Radio America Online News Bureau

Cuomo Blames Trump for Lost Revenue, Dem Voters Sticking with Northam, Fairfax Accuser Hires Ford’s Lawyers

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America see a teachable moment as New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo blames President Trump and the GOP tax reform for many wealthy people leaving his state over high taxes, but the solution would seem to be pretty simple.  They’re also surprised to see 50 percent of Democratic voters in Virginia approving of Ralph Northam as governor – even after the yearbook controversy.  And they react to the accuser of Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax hiring Christine Blasey Ford’s legal team.

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Cuccinelli Dissects Northam Mess

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Former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli III says he is surprised that the Ralph Northam he knows would put a racist photo in a medical school yearbook, but he thinks Northam needs to resign.  But he says revived allegations of sexual assault against the man who would replace Northam make things even more complicated.

On Friday, Big League Politics broke the story of the photo showing one man in blackface and another in a Ku Klux Klan outfit.  Northam initially apologized for appearing in the photo but later said he was certain he was in in it and has no idea how it got on his yearbook page.

Cuccinelli served with Northam in the Virginia State Senate and says the revelation came as a very big surprise.

“It’s really at odds with his personality and his behavior.  I’ve never observed him undertaking a racist act or statement or seen evidence of so much as a thought in all of the years I’ve known Ralph, which is more than a decade now.  So this is all the more shocking,” said Cuccinelli, who seems to agree that Northam can no longer effectively lead Virginia.

Cuccinelli says this saga also opens an old wound in the commonwealth’s history.

“I think this is a reminder that while we are growing out of the racist past Virginia had, those remnants are still around and they still matter in people’s lives,” said Cuccinelli.

Despite calls to resign from the vast majority of Virginia and national Democrats, Northam is refusing.  Some of his critics want state lawmakers to pursue impeachment charges, but Cuccinelli says they really can’t.

“It’s really up to the governor because impeachment in Virginia is more or less the same as at the federal level.  It’s only for acts taken in office,” said Cuccinelli.  “There’s no availability of impeachment here.  It’s really in Ralph Northam’s hands whether he resigns or not.”

The story got even more bizarre on Monday, with reports that Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax was accused of sexually assaulting a woman at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.  Fairfax is vigorously denying the charge, which was never prosecuted, but Cuccinelli says the Northam mess and the Fairfax allegation are emerging at the busiest possible time in Virginia politics.

Tuesday is what’s known as “crossover,” when the House of Delegates and the State Senate must pass any bills originating from their members or else the opportunity is lost for the year.  Key votes on tax relief and budgeting are taking place with both Northam and Fairfax heavily distracted.

If Northam exits and Fairfax becomes governor, Cuccinelli says the lieutenant governor’s position will remain vacant, but the Senate President Pro-Tem would effectively take over the duties of the office, which could lead to some interesting moments on deadlocked votes.

“[This] could allow him to vote on a bill which then ends up in a tie, and he gets to break the tie,” said Cuccinelli.

While Cuccinelli is aghast at the Northam allegations, he is also stunned that the media could barely stifle a yawn two days before the yearbook story broke, when Northam seemed to defend infanticide in a radio interview.

“The dichotomy has been quite extraordinary

Listen to the full podcast to hear Cuccinelli discuss the Northam and Fairfax allegations in more detail and his frustration with media’s disinterest in the Virginia abortion debate.

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World Rejects Maduro’s Madness, Virginia’s Northam Nightmare, Superbowl Ads Flop

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America welcome news that military and police are starting to defy President Maduro and that more influential nations are recognizing Juan Guiado as the interim president. They also wade through Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam’s shifting explanations for the racist photo in in his medical school yearbook and Northam defying both parties by refusing to resign. And they give thumbs down to most of the Superbowl ads for being too serious and too obvious in their efforts to be woke, saving their biggest eye roll for the Washington Post.

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Trump Strategies to Lower Drug Prices: One Smart, One Not

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President Trump is trying to make good on a campaign promise to ease the financial burden Americans face when paying for prescription drugs, but a leading policy expert says one Trump strategy is right on target while another could lead to disaster.

Americans pay the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs by a wide margin, and American Commitment President Phil Kerpen says it’s because other nations are taking advantage of us.

“Pretty much all of the other rich countries have some form of government price controls.  So they set prices far lower what a market-clearing price would be through government policy,” said Kerpen, who says American pharmaceutical companies do not have the option of not dealing with those other nations.

