, reference the number of firearms killing per year, acknowledge that the vast majority of them were committed by criminals and seek to curb their availability to that section of society. That's one of the first things you would do if you were genuinely trying to reduce killings.
To that end, you'd need to know that over 90% of the firearms used by criminals were obtained illegally. You'd also find it useful to know that, until the riots and epidemic of violence unleashed by the likes of BLM, Antifa and anyone else who fulminated against the police and made them scared of their own shadows, homicides had been on a steady decrease since the early 1990s. You'd be aware that some infringements of the 2nd Amendment had already been sanctioned by pretty much everyone, such as a prohibition on gun ownership for convicted felons (hence the illegal trade) and you'd, presumably, be keen to avoid the law of unintended consequences, whereby you end up penalizing the law abiding while doing nothing to curb the lawless.
But, if your intention is to work towards disarming the populace, ignoring the 2nd Amendment in the process, then you'd introduce bills like HR8 and HR1466. The former criminalizes the private transfer of firearms between law abiding citizens and the latter puts the onus on citizens to prove their virtue to the government if they want to own a firearm and builds a thirty day delay into a process that currently takes approximately 10 minutes for most people.
You may think this appropriate, especially if you are not American. But, in that case, you do not live under the system of checks and balances that is crafted into the Constitution. The 2nd Amendment exists to protect the citizenship from the potential tyranny and overreach of a federal government. The requirement to give up their arms had been the colonists final flash-point in their dispute with the British crown, leading directly to the War of Independence. They understood that those who wish to enslave you, first take your weapons. And that is not just ancient wisdom – it has happened elsewhere since and it applies equally well today.
Biden intends to legislate gun ownership into oblivion. There are provisions within the two bills that will lead to a federal register, to gun dealers becoming liable for what use the gun is subsequently put to (despite the fact that the FBI background check is the trigger for any sale) and there is nothing that will do anything to prevent criminal possession.
In addition, the administration is trying to get states to pass 'red flag' laws, another thinly veiled imposition and a process ripe for abuse. The government wishes to have the power to seize weapons if they believe that a person is a danger to themselves or others. Ordinarily, in the hands of a government you could trust, and accompanied by a robust, challengeable process, this is something that would seem sensible. When you realize that the hearing is ex parte, in that only the government will be present, it is easy to see how it could (and surely would) be used to target political opponents, perhaps genuine militias full of those elusive white supremacists we keep hearing so much about. Kamala Harris has a name for it; Domestic Terrorism Prevention Orders (DTPO).(7) Sounds great, doesn't it?
If you realise that it is only the likes of these far right groups that they are concerned with, you can see where it's all heading. Nobody in government ever seems to have a problem with Antifa or BLM, whose riots cost over $2 billion in damages and over thirty lives last year alone, because they are fellow travelers for now. It's only white men with long beards that bother them.
There is a pattern here that is evident across many of these issues; inflate the problem, provide a solution that appears to address it but is actually much wider in scope and speaks to different motives entirely. In the case of firearms and the thorny issue of background checks, it's not the case that checks aren't done; they are. It's that the checks aren't done well enough and that humans are involved in the process, thus rendering it automatically fallible. But make no mistake – the proposed legislation is targeted at normal citizens and is the very definition of infringement.
Domestic terrorism edicts
The Capitol Riot gave the incoming administration the perfect excuse to continue work commenced at the beginning of the Obama era, a fear mongering narrative aimed at the threat of 'right wing extremism', which is actually aimed at anyone who is a non-leftist. Apparently, the riot was the equivalent of a 9/11 moment and will necessitate an effort by the full force of the federal government in order to root out the cancer.
In fact, it's almost too perfect. There were three BLM/Antifa protests in the same locations in Washington DC on January 6th, there was FBI intelligence that Antifa was planning to infiltrate the rally, a leading BLM activist disguised as a Trump supporter filmed the footage of a woman being shot (by police) inside the Capitol, much social media boasting of their role in the riot by leftists, the cops allowing entry with the words “we disagree with your choice but respect your decision” and so forth. Hundreds of people were let into the Capitol by police, without any coercion or violence and those same people are now being arrested and locked up.
