Amy Ridenour is the president of the National Center for Public Policy Research. She and her husband David, the vice president of the National Center, are the parents of three third graders. David's comments, like those of other National Center staff members, directors, associates and fellows, often appear in this blog.
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Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Media Matters on Deneen Borelli (Ever So Briefly)
MediaMatters has posted a clip of Project 21 Fellow Deneen Borelli speaking on Sean Hannity's Fox TV show on Friday the 13th.
MediaMatters headlines its post "Borelli on Hannity: A 'big message' in black community is 'you are owed something... and don't have to work hard.'"
If you watch the complete clip (see above), or follow Deneen's work, it is clear Deneen is concerned that this philosophy of life has been expanding in all American communities.
MediaMatters focuses, though, only on this one comment of Deneen's relating to the black community. Perhaps this is a special concern of theirs.
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Project 21's Deneen Borelli on "Hannity" on Friday Night
Project 21 Fellow Deneen Borelli will appear on the "Great American Panel" on the Fox News Channel's "Hannity" program at 9:30 PM eastern on Friday, November 13.
Deneen will discuss the progress of health care reform in the Senate, the track record of Obama's "stimulus" spending and how Jim Carrey can't seem to say nice things about capitalism despite being one of the highest-paid actors in Hollywood.
Check your local listings for Fox News Channel on cable. Fox News is available on channel 118 on Fios, channel 205 on Dish Network and channel 360 on DirecTV.
This post was written by David Almasi, executive director of the National Center for Public Policy Research. Write the author at info@nationalcenter.org. Please note if you prefer that your correspondence be kept private.
President Barack Obama is often likened - and clearly sees himself as spiritual successor - to presidential luminaries like Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt. But he is fast on track to following the footsteps of a less celebrated predecessor - George H.W. Bush.
Candidate Bush accepted his party's nomination at the 1988 Republican National Convention with the immortal, Peggy Noonan-penned promise "Read my lips: no new taxes." When President Bush later agreed to raise taxes as part of the 1990 budget negotiations, he wrecked his re-election chances and became a one-termer.
In September, 2008, candidate Obama promised, "I can make this firm pledge. Under my plan, no family making $250,000 will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes."
Oops. The health care bill the House passed on Saturday, for which Obama personally lobbied members of Congress, contains - new taxes. Lots of them. New taxes that will effect earners of all income levels, but which will especially hurt small-business owners.
Of course this bill, like all of the health care proposals recently debated by Congress, was instigated by, and created at the behest of, Barack Obama, who promised in his February joint address to Congress, "quality, affordable health care for every American." That he could promise such a bauble while simultaneously vowing not to raise our taxes "one dime" betrays either a stunning economic ignorance - or deep mendacity.
Obama has clearly studied the greats, Lincoln and F.D.R. But he should also have made an examination of the less successful presidents, like George H. W. Bush, lest he repeat their mistakes and suffer their fate in political purgatory.
Written by Matt Patterson, policy analyst at the National Center for Public Policy Research. Write the author at info@nationalcenter.org. As we occasionally reprint letters on the blog, please note if you prefer that your correspondence be kept private, or only published anonymously.
1,990 pages of budget busting, mind numbing legalese! (cue my eyes scream)
Read, if you dare: H.R. 3962, the scariest thing to slither out of Capitol Hill... since the Baucus Proposal.
Written by Matt Patterson, policy analyst at the National Center for Public Policy Research. Write the author at info@nationalcenter.org. As we occasionally reprint letters on the blog, please note if you prefer that your correspondence be kept private, or only published anonymously.
I'm having another of what I call "radio days," in which I do a lot of radio interviews -- in this instance, on the latest developments in the health care debate.
If you care to tune in, I will be on the following stations (please note, all times given are Eastern):
KURV McAllen, TX 7:11 AM ET
WFLA Tampa, FL 7:23 AM ET
KTRH Houston, TX 7:34 AM ET
WTVN Columbus, OH 7:45 AM ET
WSYR Syracuse, NY 8:06AM ET
KIDO Boise, ID 8:20 AM ET
KVI Seattle 8:35 AM ET
KCOL Fort Collins, CO 9:17 AM ET
WHLO Akron, OH 9:40 AM ET
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Looks like the lobbying profession, taken as a group, couldn't be happier that the feds are messing up our health care system so badly.
