Monthly Archives: April 2025

If Iran gets nuclear weapons, they will use them

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If Iran gets nuclear weapons, they will use them by Peter Burrows 4/30/25 elburropete@gmail.com 

On August 8, 2006, the Wall Street Journal published an op-ed by Bernard Lewis, a British American historian who was regarded as one of the foremost experts on the Middle East. In that article, published almost 19 years ago, Lewis pointed out the dangers inherit in Iran having nuclear weapons. 

Namely, while other nations are deterred from using nuclear weapons because of the threat of nuclear retaliation, known as the MAD doctrine, mutually assured destruction, this is NOT a deterrence for Iran.  In fact, given Iran’s Islamic dogma, “MAD is not a constraint; it is an inducement.”  (Emphasis in original.) (1)  

This is as true today as it was then, and the fact that so many Western leaders still think it is possible to negotiate a lasting peace with Iran shows how little we’ve learned. The results could be catastrophic.  

One of the rules of warfare, emphasized 2500 years ago by Sun Tzu in The Art of War, is to know your enemy. I don’t know of any Western leader who has said anything that indicates they know our enemy. This is what they should know: 

Our enemies in Iran are Shia Muslims who believe that the twelfth and last Shia Imam was 5-year-old Muhammad al-Mahdi, a direct descendent of Muhammad, who was rescued from Sunni persecution by Allah in 854 A.D. The still living Mahdi, now 1,160 years old, has been in a state of occultation waiting for Allah to send him back to lead the Shias in their conquest of the world.   

Sometimes called the Hidden Imam, his followers are known as Mahdaviats or Twelvers. Millions of them have made a pilgrimage to a well at the Jamkaran Mosque near the city of Qom, where it is believed Allah hid him.  

The sad truth is that the little boy was probably kidnapped and murdered by the Sunnis as part of the nascent Sunni-Shia struggle for dominance, and perhaps his remains were thrown down that well. We’ll never know. The Shias and Sunnis have been fighting each other ever since, something non-Muslims can be thankful for. 

The Shias are only about 15 percent of all Muslims in the world but virtually 100% of the Muslims in Iran, of which about 90% would be considered Mahdaviats. Whatever theological differences might exist between Sunnis and Shias or between different sects of Shias, is irrelevant considering it’s the Mahdaviats who could have their finger on the nuclear trigger.  

That is why it is so important that we know that the Mahdaviates believe the return of the Twelfth Imam will occur in a time of great chaos, and if they can initiate that chaos, they will be simply hastening the day of Shia rule and world salvation. What better way to be proactive in such a holy cause than to use nuclear weapons against the unbelievers, starting with Israel? 

It is immaterial if this results in the death of the Iranians because they will be in Paradise, their promised reward for dying in the cause of Allah, something true for all Muslims, not just Shias. From the Quran, Mawdudi translation: 

Verse 9:38: “Believers! What is amiss with you that when it is said to you: “March forth in the cause of Allah,” you cling heavily to the earth? Do you prefer the worldly life to the Hereafter? Know well that all the enjoyment of this world, in comparison with the Hereafter, is trivial.” 

Verse 9:111: “Surely Allah has purchased of the Believers their lives and their belongings and in return has promised that they shall have Paradise. They fight in the Way of Allah and slay and are slain. Such is the promise He has made incumbent upon Himself —. Rejoice then in the bargain you have made with Him.” (Slightly edited for brevity.) 

While those verses apply to all Muslims, the Mahdaviates believe in a specific apocalyptic event, the return of the Hidden Imam, believed by no other Islamic sect. This means they are uniquely dangerous. To that point, here’s what the founder of the Iranian Shia theocracy, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, is quoted as saying: 

“I am decisively announcing to the whole world that if the world-devourers (the infidel powers) wish to stand against our religion, we will stand against their whole world and will not cease until the annihilation of all them. Either we all become free, or we will go to the greater freedom which is martyrdom. Either we shake one another’s hand in joy at the victory of Islam in the world, or all of us will turn to eternal life and martyrdom.  In both cases, victory and success are ours.” (2) 

Let that sink in: “IN BOTH CASES, VICTORY AND SUCCESS ARE OURS.” I don’t think it’s necessary to note that in both cases, whether defeated or not, a helluva lot of death and destruction will be visited upon the non-Muslims, us infidels, by these fanatically religious Muslims. 

