Obama's 2013 SOTU Address: More Taxes, More Spending, No Cutting

In his State Of The Union address, Obama called for massive new government revenues from eliminating tax loopholes and a carbon tax. He likewise called for massive new spending as the path to prosperity, or at least his far left version of it.

As to his proposals:

- Medicare: Obama says he will agree to reform Medicare, he just won't give specifics. We have heard like proposals in prior SOTU speeches, none of which amounted to Obama offering any compromise on entitlements.

- Revenue & Tax Structure: Obama wants “hundreds of billions of dollars” in more revenue by closing tax loopholes for the evil rich. He made no mention of the fact that he rejected just such an offer in December, preferring to raise tax rates above what they were during the Clinton years.

- Capital Gains Class Warfare: Obama is still playing class warfare for all its worth. He still wants to tax investment income the same as ordinary income, regardless of how economicly insane that idea actually is. There is a reason that Sweden, the most socialized and highest tax nation in Europe, recently dropped their capital gains tax to . . . zero. As Obama put it, he wants to insure that “billionaires with high-powered accountants can't pay a lower rate than their hard-working secretaries.”

- Debt Ceiling: A warning to evil Republicans – stop using the debt ceiling to challenge spending (Art. I, Sec. 8 be damned)

- More Public Sector Stimulus: Pass Obama's American Jobs Act (because public sector unions need more money and the government needs to get more involved in private sector finance)

- Research: Obama defended spending on “research,” most brazen being his assertion that he is spending to “[devise] new material to make batteries ten times more powerful.” Great. But didn't we just blow a quarter of a trillion dollars in taxpayer money sent to A123, the producer of advanced lithium batteries that was just purchased in bankruptcy by a Chinese company?

- Global Warming Set-Up: Obama stated “the 12 hottest years on record have all come in the last 15. Heat waves, droughts, wildfires, and floods – all are now more frequent and intense.” Where did that come from? One, using the term on “on record” refers to a little more than the past century. The earth has been, at many times, far warmer than it is today. Two, there has been no warming globally over the past 16 years. Three, even the IPCC draft wholly contradicts the claim that “heat waves, droughts, wildfires, and floods” are in any way connected to climate change. What horseshit.

- Carbon Tax: Obama called, in so many words, for the implementation of a carbon tax or a cap and trade system. The fact that the EU's experiment in cap and trade involved massive fraud and that their cap and trade market has completely fallen apart didn't make it into the speech. And if you can tax carbon, then you can tax every aspect of human existence. It is a nanny state nightmare.

- Constitutional Shuffle: If Congress won't give him what he wants, he stated his explicit willingness to bypass Congress and get what he wants through the regulatory bureaucracy. That he can do this really is the most significant systemic problem our nation faces. It flies in the face of the Constitution.

- Green Investments: Continue throwing money at wind and solar, ancient technologies that stopped being cost effective centuries ago.

- Energy Security Trust: Use our “oil and gas revenues to fund an Energy Security Trust that will drive new research and technology to shift our cars and trucks off oil for good.” So this hits three buttons. It creates a brand new bureaucracy for government to fund. It proposes punishing gas and oil production to fund it. And, the purpose of the trust is to channel funds to more left wing donors.

- Fix-It-First Program: A massive new public works program to fix our infrastructure. No price tag given.

- Partnership to Rebuild America: Obama plans to invite private businesses to fund his public works projects. This one actually sounds quite ominous, though no particulars were given. My understanding of business is that they invest with the expectation of profit, not mere good will from government. This has the distinct smell of a mafia strong arm operation.

- Housing: Obama plans yet another Fannie / Freddie style foray into our financial system, with the government taking over refinancing of existing mortgages to today's rates.

- Massive Expansion of Head Start style program: We know that Head Start http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2010/01/head-start-earns-an-f-no-lasting-impact-for-children-by-first-grade has no lasting impact on children, yet the centerpiece of Obama's new push on education is to create “ a high-quality preschool program” for all of our children, claiming that this will be the most helpful. This is nothing more than another giant program for public sector unions. What children need is access to good schools – just like those that Obama's children attend.

