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The American flag as it was intended to fly is no longer the favored symbol of so-called patriots on the far right.

Old Glory is being flipped upside down across the land, most famously outside of a residence belonging to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito. Historically used as a maritime sign of distress and later to protest the Vietnam War, the upside-down flag has been co-opted by violent Jan. 6 insurrectionists who believe the false claim that the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump. In fact, some rioters ripped down the U.S. flag from a flagpole outside the Capitol and replaced it with the flag bearing Trump's name.

And more recently, after his conviction in the hush-money trial, Trump supporters and right-wing politicians shared images of an inverted flag on social media.

Then there's a separate flag propped up by Christian nationalists and "Stop the Steal" adherents. Featuring a green, clip-art-like pine tree set against a white backdrop, it reads "AN APPEAL TO HEAVEN" in all caps. (I sense that some of the same critics who lambasted our new Minnesota state flag for its simple iconography have no qualms about flying the Pine Tree flag which, despite having roots going back to the Revolutionary War, could have been designed on Print Shop.)

Alito said his wife, apparently the flag enthusiast in the house, was responsible for flying the Appeal to Heaven flag outside their New Jersey beach house, just as she was blamed for waving the upside-down American flag.

With the traditional flag losing favor among this sect of Americans, I propose my own radical idea: That the rest of us proudly reclaim the red, white and blue.

Liberals sometimes are wary around those who flaunt their patriotism. In recent years, other than on July 4, seeing a stranger sport a flag design on their T-shirt or back of their truck can seem synonymous with MAGA hats, "Let's Go, Brandon" and full-throated support of the NRA. It has become shorthand for one party rather than the ideals that this nation was founded on.

But patriotism should not be equated with an unquestioning faith in country. It can mean criticism that comes from a place of love. It can mean acknowledging inherent flaws in our government while knowing darn well that an intact, functioning democracy is the best system we can have.

Patriotism means having some trust in our institutions, whether it's a representative government, scientists who developed a vaccine or journalists holding the powerful to account. But it also means working to make our country stronger, loving it into an even better future.

Yet when I see a flag, which in recent years has been a symbol of conservative America, I also wonder what the flag bearer might think of me.

Four years under Trump was difficult for a lot of Americans LGBTQ+ folks, Muslims, immigrants and other marginalized communities. It was an uneasy time for Asian Americans, who were vilified by COVID-19 as Trump called it the "Chinese virus." Does a flag denote a love of Trump, and perhaps by an extension, a hostility toward Asians?

But the flag has always been special to my family.

It means something to my father, who served in the Army and lost friends in Vietnam. It held significance for my grandfather, a "Chinese laundryman" (as they were known in the 1950s) who loved to take his family to July 4th parades.

If you ever are feeling jaded about our country, I beg you to visit a naturalization ceremony, where immigrants enthusiastically wave their little American flags with pride and hope and euphoric joy.

Recently, my 11-year-old son used his birthday money to buy a new fishing backpack. It came sewn with a small patch of the American flag. It surprised me that he was drawn to this symbol.

On our way to a soccer game, he noticed a large billowing U.S. flag along the freeway and commented on how majestic it looked. To him, I suspect the flag doesn't carry the political baggage it might for me. It simply stands for a love of country, a sense of home. Isn't that what it should evoke?

Flag Day, June 14, is upon us, and July 4 is around the corner. Regular Americans be they Republicans, Democrats, moderates or independents who believe in working together and protecting democracy should reclaim the flag. Let it be a symbol of the American Dream, the promise of freedom, and justice for all.

Let's make the flag great again.

Many Americans will proudly display the stars and stripes on June 14. Keep an eye out for the weather though, because it affects if the flag should be flown.

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Laura Yuen: It's time for regular Americans (liberals included) to reclaim the US flag - The Pantagraph

Rep. Nancy Mace, Republican of South Carolina, is one of Congresss oddest ducks. Shes someone who once positioned herself as a centrist before a remarkably abrupt anti-establishment flip that involved knifing former ally Kevin McCarthy. Shes known for ridiculous gaffes and stunts, like telling a prayer-breakfast crowd shed skipped sex with her fianc to make it on time, or wearing a literal scarlet letter around Capitol Hill. Her reputation as a horrible boss is legendary; her staff turnover unprecedented. Even in a town of attention hogs, her unslakable thirst for the TV cameras stands out.