Notice that the lobbyists quoted in the The Hill story by Jeffrey Young that I linked to above apparently did not want to be identified by name. I guess they still have enough pride to be ashamed of themselves.
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I'm a little confused. Maybe you can help me out. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus wants to cut $500 billion from Medicare to cover about 30 million uninsured. That's over 10 years. Handing the entire amount out to the uninsured would work out to about $6,666 annually for each family of four.
That should be sufficient for a health care plan of some kind. Presumably the resultant reduction in cost shifting would lower costs, too. So why does he plan to spend an additional 330 billion?
Hmm... Couldn't be about control, could it?
Written by David A. Ridenour, vice president of the National Center for Public Policy Research. Write the author at info@nationalcenter.org. As we occasionally reprint letters on the blog, please note if you prefer that your correspondence be kept private, or only published anonymously.
Project 21 Fellow Deneen Borelli will be a guest on the Fox New Channel show "Fox and Friends" Monday, October 19. She is expecting to discuss the White House war on Fox News as well as left-wing pressure on the White House to adopt a second "stimulus" package.
If you want to tune in, you can catch her at approximately 6:15 AM Eastern.
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Jules Crittenden: Intelligence without experience is like knowing how roller skates work without ever having skated. (One guess who he's talking about.)
PhRMA spends $9.4 million more promoting left-wing health care "reform"; forgets left-wing health care means drugs gets rationed.
Patterico tries to get a Washington Post correction. Good luck with that.
Outrage of the Day: Tax-Financed Business Loans to Wealthy, Politically-Connected Investors
I need go no further than posting the first sentence of Josh Mitchell and Stephen Power's Wall Street Journal News story, "Gore-Backed Car Firm Gets Large U.S. Loan: "A tiny car company backed by former Vice President Al Gore has just gotten a $529 million U.S. government loan to help build a hybrid sports car in Finland that will sell for about $89,000."
If it makes you feel any better, the loan was approved by a senior advisor to Obama's Energy Secretary, Stephen Chu. The car venture is partially backed by a firm of which Gore is a partner. The firm has made $2.2 million in political donations, mostly to Democrats, including Obama.
Mitchell and Powers quote Leslie Paige of Citizens Against Government Waste saying about the car, "This is not for average Americans. This is for people to put something in their driveway that is a conversation piece. It's status symbol thing."
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Has the Congressional Black Caucus Ever Been Polled on the Slavery Question?
Here's a bit of irony for a Sunday evening, courtesy of James Taranto, writing in his Best of the Web column published by the Wall Street Journal:
Only seven Congressional Black Caucus members voted to defund Acorn, and here's the honor roll...:
Sanford Bishop (Ga.) William Lacy Clay (Mo.) John Conyers (Mich.) Artur Davis (Ala.) Hank Johnson (Ga.) Kendrick Meek (Fla.) Laura Richardson (Calif.)
That is to say, fewer than 1 in 4 Black Caucus members voted to stop spending taxpayers' money on an organization that has been caught on video at least five times offering advice on how to practice slavery.
To be fair, hypocrisy may not be involved. I'm not sure anyone has ever polled the Congressional Black Caucus on the slavery question. Maybe a handful of its members have been for it all along.
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Daily Kos Wants Tea Party Participants to Forgo All Government Services, But Still Pay All Taxes
At times, activists of the superficial left write such stupid things, it is embarrassing to read them.
Such is the case with a Laura Clawson Daily Kos post Friday in which lefties are encouraged to send a faux "Socialist Free Purity Pledge" around the Internet. The gist of Clawson's message is that anyone who attended a Tea Party rally is a hypocrite if they from this point forward ever use a single thing funded by the federal government.
The post had at the time I read it 265 comments, most of which were favorable to the idea, which many of them actually thought was clever.
I ask myself, can the activist left be so uniformed as to believe that when it comes to government spending, there are only two positions possible, that of wanting the feds to spend more and grow larger, and that of wanting the feds to spend not one penny? That anyone who does not support President Obama's government-expansion plans is, ipso facto, the strictest of libertarians?
