Common Dreams | Eight Lessons US Progressives Can Learn From the UK Labour ... Common Dreams In March, progressive activists in the United Kingdom had reason to feel deeply discouraged. Nine months earlier, a majority had voted for Brexit, setting in ... Labour should be working with us to hold the Tories to account - The ... |
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Eight Lessons US Progressives Can Learn From the UK Labour ... - Common Dreams
Wall Street Journal (subscription) | Progressives Opposed to Due Process for Men? Wall Street Journal (subscription) Progressives Opposed to Due Process for Men? Maybe those accused of rape on campus should be tried in criminal court where the crime can be adjudicated under the rules of due process. July 26, 2017 5:54 p.m. ET ... Betsy DeVos: Trump's illiberal ally seen as most dangerous education chief ever |
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Progressives Opposed to Due Process for Men? - Wall Street Journal (subscription)
BY: David Rutz July 26, 2017 5:00 am
The new economic slogan for Democrats is not getting rave reviews from progressives and members of the media; in fact, it's receiving outright mocking in some corners.
Entitled "A Better Deal: Better Skills, Better Jobs, Better Wages," the economic agenda was rolled out Monday by top Democrats in Virginia as they plot a way back to power in Washington.
Former Barack Obama speechwriters Jon Lovett and Jon Favreau both criticized the new slogan on their podcast "Pod Save America," with Lovett saying he thought it was "garbage" upon first hearing of it.
MSNBC host and former Republican Joe Scarborough called the slogan "so bland" and "so terrible," and liberalWashington Postcolumnist Eugene Robinson said it lacked emotional heft.
"There's nothing there that sort of punches you in the gut, that tears at your heart, that involves you emotionally," he said.
Former Democratic congressman Harold Ford Jr. added on "Morning Joe" that the slogan "misses the point."
MSNBC host Chris Jansing noted the derisive comparisons on social media to the Papa John's slogan, "Better Ingredients. Better Pizza." She said it didn't exactly roll off the tongue.
Progressive commentator David Pakman referred to "A Better Deal" as "flaccid," and former Democratic National Committee chair Howard Dean said Sunday, "Do I think it's the best slogan I ever heard? No, but it's a start."
While interviewing Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) on Tuesday, MSNBC host Andrea Mitchell asked him for his take on the "stirring" new slogan for the Democrats, adding she was speaking ironically.
"A better deal?" she asked skeptically.
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Liberals, Media Members Pan Democrats for 'Better Deal' Slogan - Washington Free Beacon
OTTAWA National Defence has been struggling to make good on one of the Trudeau government's recent promises: giving tax breaks to military personnel and police officers deployed on certain overseas operations.
Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan announced the measure during a major speech at the Royal Military College in Kingston, Ont., in May as part of the Liberals' new defence policy.
While Sajjan billed the move as an attempt to recognize the sacrifices that are often made by military personnel and their families, it also addressed what had been a prickly issue for the minister.
Some service members based in Kuwait had become increasingly vocal in the weeks leading up the announcement about a policy change that threatened to strip their tax-exempt status.
Yet the devil has proven to be in the details, with officials now scratching their heads over what types of operations and deployments should and should not be eligible for tax relief.
The debate is particularly relevant for the navy's sailors, many of whom on close reading of the defence policy would not be eligible for tax relief despite spending up to six months at sea at any given time.
Sources tell The Canadian Press that the military's senior leadership is now seized with the issue, and that defence chief Gen. Jonathan Vance has told officials he wants the issue resolved by mid-August.
Alan Okros, an expert on the management of military personnel at the Canadian Forces College, said officials are now caught trying to make good on the Liberals' promise without making matters worse.
Earlier on HuffPost:
"They're trying to find a solution here that will achieve what the government intended," Okros said.
"But they don't want to start creating precedents that would generate lawsuits or people making claims of 'Well, if that applied there, it applies here.'"
The tax measure would see the salaries of military personnel and police officers sent on certain operations exempted from federal income tax for the duration of their deployments.
The move, retroactive to Jan. 1, 2017, exempts eligible salaries up to the pay level of lieutenant-colonel and is expected to cost the federal treasury about $85-million over the next five years.
Personnel would still be eligible for extra hardship and risk pay if deployed into dangerous environments.
Both Sajjan and the Liberals' defence policy, which was released a few weeks after the minister's speech at RMC, said the exemption would be given to members deployed on what are called "named operations."
Named operations are usually the largest and most complex, such as Operation Impact, which is Canada's mission against the Islamic State group, and Operation Unifier, the military's training mission in Ukraine.
The service members complaining in Kuwait were attached to Operation Impact, and thus would be eligible for the tax benefit.
But many military personnel deployed overseas for extended periods are never attached to a named operation, or may only spend a portion of their time in such a situation.
That is particularly true of the navy, which has had two frigates sailing around the Asia-Pacific region since March, but whose sailors are not technically on a named operation.
Officials are now backing off the explicit reference to named operations, though no decision has been made on what criteria will trigger tax relief for deployed personnel.
