California Governor Gavin Newsom is pushing a retroactive billionaire tax targeting the roughly 220 billionaires residing in California in 2025, ignoring that these individuals are the most financially mobile and can live anywhere. Expecting them to remain in the state as if they will happily and willingly hand over even more of their wealth surely must be facetious.
SEIU is sponsoring the “2026 Billionaires Tax Act.” The measure, recently listed on the Attorney General’s website, would impose a one-time 5% tax on individual wealth exceeding $1 billion, Marc Joffe wrote for the Globe this week. He explains the measure and more:
Although the tax would be levied based on 2026 net worth, it would apply to billionaires who resided in California in 2025, so theoretically it could not be avoided. Of course, billionaires are well equipped to defend themselves in court, so the constitutionality of this unprecedented tax will be rigorously tested.
Proponents assert that the measure would not cause billionaires to flee the state because of the one-time nature of the tax. Unlike federal wealth taxes floated by Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, the SEIU tax would not be applied each year.
But the flaw in this argument is obvious: if the state could impose a wealth tax once, it could do so again and again. So, yes, billionaires might well leave if this measure passes.
Why are California businesses and residents fleeing the once-Golden State in droves? We’ve asked and answered this question many times.
California has been bleeding residents and their tax revenue for many years with moves to states with no income tax or very low income tax: Florida, Texas, Arizona, Idaho, Tennessee, South Carolina, Nevada, and even Washington State.
California’s own Chevron Oil Company moved its headquarters to Houston, Texas from San Ramon, CA where it has been based since 1879, one of the biggest businesses to flee the Golden State. Chevron is in good company joining X/Twitter, Space X, Oracle, Hewlett Packard, Charles Schwab, and Toyota Motor North America, Nissei America, Inc., The Joe Rogan Experience, Gordon Ramsay North America, The Rubin Report, to name just a few of the businesses leaving California because of the state’s leftist/Marxist politics and regulatory environment.
(Bill Clinton has lost it. In his Politico article he said Newsom is the only Democrat with a chance to win in 2028.)
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Explosive blasts leave a growing wave of deafness across Gaza, with medical care out of reach
Two Palestinian boys lie next to each other at al-Wafa medical rehabilitation hospital in Gaza.
Their mother, Aya Abu Auda, speaks to them softly, but neither child reacts.
The brothers, Elias Abu al-Jibeen, five, and Ismail Abu al-Jibeen, eight, were wounded during Israeli bombardment on their displacement camp in Gaza City’s Tel al-Hawa neighbourhood on 31 August.
The attack left Elias completely deaf and Ismail with severe hearing loss.
Just a year earlier, Abu Auda had fled her home in northern Gaza after Israeli missiles flattened it and killed her husband.
“I thought my children and I had survived the worst,” she told Middle East Eye. “I didn’t know the pain would follow us even after displacement.”
Inside the makeshift tent where she slept with her children, shrapnel tore through their bodies.
Ismail lost an eye, movement in one arm and leg, and much of his hearing.
His mother noticed weeks later that he no longer responded to her voice.
A brain stem auditory test showed he had lost 50 percent of the hearing in his right ear and 71 percent in his left.
Elias’ condition is even more severe.
“Elias was in a coma for 18 days. When he woke up, he couldn’t hear, see, understand or move,” she said, her voice breaking.
“Doctors found pus had accumulated around his brain. A surgical procedure removed it, allowing him to regain limited sensory awareness.”
Elias now lives with paralysis on one side of his body, severe speech and vision impairment, and complete hearing loss in one ear.
His other ear requires treatment that is currently unavailable in Gaza due to Israel’s blockade and systematic destruction of hospitals.
“Most of the time, he screams. I try to guess what he needs, but I often fail,” Abu Auda continued.
“I have searched everywhere for hearing aids for both boys, but there is simply nothing available.”
Even after the ceasefire agreement last month, the healthcare system in Gaza has remained in crisis under Israel’s blockade, with around only 50 percent of hospitals partially functional, chronic shortages of medicines and equipment, and 229 essential drugs completely unavailable, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/gaza-israeli-blasts-deafen-thousands-treatment-blocked
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Treasury flood hits markets with $693.5B in three days, T Bill supply explodes to $6.59T a record high
https://citizenwatchreport.com/treasury-flood-hits-markets-with-693-5b-in-three-days-t-bill-supply-explodes-to-6-59t-a-record-high/
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"The major function of secrecy in Washington is to keep the U.S. people ... from knowing what the nation's leaders are doing." -- John Stockwell, former CIA official and author
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Israel is facing a “mental health tsunami”, with two million people in need of support as addiction rates soar and families and communities fall apart, according to Yedioth Ahronoth.
In an extensive report published on Friday, the news outlet said mental health professionals have raised the alarm over a sharp increase in people requiring support since 7 October 2023.
Meanwhile, there is a severe shortage of therapists and support services, which experts warn could have catastrophic consequences.
Last week, a coalition of eight major mental health organisations issued an urgent warning to the government, describing the country’s situation as an “outbreak of mental illness unprecedented in its depth and scope”
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-faces-mental-health-tsunami-after-two-years-war-report-finds
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Democrat Representative Al Green has announced he will file articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump before Christmas.
Speaking in Washington, D.C., on Thursday, Green told supporters he would introduce the measures as a privileged motion before Congress breaks for the holidays.
“There will be articles of impeachment filed before the Christmas break, this I will pledge to you,” Green said.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/donald-trump-faces-articles-of-impeachment-before-christmas/ar-AA1QTjMQ
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New House Prices have dropped below Existing Homes for the first time in history
https://citizenwatchreport.com/new-house-prices-have-dropped-below-existing-homes-for-the-first-time-in-history/
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A frequent MS NOW contributor couldn't contain his glee as he recounted how immigration enforcement agents in Charlotte, North Carolina, have had their tires slashed by protesters.
Political scientist and network regular Dr. Jason Johnson made the remarks on Saturday's episode of The 11th Hour while applauding the tens of thousands of students in Charlotte, North Carolina, who walked out of class to protest ICE operations in the city.
'In addition to the fact - and I won't say that I'm suggesting this behavior - but ICE agents have found that their tires are slashed,' he said, as host Stephanie Ruhle jumped in to say, 'stop it.'
'Yes, they have been chased out of buildings, chased out of restaurants,' Johnson continued.
'But that's dangerous behavior,' Ruhle responded.
'It is dangerous behavior, but it is a demonstration that the American public, when they're not being listened to, these are the options that they'll take,' Johnson concluded.
'I hope this administration listens and pulls back these ICE raids.'
Johnson gave his assessment offered during a segment of the show called 'MVP of the Week. ( So were these protesters American citizens or illegal aliens.?)
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/media/article-15322227/ms-jason-johnson-ice-slash-tires.html
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"Morale has never been lower..."
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/its-tinder-box-gop-members-consider-following-mtg-retirement-say-white-house-treats-them
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"Vindman is on the payroll of Ukrainian oligarchs and has committed treason against the United States, for which he will pay the appropriate penalty..."
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/vindman-brothers-who-helped-impeach-trump-2020-are-now-under-investigation
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