Seeing how badly the left governs when in office, I conclude "yes." Yes, they really can be this ignorant.
Which explains why the leftists in Congress and the White House think socialized medicine works and that the best way to deal with the Kremlin is from a position of slobbering, supplicating subservience.
The leftists think anyone who attended a Tea Party rally should sign a document pledging they will never use a government service again...
...but what the lefties don't put in their "Socialist Free Purity Pledge" is a pledge of their own to pass legislation offering to refund the tax dollars coercively paid by every person who might choose to sign their Purity Pledge and who sticks to it.
So selfish, these lefties. In their bitter little world, even the people who don't use any government will be forced to pay for it.
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E-mail comments to info@nationalcenter.org. | Subscribe to this blog's feed. | Follow the National Center for Public Policy Research on Twitter. | Download our book Shattered Lives: 100 Victims of Government Health Care.
President Obama is saying he won't sign a health care bill that adds "one dime to the deficit":
"There are some principles that, if they are not embodied in the bill, I will not sign it," Obama said in an interview with ABC News' Robin Roberts aired on "Good Morning America" today.
Yet the president declined in the interview to draw a line in the sand on a so-called "public option," offering government-run health insurance to those who cannot find coverage privately.
Asked if the must-sign elements include that option, the president said: "I will give you an example -- if it's adding one dime to the deficit, if it's not fully paid for," then he will not sign the legislation...
Nice words, but if he means them, why has he been working for months for the trillion+ dollar House health care bill?
Surely even a man who spends tax dollars as easily as does our president considers a trillion dollars to be real money.
Or perhaps he's signaling an intention to cut even more from Medicare?
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Tom Blumer: "How crazy is it that Ford has to 'negotiate' a new contract with the United Auto Workers union, even though the union has ownership interests in two of its principal competitors...?
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During the Cash for Clunkers program, GM sales dropped 20 percent vs. last year's and Chrysler's dropped 15 percent.
Ford sales increased 17 percent.
The reason -- aside from the fact that people don't want to buy from Government Motors -- is that GM and Chrysler didn't have sufficient inventory of the kind of cars that qualified for the program.
So, let's see here... Government-run companies couldn't anticipate the demand from a government-run incentive program.
I knew they didn't understand the free market, but they don't understand government either.
And if Chrysler and GM didn't have sufficient inventory for demand, why the heck were the two companies matching the cash for clunkers program with their own incentive program? Why not apply their incentive to the vehicles that didn't meet Cash for Clunkers' specifications?
This post was written by David Ridenour, vice president of the National Center for Public Policy Research. Write the author at info@nationalcenter.org. As we occasionally reprint letters, please note if you prefer that correspondence be kept private, or only published anonymously.
Examiner: If Americans were getting an average of 20 miles to the gallon before Cash for Clunkers, they are getting 20.0046 mpg after it. In a best-case scenario.
Tonsils redux: President Obama says greedy doctors are coming for your feet... but LA Times saysprevention in these cases is expensive. Why don't the greedy doctors do prevention, Mr. Prez?
Funeral Director Full-Employment Bill: President Obama sees post office as model for health care system.
Obama: "Technically, I'm not for a single-payer system." Technically?
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John Mackey, co-founder and CEO of Whole Foods, has eight suggestions for improving health care in today's Wall Street Journal.
They are, quoting Mackey:
Remove the legal obstacles that slow the creation of high-deductible health insurance plans and health savings accounts (HSAs). The combination of high-deductible health insurance and HSAs is one solution that could solve many of our health-care problems...
Equalize the tax laws so that employer-provided health insurance and individually owned health insurance have the same tax benefits...
Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines...
Repeal government mandates regarding what insurance companies must cover. These mandates have increased the cost of health insurance by billions of dollars. What is insured and what is not insured should be determined by individual customer preferences and not through special-interest lobbying.
Enact tort reform to end the ruinous lawsuits that force doctors to pay insurance costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. These costs are passed back to us through much higher prices for health care.
Make costs transparent so that consumers understand what health-care treatments cost...
Enact Medicare reform. We need to face up to the actuarial fact that Medicare is heading towards bankruptcy and enact reforms that create greater patient empowerment, choice and responsibility.