The Ayatollah Khomeini died in 1989, but his successors have not deviated from Mahdi orthodoxy.  The current Supreme Leader of Iran is the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who last year said that any retreat from punishing Israel for assassinating a Hamas leader when he was in Tehran would risk “divine wrath.” (3)  

Trump has been elected since then and is spouting a lot of tough talk about Iran’s nuclear program. He says it’s unacceptable for them to ever get a nuclear weapon, yet he’s negotiating with them. Why? There’s nothing to negotiate.  Is his rhetoric merely a gambit in “the art of the deal?” 

In the short run, risking Trump’s decidedly undivine wrath may be something the Ayatollah wants to avoid, but in the long run we can be sure that it’s avoiding the “Divine wrath” that matters. This means he’ll play Trump’s ego and negotiate a deal for the self-anointed world’s greatest deal maker, a deal which might even get Trump nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. All that such a deal will do, unless it has on-site monitoring and on-demand access to anyplace in Iran, is buy more time for the Iranians to continue developing nuclear weapons.   

After all, they have been waiting for almost 1,200 years for Muhammad al-Mahdi to lead the Shias to eternal victory in the cause of Allah, so a few more years or decades is of little consequence. As one Muslim famously said, “You’ve got the watches, we’ve got the time.” 

I haven’t given up hope, though. Trump just appointed Mark Levin to the Homeland Security Advisory Council, and Levin is smart, tough and Jewish. You probably know him from his TV show, “Life liberty and Levin” which airs twice a week on Fox. This past Sunday, April 27, his guest was Alan Dershowitz, another smart, tough, Jew, and they talked about the danger that a nuclear armed Iran would pose to Israel. 

They both agreed that Iran should never have nuclear weapons, that negotiating is a mistake, and that anybody advising Trump to make a deal is simply wrong. I hope Trump takes their advice.  

1) www.wsj.com/articles/SB115500154638829470  

2)  ibid  

3) www.iranintl.com/en/202408148230 

Other sources: 

www.raymondibrahim.com/2023/12/21/mahdism-the-apocalyptic-ideology-behind-irans-nuclear-program/ 

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-401858/Why-man-nightmares.html 

www.americanthinker.com/articles/2006/01/ahmadinejad_awaits_the_hidden.html  

en.radiofarda.com/a/ap-was-there-iran-s-1979-islamic-revolution-sweeps-nation/29765359.html 

www.breakpoint.org/preparing-for-the-mahdi/ 

Income Tax Insanity

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Income Tax Insanity by Peter Burrows 4/23/25  elburropete@gmail.com  

One of the worst ideas the Trump Administration has come up with is to eliminate income taxes for those making $150,000 a year or less. This might make short-term political sense, but in the long run it will make controlling the size of the government even harder than it is now. 

It would mean only 7 percent of US citizens would pay 100 percent of the income tax. The other 93 percent would pay zero percent and have no incentive to reduce government spending or oppose future tax increases. It’s bad enough now, with the bottom 93 percent paying only 24 percent of all the income tax revenue while the top one percent pays about 40 percent. That’s worth repeating: the top one percent pays 40 percent of the total. 

Ironically, when Bernie Sanders, or some other demagogue, rants about “tax cuts for the rich,” there’s some truth in that because it’s “the rich” who are paying most of the taxes, certainly more than their “fair share.    

Such demagoguery surrounding the income tax has been going on for over 100 years, almost since it was authorized by the Sixteenth Amendment in 1913. At the time, less than 1% of Americans had to pay the tax. If you are thinking something along the lines of “camel-nose-tent,” me too. 

I’m also reminded of something noted almost 200 years ago by French philosopher and historian Alexis de Tocqueville: “A democratic government is the only one in which those who vote for a tax can escape the obligation to pay it.”  Voters are thus more likely to vote for tax increases because, after all. the tax doesn’t hit thee or me, only the guy behind the tree, to paraphrase an old saw.  

In the long run, Trump’s tax could motivate people with high incomes – who are not necessarily rich — to find other places to live where success isn’t penalized, or to do things to reduce their taxable income, such as buying tax-free bonds instead of “plowing another field.” 

Much depends upon the actual rate at which income is taxed. A top rate of 25-30% is probably not high enough to motivate very many people to avoid paying taxes. Currently, the top rate is 37% which kicks in for joint returns over $751,000 in income. Paradoxically, more revenue might be raised from those taxpayers if the tax rate was LOWERED from 37%.  

This is something that’s also been known for over 100 years. Here’s what Calvin Coolidge said in 1924: “The first object of taxation is to secure revenue. When the taxation of large incomes is approached with this in view, the problem is to find a rate which will produce the largest returns. Experience does not show that the higher rate produces the larger revenue —” 

President Kennedy said something similar in 1962: “It is a paradoxical truth that the tax rates are too high today and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise the revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now.”  President Reagan’s tax cuts were justified with the same reasoning. 