Anyway, congrats to Nancy Mace on landing Trumps endorsement and sailing through her primary last night! Happy Wednesday.

Can liberals be for law and order?

In a world of terror threats, border turmoil, and ugly mobs on city streets, they need to be. We need to be.

Terror: NBC News reported last night:

Eight men from Tajikistan with potential ties to ISIS out of central Asia were arrested over the weekend in New York, Philadelphia and Los Angeles . . .

The suspects had been on the FBIs Joint Terrorism Task Force radar and were arrested by personnel with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, better known as ICE . . . .

All eight men crossed through the southern border into the U.S.

This follows on warnings from senior administration officials about an elevated terror threat. Two months ago, FBI Director Chris Wray testified to Congress that Weve seen the threat from foreign terrorists rise to a whole another level after October 7 . . . Looking back over my career in law enforcement, Id be hard pressed to think of a time where so many threats to our public safety and national security were so elevated all at once.

The border: As we see in poll after poll, immigration is near or at the top of the list of issues Americans say matter most to them. The sense that the border is out of control is so widespread that it led congressional Democrats earlier this year to agree to what once would have been unpalatable border measures, and to President Bidens executive order on the border a week ago.

Mobs in the streets: Meanwhile, weve seen demonstrations and disturbances in major cities by pro-Palestinian (sometimes pro-Hamas) mobs, most recently in New York City, outside an exhibit memorializing the victims of the October 7 massacre. Demonstrators at this event carried Hamas and Hezbollah flags. They held signs reading Long Live October 7 and the Zionists are not Jews and not humans.

As one member of Congress put it, the callousness, dehumanization, and targeting of Jews on display at last nights protest outside the Nova Festival exhibit was atrocious antisemitismplain and simple. That was not said by a Trump supporter or a Republican. It was Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.

Terror, immigration, and demonstrations are distinct issues. Sensible policies in each of these areas can be complicated. But in the hands of a skillful authoritarian demagogue, these problemsa border that seems out of control, a genuine terrorism threat, and mobs in the streetsform a toxic political combination.

Its a combination that those who want to defeat the authoritarian demagogue cant wish away.

How to respond to public sentiment while maintaining sound policies in these areas is challenging. But thats what good politicians have to do.

That means they have to recognize and credit those concerns of the public.

Which in turn means, to put it simply: Liberals have to be for law and order.

I know the phrase has a problematic history. And being friendly to law and order doesnt mean you cannot or should not denounce religious bigotry, seek to curb police brutality, defend the First Amendment, and criticize demagogues who exploit public concerns for their own purposes.

It also doesnt mean you cant try to emphasize, as Democrats did in the late 1960s, that youre for law and orderand for justice. I like that modification, and perhaps it can be revived today. But still, the fact remains that in the current political climate, you cannot be a majority party in the country if youre perceived as indifferent to or unfriendly to law and order.

And of course law and order properly understood are things we should be in favor of. In the Preamble to the Constitution, to insure domestic tranquility is the third purpose listed, after to form a more perfect Union and establish justice.

The perceived and conflated threats of out-of-control immigration and terrorism made Donald Trump president in 2016. They could do so again.

Trump understands this. On the campaign trail this year, hes promised to immediately restore and expand the Trump travel ban on entry from terror-plagued countries. If you hate America, if you want to abolish Israel, if you sympathize with jihadists, then we dont want you in our country!

Well be hearing much more along those lines now. Do we have an effective response?

William Kristol

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What to say about a verdict everybody expected?

Jurors needed only three hours deliberation Tuesday morning to convict Hunter Biden on three nonviolent gun felonies.

Federal law prohibits drug addicts from acquiring or owning firearms; the jury was unmoved by the defenses argument that Hunter had not considered himself an addict when he testified he wasnt one in order to buy a gun in 2018.

Like the rest of his family, Hunter has endured unspeakable tragedies, from the deaths of his mother and sister when he was just three to the death of his brother Beau in 2015.

Tragedies can ennoble people; they can also break them. Hunter was no boy scout prior to Beaus deathhed already launched into his scuzzy business dealings in China and Ukraine, and had been discharged from the Navy Reserve after testing positive for cocainebut it was that death that sent him spiraling into an uncontrollable addiction that made him a vector for more family tragedy.

In the depths of that addiction, he bought a gun, falsely attesting as he did so that he was not using illegal drugs at the time.

Many have noted that its rare, if not unprecedented, for these crimes to be charged without being connected to some further crime committed with the gun.