Finally, revise tax forms to make it easier for individuals to make a voluntary, tax-deductible donation to help the millions of people who have no insurance and aren't covered by Medicare, Medicaid or the State Children's Health Insurance Program.
Mackey's op-ed is excellent. I strongly encourage folks to read the whole thing.
This post was written by National Center for Public Policy Research Vice President David Ridenour. E-mail comments to info@nationalcenter.org. | Subscribe to this blog's feed. | Follow on Twitter.
Washington Independent: Cash for Clunkers "steals its funding from a Department of Energy program encouraging the development of renewable energy technologies." Someone thought this bill was about the environment?
John McCain calls Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill "a farce," saying "they bought every industry off - steel mills, agriculture, utilities." More welfare for the rich.
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10 reasons the government should take over health care (NOT).
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As to the statistics themselves, Scott Hodge of the Tax Foundation, which provided the tax analysis above, notes:
Remarkably, the share of the tax burden borne by the top 1 percent now exceeds the share paid by the bottom 95 percent of taxpayers combined. In 2007, the bottom 95 percent paid 39.4 percent of the income tax burden. This is down from the 58 percent of the total income tax burden they paid twenty years ago.
To put this in perspective, the top 1 percent is comprised of just 1.4 million taxpayers and they pay a larger share of the income tax burden now than the bottom 134 million taxpayers combined.
Insulating 95 percent of voters from the consequences of their electoral decisions is dangerous and misleading. Does anyone really believe that we can expand nondefense spending to a record share of gross domestic product, reform the health-care system that amounts to one-sixth of the economy, reinvent the energy portfolio that powers our lives, and drive next-generation broadband to every home while cutting taxes for 95 percent of Americans?
I don't believe it. I believe we need to cut spending, and I also believe the top one percent -- which does not, alas, include me in their number -- are paying more than their fair share.
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Hovde explains how Cash for Clunkers hurts "already-hurting auto parts suppliers," recyclers and lower-income people, and she has the facts to prove it.
John McCain reportedly is going to filibuster the renewal of Cash for Clunkers when it hits the Senate next week, and good for him. Too bad it was barely debated when it passed the first time.
I agree with those who point to the initial self-destruction of this program and say, if the federal government can't administer a program to give away free money so people can buy themselves a nice new car, how can we possibly trust it to run our health care?
Somebody is saying that, right? Because we would be insane to trust our very lives to a government this full of boobs.
Cash for Clunkers -- the coercive confiscation of the wealth of some people to help other people upgrade the quality of their consumer goods (notice we don't even bother with means testing anymore) -- is antithetical to common sense, fairness and any sense of budgetary realism. It's so bad, it's anti-American. Our federal government was not set up for the purpose of buying people vehicles (or anything else, for that matter).
I'm going to go now and read the list of the Members of Congress who voted today to extend this travesty. None of them, I believe, deep in the hearts, are Americans. Their passports may say they are Americans, but their hearts show something else. And anybody who takes the money under this program is a welfare queen, and should be ashamed of themselves. You are stealing from your fellow taxpayers, and the government endorsing the theft doesn't make it right.
Addendum, 8/1/09: The U.S. public opposes the program, 54 percent to 35 percent.
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"Mouthing Disingenuous Assurances Isn't Leadership or Change"
Project 21 Chairman Mychal Massie, writing in his personal column on WorldNetDaily, asks: "Why the rush on Obamacare?"?
Mychal (as usual!) doesn't mince any words in his conclusion:
Parading in front of teleprompters and mouthing disingenuous assurances isn't leadership or change. It is simply more of the same from another smarmy politician who will say and do anything to advance a diabolical agenda – no matter how bad it is for the nation.
You can see what Mychal has to say by reading his column here.
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Some sample savings found by U.S. government agencies in response to President Obama's request that agencies come up with $100 million in savings:
* The U.S. Forest Service will get by with new white vehicles, despite preferring green.
* When the Army sends soldiers on vacation, it will send more at a time.
* FEMA is going to re-use emergency trailers instead of throwing them out.
* Homeland Security and NHTSA are going to read newspapers online instead of subscribing to the paper versions.
* The Navy will delete unused email accounts, which, somehow, will save $5 million. (How many unused accounts can there possibly be?)