- Tie Federal Aid In Student Loans to Costs & Success Rates: This actually is a good idea.

- Immigration Reform: check.

- Violence Against Women Act: check.

- Paycheck Fairness Act: This act has nothing to do with paycheck fairness. It would have much more to do with the bottom line of lawyers than women. As it stands, this act is just the left's weapon to beat Republicans over the head with when the left needs to claim a war on women.

- Minimum Wage: Obama wants to raise it to $9 an hour. The negative effects of the “minimum wage” laws are so well established that its hard to understand how Obama could possibly push for this, particularly at a time of record long term unemployment and in an economy where the majority of new jobs being created are low wage jobs. Just insanity.

- Underwrite Democrat Failures At The Local Level: Virtually all of the most economically depressed cities in America share a single thread – years of one party Democrat rule. Obama wants to put our federal tax dollars to work helping out the 20 worst offenders. You will recall that after the election, one of Detroit's politicos asked when Obama was going to start sending Obamabucks their way, since they had gotten out the vote for him. They apparently now have their answer. No price tag given.

- Afghanistan: We're out of there. Obama is unilaterally ending the war.

- Al Qaeda: Its dead, but its reforming in many places. Obama will do nothing in the war of ideas. He is just going to support Muslim governments.

- Cybersecurity: This is a legitimate issue. Obama wants much more Trade: Obama is calling for some type of trade pacts with Asian nations and the EU. No details were given.

- World Poverty & AIDS: Obama wants to spend tax dollars so that he can cure world poverty and eradicate AIDS. He has a plan, I think.

- Gun Control: According to Obama, gun control is good, it's needed, every thinking and moral person wants it. Interestingly enough, he called on Congress to give each of his gun control measures a vote. I found that fascinating, given that there are a host of Democrat Congresscritters in purple and red states who would rather have their teeth pulled than have to vote on gun control.

Other Responses:

- Rand Paul's Rebuttal On Behalf Of The Tea Party

- Marco Rubio's Republican Response

- AP Fact Check

- Nice Deb: Sen. Cruz Statement On SOTU

- WSJ: Obama offers an agenda aimed at electing a Pelosi House

- Daily Caller: Obama puts government at center of Americans' lives

- Krauthammer: ‘This speech is about spending your way to prosperity

’ - George Will: SOTU makes clear no entitlement reform, spending cuts are coming

Tweet

Read More...

Summary only...

Krauthammer Dissects Obama's WTF Budget

Charles Krauthammer has read the proposed budget and gives us his bill of particulars:

. . . The budget touts a deficit reduction of $1.1 trillion over the next decade.

Where to begin? Even if you buy this number, Obama’s budget adds $7.2 trillion in new debt over that same decade.

But there’s a catch. The administration assumes economic-growth levels higher than private economists and the Congressional Budget Office predict. Without this rosy scenario — using CBO growth estimates — $1.7 trillion of revenue disappears and U.S. debt increases $9 trillion over the next decade. This is almost $1 trillion every year.

Assume you buy the rosy scenario. Of what does this $1.1 trillion in deficit reduction consist? Painful cuts? Think again. It consists of $1.6 trillion in tax hikes, plus an odd $328 billion of some mysterious bipartisan funding for a transportation trust fund (gas taxes, one supposes) — for a grand total of nearly $2 trillion in new taxes.

Classic Obama debt reduction: Add $2 trillion in new taxes, then add another $1 trillion in new spending and, presto, you’ve got $1 trillion of debt reduction. It’s the same kind of mad deficit accounting in Obamacare: It reduces debt by adding $540 billion in new spending, then adding $770 billion in new taxes. Presto: $230 billion of “debt reduction.” . . .

And what of those “painful cuts” Obama is making to programs he really cares about? The catch is that these “cuts” are from a hugely inflated new baseline created by the orgy of spending in Obama’s first two years. These were supposedly catastrophe-averting, anti-Depression emergency measures. But post-recession they remain in place. As a result, discretionary non-defense budget levels today are 24 percent higher than before Obama — 84 percent higher if you add in the stimulus money.