Even so, those laws are just. An addict is by definition someone who has lost a great deal of control over his own actions. If laws trying to keep guns out of addicts hands werent on the books already, wed want them to be.

Former federal prosecutor Andrew Weissmann, who served as one of the head lawyers on the Mueller probe into Donald Trump, summed things up well on MSNBC yesterday:

I think that what youre seeing today and what we saw in New York in connection with the Trump criminal case is jurors doing their job . . . In both situations, jurors heard the facts, they weighed credibility, and they made decisions. And it didnt matter if youre dealing with the former president of the United States . . . or youre dealing with the son of the president. These are jurors that did their duty and the rule of law held in both situations.

The verdict has raised awkward epistemic problems for MAGAworld. After all, when they arent imagining Joe Biden to be a senile old fool, theyre picturing him as a cunning mastermind bending the whole Department of Justice to his dastardly ends. If Hunter was found guilty, then, there must have been some reason why his father wanted him to be found guilty.

We could fill a whole newsletter with the mental gymnastics the right is using to try to square this circle: Do you see the op now? senior Trump adviser Stephen Miller tweeted. Charge Hunter with a minor gun violation and NOT his conduct as an unregistered foreign agent or illicit foreign business dealings in order to protect the BIG GUY before the election. DOJ is Bidens election protection racket.

But enough about them. We talk about them plenty. Whats more striking is how the real Bidennot the Biden of MAGA fantasiaresponded. Up at the site today, Jill Lawrence takes a look back at the remarkable way Biden has handled the Hunter affair all along, standing by his son unconditionally on a personal level while refusing to taint the judicial process:

When he took office, Joe Biden retained Delawares Trump-appointed U.S. attorney, David Weiss, to finish an investigation into whether Hunter Biden falsified a gun form and evaded taxes while he was addicted to drugs. Joe Biden did not attack the justice system when a Trump-appointed judgeMaryellen Noreikaquestioned Hunters plea agreement, which ultimately fell apart. Joe Biden didnt comment or intervene when Attorney General Merrick Garlandhis own appointeeelevated Weiss to special counsel status, allowing him broader authority to investigate and bring charges.

When his son went on trial in Wilmington, again in Noreikas courtroom, Joe Biden did not attack the judge. He also said he would not pardon Hunter if he were convicted. After the guilty verdict Tuesday, the president said he was proud of the man he is today and added: As I also said last week, I will accept the outcome of this case and will continue to respect the judicial process as Hunter considers an appeal. . . .

It also takes strength and discipline for a president to let the Justice Department do its job without fear, favor, public criticism, or outright meddling.

We wont speculate on how the verdict will affect Bidens reelection chances in November, as theres plausible arguments to be made for it helping him (empathy!), hurting him (family scandal!), or having no difference whatsoever (Hunters baked in!).

But on a personal level, the Biden family isnt through this painful period yet. Hunters other trial, concerning $1.4 million in unpaid back taxes, is due to begin in September.

Andrew Egger

May CPI shows inflation cooling for second straight month: Axios

Trump-endorsed candidates win primaries in Nevada, South Dakota, and South Carolina: NBC News

Trial pulled back curtain on Biden familys dark moments: New York Times

New poll goes deep on Kamala Harriss liabilities and strengths as a potential president: Politico

Is Emmanuel Macron too toxic to win? Politico

For many observers, the most difficult part of following the Hunter Biden trial was the deep family pain it dredged up and dragged into the spotlight. While he was using, Hunter was a messa black hole of suffering for himself and the people around him. But as our friend Molly Jong-Fastherself a recovering addictwrites at MSNBC, he was also a victim of his disease:

Biden and I are not alone in being addicts. Roughly 16% of Americans (but likely more) struggle with alcohol and drug addiction. Thats about 48 million people.

Fox News' The Five co-host Jeanine Pirro reportedly complained about eight jurors who have someone in their family whos had a drug or alcohol addiction problem or someone who died from alcohol or addiction. So they picked a jury who is sympathetic. The Washington Posts Aaron Blake pointed out that 8 of 12 jurors = 66%. Thats exactly in line with the population. . . .

Addiction is a disease. People who struggle with addiction are sick, not bad. Huge swaths of the country are affected by alcohol and drug addiction that affects not just them, but their family members and people who are even tangentially connected to them the parents, grandparents and kids and brothers and sisters and acquaintances of the addict. Alcoholism and drug addiction are a disease with a long tail, a disease that ripples through our society in myriad ways. . .