It is also logistically impossible for anyone in the vanguard of the assault to have heard the president speak at the Trump Rally, which was two miles away. The first violence at the Capitol was at 1pm; Trump's speech didn't end until ten minutes after that. To date, no-one has been charged with insurrection and no evidence of prior organisation is being alleged. It bring to mind FDRs maxim; “in politics, nothing happens by accident.”
Incidentally, the administration is staffed by the same people that were helping to bail out rioters in the summer of 2020 (including such luminaries as the current Vice President), via something called the Minnesota Freedom Fund. Included among the bailees were rioters accused of shooting at the police, murder and kidnapping and assault. What sort of a world do we live in where the VP candidate is helping to bail out rioters who are burning cities and trying to kill people?(8)
The rhetoric from the White House makes no mention of anybody left of center, nor will it. Whatever the left defines as 'incitement to violence' will be exclusively targeted at the right, at political opposition. It's easy to see how Harris' DTPOs and gun control measures that feature prominently in proposed legislation will come into it; anyone who the administration deems a threat, by virtue of the fact that they oppose the left politically, will potentially find themselves the subject of federal attention and, additionally, in court trying to get their guns back. Not only that, but government is already calling on Big Tech to further police speech; otherwise known as trashing the First Amendment by proxy.(9) This is not an administration that is shy about its totalitarian designs and why should they be; they are in the right, aren't they?
Covid Relief Bill
The much delayed, much abused American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion splurge finally made it into law in March 2021. Regrettably, but entirely predictably, only 9% of it was in direct relief to the citizenry or to fund vaccination programs. The $1,400 for each eligible American (anyone earning less than $75,000 a year) will end up costing each of them $5,757 plus interest.(10)
Vast sums of money were given to states, particularly blue states, who had locked down and brutalized their citizens. The whole farcical charade was classic government – lock-down, ruin businesses and livelihoods, grant money that the government doesn't have which will be paid for by the very same citizens whose lives you've compromised, but limit its use to projects stipulated by the federal government – which are the causes favored by one party over another – thus accomplishing a massive redistribution of wealth and making many more American dependent on the munificence of Uncle Sam. And, once you're dependent, you'll keep voting for the party that will keep paying.
The funds themselves were also predicated on maintaining a state of emergency; if you didn't, federal money would be thin on the ground, although your taxpayers would still be paying for those states who took the money. The more dire the fiscal position of a state, the more money it got and, of course, the majority of the states in that particular camp were Democrat run. To add insult to injury, there was still over $1 trillion unspent from previous aid packages to the states.
If you give local government more money in the short term, they necessarily have more clout. They also need to spend it, so there will be more programs, more workers to staff the programs, more government overreach. And then, when the initial funds are spent, there will be higher local taxes to pay for the shortfall. It's an established pattern and one that the federal government must be aware of. It should also be borne in mind that, as covered in previous articles, there was no scientific justification for lock-downs, they had never been done before and those states that enforced them most rigidly benefited not one jot, largely because that wasn't the primary motivation.
Infrastructure Bills
“To simply call it an infrastructure plan understates its ambitions. It’s the closest we’ve come to a realization of the Green New Deal, an ambitious collection of progressive proposals to combat climate change, racial injustice, and gender inequality as much as one to upgrade asphalt.”(11)
You will notice another theme developing, a familiar one where the Democrats are concerned. Call a bill something that it demonstrably isn't, let the media run cover for you and just keep lying. Infrastructure has always previously been defined as roads, railways and so forth; physical assets of a type easily recognizable as such. Under this administration, the English language has been re-defined and infrastructure now refers to anything that the blue party deems it to. This behemoth bill is priced at $2.3 trillion of which only $621 billion is actually going to be spent on genuine items; the rest, pet projects, of course.
In particular, funds to boost clean energy construction, technology to address the 'climate crisis', clean energy and a 'sustainability accelerator’, whatever that may be. If we were to get picky, even some of the $621 billion isn't going on traditional infrastructure; $178 billion is going on electric car charging stations. There's even $100 billion to enable school lunches to be 'greener'. In truth, the Green New Deal is just a badge attached to a plan that already existed – a plan to redo the American economy from top to bottom and to engineer a complete upheaval of US society. Remember, a lot of the people trying to impose this on the public don't actually believe in global warming. It's just a vehicle to assist them in getting what they want, which is more power over the people.
