Category: Domestic Policy

2022 Election, Domestic Policy, Infrastructure, Politics

2022 American Nationalist Voting Index – A Strong America

Bob Claude |

The USS Theodore Roosevelt is a proud symbol of American strength and the selfless service of our armed forces in preserving our freedom. However, a nation’s true strength is found in the commitment of its people to their fellow citizens and their nation as a whole. This is doubly true of the America of TR, who stood for both democracy and equal opportunity for all. While it was often an ugly process, Congress actually considered and occasionally passed legislation consistent with TR’s ideals and deserved the support of American nationalists.

Congressional Gold Medals for Capitol Police

This Congress convened amidst an attack by a rebellious mob that came perilously close to overthrowing a newly elected president during the certification of the electoral count. The Capitol Police bore the brunt of the attack and defended congressmembers with conspicuous bravery. The House and Senate recognized their service to the nation by voting to award them Congressional Gold Medals.The Senate vote was unanimous and the House roll call vote can be found here:

https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2021161

Every true American nationalist should agree and salute them as well.

Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill

We have lived with the decline in our national transportation infrastructure for decades. As I discussed in this previous post, Congress finally took action when it passed the Infrastructure and Jobs Act (HR 3684) more commonly known as the Bipartisan infrastructure bill. The links to the House and Senate Votes are

House Vote : https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2021369

Senate Vote: https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_votes/vote1171/vote_117_1_00314.htm

CHIPS Act

The COVID pandemic exposed dangerous gaps in the supply chains of our basic industrial materials and human needs products.  The shortage of domestically produced computer semiconductor chips that are key components of almost every product led to the passage of the CHIPS Act (HR 4346), which will jump start the production of them in the US. The bill also makes important investments in research and technology education. Here are the links to the votes in the House and Senate:

House Vote ; https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2022404

Senate Vote – https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_votes/vote1172/vote_117_2_00271.htm

Economic Security

Congress voted on several other bills to address supply chain shortages threatening our economy. HR 4476 would have created an Office of Trade & Economic Security in the Department of Homeland Security charged with monitoring critical supply chains and coordinating a response to potential issues.  It passed the House but died in the Senate. The House vote can be found here:

https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2022112

Finally, the House and Senate considered a bill called the America COMPETES Act, a predecessor to the CHIPS Act which would have created a Committee on National Critical Capabilities to monitor and prevent the transfer of vital American technology to China and other foreign adversaries. The bill passed in both Houses of Congress, but differences in the text were never resolved. The two votes can be found here:

https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/202231

https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_votes/vote1172/vote_117_2_00109.htm

Conclusion

Theodore Roosevelt was a paragon of personal resilience and knew America needed to be resilient to be a truly strong (see this previous post). As we head to the polls, let us reject many politicians calls to division and ease and, instead, recommit ourselves to building the nation and the people that TR envisioned. Remember to vote and God bless America!

2022 Election, Antitrust & Trade Regulation, Domestic Policy, Immigration, Politics

2022 American Nationalist Voting Index – The Square Deal

Bob Claude |

Theodore Roosevelt famously promised a “square deal” for the average American to reduce the stark inequality of his times. His approach was both pragmatic and straight-forward, best described by this quotation from his New Nationalism speech

But when I say am for the square deal, I mean not merely that I stand for fair play under the present rules of the game, but that I stand for having those rules changed so as to work for a more substantial equality of opportunity and of reward for equally good service.

Today, his crusade against monopolies remains keenly relevant.  Meanwhile, while wage earners have more power to demand better wages and benefits in today’s economy, employers are still agitating for increased immigration to blunt their power.

Antitrust Law

Corporate market power drew criticism in Congress from both political parties, whether it was Big Tech’s influence on political discourse or high gas prices. Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D. Minnesota) took an admirable lead on the issue by introducing two trailblazing bills. The Consolidation Prevention and Competition Promotion Act (Senate Bill 3267) would have strengthened the Clayton Act by prohibiting mergers that create an appreciable risk of materially lessening competition or may create monopsonies (monopolies of buyers, not just sellers). Her Platform Competition and Opportunity Act (Senate Bill 3197) would have cracked down on social media’s market power. Unfortunately, neither was reported out of committee, but they still represented a step in the right direction.