Which is why the supposedly painful cuts yield spending still at stratospheric levels. After all the cuts, Department of Education funding for 2012 remains 35 percent higher than in the last pre-emergency pre-Obama year, 2008. Environmental Protection Agency: 18 percent higher. Department of Energy: 22 percent higher. Consider even the biggest “painful cut” headline of all, the 50 percent cut in fuel subsidies for the poor. Barbaric, is it not? Except for the fact that the subsidies had been doubled from 2008 levels. The draconian cut is nothing but a return to normal pre-recession levels.

Yet all this is penny-ante stuff. The real money is in entitlements. And the real scandal of this budget is that Obama doesn’t touch them. Not Social Security. Not Medicaid. Not Medicare.

What about tax reform, the other major recommendation of the deficit commission? Nothing.

How about just a subset of that — corporate tax reform, on which Republicans have signaled they are eager to collaborate? The formula is simple: Eliminate the loopholes to broaden the tax base, then lower the rates for everyone, promoting both fairness and economic efficiency. What does the Obama budget do? Removes tax breaks — and then keeps the rate at 35 percent, among the highest in the industrialized world (more than twice Canada’s, for example).

Yet for all its gimmicks, this budget leaves the country at decade’s end saddled with publicly held debt triple what Obama inherited.

A more cynical budget is hard to imagine. This one ignores the looming debt crisis, shifts all responsibility for serious budget-cutting to the Republicans — for which Democrats are ready with a two-year, full-artillery demagogic assault — and sets Obama up perfectly for re-election in 2012. . . .

Whatever Obama may be, and I can think of numerous words and phrases to describe him, the words "leader" and "patriot" are not among their number. That is too bad, given his job description.

Read More...

Summary only...

Amen - Paul Ryan On Real Economic Recovery

Paul Ryan impresses me every time I hear him.

He appeared on Hardball to discuss the Bush Tax Cuts and plans to put our economy back on a fiscally sane path. Matthews did a hyper-aggressive interview with Ryan and Ryan shined.

Rep. Joe Crowley of NY also appeared on the show - and was about as far out of his element as he could be. His answer to our economic milaise was to tout the Democrats Pay-Go legislation. The problem of course is the left has that new law encased under glass, only to be brought out to wave around on camera before the mid-terms. Matthews didn't push Crowley at all, but its just as well as that gave more time for Ryan.

Do enjoy this one:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

(H/T Noel Sheppard at News Busters)

Read More...

Summary only...

Governing By Clown Magic Part II

Obama and our Congressional Democrats have leapt beyond smoke and mirrors, they have run past the zone of Orwell, and they have now moved into the previously uncharted territory of governing by . . . Clown Magic. It is when they spend us into oblivion and, at the same time, claim the mantle of fiscal responsibility.

- Defining Clown Magic

Who is responsible for spending and taxaation? Its not hard to find. According to Article I of the Constitution, its Congress.

Who is responsible for approving or vetoing spending? That's not hard to find either. Accroding to Article I, sec. 7 and Article II of the Constitution, its the President.

So where in the Constitution do we find a "blue ribbon panel" that is responsible for doing the job of the Congress and the President?

Nowhere, which ought to tell you that creating this "blue ribbon" panel to tell Congress how to spend and tax - or cut spending and cut taxes (Ha) - is pure Clown Magic to allow our Clown In Chief and his Clown minions in Congress to disclaim any responsiblity for their profligate spending, a deficit traveling into the stratosphere at ludicrous speed, and what will soon be a call for draconian taxes on every American.

The key to defeating Clown Magic is simple - don't play along with the trick and continuously point out the how the trick is being done. Repeat it ad infinitum before every microphone you can find. Think our Republicans are up to it? We will see with the upcoming meeting with Obama on health care scheduled for 25 Feb. If the Republicans show up for that instead of doing as I suggested here, they are, at a minimum, clown enablers.

Read More...

Summary only...

Heading Towards A Self Inflicted Depression?

And to think that Obama ran against Bush on the charge that Republicans lacked fiscal responsibility.