In 1974, economist Art Laffer famously sketched on a napkin a simple graph showing this trade-off between tax rates and tax revenues, which became known as the Laffer Curve. Still, almost 60 years later, the idea that you can increase tax revenues by decreasing the tax rate on high incomes doesn’t seem to have sunk in. This means that it is inevitable, with 93% of the income earners paying no income taxes, that some demagogue will campaign – and win – calling for higher tax rates on “the rich.” 

I wish Trump would have instead called for a flat tax on ALL incomes. Flat tax proposals have been around for years, but such a tax has such powerful opposition that it’s never had a realistic chance of becoming law.  With Trump as President, however, and with Trump actively supporting it, a flat tax proposal would at least get a good hearing in Congress.  

While it wouldn’t get through THIS Congress, it could start a discussion that might mean a future congress would enact a flat tax. It’s a discussion well worth having. A flat text has three very attractive features: 1) Almost all income earners would have a stake in how the government spends our money, “skin in the game,” so to speak.  2) It would dramatically simplify tax preparation: “1040 on a postcard.” 3) Such simplification would mean the IRS doesn’t have to be nearly as big as it is. 

A key feature of a flat tax is that only standard deductions are allowed for individuals: one for the filer, one for the spouse, and a standard deduction for every dependent.  No other deductions are allowed. That would mean no deductions for charitable donations, religious contributions, interest on your home mortgage, 501(c)(3)s etc. None. Nada. 

As you can imagine, a flat tax doesn’t get a lot of support from real estate agents, charities, tax preparers or anybody who’s income depends upon tax deductible contributions or a complex tax code. Those on the left will also argue that we need a progressive tax code to ensure that the rich pay their “fair share,” as if 40 percent from the top one percent isn’t enough.  

In fact, another attractive feature of a flat text is that the “fair share” lie would be easier to refute. Here’s an example of how that would work:   

Assume standard deductions for a couple filing a joint return of $10,000 each and $5,000 for each child. A couple with two children would thus have $30,000 of deductions. On an income of $40,000, they would therefore have taxable income of $10,000. If their income is doubled to $80,000, their taxable income is $50,000. Summary: 2X the income but 5X the income tax. I think that would sound “fair” to most people. 

As desirable as a flat tax may be, we’ll never get one without a Constitutional amendment imposing term limits for Congress. As it is, too many in Congress want to get re-elected above all else, and they’ll follow the dictates of the tax lawyers, the charities and all the nonprofits such as Planned Parenthood, the Sierra Club Foundation, BLM, even the Metropolitan Opera, and on and on. 

I’m afraid we’re stuck with a needlessly complex and unfair income tax. I’m disappointed that Trump hasn’t done anything to fix it, but maybe President Vance will.   

Trump’s Tariff Tango: Shrewd or Stupid?

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Trump’s Tariff Tango: Shrewd or Stupid? By Peter Burrows —  elburropete@gmail.com 4/14/25 

I think President Trump makes a compelling case that the United States has been harmed by unilateral tariffs placed on American goods by, apparently, nearly every country in the world.  I had no idea such tariffs were so ubiquitous and had been in effect for so long, and in some cases, had been so damned high.  

His retaliatory tariff policy, while causing great consternation around the world, appears to be having the desired effect as many countries are now offering to lower or eliminate their tariffs if we’ll do the same.  Trump’s “shock and awe” tactics may be well thought out or spur-of-the-moment. Probably both. 

With Trump you never know.  He can turn on a dime and claim that’s what he intended to do all along — and say it with a straight face.  That causes heads to explode, which is fun to watch, and while he seems to be enjoying himself now, that will come to an end when he finds out just how much we depend upon China for everyday goods.  He’s already removed his tariffs on smartphones and PCs from China, which supplies 75 percent of US demand. 

If Trump’s Chinese tariffs are intended to make us less reliant on China as a matter of national security, such tariffs make sense. In a perfect world there wouldn’t be any tariffs anywhere, but we don’t live in a perfect world. Tariffs to protect vital industries are necessary if those vital Industries are under partial or near total control of an adversary country, which China certainly is.  

However, that fact, plus the fact that China is much more dependent upon selling things to us than we are on buying things from them, may not be important to the Democrats, who will be delighted to blame Trump when shelves start to empty and prices at Walmart and Amazon start going through the roof. 

