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Golden state no longer land of dreams

National Columnists

Many years ago, sometime after Ronald Reagan replaced Pat Brown as governor of California, I was driving up the coast from Los Angeles to San Francisco and visited Hearst Castle, William Randolph Hearst's epic mansion in San Simeon. It was state property then, donated by the Hearst family, and the uniformed guide struck me as knowledgeable, competent and proud of her work. Some time later, I wrote articles arguing that California, not yet the highest-tax state but never a tax haven either, was proof that big government could provide competent services. For a generation under ...

Taxpayers defrauded of billions of dollars

National Columnists

At first, it didn't sound right. Someone must have miscalculated. How could there be so much fraud that has robbed taxpayers of billions of dollars without anyone seeming to notice? Worse, it appears they didn't seem to care. Vice President JD Vance convened a meeting on Tuesday of his Task Force to Eliminate Fraud. Fifteen Republican attorneys general showed up. Almost two dozen Democrat attorneys general didn't come, citing short notice. Their invitations went out on Friday, so they probably had a good excuse. Vance urged all of them to help in rooting out more fraud than has so far ...

Jazz musician Sonny Rollins knew not to die young

National Columnists

How is it that the "Saxophone Colossus" Sonny Rollins lived to 95? Aren't jazz musicians supposed to die at tragically early ages? Actually, that's a myth that Rollins and others proved flawed. It's true that Bix Beiderbecke, king of the cornet, was gone at 28, Charlie Parker at 34, Dinah Washington at 39, John Coltrane at 40. Billie Holiday made it to 44 – not young, but an age that should have been before her time. Some musicians, classical and rock, as well as jazz, reach especially advanced ages. The music stimulates their mind, connects them with others and lowers ...

A nation of suspects

National Columnists

Some of the recent legal challenges to the use of surveillance by the Department of Homeland Security upon Americans have resulted in the revelation of truly terrifying behavior by the government, in direct defiance of the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution. We now know that the federal government spies on innocent Americans without suspicion and without warrants. The spying seems to fall into several categories. The National Security Agency, which is in the Department of Defense, employs about 60,000 domestic spies. These are the folks who want us to believe that they go ...

Pope Leo needs Trump to tame AI

National Columnists

Pope Leo is right about the need to make artificial intelligence answer to the human good. AI has to be subject to human moral responsibility. But whose? The pope warns against power accumulating in private hands: A few companies, led by a handful of executives and board members, control AI development. The hard question Leo's first encyclical, "Magnifica Humanitas," tries to answer is how to make AI accountable to public authority and the common good, not just the interests of its creators. This is where Leo runs into trouble. The encyclical is written in the ...

America needs more billionaires

National Columnists

Billionaires are getting a bad name. Once upon a time, we saluted and celebrated America's empire builders who got rich but created great industries that built the richest nation on earth. We see the assault on wealth every day: wealth taxes, blue states are raising their income taxes on millionaires and billionaires, and many Democrats in Washington wanting to institute tax rates above 50%. But much of this rich-bashing isn't based on fact. Robert Reich of the University of California, Berkeley, wrote recently that average Americans pay a 14% tax rate, but billionaires ...