The economic news gets progressively worse by the day. Obama has broken the bank with his profligate spending. Indeed, the borrowing for his spending has been so massive that Moodys is warning that it may have to downgrade federal government bonds - a move that would send us far deeper into debt. Further, this downturn is turning into a perfect storm, as it is merging into a crisis with social security and Medicaid. One would think all of that is more than enough, but no. Obama is pursuing plans for massive taxation through several vehicles, the sum total of which will massively burden every American and portends to derail any recovery. Then there is Obama's non-sequiter that in order to stem the bleeding from Medicare, we have to enact another trillion dollar program, universal health care. And lastly, from Carl at No Oil For Pacifists, a detailed review of Obama's economic programs to the present, set in an econ 101 grading scheme.

Economists debate whether FDR's massive "New Deal" spending was effective in combating the Great Depression. Given that the depression did not end until WWII, that is an open question. But Obama has bet the farm - and the second mortgage on the farm - on the theory that FDR had it right.

The national debt today is four times higher than it was just one year ago, standing at $1.84 trillion dollars. Of that, half has been borrowed. And that is a figure likely to rise as the year progresses both through increased allocations, increases in the cost of borrowing, and the failure of the Obama rosy predictions to fail to materialize. Just paying down that figure is daunting, if there was nothing more.

But we are in the midst of a near perfect economic storm. Democrat protests to the contrary, we have known for years that Social Security and Medicare were going to balloon in size - into the multi-trillions of dollars - as more baby boomers age. Democrats have run these plans as a ponzi scheme, and the scheme is being exposed by falling receipts. This will come to crisis proportions in a few years, if not sooner. But Obama has yet to say word one about how he will address social security. More on medicaid below.

Between Obama's profligate spending and our looming massive crisis in Social Security and Medicaid, we face yet another major obstacle. This from Financial Times:

Long before the current financial crisis, nearly two years ago, a little-noticed cloud darkened the horizon for the US government. It was ignored. But now that shadow, in the form of a warning from a top credit rating agency that the nation risked losing its triple A rating if it did not start putting its finances in order, is coming back to haunt us.

That warning from Moody’s focused on the exploding healthcare and Social Security costs that threaten to engulf the federal government in debt over coming decades. The facts show we’re in even worse shape now, and there are signs that confidence in America’s ability to control its finances is eroding.

Prices have risen on credit default insurance on US government bonds, meaning it costs investors more to protect their investment in Treasury bonds against default than before the crisis hit. It even, briefly, cost more to buy protection on US government debt than on debt issued by McDonald’s. Another warning sign has come from across the Pacific, where the Chinese premier and the head of the People’s Bank of China have expressed concern about America’s longer-term credit worthiness and the value of the dollar. . . .

The bottom line of all of this is that we are headed for far more difficult times if the cost of our ability to borrow rises significantly - as will assuredly happen if we lose our AAA rating.

One of the clear lessons that came out of the Great Depression was that increasing taxation can defeat a recovery. Obama is planning to do tax increases on steroids. Obama intends to fund his profligate spending on the backs of all Americans through massive direct and indirect taxes as well as a business tax that portends to drive multinational businesses from our shores. As discussed by Martin Feldstein in the WSJ:

The current outlook for an economic recovery remains precarious. Although the stimulus package will give a temporary boost to growth in the current quarter, it will not be enough to offset the combined effect of lower consumer spending, the decline in residential construction, the weakness of exports, the limited availability of bank credit and the downward spiral of house prices. A sustained economic upturn is far from a sure thing. This is no time for tax increases that will reduce spending by households and businesses.

Even if the proposed tax increases are not scheduled to take effect until 2011, households will recognize the permanent reduction in their future incomes and will reduce current spending accordingly. Higher future tax rates on capital gains and dividends will depress share prices immediately and the resulting fall in wealth will cut consumer spending further. Lower share prices will also raise the cost of equity capital, depressing business investment in plant and equipment.

The Obama budget calls for tax increases of more than $1.1 trillion over the next decade. . . .

Mr. Obama's biggest proposed tax increase is the cap-and-trade system of requiring businesses to buy carbon dioxide emission permits. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that the proposed permit auctions would raise about $80 billion a year and that these extra taxes would be passed along in higher prices to consumers. Anyone who drives a car, uses public transportation, consumes electricity or buys any product that involves creating CO2 in its production would face higher prices.

