Bob Lord

Bob has mostly wound down his 39-year career as a tax and business lawyer (with a 1-year interruption to run for Congress in 2008 (CD3), when he tried to unseat John Shadegg. Bob now serves as the senior advisor on tax policy for the Patriotic Millionaires, a group of wealthy Americans who believe the light taxation of America's rich is destabilizing our democracy, and as an associate fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. Bob has been writing for Blog For Arizona since late 2011, concentrating mostly on federal issues, with an occasional foray into Arizona state politics.

The Arithmetic of the CEO-Worker Pay Divide

August 27, 2018 by Bob Lord

[Cross-posted from Inequality.org]

Sometimes percentages alone don’t do justice to the injustice of corporate compensation.

The Economic Policy Institute reported earlier this month that the average CEO of the 350 largest firms in the U.S. pocketed $18.9 million in 2017, a 17.6 percent pay increase over 2016.

At the same time, typical worker compensation remained flat, rising merely 0.3 percent.

If you do some quick math, dividing 17.6 percent by 0.3 percent, you might conclude that CEO pay in 2017 increased about 60 times faster than worker pay.

But if you take a moment and do some more careful calculations, that CEO-worker pay gap will soar incredibly higher — to a CEO pay boost over 15,000 times the pay hike for workers.

Are the Russia Dots About to Connect?

August 26, 2018 by Bob Lord

To believe the Mueller investigation is a “witch hunt” is to believe that all the connections between Trump and those in his orbit are not inter-connected; that it’s all one huge coincidence. Here are the various dots (I may be missing a few):

George Papadopoulos’ Russian contacts (through an intermediary) in early 2016.
The June 2016 Trump tower meeting.
Manafort’s many Russian connections and his willingness to manage Trump’s campaign at no charge, at a time he was deep underwater financially.
Roger Stone and his connections to Wikileaks and Guccifer 2.0.
The mysterious softening of the Republican platform position on Russia.
Trump’s public ask for help from Russia finding HRC’s emails within hours of when Russia launched its hacking operation.
The efforts to create a back channel, by both Jared Kushner and Erik Prince (the Seychelles meeting).
Michael Flynn’s Russia contacts regarding sanctions.

As I said, I’m sure I’m leaving out a few.

Recently, I’ve started following blogger Marcy Wheeler, of Emptywheel. Marcy’s analysis during the Valerie Plame/Scooter Libby imbroglio was brilliant. On several occasions, she figured things out that the mainstream media had missed.

Her analysis of Mueller investigation related matters has been stellar as well.

David Safier, Former BfAZ blogger: Bodine Depiction of Garcia Book “Wrong”

August 12, 2018 by Bob Lord

If there were a hall of fame for Blog for Arizona writers, David Safier certainly would occupy a premier space. David wrote over 3,000 posts here before moving on to his current gig at Tucson Weekly’s The Range. His posts here covered many topics, but mainly on his passion, education policy. His posts always were thoughtful.

After reading Larry Bodine’s hit piece on David Garcia’s book, “School Choice,” David reviewed the book himself and wrote his own piece at The Range, A Review of David Garcia’s Book, “School Choice”.

Here’s Safier’s take:

Bodine’s depiction of the book is, in a word, wrong.

In other words, David agreed with Brahm Resnik’s characterization of Bodine’s piece as a “gross distortion.”

Safier went a bit further than Resnik:

Brahm Resnik: Blog for Arizona Post “Grossly Distorts” Garcia Book

August 10, 2018August 9, 2018 by Bob Lord

Disclosure: I voted for David Garcia.

Further disclosure: I know Brahm Resnik better than I know my co-blogger, Larry Bodine. I put Brahm at the top of Arizona’s political media. When it was time to go public with the John Huppenthal’s racist comments on this site, it was a huge plus having him be the one to break the story.

Here’s what Brahm Resnik said when he learned of Bodine’s hit piece from Tim Steller on Twitter:

I read the book. The blogger and the professor grossly distort the content. It’s not even a close call.

So, one of the most respected reporters in Arizona just said this blog grossly distorted the facts. If Brahm Resnik’s tweet is correct, we committed a fraud on our readers. Ugh.

The Farley campaign reportedly is broadcasting the Bodine post, which Brahm characterized as a gross distortion, far and wide. That’s how politics works. It’s a dirty business.

David Garcia’s own statement regarding his book follows after the jump. If you think we owe David an apology, say so in the comment section.

Another Thing About Those Devin Nunes Comments

August 9, 2018 by Bob Lord

Rachel Maddow last night played audio from Devin Nunes’ appearance at a fundraiser for Kathy McMorris Rodgers. Rodgers, the fourth ranking member in the Republican House caucus, is in a tough battle to retain her seat.

Nunes, with Rodgers seemingly on board, explained how the Rosenstein impeachment isn’t dead, it’s just on hold until the Senate confirms Kavanaugh. If the House impeached Rosenstein, you see, the Senate would have to table all other business during the Rosenstein’s trial.

Yes, that’s disturbing. Good on Rachel for reporting it.

But the other disturbing part of the story is the role Nunes was playing at the event.

Many readers here think of Nunes as nothing but a corrupt stooge for Trump.

Yet there he was, playing the headliner role at a fundraiser for the fourth ranking Republican in the House.

Were it an event to rally the folks like those we’ve seen at recent Trump rallies (my fave is the woman in the sleeveless flannel shirt flipping the bird at the camera), this would not be surprising. You’d expect Nunes to be popular with that crowd.