John Harvard’s Body Molting In His Grave

My incessant reading of Democrat manipulations, deceptions and transgressions are killing me, but I can't help myself. The latest: Bill de Blasio, former NYC mayor, avowed socialist, supporter of the Sandanistas, child of communist sympathizers, Hillary Clinton campaign manager, who honeymooned in Cuba, welcomed Zimbabwe strongman Robert Mugabe to New York’s City Hall and was so tone deaf that he once chanted Che Guevara slogans at a Miami political rally…….yeah, that Bill de Blasio, ended his congressional campaign run last month and has been appointed to a position as senior leadership fellow at Harvard University. Seriously. Maybe he and Liz Warren can get together for tea. After all they have the time to teach only one class apiece. The WSJ reports that Mr. de Blasio, formerly William Wilhelm until he chose to reject his father’s family and take his mother's maiden name, will hold office hours, meet with students, and teach at least one class at the T. H. Chan School of Public Health. Sounds super taxing. And how interestingly appropriate that he lands a position at the Chan School, named for its benefactor that contributed the largest single donation to Harvard in history, enough to get them to change the name of the place. According to an article by Guillermo Hava of the Harvard Crimson, the donation is not from the Chan family directly but from the Morningside Foundation, a 591(c)(3) non-profit entity founded by Gerald and his brother Ronnie. Morningside apparently derives their income from three sources. The first two sources are benignly named after East Asian Teas, Bancha and Keenum, and coincidentally occupy the same address in Iowa. That address is linked to Morningside Private Investors, yet another tentacle of the Chan corporate octopus. The two entities, according to the Crimson article, donated precisely the same amount: $1.05 million apiece. Interestingly, Mr. Hava reports that neither entity has an internet presence, with no mention in the public domain, thus having all the earmarks of a shell corporation. The third income source is Echo Enterprises International Holdings Group, Ltd, located in tax haven Monaco. Echo is linked to Stealth BioTherapeutics, which is, you guessed it, yet another part of the Chan corporate empire. 

While Gerald Chan seemed to be the frontman for the donation, his brother Ronnie was also involved and is a much more interesting case study. Both brothers serve both the Hang Lung Group as well as Morningside with the distinction between the two corporations described as being blurry. Pro-democracy media mogul Jimmy Lai was quoted calling Ronnie Chan “ a pawn of the CCP.” Ronnie, as Co-chair of the Asian Society’s Hong Kong Chapter, has been accused of defending China’s incursion into Hong Kong, supporting pro-China censorship, and is purported to have close ties with Beijing. He appeared to be instrumental in the firing of a Forbes contributing author who penned an article critical of Chan, an article that mysteriously was removed from their website. Interesting to note that a Hong Kong investment firm purchased a majority stake in Forbes in 2014. Also, under Chan’s tenure at the Asian Society, the NBA came under pressure to censure tweets supporting pro-democracy demonstrations. Joshua Wong, leader of Hong King’s pro-democracy Umbrella Movement, suggested that Chan was “behind decisions to build connections with US universities while suppressing dissent at home,” wondering if Chan plays “a supplemental role in China’s global propaganda campaign.”  Adding further credence to Chan’s Beijing ties, Mr. Hava reports that he serves as governor of the China-US Exchange Foundation, a registered foreign agent chaired by Tung Chee-Hwa, Vice-chairman of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference. Orville Schell, yet another Harvard man serving as the Ross Director of the Asian Society New York Center on US-China relations, suspects Ronnie Chan’s motives “may be purely economic” but goes on to call the Asia Society’s Hong Kong Chapter “insufferable and quite repellent.”  Further, he states, “Ronnie Chan seeks to appease an increasingly authoritative government for money, and Harvard renames an entire school after his family-all with just enough legal and financial opacity to make it impossible to ascertain the fund's origins.”  

So is Harvard purposely moving farther to the left and supporting the CCP as it makes inroads into American educational, financial and government institutions?  Or are they, like Robbie Chan’s lesser detractors imply, simply sleeping with the enemy for purely financial motives? Either way, I fail to see how America benefits, how our public policy improves, and how our students will continue to receive a superior education. What does yet another socialist like Bill de Blasio brings to Harvard?  Certainly not diversity in public policy. Harvard, for all its claims of Ivy League elitism, is beginning to lose its luster. You will be judged by the company you keep, the faculty you employ, and the donations you accept. And,the policies of those you choose to honor. 