CBO Director Douglas Elmendorf testified before the Senate Finance Committee on May 7 that the cap-and-trade price increases resulting from a 15% cut in CO2 emissions would cost the average household roughly $1,600 a year, . . .

But while the cap-and-trade tax rises with income, the relative burden is greatest for low-income households. According to the CBO, households in the lowest-income quintile spend more than 20% of their income on energy intensive items (primarily fuels and electricity), while those in the highest-income quintile spend less than 5% on those products.

The CBO warns that the estimate of an $80 billion-a-year tax increase could be significantly higher or lower, depending on how the program is designed. The Waxman-Markey bill currently before Congress calls for reducing greenhouse gasses 20% by 2020 and by an incredible 83% by 2050. As the government reduces the amount of CO2 that is allowed, the price of the CO2 permits would rise and the pass-through to consumer prices would also increase.

The next-largest tax increase -- with a projected rise in revenue of more than $300 billion between 2011 and 2019 -- comes from increasing the tax rates on the very small number of taxpayers with incomes over $250,000. Because this revenue estimate doesn't take into account the extent to which the higher marginal tax rates would cause those taxpayers to reduce their taxable incomes -- by changing the way they are compensated, increasing deductible expenditures, or simply earning less -- it overstates the resulting increase in revenue.

This is a large part of the smoke and mirrors of the Obama unrealistic forecasts. If a 10% tax in place on $1000 of income brings in $100 today, raising the tax to 15% almost assuredly does not mean that tax receipts will rise to $150. The more confiscatory taxes become, the more people do what they can to lessen the burden. To continue with Mr. Feldstein:

Since the projected revenue from this source is already designated to be used for Mr. Obama's health plan, some other tax increases will be needed. Moreover, Mr. Obama's budget characterizes the projected $634 billion outlay for health-care reform as just a down payment on the program. The budget notes that there would be "additional resources and new benefits to be determined with Congress." Those additional resources would no doubt be even higher taxes.

The third major tax increase is the plan to raise $220 billion over the next nine years by changing the taxation of foreign-source income. While some extra revenue could no doubt come from ending the tax avoidance gimmicks that use dummy corporations in the Caribbean, most of the projected revenue comes from disallowing corporations to pay lower tax rates on their earnings in countries like Germany, Britain and Ireland. The purpose of the tax change is not just to raise revenue but also to shift overseas production by American firms back to the U.S. by reducing the tax advantage of earning profits abroad.

The administration is likely to be disappointed about its ability to achieve both goals. Bringing production back to be taxed at the higher U.S. tax rate would raise the cost of capital and make the products less competitive in global markets. American corporations would therefore have an incentive to sell their overseas subsidiaries to foreign firms. That would leave future profits overseas, denying the Treasury Department any claim on the resulting tax revenue. And new foreign owners would be more likely to use overseas suppliers than to rely on inputs from the U.S. The net result would be less revenue to the Treasury and fewer jobs in America. . . .

Read the entire article. To add to this list of proposed taxes, we find today that the Senate is looking into raising taxes on sin - specifically, alcohol, tobacco, chips and sodas. The bottom line, Obama's plans seem to be a clear path to a much weaker economy - and the people who are going to bear the biggest brunt are those in the lower and lower middle class.

As to Medicaid, that is clearly a plan that has to be addressed. But instead of trying to staunch the bleeding, Obama is making ridiculous claims that it can only be done as part of an incredibly expensive move to universal health care. As Megan McCardle points out:

Perhaps predictably, someone showed up in the comments to my post on Medicare and Social Security to argue that liberal analysts have very serious plans to cut Medicare's costs, which is why we need universal coverage, so that we can implement those very serious plans.

I hear this argument quite often, and it's gibberish in a prom dress. Any cost savings you want to wring out of Medicare can be wrung out of Medicare right now: the program is large and powerful enough, and costly enough, that they are worth doing without adding a single new person to the mix. Conversely, if there is some political or institutional barrier which is preventing you from controlling Medicare cost inflation, than that barrier probably is not going away merely because the program covers more people. Indeed, to the extent that seniors themselves are the people blocking change (as they often are), adding more users makes it harder, not easier, to get things done.