Next up is another massive spending bill, cosily called the American Family Plan, which will cost $8-10 trillion over ten years, whilst raising approximately $4 trillion in taxes to not pay for it. This extravaganza proposes a vast expansion of the welfare state; more child care, free community college, paid leave, free school meals, child benefit and so on and so on. More big government, more dependency. And to pay for it? Tax rises of course, up to 39.6% and a big fat tax on inheritance. In entirely predictable fashion, the reasonably well off will pay most (not the elites) and they'll start paying immediately, whilst the promised benefits will phase in over the whole ten year period. The result will be another huge transfer of assets away from working, middle class people to the welfare state, via the federal government. The entire price tag of both bills will be around $5.4 trillion in this budget year, or more than $43,000 per household.(12)
It may seem that, given what I've said about bills needing sixty votes to pass in the Senate, that these two spending plans will be dead on arrival. Unfortunately, this is unlikely to be the case because, somehow, the administration has convinced the senate authorities that, in these trying times, more than one budget bill should be passed in the financial year. So, there will be the Covid Relief Bill plus these two, if they get their way and none of them will need sixty votes. They can pass on a simple majority.
Clearly, passing massive spending bills on a simple majority is, to a layperson, a corruption of the system. The whole point of the sixty vote requirement is to gain wide support for legislation. Further, if you can effectively also pass new legislation in a budget, rather than having to run the gauntlet of the Senate in 'regular order', it is a clear abuse of the process. As we have seen, abusing the process is a Democrat specialty, leavened with no sense of shame, because it's justified as they are right and everyone else must, therefore, be wrong.
Nominees and Reparations
Because everything can be explained by reference to the oppressors and the oppressed, according to the left, people who are steeped in this way of thinking are needed to fill all the important positions. To that end, we have seen the usual posturing and promotion of minorities, seemingly purely on account of what race they are and what they believe. This is not a racist observation – positive discrimination is a fundamental part of Critical Theory.
So, we have Xavier Becerra, a lawyer who is apparently qualified to serve in Health and Human Services; having said that, he advocates for open borders, gun control and radical climate policies, so perhaps he is the prefect fit, after all. Then Rachael Levine, a man identifying as a woman, who was an abject failure in her previous role, Vanita Gupta a race obsessed Assistant Attorney General and, as Secretary to the Treasury, Janet Yellen, who wants a $2 billion carbon tax, which would immediately put 40 cents on a gallon of fuel. Not forgetting Deb Haaland, a Native American and Secretary of the Interior who is doubly qualified by her race and her qualifications as a climate activist and champion of the Green New Deal.
And, because it's vital to make things up to black American slave descendants, reparations will need to be paid. This, despite the fact that over 400,000 white Americans on the Union side died in a Civil War that was fought over the issue of slavery, thus causing immediate loss to the families of the deceased and further loss to their descendants. And the inconvenient fact that a majority of modern day black Americans are descended from people who immigrated after end of the Civil War. But, no matter, there's a bill for that too; HR40.
Conclusions
While it is probable that no system is infallible, unavoidable imperfection should be embraced if there is no viable way of ensuring the same outcome with any other method. Better is frequently the enemy of good, in any event. But this administration is not interested in making the Constitution or congressional procedures objectively better; they are only interested in their own agenda and in their view the Constitution is a racist relic, anyway.
“The ends of our government are no longer determined by the people through public deliberation constrained by moral and natural limits; nor are they even to give the people what they want regardless of those limits. They are rather to force upon the people what “science,” the research universities and public intellectuals have determined they should want. Since these “discoveries” are held to be “scientific” and therefore incontrovertible, limits on administrative power are not merely unnecessary but harmful. When you know what’s right and necessary, why wait? Why let yourself be held up by mere procedural hurdles, or worse, by the contentless objections of the ignorant?”(13)
The coercive tendencies of the state are going into hyper-drive, partly because time is short and partly because their bullying of the population and people's supine response during the past year or so has emboldened them. It's important to remember one thing; the Constitution was written in the way it was, because the Founders were aware of, and determined to prevent, federal tyranny. Anyone attempting to take a wrecking ball to it is, ipso facto, in the business of enabling just such an outcome. The checks and balances designed into the system are going to be picked apart, piece by piece. By isolating each device, a case will be made that seems to make some kind of sense, at least superficially, and an attempt will be made to sweep it away without reference to where it fits into the whole.