"The Canadian Armed Forces is currently working on a framework aimed at implementing the proposed amendment to the Income Tax Act," said National Defence spokeswoman Kim Lemaire.
"It doesn't say specifically 'named operations' because there may be others that, as determined by the chief of defence staff, this tax relief will be applied to. That's still in the works right now."
Okros said the Liberals have been trying to contrast their treatment of Canada's military personnel with that of the Harper government, which was seen as being "stingy" with benefits for service members.
"Under Trudeau, they are trying to send a different message of 'We actually do support the troops,'" Okros said.
"So I think there's a bit of that in terms of a political agenda. But then how do you do this in the right way so that it doesn't create more problems than it solves?"
Current MPs With Military Experience (2016)
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Liberals' Tax-Break Pledge To Troops Causing Headaches For Officials - Huffington Post Canada
By Brian C. Rosenberg By Brian C. Rosenberg July 26 at 6:00 AM
Amid ongoing national debate about politics, ideology and free speech on campus, Brian C. Rosenberg, president of Macalester College, a private liberal arts school in Minnesota, writes about the real issue at hand:
The number of college presidents willing to address controversial issues and to engage as public intellectuals with ideas that matter remains small. These campus leaders can become a target of both the right and the left, a position with which I am not unfamiliar.
A leading example, Wesleyan University President Michael Roth, does not shy away from spirited debate, expressing his views in the Wall Street Journal, The Opening of the Liberal Mind, and Inside Higher Ed, From Unruly Hearts to Open Minds. He articulates many points in both articles with which I agree. His fundamental argument is that liberal orthodoxy has become so deeply ingrained in many colleges and universities that alternative, largely conservative viewpoints are at best unfamiliar to the majority of students and at worst greeted with hostility, fear and even violence.
I have observed the same phenomenon and worry about the inability of campus communities to grapple productively with intellectual and philosophical discomfort.
I worry less about free speech (a term often misused in debates over these matters) than about speech period.
[Trump lashes out at Berkeley after violent protests block speech by Milo Yiannopoulos]
The defining verbal action of our particular historical moment seems to be the shout, or, even worse, the intemperate tweet.
Roth argues that colleges should make a special effort to enhance the study of conservative (religious and libertarian) traditions, broadly conceived and that those who point out the dangers of big government, emphasize the needs of national security in an age of terrorism, extol the virtues of family and religion, or defend free speech deserve intellectual engagement not insult and irony. This is fair enough, though I would myself stay away from terms such as affirmative action for conservative ideas, which seems to me to distort and minimize the true and original intent of race-based affirmative action.
But here is what is missing from the discussion: At the present time, the deepest challenge to conservative (religious and libertarian) traditions comes not from liberals, but from conservatives.
More specifically, how does one reconcile those conservative traditions with conservative actions in the Age of Trump?
If conservatism emphasizes the importance of national security, how does one understand the indifference to Russian interference in our election process? If conservatism extols the virtues of family and religion, how does one understand the tolerance of indeed, if polling is accurate, the still overwhelming Republican support for a person whose moral failings could lead to his being fired from every job except the one he holds? If conservatism defends free speech, where is the outrage over the attacks on a free press?
Those who argue that students need more exposure to conservative thinking to understand our current political dynamic seem to be missing the fact that, when it matters most, conservatives have stopped being conservative.
Viewed dispassionately, the lesson that the most visible conservatives appear to be teaching our students is that power is more important than principle, that winning is more important than adhering to an ethical code, that compromise is failure, and maybe worst of all, that facts dont matter.
It seems rather shortsighted in this broader context to lay the blame for the poor behavior and narrow-mindedness of some of our students chiefly at the door of colleges. They have more than a few role models beyond the boundaries of campus.
[Student protesters burn American flags at confrontation over Trump victory]
Liberals are surely guilty of many of the same failures as conservatives. Hypocrisy is not confined to any particular demographic or political party. But I refuse to buy into the narrative of false equivalency. Put simply, there is no liberal equivalent to President Trump and all that he embodies. There is no liberal equivalent to the ongoing championing of Trump and all that he embodies.
[College president, rejecting safe spaces, writes: This is not a day care. This is a university!]
Let us concede that liberals have their classrooms and syllabi. Conservatives, on the other hand, hold majorities in both houses of Congress and control of 32 state legislatures. They hold the U.S. presidency and 33 governorships. They hold a majority on the Supreme Court that is likely to grow.
They have an almost unprecedented opportunity to show the country what conservative philosophy looks like in practice.
They have, that is, the chance to persuade all people, including the young ones who attend college, that their ideas are worth putting into practice and will advance the common good.
If they are unable to persuade a college sophomore that conservatism is worth embracing, why should we assume that the fault lies with the college?
I am prepared to insist upon the seriousness of conservative ideas. It would be far easier to do so if conservatives resumed taking those ideas seriously.
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It's not liberals on campus crushing Republican ideas. It's conservatives. - Washington Post