Lastly, in this whirlwind of bad news, Carl at No Oil For Pacifists has an exceptional post documenting Obama's economic moves over the past 100+ days:

What if the Presidency were a college course? Should Obama get good marks for making the first steps towards financial sanity? Imagine Obama's mid-semester report card from an ivy-covered academy . . .

Read it, and do hit all of the links. You will be amazed that Obama gets an A in econ 101.

Read More...

Summary only...

Math, Not Ideology

Much as I admire President Obama, I believe with something approaching certainty that his spending will bring this country to its knees. “Sustainability” is all the rage as a buzzword, but a $3.6 trillion budget is not “sustainable.” Doubling the national debt is not “sustainable.” Inaction in the face of $77 trillion in unfunded liabilities (Social Security, Medicare, entitlements) is not “sustainable.” This is math, not ideology.

- Author Christopher Buckley, writing at The Daily Beast

Mr. Buckley's assessment of our economic posture could not be more accurate when looking only at Obama's first 100 days. But Mr. Buckley's assessment hardly presents the full picture of the danger presented to our economy by the Obama drive to socialism. The numbers mentioned by Mr. Buckley are the tip of the Obama iceberg. Still on the horizon are Obama's plans to take over medical insurance and the student loan sector, both of which will add heavilly to our debt. And then there are the massive costs Obama seeks to impose on our economy using the canard that carbon dixoide is a pollutant. Obama's purpose there is to force us off oil and coal and into a utopian world of "green energy" No, Mr. Buckley's assessment, though accurate, doesn't even begin to contemplate the totality of spending and taxation planned by Obama.

And as an aside, you don't see many new oil wells going up, do you? Or what about offshore oil exploration? Coal fired plants? Nuclear power? Weren't these part of the centrist Obama campaign promises? But as should be obvious to all - even the most partisan of Obama supporters - Obama's campaign promises were not worth the paper upon which they were printed. Indeed, while Obama did and still does speak as a centrist, he governs from the far left.

As to energy, note that the global conditions that gave rise to $4 a gallon gas in the U.S. a year ago have not gone away. They are, like a cancer, merely in remission. India and China will recover and their thirst for oil will resume. Obama is only weakening our ability to withstand those inevitable costs as he steers us towards "green energy" that is wildly cost ineffective. In good times, we can subsidize those "green energy" boondogles and the population, looking at their energy bill, is none the wiser. But that will all come to a crashing halt when oil passes by the $300 a barrel mark on a trajectory ever upwards. God help us when that scenario hits, as it inevitably will.

We are rushing headlong into massive inflation at a minimum. You cannot print tons of money to without devaluing your currency. Little could be more well proven. And indeed, even China is no longer willing to buy Treasury securities. If what I heard on the news is accurate, than Obama plans to address this by having other U.S. government bodies buy the treasury securities, thus giving us the werewithall to fund spending through an accounting gambit in what can only be described as a government run fraud scheme. Such schemes inevitably fail, and catastrophically so. That coupled with the anti-business, pro-tax policies of the Obama administration hang like a sword of Damoclese over our economy.

I am daily amazed at the examples I see of the post modern left in action, claiming as reality whatever it is they want it to be. But math is not subject to such fantasy. Unfortunately for all us, two plus two always equals four.

Read More...

Summary only...

Socialist Laboratories

I have long maintained that the UK is a laboratory for the ills of socialism when it is is integrated into a Western democracy. George Will, today, identifies a second - California.
__________________________________________________________

This from George Will, noting the descent of California into a heavilly unionized, grossly overspent and over-taxed leftist . . . well, 'utopia' would not be the right word:

. . . National economic revival is being impeded because one-eighth of the nation's population lives in a state that is driving itself into permanent stagnation. California's perennial boast -- that it is the incubator of America's future -- now has an increasingly dark urgency.