The Spin

So the democrats, in defense of their student loan debt cancellation program, are comparing student loans to PPP loans doled out during the pandemic. Specifically, they target Republicans who had their PPP loans forgiven but who have been critical of Biden’s latest vote-buying scheme. Apples and oranges, people. Recall PPP is an abbreviation for paycheck protection program, payments made to businesses crippled by pandemic shutdowns to pay their employees and keep the lights on. A requirement existed that businesses had to retain staff, and it served as a bridge to keep the business afloat in the midst of massive government-mandated shutdowns. How exactly does that compare to college students making poor decisions in choosing expensive schools where they pursued unmarketable courses of study or graduate students seeking professional degrees or MBAs who will soon be high earners? It doesn’t. Whatever happened to that “pay your fair share” mantra that the democrats wheel out every time there is a progressive tax increase? The end result will be higher tuition, higher inflation, and higher taxes as everyday working Americans struggle to pay off the $300 billion price tag. I don't know about you, but this whole sham has my knickers in a twist!

Student Loans

And now student loan forgiveness. There’s not much that I  can say that hasn’t already been said. It is, in short, a blatant vote-buying scheme that benefits the top 60% of wage earners while punishing blue-collar workers who chose not to attend over-priced colleges and universities and incur significant debt. How cynical. Rewarding irresponsible choices by funding the elite that spent four years enjoying the college experience with forays into such preposterous majors as interpretive dance, film studies, and gender studies. Did they really expect a return on their investment?  And like Ford Motor Company, who magically increased the cost of their electric vehicles by $8000 in response to government subsidy, coincidentally of the same order, we will see universities respond in kind. A blank check had been issued to secondary education, and a middle-digit salute to all of us that chose to pass on the college experience or, worse, worked hard to pay off our own debt. And to be subjected to that pencil-necked, bobble-headed, pretend Native American, Elizabeth Warren, a self-appointed expert on economics of the middle class, trying to blow smoke up our collective backsides with a diatribe about how this is “not only good for the recipient, but good for all Americans as it lifts the whole economy” is a level of subterfuge that is just beyond the pale. Sitting there lecturing us with her $300K faculty position at Harvard, where she teaches one class, having secured the position based on her entirely fictional racial credentials, is particularly reprehensible, knowing that inflated college tuition is what pays her exorbitant salary. Disgusting.

Hypocrisy Run Amuck

The double standard leaves me awestruck. Recalling Bill Clinton’s mishandling of documents, nuclear codes, and the leniency the courts showed him when he failed to produce his secret tapes. Again Recalling how Nixon fared in the public forum, condemned by the always compliant media cabal when it was discovered he was recording Oval Office meetings. Trump as well, by virtue of his conservative candidacy and threat of another run for the presidency, will suffer at the hands of the feds and the media under the misapplication of archaic statutes dredged up to hobble his campaign and destroy his legacy. VDH, in his book The Dying Citizen, reminds us of Lois Lerner’s escapades at the URS when she tilted the table against conservative non-profit entities, effectively suppressing their ability to fundraise for the Republican presidential candidate in the 2012 election cycle, helping propel Obama to his second term. The IRS admitted wrongdoing, yet Lerner escaped prosecution and was able to retire with her pension intact. We have a short political memory for a glaringly apparent double standard. The deep state, entrenched unelected democrat bureaucrats, are brazenly weaponizing government against conservatives. And with the recent $80 billion cash infusion into the IRS, effectively doubling the size of the most feared government agency on the planet, we should carefully document the party affiliation of the taxpayers who will be subjected to an audit, bearing witness to this government sham.