Other than national security, the other reasons Trump touts for tariffs don’t make sense.  He has said, for example, that tariffs make nations rich. Nonsense. If nations with tariffs get rich, it’s despite tariffs, not because of them. The industries and workers protected by the tariffs may get rich, but they do so because in the absence of foreign competition they can overcharge their customers. Whenever government, industry and labor get together on something like tariffs, it’s a guarantee that consumers are going to get screwed.  

Another ridiculous idea Trump touts is that tariffs are a good source of revenue and will allow the Republicans to cut income tax cuts. Well, maybe so, but there will be no decrease in total taxation because all that would do is substitute a sales tax, which is what tariffs are IF THEY ARE PAID, for the income tax.  Trump’s notion that tariffs can replace the income tax shows he doesn’t realize tariffs are essentially a sales tax.  

Ask yourself this question: If tariffs raise the price of imported products so high that nobody buys them, how much money do the tariffs raise? If you said “zero,” go to the head of the class. 

A tacit assumption about tariffs is that they are paid by the foreign companies. More nonsense. Those companies collect the tariffs from their U.S. customers and then remit the proceeds to the government. It’s analogous to corporate income taxes. Corporations don’t pay income taxes, their customers do.  

Unlike the sales tax, corporate income taxes are incorporated into the price of the product before the customer gets to the cash register. At the cash register, the customer can see the sales tax imposed by government but not the income tax. Tariffs will be very visible, just like sales taxes. How long will consumers tolerate this?  

As a general principle, it may be a good idea to substitute sales taxes for income taxes, but that isn’t very likely given that over 50 percent of the wage earners in America pay little or no income taxes. They have no incentive to make such a trade-off.  

Which brings up another poorly thought out Trump idea: eliminate the income tax for those earning less than $150,000. This may be a good short-term political move, but in the long run it just means fewer and fewer people have any incentive to reduce the size of government. After all, it’s the guy behind the tree who’s being taxed. 

About now you’re probably thinking, “Well, who is giving Trump all this bad advice?” Perhaps nobody. I suspect most of this stuff is Trump’s idea. However, Peter Navarro, Trump’s top economic adviser, has said that tariffs will raise $600 billion a year and lead to tax cuts while also encouraging consumers to “buy American.” Oh, my. Those are mutually exclusive: The more Americans “buy American” the lower tariff revenue will be.  No wonder Elon Musk called Navarro a moron.  

Trump also says tariffs will motivate companies to move here to get behind the tariff walls, and some companies have announced expansion plans in the United States since the tariffs were announced. Trump claims this was because of his tariff threats, but I think they were going to come here anyway to escape Europe’s ridiculously high electricity prices. Trump’s energy policies are much more sensible than Europe’s. 

(If Trump really wants to get foreign companies to move here, lowering the corporate tax rate would be a much more effective way. The ideal corporate income tax rate is zero but try getting that through Congress!) 

Another nonsensical idea is that the threat of tariffs will cause Mexico and Canada to beef up border inspections and reduce the amount of fentanyl coming into the U.S. Fentanyl producers will simply move their labs to the US, just like Trump predicted producers would do, though he didn’t have fentanyl producers in mind.   

Perhaps the most seductive argument in favor of tariffs is that they will reduce our trade deficit. Trade deficits and surpluses are an area that very few people understand, including damn near all our politicians. Whether we have a trade deficit or trade surplus is irrelevant. 

For 70 years from 1800 to 1870 the United States ran a trade deficit in all but three years. Then, for the next 100 years, 1870 to 1970, we had trade surpluses. Since 1975 until now, 50 years, it’s been deficits. I don’t know of any economist anywhere who’s ever made the case that surpluses are good and deficits are bad, or the converse. 

Not so tariffs. Most economists recognize that tariffs do a lot of harm, especially if one tariff leads to a retaliatory tariff, and then to another and on and on.  The Founding Fathers realized this and they made provisions in the Constitution to make sure that states didn’t tariff one another.  

Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution has this sentence: “No tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from any State.” Section 10 clarifies this prohibition: “No State shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any Imposts or duties on Imports or Exports except what may be absolutely necessary for executing it’s inspection laws and the net produce of all duties and imposts laid by any state on Imports or Exports shall be for the use of the Treasury of the United States and all such laws shall be subject to the revision and control of the Congress.”  

Our Founding Fathers were brilliant!  

So, is Trump’s tariff tango shrewd or stupid? If the end result is elimination of tariffs with most of our trading partners and reducing the threat of depending on China for strategic goods, then Trump is shrewd and I’m stupid. I hope that’s how it works out.