However, a seemingly innocuous but important antitrust measure entitled the Merger Fee Modernization Act (House Bill 3843) passed the House but died in the Senate. In addition to raising the fees companies must pay for the required pre-merger review, it requires the disclosure of foreign government subsidies of acquirers and gives state attorney generals the right to enforce antitrust laws in their own state courts. A good summary of the bill can be found at this link. If you are interested in how your congressmember voted, it can be found here:

https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2022460

Immigration

Once again, the President and Congress dodged their responsibility to pass a comprehensive fix for our broken immigration system and secure not only our borders, but also the economic security of American workers. As I have argued previously, our current de facto system of unrestricted immigration is a new slavery that benefits primarily high-tech and low wage employers. Sadly, the only substantive bills on the subject would worsen the situation.

I believe immigrants who have been in the country since 2012 (the so-called Dreamers) should be brought out of the shadows and legalized. However, I also have argued the Obama Administration’s original Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals rule (DACA) was unlawfully issued and the courts have finally so ruled (see this post). This prompted the Biden Administration to attempt to legalize it pursuant to a formal rulemaking under the federal Administrative Procedure Act, though whether this is outside of their authority under the immigration statutes remains to be seen.  Meanwhile, the House passed an even more radical legalization program called the American Dream and Promise Act that would extend the program to those who entered the country illegally before 2021.  The roll call vote on the bill can be found here (a “No” vote is a nationalist vote):

https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/202191

Sadly, Sen Klobuchar tarnished her nationalist credentials by sponsoring and passing legislation (Senate Bill 3167) mandating the government encourage the employment of high-skilled immigrants, thus feeding Big Tech’s greed for cheap technical workers at the expense of Americans with the same skills. The record vote on that bill can be found here (again, a “no” vote is a nationalist vote):

https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2022439

It passed the Senate by a regrettably unanimous voice vote.

Conclusion

Elites regularly lament the effects of the Great Resignation on American workers’ new-found bargaining power and opportunity to improve themselves. American nationalists should celebrate this power, but also be aware of how fleeting it is, especially as we face the prospect of a potential recession. More changes in the rules of the game are necessary to ensure these gains endure.  

Domestic Policy, Environment, Uncategorized

Climate Change Realism

Bob Claude |

The debate over climate change policy has historically been dominated by globalist proposals that impose a crushing socioeconomic burden on the United States and weaken us by endangering our energy reliability.  Meanwhile, China, Russia, and the developing countries of the global south would continue to prioritize strengthening their economies and national power even at the cost shamelessly increasing their carbon emissions. As I discussed in this post, the American nationalist approach of Theodore Roosevelt would balance environmental responsibility, national security, and economic fairness to achieve realistic carbon reductions as well as the necessary adaptations to the changing climate.

The (unfortunately misnamed) Inflation Reduction Act recently negotiated by Sen. Joe Manchin and Democratic Senate leadership is a step in the right direction despite its various flaws. It appropriates $380 billion over ten years to spur production and installation of clean energy technology,  as opposed to the original budget-busting $1.78 trillion of President Biden’s Build Back Better proposal. At the same time, it contains tax credits for nuclear power and clean hydrogen.  It also recognizes that oil and gas must remain part of the energy mix for now by opening up off-shore and federal lands for drilling (for an in-the-weeds analysis of the energy provisions, see this link to one law firm’s analysis).

There is, however, a cost.  To be at least deficit-neutral, it primarily relies on the following revenue and tax increases:

Authorizing Medicare to negotiate and purchase certain prescription drugs in bulk for Medicare drug plans

Creating a 15% minimum corporate income tax

Strengthening IRS enforcement efforts

Imposing a new fee on excess emissions of methane from oil and gas facilities

Tightening the loophole that taxes investment manager’s income at capital gains rates instead of ordinary income rates.

All of these are welcome changes in tax and spending policy in and of themselves. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates the legislation will result in a small 155 billion reduction in the budget deficit over the next ten years.  

The bill could have been better in two ways.  While it imposes domestic content and prevailing wage requirements on clean energy producers, a more robust tariff to support domestic producers and prevent Chinese predatory pricing should have been added. As even the New York Times admits, the bill also allocates far too little to expanding and modernizing the transmission grid to support large scale energy projects so important to achieving energy reliability. Indeed, it seems to favor rooftop solar and other forms of distributed generation over central generation such as nuclear and gas-fired generation and wind farms that provide crucial backup generation.  The Biden Administration has promised Sen. Manchin that the permitting process for such projects will be streamlined to encourage transmission projects in future legislation. 

Nevertheless, the bill meets Roosevelt’s sobering realism expressed above by beginning the process of reducing carbon emissions here at home, but not at the price of economic dislocation or strategic weakness.  Much more needs to be done, especially in the realm of climate adaptation.  However, America would retain the leadership in environmental stewardship that TR established while refraining from sacrificing its strength.  This is the kind of national responsibility he would have enthusiastically supported.