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No one can question Trump's resilience

National Columnists

Andrew Jackson is the only president of the United States who got the better of his attempted assassin. The aged Jackson was at the Capitol for a congressional funeral when a crazed man named Richard Lawrence aimed a pistol directly at his chest and pulled the trigger. It misfired. Jackson bull-charged his assailant with his cane and, incredibly, Lawrence pulled out another pistol. It, too, misfired. As bystanders intervened, an enraged Jackson supposedly yelled, "Let me alone! Let me alone! I know where this came from." Lest we think we live in a uniquely inflamed, conspiratorial ...

Call it 'divine intervention'

National Columnists

The U.S. government produced a net of 178,000 jobs in the month of March. But, Connecticut contributed just 100 of those jobs. Terrible. But in comparison to February when the state lost about 4,000 jobs, one could call it an "improvement" of sorts. To be fair, Maryland and the District of Columbia combined lost around 90,000 jobs in March. One could contribute at least part of that lost to President Donald Trump's overt attack on the federal workplace. Where were the states with the highest net job growth? Texas at 46,800 and California at 28,100. It should be noted that a much ...

When businessmen enter Beltway

National Columnists

Something strange is happening in Washington. A generation of investors and entrepreneurs who built careers championing private capital and intuitively understood the power of market discipline and limited government have joined the Trump administration, taking charge of hundreds of billions of dollars of other people's money. They assure us that they are deploying it strategically, with accountability and a businessperson's rigor. From Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick (who is apparently convinced he can rearrange the American economy through tariffs and industrial policy as ...

Capitalism makes life better for most

National Columnists

Young people now blame capitalism for poverty, racism, high prices, even climate change. They listen to people like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who says, "Capitalism ... is the absolute pursuit of profit at all human, environmental and social cost. That is not a redeemable system." Yes, capitalism is often ugly. It brings out greed in some, exacerbates wealth differences, creates pollution (creating an actual need for government regulation, which capitalism funds) and leaves some people behind. But nothing else works! Nothing else makes life better for most people, ...

Big government needs to diet

National Columnists

It's the most wonderful time of the year — and I don't mean Christmas. It's the time when Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) releases its annual "Congressional Pig Book Summary," exposing some of the most outrageous, ridiculous and in many cases unconstitutional spending one can imagine. I guarantee you won't be able to imagine most of it. Why should you when it's not their money they are spending and borrowing, which has driven the debt to unprecedented and dangerous levels. According to CAGW, the number of earmarks, which is spending that avoids going through the normal ...

Why does AOC think billionaires can't exist?

National Columnists

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez doesn't believe in billionaires. On a podcast the other day, she said that it's impossible to make a billion dollars without lying, cheating or stealing. "There's a certain level of wealth and accumulation that is unearned, right," AOC declared. "You can't earn a billion dollars. You just can't earn that. You can get market power, you can break rules, you can abuse labor laws, you can pay people less than what they're worth, but you can't earn that." The New York congresswoman makes it sound as though our billionaires are the equivalent of Russian oligarchs ...