Oz vs. Fetterman

I just read an editorial criticizing senate candidate Mehmet Oz from NBC news, my first mistake, written by a woman who hails from South Jersey and now resides in South Philadelphia. Woman, New Jersey, NBC, I wonder if she’s a Democrat? Apparently, her geographic street cred and ability to pronounce “water” and “coffee” with a distinct Jersey twang makes her an expert on Dr. Oz’s foray into cross-border politics. In typical democrat fashion, her tactics are to divide us into tribes then subject us to a preposterous level of hypocrisy. She parrots Oz’s distinctly uncouth opponent Fetterman’s only real campaign issue that Oz “isn’t from here,” that he’s a “carpetbagger”. Apparently the doctor, like many successful professionals, did some traveling to pursue his education and career. He was born in Ohio, grew up in Delaware, was educated in Massachusetts (Harvard) and Pennsylvania (UPenn)and settled in New Jersey. He maintained his medical license in Pennsylvania and moved there in 2020 and is running for the Senate seat vacated by Pat Toomey (R). So what?  Recall Hillary Clinton, born in Chicago, schooled in Massachusetts (Wellesley) and Connecticut (Yale), married Bill and moved to Arkansas, then Washington DC, yet carpetbagged herself to New York for a Senate seat. Awfully familiar track record save for the big D after her name. And how about progressive darling Liz Warren, she of 1/1024 Native American ancestry. Born in Oklahoma, lived in Texas, Michigan and New Jersey where she received her law degree. From Rutgers, incidentally. Yawn. Was law school faculty in Newark, Houston, Ann Arbor, and Austin, carving out her niche in middle class economics, before landing in Massachusetts at Harvard, of course. Not being of Ivy League pedigree she most likely landed that gig based on that incredibly diverse 1/1024 Indian ancestry. And I use the politically incorrect title “Indian” because that’s exactly what she hand-wrote on her application on the race question. Maybe she should have used “Guardian” but I digress. After all she isn’t from Cleveland. She may win the carpetbagger title for most stops on her train to her Senate seat in Massachusetts but alas, she too has the big D after her name. So much low hanging fruit. Just one more. Remember Patrick Kennedy the disgraced ne’er-do-well son of Teddy, he of Chappaquiddick fame? With no career prospects after attending Providence College, young “Patches” saw a House seat open across the border, from his posh Massachusetts upbringing, in perpetually blue and confused Rhode Island. His door to door campaign and name recognition earned him a seat and most hilariously he was appointed a member of the President’s Commission on Combatting Drug Addiction. He served from 1988-1993 until a series of privileged social blunders involving alcohol, drugs and destruction of property caused him to slink away into obscurity. Carpetbagging? Of course not. Big D means special privileges. Even after drunk and under the influence of Ambien and likely OxyContin, crashing his car into Capitol barricades, claiming he was late for a vote cast 6 hours earlier, he was politely escorted home by Police, having not been administered a field sobriety test. He may not win our carpetbagger award but he certainly gets honorable mention. And on to our Jersey editorialist’s second Fetterman endorsed attack. Dr. Oz is rich, owns 10 properties, and he is pretending to be one of us. Really?  Again, I repeat: so what? Is this a tribal election or is it one based on policy? Admittedly Oz is a horribly inept politician and has shown himself to be a bit tone deaf. His grocery store spot where he pretends to be aghast at food prices as he shops for ingredients for his crudité was painful at best, and it allowed Fetterman’s adept internet social warriors to meme it to death.  Lost in the snark was the fact that produce prices are indeed astronomical and inflation is a concern, but the left’s currency is demagoguery, not practical issues that effect us all. How quickly we forget Liz Warren’s “gonna get me a beer”video, subjecting us to the visual of her attempt at swigging it out of the bottle, undoubtedly the first and last time she ever did that. And they all do it. From Obama shooting hoops, to Biden and his bicycling forays, sometimes even in an upright position. Hillary and her hot sauce and Kamala and her joy of weed radio interview. Come on, man, they’re just like us. Sure Dr. Oz is wealthy, but Pocohontas has a net worth of $12 million, hardly reflective of her supposed expertise in middle-class economics. But Oz was a TV darling after a successful career as a cardiothoracic surgeon. How exactly did an academician and public servant like Liz accumulate that kind of wealth? Certainly not on her exorbitant $300000 a year salary to teach one class at Harvard, even if you tack on the $175K she earns each year as a Senator. Joe Biden? A net worth somewhere north of $9 million but with the Big Guy, you never know where the cash is hiding. Barrack Obama? $50 million. Hillary Clinton?  A whopping $120 million. Seriously, Mehmet Oz is swimming in some deep waters. But apparently exorbitant wealth is never a concern if you have that D after your name. Wealth can generally be associated with success and, although some luck may be involved, it usually implies some degree of smarts are involved. At least in the cases of Oz, Hillary, Warren, and even Obama, I have to concede that they possess intelligence and they have the paper to prove it. Biden I suspect to be more of an Everyman with swarmy back room connections and handlers. Fetterman interestingly comes from a privileged family, and despite mediocre academic credentials, did receive a Masters in Public Policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School, for what that’s worth. He is not nearly in the wealth class of Oz, but he certainly can’t compete with most of his democrat colleagues either. But do we really need another soft on crime, lighter prison sentences, looser marijuana laws, class warrior democrat like Fetterman who has stated he has become “preoccupied with the lottery of birth”? Vote for me I’m “one of youse” is not an issue. Oz is a Turkish-American Muslim that is a product of immigrant parents. Isn’t that consistent with the democrat’s infatuation with immigration and diversity? Isn’t to suggest that he is an outsider suggestive of racism? Disregard the noise, the tribalism, the class warfare and vote on the issues. Pennsylvania can’t afford to make any more mistakes. Have you been to Philadelphia recently?