For years, Republicans have used pictures of Hunter Biden strung out on crack cocaine as some kind of indictment of his father. But when I see those pictures, I see a warning.

Im sober 26 years, but I have the same illness of addiction that Hunter Biden does. Being sober doesnt make me a better person than people who are active in their addiction. It just makes me luckier than they are.

Read the whole thing.

On a lighter note, this is sure worth a watch:

Continued here:
Liberals Shouldn't Give Up On 'Law and Order' - The Bulwark

Political fragmentation, far-right, national responses to housing, inflation, the war in Ukraine and the efforts required by the European Green Deal may play a role in the painful losses suffered by the liberal Renew group and the Greens following the European elections held between 6-9 June.

The future of environmental policies may be at risk as the greens and liberals came out as the major losers in the European Parliament elections, having lost 18and 23seats, respectively, according to themost recent results today (June 10), compared to the elections held in 2019.

Belgium, France,Germany and Italy are amongkeycountries where liberals and greens suffered heaviestdefeats, often to the benefit of the far right, particularly in Paris and Berlin. Lack of access to decent housing and high inflation rates alongside national responses to the war in Ukraine may also have played a role in the far rights rise and decline of the greens and liberals.

While final results for some EU countries are yet to be announced, the latest projections reveal a clear loss in seats for the Greens/European Free Alliance (EFA) and the liberals from Renew Europe sitting in Brussels and Strasbourg. However, the liberals are eyeing an opportunity to forge a coalition with the centristEuropean Peoples Party (EPP) which consolidated its position as the strongest party, gaining seats for the first time since the 2009 election and the Socialists (S&D),which broadly retained their position, losing fiveseats.

Following the first results of the election night, Philippe Lamberts, Greens/EFA Co-Presidenttoldreportersthat the Greens were the only political force advocating for the environmental protection of the planet, against strong adverse winds in the public opinion in the far right and others too in reference to the votes tallied in the Parliament before the elections,in which the EPP and liberals blocked key climate files.

You may well have a majority between the three of you," Lamberts warned leaders from theEPP, S&D and Renew Europe, adding: "But if you are looking for stability and for responsible policies within the next five years, embracing the various flavours of the far-right, cannot be an option for you.

But the liberals already appear to be making overtures to the centre parties.Commenting on the outcome of the elections at an event today, Didrik de Schaetzen, the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europes (ALDE) secretary-general urged the EPP and S&D groups to work together in the spirit of compromise.

Numerically it looks like the three of us [EPP, Renew Europe and S&D] could have a string majority, what matters is the compromise that will come from the discussions, De Schaetzen said.

De Schaetzenreprised the desirefor non-cooperation with the far right at the EU level, despite the significant gains made by its parties, and maintaining a so-called cordon sanitaire to block parties such as Rassmemblent National from participating on parliamentary committees.

His counterpart, Benedetta De Marte, European Green Party s (EGP)secretary-general, acknowledged some issues that are not small between the liberals and the greens at national level and blamed political fragmentation for the rise of the far right.

These ambiguities enable the far right to get where they are, De Marte said today during the event.

When asked, De Marte rejected the notion that the Greens became perceived as an unreliable partner due to their resistance to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) or for advocating very strongly for the European Green Deal, the EUs flagship programme to reach carbon-neutrality by 2050, saying the group hadbeen "reliable and constructive" and that the party's goal is to "change things and not just hold positions".

The Greens secretary-general said the party had recognisedthat it wasnot going to repeat the success of 2019 adding there was a drive[towards climate action]in society that unfortunately we dont see anymore.

Despite the massive loss in France, French liberal lead candidate Valrie Hayer said the outcome of the ballots revealed that no pro-European majority in Parliament is possible withoutthe liberals.

We [Renew Europe] proudly intend to be in the driving seat of the next pro-European coalition for the upcoming five years. Our groups central role will come with a responsibility to make sure our conditions and ambitions are matched, Hayer wrote on X.

Lawmaker Daniel Freund (Germany/Greens), who was re-elected for another term, linked the weak results for the Greens to developments at national level, such as housing and inflation.

"Greens in Germany lost significantly with younger voters. This is alarming. Our campaign was not able to address these voters to show them the urgency of our climate policy, Freund told Euronews.

However, I think what we see in Germany and to a certain extent in France as well is that voters used these European elections to express their dissatisfaction with their national governments,"he added.