“If you try to do that, the other country will typically just try to steal your patent and have a local company produce it without compensating you or compensating you even lower,” said Kerpen.

As a result, the Trump administration is pressuring developed nations to ease price controls on prescription medications through trade negotiations.  Kerpen says Canada and Mexico are already on board with paying higher costs through the new trade deal that will soon replace the North American Free Trade Agreement.

Kerpen believes trade negotiations are the best way to address the problem and says the best argument for raising costs abroad is that the additional revenue will lead to more effective treatments for many ailments.

“If the other rich countries gave up their price controls, two things would happen.  We would get a lot more new cures developed because we’d get a lot more research and development.  There would be a lot more incentive to invest in it.

“The best research shows we’d get 10-13 new drugs per year if they loosen price controls in the other rich countries, but we’d also get lower prices in the U.S. through more competition,” said Kerpen.

The prices Americans pay for drugs provides the bulk of the funding for research and development.  Kerpen says bringing a new drug to market costs $2.5 billion to $3 billion when factoring in the cost of compliance with government regulations and all the resources spent on drug projects that fail.

While pushing hard on the trade side, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar is exploring price controls here in the U.S.  Kerpen says Trump needs to abandon that effort or else innovation could be strangled.

“[It] feels good in the near term.  We’re paying less.  That seems good, but that would completely undermine the incentives for R&D in developing new cures.  Instead of the rest of the world free-riding on us.  There would be no one to free ride off of.  There would be no place to earn a market return.

Listen to the full podcast to hear Kerpen’s full diagnosis of the high prescription drug costs we face and why he says the Trump administration must abandon the domestic price controls if it hopes to win trade concessions from developed nations.

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Strong January Jobs Report, Kaine’s Lame Abortion Response, Booker 2020

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America are thrilled to see over 300,000 jobs created in January, easily surpassing expectations.  They also smack Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine for the wimpiest possible opposition to the controversial abortion bill in Virginia and break down the logical problem in Kaine’s official position that he’s personally opposed to abortion but would never impose that view on others.  And they dissect the launch of New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker’s 2020 presidential campaign – with Jim offering an extensive review of Booker’s time as mayor of Newark.

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Left Exposing Its ‘Extreme’ Position on Abortion

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Lawmakers in New York recently enacted legislation allowing abortion at any point in a pregnancy if the abortion provider determines a risk to the mother’s health.

Virginia Democrats pushed a very similar bill this week, even allowing abortion during labor or allowing parents to let a baby die if it is delivered alive following a failed abortion.  That bill was defeated in subcommittee by a Republican majority.

Similar abortion measures are advancing in California, Rhode Island, and Vermont.

Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam set off a firestorm of condemnation Wednesday by stating a baby fully delivered after a failed abortion is not necessarily entitled to medical care.

“In this particular example, if a mother is in labor, I can tell you exactly what would happen.  The infant would be delivered.  The infant would be kept comfortable.  The infant would be resuscitated if that’s what the mother and the family desired.  And then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother,” said Northam.

Northam insists he was referring to late-term pregnancies in which the babies are not considered viable or suffering from severe birth defects.

Catholic Association Senior Fellow Ashley McGuire says the late-term abortion bills advancing in multiple states prove something more sinister: that Democrats are out of touch with the public on abortion.

“What I think all of this shows is how extreme the left has gotten on abortion.  The overwhelming majority of Americans, by a nine-to-one ratio, oppose third trimester abortions.  In fact, most Americans, even those who self-identify as pro-choice, are only OK with it in the first trimester,” said McGuire.

But whether Northam was defending infanticide or not, McGuire says the debate shows how silly it is to consider a baby a human at one end of the birth canal and not the other.

“What is the difference, really, between an abortion right before a baby is born and killing a baby right after it’s born.  I think it’s showing that when you take their position to it’s logical extreme, it’s pretty appalling and barbaric,” said McGuire.

But McGuire is hopeful that the outrage to the legislation in New York and Virginia will wake people up.

“If there’s any sort of positive coming out of all of this is that it is shedding light for Americans on the grotesque extremism that’s gotten the Democratic Party in a choke hold when it comes to abortion,” said McGuire.

Not long ago, Democrats were publicly horrified at the story of Philadelphia abortion provider Dr. Kermit Gosnell, who was convicted of murdering babies who survived attempted abortions.  Listen to the full podcast to hear McGuire explain how the Democrats have taken steps in legislatures and in court to prevent states from preventing Gosnell-like horrors from happening again.