There Was A Time

“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, for which it stands one nation under God with liberty and justice for all.”.....

“Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the power, and the glory forever. Amen.”

Was that such a wrong way to start a school day? When I think about it today when the pledge of allegiance to the flag and the Lord’s prayer was abolished from our public schools marked the beginning of the Progressive's attack on our American culture that embraced godliness and adherence to Judeo-Christian doctrines and values. Principles, not meant to exclude other religious beliefs but to advise religious beliefs, were part of our fabric as a nation. Today we are in a full-blown counter-culture mode driven by a Woke mentality bent on fundamentally changing America as we know it. We are being strung us up on our own constitutional petard!

Let's Hear It For California

What’s truly amazing is that the liberals hold California up as the standard of progressive utopian ideals. Yet, as advised by V.D. Hanson, they lead the nation in income inequality, have the most citizens under the poverty line, the highest percentage of homelessness, a third of the state population are on public assistance, the highest urban crime rates, the highest state and local taxes, the highest gas tax, the most significant wealth disparity, the poorest public school rating, the poorest business climate rating and the highest rate of middle-class egress. I don’t get it. 

I See You

Does anyone really believe that the justice department raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence was about him retaining classified documents?  Anyone?  This is transparently nothing more than a furthering of the fishing expedition to uncover something, anything, to implicate Trump in the January 6, and I hesitate to use their label, “insurrection.” What a dangerous precedent to set, especially by an administration with so many skeletons in its closets. This is yet further evidence that Biden isn’t in charge or, even worse, is so impaired that he fails to recognize that a Republican administration that follows will assuredly be more aggressive in metering out justice for the Biden family enterprise, led by the laughably incompetent and embarrassingly photogenic Hunter Biden. No raid required; Hunter has conveniently given us all the documentation on his laptop. And such government overreach on the heels of Hillary’s similar offense with the infamous server, when the public was subjected to the condescendingly false naïveté of “like with a cloth” when responding to charges that she wiped her server clean. Unequal justice in America is on full display, and the justice department has lost all credibility.

Inflation Reduction Act

It is all procedural. As usual, the democrats started hanging all sorts of things from their liberal wishlist on the deceptively named “Inflation Reduction Act.”  Capping insulin prices was one of them. According to the non-partisan parliamentarian, this had no business being in a budget bill being rammed through under the reconciliation process. The republicans voted to preserve the cap under Medicaid but rejected the overreach as being procedurally incorrect. I’m not sure why they chose to die on that hill, but my guess is they want to send the message that you can’t just cram all sorts of goodies into what is supposed to be an emergency budget authorization. Reconciliation was rarely used historically but has now become commonplace under democrat rule to avoid the 60 vote threshold that is constitutionally required. And seven republicans chose to vote for it, but it is interesting to note that Mitt Romney, who always bends to the left, was not one of them. There must be more to this than meets the eye. To play devil’s advocate, why insulin?  Why not ridiculously overpriced cancer medications? Where does it end? Even big bad Pharma has to make a buck to subsidize their R &D, even though I agree that insulin prices have skyrocketed much like the Epi-pen cost that jumped recently. Is it related to supply chain issues, cost of production, worker shortages, or reduced numbers of manufacturers?  I don’t know. All I do know is that this bill is yet another example of the progressive demand for more revenue and their desire to punish businesses is insatiable. 

