111. SOTU Truth: President Biden's Rhetoric Doesn't Match Reality

In this newsletter, I highlight the facts not mentioned in President Biden's 2023 State of the Union address about the weak state of the union and ways the states and U.S. should let people prosper.

Hello Friend,

I hope you’re having a prosperous week. I don’t usually send another newsletter so soon but I’ll be busy over the next week or so. I have some family events this weekend and an “unconference” in Miami, Florida next week to meet with about 100 thought leaders who are interested in restoring the intellectual rigor and advocacy for free-market capitalism which is too often being lost by progressives, national conservatives, and populists.

This newsletter will mostly summarize the points that I made during President Biden’s second State of the Union address on February 7, 2023. In short, he was wrong on many issues even though he yelled most of it in a fiery tone and the state of the union is fragile at best.

But before I get to the information that I’d like to share with you, I just had this notice pop up on my phone and I felt compelled to share it and ask us to pray for these innocent lives lost. It’s another example of how short life is on earth. May we continue to count our blessings, love others, and be ready for Heaven. You can find updates on the aftermath of the earthquake here.

Let People Prosper Show: Please subscribe to my podcast on your favorite platform: YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Google Podcasts. I’ve received great feedback on the relaunched episodes and the first six will be relaunched soon so that all 30 episodes will have the latest and greatest sound and look. I’m honored to have so many people subscribe and watch. Please subscribe if you haven’t yet and share it with others. The best is yet to come!

Here are the latest two episodes:

The new episode this coming Tuesday will be with The Honorable Jason Isaac who was a former state legislator in Texas and is now the director of the Life:Powered campaign at the Texas Public Policy Foundation. We will talk about how oil and gas fuel the economy and how the mostly deregulated electricity market in Texas is doing. Don’t miss it!

Check out these short videos of about 1 minute each where you’ll learn something and see which longer episodes you want to check out.

Here are two recent shorts that you should watch:

• Watch the full episode with Dr. Alex Salter of the Free Market Institute at Texas Tech University on the benefits of free-market capitalism with low spending, taxes, and regulations, as people move with their feet.

• Watch the full episode with Dr. Samuel Gregg of the American Institute for Economic Research on the foundations of the U.S. is based on classical liberalism and why we need to get back to it.

Latest Interviews

• Don’t miss my latest television and radio interviews and past speeches here.

TAKE ON STATE OF THE UNION 2023

I had many people ask me for my views on President Biden’s SOTU address. I did a Fox radio tour across the country through Young Americans for Liberty on the morning of the SOTU and discussed what he would say. He gave a rosy scenario that doesn’t match the reality of the data or what Americans are facing on main street. It shows just how disconnected he and his administration are from reality. We must go in a different direction in order to restore human flourishing in America. Instead of writing more on this, here’s my Twitter thread that night where I rebutted his points by simply providing facts. Please share as you’d like and tag me so I can reshare.

Clearly, I believe this was a bad SOTU and his yelling and mumbling made things worse. But I’ll be praying for him and for our country.

TAKE ON STATE ECONOMIES & POLICIES

1. Louisiana needs to improve its tax structure by passing a flat income tax until it can eliminate income taxes.

   

2. Great to co-author the Sustainable Michigan Budget with James Hohman.

   

3. Not only does Louisana have a bad tax structure, but the poor fiscal policy is driving people away and therefore contributing to less economic growth.

   

4. Texas needs spending restraint and property tax relief! This plan does that.

   

   

5. Housing matters! Check out my latest co-authored piece with Nicole Nosek of Texans for Reasonable Solutions on how to improve housing affordability.

   

6. Sad to see this recently in the WSJ about my alma mater, Texas Tech University. But from the pushback they received, they issued a statement indicating changes are coming. I don't necessarily have a problem with DEI policies but it’s when reverse discrimination is the result that there is a problem. I should note that this is rampant at most universities these days just Texas Tech was caught doing it. Reforms are needed in higher ed!

   

   

TAKE ON U.S. ECONOMY & POLICIES

1. This isn’t a good sign for the economy.

   

2. Good analysis here by my former colleague E.J. Antoni on how the recent jobs report is biased by revised calculations of seasonal adjustments based on junk data over the last three years.

   

3. We have to stop falling into the Keynesian traps!

   

4. The housing market is down and has a long way to go down.

   

5. Protectionism sucks! Listen to this podcast where my good friend John Hendrickson takes the protectionist side and I take the free trade side. Who wins?

   

CLOSING TAKE

• Happy birthday to President Reagan.

  

• Don’t miss my favorite video of Milton Friedman where he states: “The real problem is government spending.” Amen!

• There is no need for a central bank as it just manipulates the economy and makes us worse off in the process.

  

• My family is doing well. Our baby girl is now 10 months old and crawling everywhere. Our five-year-old boy is smart as a whip and keeps us on our toes with new athletic endeavors every day and is overcoming his over-excitability (intensity) each day. Our eight-year-old boy is amazing us with his generosity and determination to work hard at sports, academics, and ways to conquer his ADHD. We are truly blessed! Please keep us in your prayers. The recent ice storm here was intense and brought down many trees and limbs in the area along with many power outages because of fallen trees, but we were thankful that we just had a few tree limbs down and a lot of quality family time and didn’t lose power.

  

• I’m praying that we will be generous people so we will prosper and will refresh others so we will be refreshed. Jesus is the answer.

  

• Let people prosper.