IRS whistleblowers vindicated, fight crime to fight gangs and other commentary

Why is Donald Trump “fundamentally uprooting the federal bureaucracy?” asks The Wall Street Journal’s Kimberley A.Strassel.Look at the “years of retaliation” within the IRS against Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler “for their sin of treating Hunter Biden like any other lawbreaker.”They “encountered political interference” and were “thwarted in attempts to search Joe Biden’s guest house”; “instructed not to ask questions about Joe or pursue leads connected to Joe’s grandchildren” and “exiled from the Hunter case” when they refused to play ball.“Shapley and Ziegler have been vindicated many times — by the ultimate Hunter prosecutions, his guilty pleas, and even his pardon.”But their promotion “this week to senior jobs, advising Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on IRS reform” is the truest vindication of all. Despite “a wide array of prevention and intervention efforts to steer kids away from gang life,” those “initiatives have had mixed results,” laments Joshua Carter at City Journal.Since “the biggest driver of gang membership is violent crime,” policymakers must understand that “the best way to stop teenagers from joining gangs is to provide them with safer neighborhoods.”High-crime communities limit “economic opportunities,” increase “kids’ sense of vulnerability” and heighten “social isolation.”In places where “lower crime, stronger social ties, and resulting economic opportunity” exist, “fewer young people feel the need to join gangs.”“Safe neighborhoods” are “the product of deliberate policy choices” — and “curbing gang activity” is an important one.“To put it bluntly,” the World Happiness Report, which consistently claims that “the happiest countries in the world are in Scandinavia” while ranking the United States far lower, “is a sham,” fumes Yascha Mounk at his Substack.Though news outlets print its findings “without a hint of skepticism,” t...