In essence, I'm to gather they propose just giving out better insurance with low deductibles. But that just transfers the cost to the insurance industry, which will respond by raising premiums, especially for those with “Cadillac” plans. So that solution is just another redistribution scheme. Not only that, but I thought Obamacare had solved the problem of the uninsured. Hmm. And it’s a numbers game as well. The pharmaceutical companies are not totally responsible for rising costs as it appears hospitals and pharmacies are acting as the middle man and are reaping profits through inflated pricing as well.

Additionally, how many people are we talking about?  If 35 million Americans have type I IDDM, and a third requires insulin, that’s only 12 million. How many of those are uninsured? The bottom of the spectrum have Medicaid or some state plan, seniors have Medicare which Is capped, and the top tier has private coverage, so how many people are we actually talking about?  And if insulin cost ranges from $175 to $300 a vial with the average patient needing two vials a month, averaging those figures would result in an out-of-pocket expenditure of $225 a month or $2700 per year. That’s less than what my insurance coverage costs me per month, and once again, how many people are we talking about? And why don’t these folks have insurance coverage in Obamacare America? Is it by choice? I would love for my medications and medical supplies to be free as well, but these proposed solutions all are a push toward socialized medicine or universal healthcare, and we all know where that heads: excessive taxation, redistribution, and rationing. And the solution to cap prices leaves out the comment that the pharmaceutical industry claims the cost is justified. They also propose “value pricing,” which is essentially asking private businesses to reveal their cost and then allow the government to determine what they will allow you to charge. Try that with the automobile industry and see if that works. So the bottom line is the utopian desire to have free healthcare by railing against Big Pharma, which operates within the capitalist system of producing a product for profit. The issue is much more complicated than scapegoating the republicans because you want free insulin. I know I'm thrashing about in a sea of confusion here, lent, I'm sure by misinformation and disinformation, but that's the landscape we are dealing with these days! Bear with me.

They Are Out To Get Us

Sneaking funding for an additional 87000 IRS auditors into the deceivingly mislabeled “inflation reduction act” is yet another example of, as the WSJ so eloquently phased it, “the progressive demand for more revenue,” and their requirement “to punish business is insatiable.” The left’s constant portrayal of business as “tax cheats” and “not paying their fair share” is at best cynical in a post-Covid world of only 62% job participation and government handouts. And remember that government data has been spun now that we don’t count people not actively looking for work in our unemployment statistics. Doesn’t it strike anyone on the left as irony that our government continues to squeeze an ever-declining share of the makers in order to support the takers? And as government gets bigger and more intrusive, who exactly will be the low-hanging fruit in this auditor deployment scheme?  Small business, of course. Less likely to have hoards of attorneys and accountants on retainer to defend what may be merely be sloppy bookkeeping, the only choices will be to pony up the fines or descend into bankruptcy. And all for what amounts to pocket change. And who are these businesses?  Your doctors, your dry cleaner, your electrician, your mini-mart in the corner, your favorite restaurant. Yeah, those guys. All those conveniences that make our lives better.  And if they manage to stay in business after suffering the government-sanctioned revenue assault, what will be their most likely response?  To increase the cost of their goods and services to compensate for the financial hit. And everyone say it together: That’s called inflation. A friend of mine, a dentist, had the IRS descend on him for an audit a few years ago. He was perhaps the most meticulous bookkeeper I had ever met. He recorded the date and cost on the popsicle sticks when he treated his staff and filed them. Yeah, that fastidious.  After three days of auditors and accountants pouring through his books, they found nothing but minor clerical errors. The cost to him was major loss of office production and a four thousand dollar bill from his accountant. Is that really effective use of government resources? And who is it that gets inconvenienced by this level of harassment?  Liberals will be the first to complain about canceled appointments, having to wait for services and access to life’s conveniences. When exactly will it occur to them that their policies are at fault for a steady deterioration in services and an increase in cost on virtually everything? They are under the mistaken impression that government policies and especially bigger government, will fix everything. But you just can’t fix stupid.