James Kanagasooriam, chief research officer at polling platform Focaldata doesnt see the election outcome as a collapse for the greens, despite the tilt to the far-right.

The Greens are down, but not necessarily the population's views on climate change, said Kanagasooriam. The data is clear, EPP voters stand closer to the S&D and Renew than other parties in regards to green issues, and their voters will probably expect policy tracking in that direction, he added.

"Continuing the net-zero transition agenda in this mandate is a strategic choice to reposition the EU on the map of industrial powers," said Neil Makaroff, director at the pan-European think tank Strategic Perspectives, adding: "Such a plan could cement a coalition between the EPP, S&D, Renew and the Greens."

Read the original here:
What went wrong for the EU election-losing Greens and Liberals? - Euronews

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NOAH FELDMAN: Secret audio of Alito isn't the smoking gun liberals think - Indiana Gazette

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Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre rises during Question Period in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on June 13.PATRICK DOYLE/The Canadian Press

We would appear, as Woody Allen once said, to stand at a crossroads: One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness; the other to total extinction. (Let us pray that we have the wisdom to choose correctly.)

That, at any rate, is what one would gather from the rhetoric over the governments capital-gains tax proposal. On the one hand, according to the Finance Minister, Chrystia Freeland, the measure an increase in the share of capital gains subject to tax from 50 per cent to 66 per cent, though only (for personal income tax payers) on gains in excess of $250,000 is all that stands between us and, if not total extinction, then certainly despair and utter hopelessness.

What kind of a Canada do you want to live in? she asked opponents of the move, in a speech in Toronto on Sunday, the day before introducing enabling legislation in the House of Commons. Do you want to live in a country where kids go to school hungry? Do you want to live in a country where a teenage girl gets pregnant just because she doesnt have the money to buy birth control?

Do you want to live in a country, she went on, where those at the very top live lives of luxury, but must do so in gated communities behind ever higher fences, using private health care and airplanes because the public sphere is so degraded and the wrath of the vast majority of their less privileged compatriots burns so hot?

The premise, I gather, is that without the additional $19-billion over five years the measure is expected to raise, this is the future to which we are inexorably headed. I know what youre thinking: How on Earth could the Liberals have let things get this bad? Eight years in power, having spent a total of $3.3-trillion in that time, and the country is one paycheque away, as it were, from poverty and revolution?

For his part the Conservative Leader, Pierre Poilievre, was equally convinced of the disaster that awaits us if the capital-gains measure were to be implemented. This job-killing Trudeau tax, he said in a statement released shortly before the bill was introduced, will drive billions of dollars of machines, technology, business and paycheques out of our country. In a video posted online, he raised the stakes even higher. Businesses, jobs, doctors and food production will leave Canada, he predicted.

I know what youre thinking. If this is the kind of carnage the tax would inflict on the country, surely Mr. Poilievre plans to repeal it at the first opportunity. But in fact the Conservative Leader has made no such pledge. The Conservatives will vote against it in the House, but after that all bets are off.

Still, its newsworthy enough that Mr. Poilievre committed his party to oppose it. Since the measure was first unveiled in the April budget, the Conservatives had been conspicuously silent on the matter, seeming to validate Liberal hopes that they had forked the Conservative Leader: Either endorse the tax increase, and infuriate his base, or oppose it, and give up his populist pose as the friend of the working man.

The Liberals even went so far as to hive the capital-gains provision off from the rest of the budget, forcing the Conservatives to vote on it separately. Not until the last minute did the Conservatives declare their position.

You could see the Finance Minister working hard afterward to seize the advantage. The Conservatives are coming out against fairness, she crowed. Canadians are now seeing what side the Conservatives are on. The Conservatives are very clearly saying theyre against fairness, theyre in favour of the wealthy lobbyists who advise them. Liberals everywhere hugged themselves. Now at last they had them.

Have they? Had the Conservatives declared themselves opposed out of the gate, in the government-dominated news cycle that inevitably follows any budget, that might well have been the effect. But the passage of two months has given them some breathing room.

The Liberals contention, that the measure would only apply to the top 0.13 per cent of taxpayers, has been shot full of holes. That may be the share of the population reporting capital gains in excess of $250,000 in a given year, but over their lifetimes a much larger proportion will do so at least once. The increased inclusion rate, moreover, applies to the first dollar of capital gains earned by corporations which would include the 300,000 Canadians who have incorporated themselves.

