Tag: political agenda

Commentary: The CFPB Attacks the Credit Card Rewards Programs Consumers Want

RealClearWire
Consumer using a credit card

Unsurprisingly, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s recent report on Credit Card Rewards is dismissive of programs that are popular with tens of millions of American households. However, its objections manifest the same sort of deceptive advertising and hiding of details that it complains are characteristic of credit card rewards, and the data in its report does not match the conclusions its director, Rohit Chopra, has made in his statement about the report as well as his testimony before Congress on the issue.

The CFPB’s press release announcing the Credit Cards Rewards: Issue Spotlight report denigrated rewards programs, alleging that “Consumers tell the CFPB that rewards are often devalued or denied even after program terms are met;” that “Consumers who carry revolving balances often pay far more in interest and fees than they get back on rewards;” and that “Credit card companies often use rewards programs as a ‘bait and switch’ by burying terms in vague language or fine print.”

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Commentary: The Libertarian-Socialist Axis

Admin

On the surface, it might seem ridiculous to suggest libertarians and socialists work to further the same political agenda. Their ideologies are diametrically opposed. The extreme version of a socialist system is for all property to be owned and controlled by the government. The extreme version of a libertarian system is for all property to be privately owned. And yet the extremes meet. 

The unwitting consequence of socialist and libertarian movements in the United States has been to assist in the formation of an unprecedented concentration of wealth and power in the hands of a corporatist elite that has perfected its ability to manipulate both movements.

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Commentary: Dogma, Not Facts, Risks the Navy’s Readiness to Defend the Nation

Michigan Star Staff
Airplanes in the air above Navy ships

After the 2020 summer of riots, the U.S. Navy’s Chief of Naval Operations stood up Task Force One Navy (TF1N) on July 1, 2020. After a six-month effort, the final 142-page report was submitted on January 28, 2021 Its two operating assumptions are, first, that the Navy, as an institution, is systemically racist, and, second, that “Mission readiness is stronger when diverse strengths are used and differing perspectives are applied.” Notwithstanding several key military principles—such as unit cohesion, strict discipline across the chain of command, and, well, uniforms—the Navy is now ideologically committed to the mantra that “diversity is strength.”

Not surprisingly, considering the key entering assumptions, the task force report identified problems with Navy systems, climate, and culture; and submitted almost 60 recommendations aligned with four lines of inquiry: Recruiting, Talent Management/Retention, Professional Development, and Innovation and STEM (as well as a fifth line for miscellaneous recommendations).

One should be skeptical, however, about the entire exercise and the recommendations that flow from it. It inaccurately depicts the proud institution of the United States Navy as systemically racist—a slander that has more potential to undermine morale, good order, discipline, and military effectiveness than any geostrategic adversary. 

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