Under Arnold Schwarzenegger, the best governor the states contiguous to California have ever had, people and businesses have been relocating in those states. For four consecutive years, more Americans have moved out of California than have moved in. California's business costs are more than 20 percent higher than the average state's. In the last decade, net out-migration of Americans has been 1.4 million. California is exporting talent while importing Mexico's poverty. The latter is not California's fault; the former is.

If, since 1990, state spending increases had been held to the inflation rate plus population growth, the state would have a $15 billion surplus instead of a $42 billion budget deficit, which is larger than the budgets of all but 10 states. Since 1990, the number of state employees has increased by more than a third. In Schwarzenegger's less than six years as governor, per capita government spending, adjusted for inflation, has increased nearly 20 percent.

Liberal orthodoxy has made the state dependent on a volatile source of revenues -- high income tax rates on the wealthy. In 2006, the top 1 percent of earners paid 48 percent of the income taxes. California's income and sales taxes are among the nation's highest, its business conditions among the worst, as measured by 16 variables directly influenced by the Legislature. Unemployment, the nation's fourth highest, is 11.2 percent.

. . . Flinching from serious budget cutting, and from confronting public employees unions, some Californians focus on process questions. They devise candidate-selection rules designed to diminish the role of parties, thereby supposedly making more likely the election of "moderates" amenable to even more tax increases.

But what actually ails California is centrist evasions. The state's crisis has been caused by "moderation," understood as splitting the difference between extreme liberalism and hyperliberalism, a "reasonableness" that merely moderates the speed at which the ever-expanding public sector suffocates the private sector.

California has become liberalism's laboratory, in which the case for fiscal conservatism is being confirmed. The state is a slow learner and hence will remain a drag on the nation's economy. But it will be a net benefit to the nation if the federal government and other state governments profit from California's negative example . . .

Read the entire article.

Read More...

Summary only...

Pork In The Night

It is not the title of the latest pornographic flick, merely the latest senatorial obscenity.


_____________________________________________________

Senators John McCain and Jim DeMint sponsored a bill that would have placed a moratorium on earmarks for a year. The odious Harry Reid, the man who recently attempted to defend the earmark process as part of constitutional system at its inception, scheduled a vote on the bill late in the eve when reporting on it would be at a minimum. This from the WSJ:

For Congressional Appropriators, Thursday night's vote cashiering the earmark moratorium was an embarrassment of riches, with some 71 Senators endorsing Capitol Hill's spending culture. For everyone else, it was merely embarrassing.

The amendment, sponsored by Jim DeMint (R., S.C.), would have imposed a one-year earmark freeze, and it seemed to be gaining momentum earlier in the week, even cheered on by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. But the Appropriations empire struck back, twisting every arm to preserve its spending privileges. The measure was voted down after being ruled "non-germane" to the budget. That's as good a measure as any of the Congressional mentality: Apparently earmarks, which totaled $18.3 billion for 2008, aren't relevant to overall spending.

Just three Republican Appropriators voted for the amendment, including surprise support from longtime skeptic Mitch McConnell. No such shockers from the Democrats, with all Appropriators going against and only six Senators bucking the party line, especially Missouri's Claire McCaskill, one of the more courageous antipork champions.

Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton no doubt backed the moratorium to insulate themselves against one of John McCain's signature themes. But they're also bending to the broader political winds. In an election year, voters understand the waste and corruption that pork enables, leading even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to say, "I'm losing patience with earmarks."

That Mr. McCain's Republican colleagues fail, or refuse, to recognize the political potency is not a good sign. More GOP Senators voted against the moratorium than voted for it, proving that they are just as complacent about pork as most Democrats. And this vote comes on the heels of offenses like appointing ranking GOP Appropriator Thad Cochran ($837 million in pork last year) to the earmark-reform "working committee." The Republicans appear to be settling in comfortably with their minority status.

Read the entire article. And there is more on the vote at Hot Air, including a list of the Senators who voted against the bill. I suspect the votes of Clinton, Obama and McConnell were little more than an attempt to innoculate themselves from criticism. All three are committed porkers.