There are Executive Orders and proposed bills that are clearly unconstitutional. There are attempts to overturn procedure for no other reason that to get their own way. Ordinarily, a party would be well advised to abjure measures that provide a precedent that may end up being used against them if they were to lose one or other of the houses in the Senate. However, if the very point of some of the measures is to ensure that such an outcome never happens again, they may as well fill their boots while they can. The agenda is to create a government tyranny, to make the states dependent on federal funding and to keep the people within them in hock to the welfare state.
These are not the actions of people who are interested in the democratic process. They don't care to tailor their policies to gain electoral validation; they choose to game the system any which way they can. They are in the business of destroying the finely calibrated institutions of the American republic. This will be the overt version of what has been happening behind the scenes for decades, inasmuch as the ruling elite have done their own thing, regardless of which party nominally held the reins of power. The last impediments to tyranny will be removed and one party rule, ad infinitum, will be the result.
“Our Founders created a federal system, not an unstable majoritarian democracy. The interests and rights of the states, in our country, are pitted against the interests and rights of the federal government, and the winners are individuals, whose rights are preserved.”(14)
As for the detail; if they don't abolish the filibuster, they can't get their program passed. After all, the Republicans have to put up some semblance of a fight. If they can't get DC statehood, HR1 and immigration law passed, they can't guarantee their hegemony. In an alternative universe, where existing norms and practices were respected and worked within, where the Constitution and the law meant something, none of this would stand a chance; there certainly wouldn't be a swathe of bills and Executive Orders ready to go within the first three months of an administration.
But, in this universe, we have a ruling party that doesn't care that some Democrat voters are experiencing buyers' remorse. They certainly don’t care for the Deplorables that make up the other 50% of the country. They claim that they have the endorsement of the public; they know they don't. And whither the Republicans? They have been supine, more than willing to play the obedient junior partner. They will be tempted to think strategically, to compromise, possibly calculating that if they oppose everything, it will hasten the end of the filibuster and then everything will get through. They don't understand that to be party to passing any part of this agenda will be regarded as a betrayal by a large section of American society. They don't understand that this is not business as normal; this is a coup. Or maybe they do, but they are either complicit or too frightened to do their duty.
Ultimately, for this administration, the enemy is people who run their own businesses and support themselves and others; people who worship any god other than progressivism; people who own weapons; people who are white. It sounds ridiculous, doesn't it? And this analysis may well seem alarmist. But ask yourself this; have the Democrats introduced these bills? Are they talking about court packing and abolishing the filibuster? The answer to both those questions is yes, they have. They wouldn't do that for nothing, would they?
“Once you eliminate the impossible, what remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.” (15)
Any ideology that untethers itself from objective reality and truth and self reflection is a cancer. But, is it any wonder that the Democrats and their minions do what they do? They know they are right and they are, therefore, justified in doing anything that furthers the cause. It's an ideology that legitimizes the sociopath and the egotist and there are a few of each on display, at the moment. But, make no mistake. If the filibuster goes, what looks horrendous in prospect will be purgatory in real time. And, the rest of the world follows where America leads, for good or for bad.
Citations
ojp.gov/pdffiles1/Digitization/115093NCJRS.pdf
https://www.migrationpolicy.org/sites/default/files/Explainer-IllegalImmigration-PRINT-Final.pdf.
https://www.numbersusa.com/sites/default/files/public/Biden-Amnesty-10-Year-LPRs_v2.pdf
US Constitution
https://htv-prod-media.s3.amazonaws.com/files/kamala-harris-domestic-terrorism-plan-1565799257.pdf
https://thefederalist.com/2021/02/15/bidens-domestic-war-on-terrorism-may-seek-to-criminalize-political-dissent/
https://www.theepochtimes.com/bidens-first-100-days-a-radical-transformation-of-america_3793489.html
Michael Anton, https://claremontreviewofbooks.com/draining-the-swamp1/
Arthur Conan Doyle