Author: Peter Roff

Washington, D.C. – The Tax Policy Center, a left-wing group that favors higher taxes on the wealthiest Americans, released an analysis of President Joe Biden’s budget proposal for the upcoming fiscal year that showed it would cause taxes to rise for those making less than $400,000 in annual income. The study, which is supposed to show Biden is following through on his promise to make the rich pay more, has also arranged it so that the people whom he specifically and repeatedly has said would not pay “one thin dime” in additional levies would also see their taxes go up.…

Washington, D.C. – For much of the 20th century, the world was at war. That ended, in as much as those things can, with the collapse of the Soviet Union. Nonetheless, the global alliances that were created by the West to keep the peace during the Cold War survived and today still drive much of U.S. foreign policy. Whether they should is a question people started asking with greater frequency once Donald Trump became a candidate for president. He, it will be recalled, openly questioned America’s ongoing commitment to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization because our European allies were not…

Washington, D.C. – Fears of an imminent recession rose Wednesday as the U.S. Federal Reserve raised interest rates by a quarter of a point Wednesday as part of its ongoing effort to fight inflation. At just 25 basis points, the hike may seem modest and, as commentators have suggested, might be the last or one of the last hikes to be seen for some time. The markets are still jittery because of the recent and apparently narrowly-averted crisis in the U.S. banking system. Yet, as this is the ninth such increase since March 2002, making for the steepest rise in…

Washington, D.C. – As one of few medical doctors in the U.S. Senate, Kansas Republican Roger Marshall has staked out a position as the people’s watchdog on public health matters, especially COVID. Frustrated by the continuing lack on the part of former U.S. government officials about what they knew about it and when they knew it, Marshall Wednesday called for a full investigation into the reported contributions made by a U.S.-based non-governmental organization called EcoHealth Alliance to Chinese biological research efforts for which, according to the latest revelations, the U.S. government may have been double billed. “There is something illegal going…

Washington, D.C. – The latest YouGov poll of Democrats shows just about one-third of Joe Biden’s 2020 voters don’t want him to be the party’s 2024 standard-bearer. It’s not clear if that’s because they think he’s doing a poor job or because they think he’s not up to it. It’s probably a little of both but, for the president and his advisers, it’s a big problem. The White House political people need to find ways to shore up his support among his base more quickly and effectively than they have been doing. If they don’t, his voters are going to…

Washington, D.C. – Washington is full of special interest groups whose reputations make them formidable participants in the ongoing battle over what the government should be doing. Among the most powerful of these groups is AARP. Formerly the American Association of Retired Persons, it has, over the years, been transformed into a network of well-informed, politically active seniors who vote and who can be provoked into entering the fray whenever they can be made to believe their benefits are threatened. This makes them a group to be feared. No one wants to cross AARP, at least not politically. Few have…

Washington, D.C. – Florida GOP Sen. Marco Rubio has upped the stakes in the GOP’s ongoing battle with the Biden White House over a host of issues by placing holds on seven of the president’s recent nominees and re-nominees to influential positions needing Senate confirmation. In a statement, Rubio blasted the administration for choosing people of questionable character and accomplishment to occupy positions of authority within the federal government. “One of these nominees has ignored credible sexual assault accusations in his prior office. Another has done legal work with solar panel companies operating in Xinjiang, where egregious human rights abuses…

Washington, D.C. – America is a great nation, as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich used to say, filled with good people who sometimes do amazing things. Lately, it doesn’t feel that way. The most recent Real Clear Politics polling average finds nearly two-thirds of all Americans – 65.7% – think the country is on the wrong track. Real wages are down for 22 straight months, inflation has people worried about the security of their personal economy, and we are, to recall the words of Jimmy Carter, suffering through a period of malaise. Not all of this is the president’s fault.…

Washington, D.C. – The Democrats’ main objective is to spend money. It’s the glue that holds the groups that put them into office together. Everyone who helps them gets a piece. Everyone who gets in the way gets run over. The worst part of all, though, is the inability to hold those responsible for allowing this to continue year after year, decade after decade, accountable for their abuse not just of the process but the law. The way the Democrats spend to keep alive a system of spoils that keeps them in power undermines both the democratic process and the…

Washington, D.C. – There’s a saying some people like to throw around in politics: Demographics is destiny. It is, up to a point. Some places have been and will continue to be, at least for the immediate future, homogenous enough that the same kinds of people will end up winning elections there over and over and over again. Most of those places are, counter to what you might expect, hopelessly liberal. This includes most major American cities. There are a few that can be made to lean a bit to the right if the wind blows a certain way but,…