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Dems Exposed on Abortion, Left Savages Schultz, Banish the Billionaires

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America are glad America is seeing just how radical Democrats are getting on abortion, with Virginia’s governor even appearing to endorse infanticide.  They’re also happy to see one Democrat in the Virginia legislature change her mind on an abortion bill after the intense public opposition.  They also shake their heads as Democrats and their friends in the media launch a relentless mission to destroy former Starbucks Chairman and CEO Howard Schultz for considering an independent presidential run.  And they react to a Huffington Post column arguing that billionaires are bad for America so we shouldn’t have any.

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Why Do We Still Pay Property Taxes?

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Most Americans know that property taxes pay for the public schools, police and fire departments, and services like trash pickup and road repairs, but why are those things funded through what one economics expert considers a relic of the colonial era.

The issue arose in connection with Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s call for a wealth tax on assets above $50 million.  During an interview with Chris Hayes on MSNBC, Warren claimed her wealth tax was a brand new idea in America.

Hayes gently corrected her, noting that all homeowners already pay a wealth tax.

“It’s brand new, although I will note to people out there who own a home, you’re paying a wealth tax right now called property taxes.  So it does exist in America,” said Hayes.

But should it?  Longtime economic author and columnist John Steele Gordon says property taxes belong on the ash heap of history.

“It’s a very inefficient way of raising revenues for the government.  For one thing, how much is a given property worth?  Well, you really only know that when it is sold,” said Gordon.

He says property taxes made a lot more sense around the time of our nation’s founding because property value was closely linked to income.

“In colonial days, almost all properties were income-producing.  They were farms or they were stores.  Today, almost all properties are income absorbing.  They’re houses,” said Gordon.

Gordon’s biggest complaint is that property taxes are regressive and can wallop people making far less than their neighbors.

“Say you retire and your income goes down 40 percent.  Well, your property taxes don’t.  That seems hardly fair,” said Gordon.

So why do property taxes still exist?

“It’s sheer laziness.  It’s there.  It’s always been there.  The mechanism is in place.  Every town has its assessor and its grievance board.  Therefore, it’s just easier to let it go on rather than come up with a more efficient system,” said Gordon.

Listen to the full podcast to learn what Gordon thinks would be a much better and fairer alternative to property taxes and how former late night host David Letterman figures into his call to abolish property taxes.

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Inside the Koch Confab, We’re Not Getting A Wall, Covering Up Kamala’s Cronyism

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America review Jim’s trip to the Koch Seminar Network and how the billionaire brothers that Democrats and the media like to describe as evil are pouring money into charities so struggling Americans don’t have to depend solely on the government.  They also sigh as reports make clear that Senate Republicans have no intention of allowing another government shutdown, meaning they aren’t prepared to play hardball over border wall funding.  And they take aim at a Washington Post opinion column arguing that it’s somehow sexist to question whether Kamala Harris got help in launching her political career due to prominent appointments she received from a man she was having an affair with at the time.

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Are Non-Citizens Voting in Texas?

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Texas officials say they found 95,000 non-citizens registered to vote and believe as many as 58,000 cast ballots in the state.  More investigating needs to be done to determine how many of those people became citizens after registering, but one election law experts believes this is simply the tip of the iceberg.

“I think what they’re going to find is that a large percentage of these individuals were, in fact, not U.S. citizens when they registered to vote,” said Hans von Spakovsky, manager of the Election Law Reform Initiative at the Heritage Foundation.

He says other evidence proves this is more than a hunch.

“Federal reports indicate that the majority or folks who register to vote do so when they go to a state driver’s license bureau and get a license.  So I think they’re probably going to find that a very large number of these 95,000 individuals registered to vote at the very same time that they went in to get a driver’s license as a legal non-citizen,” said von Spakovsky

State official will now be asking county officials in Texas to look at each of those possible non-citizen voters to determine if they are now citizens and were citizens when they registered and when many of them voted.

Von Spakovsky says this revelation does not surprise him at all.

“It’s no surprise because it just complements the other evidence that has been found from many other states across the country that non-citizens are illegally registering and voting,” said von Spakovsky, noting that California now automatically registers anyone to vote when they come in to get a driver’s license.

Listen to the full podcast to hear von Spakovsky explain why he believes red and blue states will have very different reactions regardless of the final conclusions in Texas, why some political leaders seem to have no interest in making sure only eligible citizens are voting in their jurisdictions, and how he sees an effort to blur the distinction between citizens and non-citizens.

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