Q&O, in defining the problems with pork, had this to say:

1. Earmarks are not a significant fiscal problem - certainly not when compared to entitlements or other programs.

2. However, earmarks are the primary fulcrum for outside interests to corrupt the legislative process. Earmarks are the source of much of the undue power of individual Congressmen.

3. Earmarks aren't just corruption bait, though. They are also an Incumbent Slush Fund, allowing politicians to spread the pelf around their State/District to secure votes and favor. Perhaps we should start counting them as de facto campaign contributions. That's exactly how they are used.

I would add a fourth paragraph to that, and that is that the earmark process itself is corrupt. This from an article on earmarks in the Daily Standard.

President Bush seems to grasp the issue. A year ago he publicly complained that "over 90 percent of earmarks never make it to the floor of the House and Senate. They are dropped into committee reports that are not even part of the bill that arrives on my desk. You didn't vote them into law. I didn't sign them into law. Yet, they're treated as if they have the force of law."

Earmarks are corrupting and, unfortunately, a wholly bipartisan addiction. In an era where our long term fiscal health is very much at issue and out of control spending threatens the long-term viability of our nation, earmarks are not simply a minor problem, but an obscene emblam of corruption and an existential jettisoning of fiscal discipline. For conservatives, watching our Republican legislators dine at the trough is the equivalent of watching Nero fiddle while Rome burns.

George Will, in a column a month ago, gave the sordid blow by blow description of how earmarks, if not outright corruption, certainly dance on the knife's edge of corruption. Certainly the worst excesses of this corrupt system are also often a complete waste of taxpayer funds.

Most recently, we learn from the Obama camp that he secured a million dollar earmark for the University of Chicago Hospitals, where his wife is employed as VP of Community Affairs. Once Obama was elected Senator, the University nearly tripled her salary to $316,962. Is this corruption? I am sure it is not in the criminal sense, but it certainly has the stench of corruption and quid pro quo about it.

The first step to getting a handle on out of control government spending will be an end to the modern practice of earmarks. And the only chance of that happening is if McCain is elected and crams it down the throats of our corrupt Republican Senators.

Read More...

Summary only...

Republicans Return To Reagan

There is little disagreement that Republicans as a group lost their way over the past several years. Republican leadership in both the House and Senate has ranged from weak to nonexistent and loyalty has mattered more than bedrock principals and values. That is the only reason I can fathom that Republicans put Jerry Lewis and Ted Stevens anywhere near our nation’s checkbook. Conservative values that infused the Republican Party from Reagan's presidency through the Contract with America fell by the wayside as Republicans settled into the majority. Nowhere was this more evident than in spending. The Republicans of today tossed aside the mantle of fiscal conservatism, embraced earmarks and spent like drunken Democrats. Indeed, in a role reversal, the Dems rode to power in 2006 on their promises to clean up the fiscal mess and to attack earmarks. As is now apparent, that role reversal barely survived the swearing in ceremonies.

Regardless, there is apparently a movement afoot to try and breathe life back into the Conservative movement among our lawmakers.

Capitol Hill Republicans are invoking former President Ronald Reagan in their latest effort to strengthen their party's conservative credentials, forming a new caucus whose members must pledge to support limited government and to restore ethics in Washington.

"We don't want to go back to what Reagan did," said Sen. Jim DeMint, South Carolina Republican. "We want to take those principles he stood for and go forward, applying them to the challenges of today."

. . . "As a party, we've been strong on social issues," said Rep. Paul D. Ryan, Wisconsin Republican. "But on spending issues, we've dropped the ball."

. . . Along with Mr. DeMint, Reagan21 was formed by a small group of similarly-minded fiscal and social conservatives. Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma is the Senate's other leading member, while the House membership includes Rep. Jeb Hensarling of Texas, the RSC chairman; John Shadegg of Arizona; Mr. Campbell; Tom Price of Georgia; and Mr. Ryan.

"Americans are disgusted by a Congress that is self-dealing and corrupt — that spends too much and under the control of the new majority is moving dramatically to the left," Mr. Shadegg said.

Read the whole story here. This news is strikes me like good news out of Iraq. It is wonderful and it’s a real step in the right direction, but there is a long way to go before success can be claimed.

Read More...

Summary only...