Late on Friday, January 19, 2018, politicians in the U.S. Congress failed for the nineteenth time in the last 42 years to approve a resolution that would allow the U.S. government to continue borrowing money to support all of the spending that they’ve mandated. As a result, nonessential federal government employees have been directed…
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For years, bureaucrats at U.S. government agencies have been involved in unlawful schemes to pass off significant parts of their workload to contractors who are not bound by the restrictions of the U.S. Constitution. That’s the gist of a startling claim made by Robert J. Hanrahan Jr., an employee of the National Nuclear Security…
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“A slew of delays and higher-than-expected costs are driving the anticipated price of high-speed rail construction in the central San Joaquin Valley by more than one-third, to about $10.6 billion,” writes Tim Sheehan in the Fresno Bee. “That’s a $2.8 billion jump from the California High-Speed Rail Authority’s estimate in 2016 of $7.8 billion…
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Last year, the Thomas fire in California’s central coast region made the national news night, after night, after night, as it became the biggest fire in state history. Combined with several other outsized wildfires, 2017 shattered state records for both wildfire-related losses and the sheer amount of money spent to suppress them. What many…
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As we noted, the new federal tax bill caps the amount state taxes filers can deduct on their federal return at $10,000. That displeases California’s senate boss Kevin de Leon, whose Protect California Taxpayers Act will allow Californians to pay their state income taxes as though they were a charitable donation, and therefore fully…
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Like a kayak over a waterfall, the U.S. Congress is barreling toward another episode of government shutdown theater. Jordain Carney of The Hill explains: Lawmakers are scrambling to avoid a government shutdown as they barrel toward another funding deadline without a clear path forward. GOP leadership is remaining tightlipped about their plan, with Senate…
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Last February 7 during heavy rains the Oroville Dam’s concrete spillway failed, launching fears of a complete dam failure, and forcing the evacuation of 188,000 people. As it turned out, government engineers knew for decades that the alternate earthen spillway was unreliable but failed to reinforce it with concrete. As Rep. John Garamendi famously…
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It can be argued that the U.S. government has an excessive spending problem, where the politicians that American voters send to Washington D.C. in each election seem to have very little appetite to rein in their free-spending habits, where the opportunity to spend other people’s money on things that can make them more popular…
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The recently passed federal tax bill lowers the corporate rate from 35 to 21 percent, reduces rates in five of the seven tax brackets, and according to the New York Times will cut taxes for about 75 percent of filers in 2018. The bill also caps the amount of state taxes filers can deduct on their federal…
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The week between the Christmas and New Year’s often makes for a slow news week, where all the hubbub and activity of the holidays work to refocus the attention of Americans on their families and friends rather than what’s going on in their communities or is happening in Washington D.C. Since this is my…
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