So the Liberals own position the tax increase is existentially important, but will have no impact on anyone but a handful of the super-rich has looked increasingly untenable. If that were true, why are so many of the non-super-rich doctors, farmers, small businesses so upset by it?

That so many of these groups had already lined up against the tax by the time the Conservative Leader declared his position, then, may not have been as discomfiting as all that. He can vote against the tax increase today, and accept their plaudits, without committing himself to do anything in particular with it should he become prime minister. That gives him time to devise an alternative.

Indeed, the most significant, and fortuitous, outcome of the weeks exchange of fire may prove to be Mr. Poilievres other announcement: that within 60 days of taking office he would appoint a task force to design what sounds suspiciously like comprehensive tax reform one that would lower taxes on work, hiring and making stuff, with the revenues made up, in part, by cutting corporate welfare, presumably including corporate tax breaks.

This is exactly the right response. Leave aside the ludicrous class-war rhetoric and pleas of poverty this, from a government that already spends more and taxes more, in constant dollars per citizen, than any government in the history of the country offered in its defence: Raising the inclusion rate on capital gains, as the Liberals propose, is good policy, on its own.

The reason taxpayers dont pay tax on the whole gain, remember, is to compensate for the tax already paid on the same income at the corporate level. At a 50-per-cent inclusion rate, however, the system overcompensates: The combined rate of tax, corporate and personal (and federal and provincial) works out to about 46 per cent, seven points lower than the 53-per-cent top rate on income generally. Raise the inclusion rate to 66 per cent, and the gap all but disappears.

Thats good, both in terms of fairness (why should people who make their money buying and selling stocks and other assets be taxed less than those who earn it by their labour?) and efficiency: You want people to make economic decisions based on the real costs and benefits of different alternatives, not because of the tax breaks attached to each.

The problem with the Liberal proposal, then, is not that capital gains should not be taxed at the same rate as other income. Its that thats all they did. Raising the tax on capital gains may make the system more efficient in one way, but its still a tax increase, which makes the system less efficient in other ways.

The proper way to oppose such a measure is not to reverse it once it has been implemented, but to embed it in a broader tax reform as the Liberals should have, but failed to do. Mr. Poilievre has talked generally of tax reform in the past, but this is the first time I can recall that he has committed himself to it in such concrete terms, even if the specifics of the reforms are to be left until after the election.

If he is prepared to be bold, however, he has the opportunity to do much good: if not by assuaging the particular complaints of capital-gains earners, then by improving incentives to work, save and invest generally.

The reference to corporate welfare may sound like a throwaway line, but in fact there is a massive amount in that particular kitty. Between explicit subsidies and the various preferences built into the tax system, the economist John Lester after a career with the federal government, latterly as director of research for the Expert Panel Review of Federal Support to Research and Development, he knows where the bodies are buried puts the total at $40-billion. He estimates about 80 per cent of this serves no useful purpose or is actively harmful and should be cut. Lets say 50 per cent of it was: Thats $20-billion that could go to cutting taxes.

There are similar amounts to be found on the personal income tax side: the non-taxation of capital gains on principal residences, worth about $6.5-billion annually; the age tax credit ($5.5-billion); the Canada Employment Credit ($3.2-billion); the non-taxation of employee health and dental benefits ($4-billion); and the charitable donations tax credit ($3.8-billion).

How much could tax rates be slashed with this kind of dough? The Parliamentary Budget Officers Ready Reckoner webpage offers a clue. You could collapse the current five tax brackets (15, 20.5, 26, 29 and 33 per cent) into three (15, 25 and 29), I calculate, at a cost of $22-billion. For another $19-billion, you could cut the general corporate tax rate from its current 15 per cent to 9 per cent (the same as the small-business rate: alternatively, you could make them both 12 per cent for less than half the cost).

Many of these examples might seem politically unfeasible viewed in isolation. But the lesson of past tax reforms, both those that succeeded and those that failed, is that broader, deeper reform is not only better in policy terms: Its more saleable politically. The losers from any reform are always going to hate you, no matter how lightly their ox is gored. The key is to create many more winners than losers.

The Liberal capital-gains tax hike may not prove to be the political winner they had hoped. It may not be to everyones liking as policy. But if it spurs the Conservatives to offer a broader tax reform plan in response, it will have done the country a favour.

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Opinion: Poilievre wriggles out of the Liberal trap, with a commitment to much broader tax reform - The Globe and Mail