Regrettably, only one federal department -- the Labor Department -- suggested eliminating a program.
If only government agencies were as parsimonious about spending as they are about cutting programs.
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U.S. government to study dangerous pathogens in Tornado Alley. Yucca Mountain remains unused. Obama is tightening CAFE standards, which make cars less safe. The way we're going, the euthanasia provisions in the health care bill will be superfluous.
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RedState reports: A top Democratic Congressional staffer says hospice is how the Democrats' health care bill controls health care costs.
MoveOn.org organized a rally in favor of Obama's health care reform legislation outside GOP Senator John Cornyn's Dallas office, but found itself outnumbered by Tea Party patriots as much as 20-1.
Midwives to be paid the same as doctors under the House Democrats' health care bill. America to follow Britain in giving up having a doctor present at births?
Members of the Congressional Black Caucus agree with President Obama about the Cambridge Police Department.
Put some tobacco in a pipe and smoke it, and your government health premiums go up. Put some crack in and smoke it and, hey, no problem!
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House Left Moves to End Community Service Requirement in Public Housing
The Congressional conservatives' Republican Study Committee reports that Congressmen Rangel (D-NY), Frank (D-MA), Waters (D-CA) and Watt (D-NC) will introduce an amendment to the Transportation-HUD appropriations bill later today to prohibit requiring people in public housing to contribute eight hours per month to community service or spend a comparable time in an economic self-sufficiency program.
Eight hours per month must have been too much to ask.
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The Congressional Budget Office said today taxpayers should expect no net savings if one of the health care plans being developed by House and Senate Democrats is adopted.
In a nutshell, CBO Director Doug Elmendorf says any savings the plans might deliver are offset by additional costs they impose.
President Obama, has, of course, been insistent that health care reform is necessary so cost savings can be achieved.
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House Health Care "Reform" Bill Bans Sale of Private Health Insurance Policies
Investor's Business Daily is reporting that page 16 of the House Majority's health care bill bans new health insurance policies from being sold after the bill becomes law.
The editorial says, in part:
It didn't take long to run into an "uh-oh" moment when reading the House's "health care for all Americans" bill. Right there on Page 16 is a provision making individual private medical insurance illegal.
When we first saw the paragraph Tuesday, just after the 1,018-page document was released, we thought we surely must be misreading it. So we sought help from the House Ways and Means Committee.
It turns out we were right: The provision would indeed outlaw individual private coverage. Under the Orwellian header of "Protecting The Choice To Keep Current Coverage," the "Limitation On New Enrollment" section of the bill clearly states:
"Except as provided in this paragraph, the individual health insurance issuer offering such coverage does not enroll any individual in such coverage if the first effective date of coverage is on or after the first day" of the year the legislation becomes law.
So we can all keep our coverage, just as promised - with, of course, exceptions: Those who currently have private individual coverage won't be able to change it. Nor will those who leave a company to work for themselves be free to buy individual plans from private carriers...
...It took just 16 pages of reading to find this naked attempt by the political powers to increase their reach. It's scary to think how many more breaches of liberty we'll come across in the final 1,002.
There's more in the editorial; for copyright reasons I could only excerpt it. Please go to Investor's Business Daily and read "It's Not An Option" immediately. Then ask your friends to do so.
This isn't merely a smoking gun showing the liberals are making a hard push now for socialized medicine, folks. This is a forest fire.
Addendum, 9:30 AM: A private source is telling me that, under the legislation, individual private insurance policies would still be permitted for sale through the government's insurance exchange, but the current system for the purchase and sale of health insurance would be shut down. So, as Matt Drudge would say, developing...
The Government's Penalties for Success Are Running Into Its Subsidies for Failure
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) says today in an article by Matt Cover for CNSNews.com that small businesses don't make $280,000 a year, so new health care tax hikes at that level won't harm small business.
Oddly though -- as a commenter on the CNSNews.com website noted -- the Small Business Administration will provide financial assistance to firms making many times that.
If you manufacture cigarettes, for example, you are eligible for Small Business Administration assistance if you have a thousand employees. Setting aside the question of why Congress is subsidizing cigarette manufacturing while penalizing it with sin taxes, can we rationally assume a business with a thousand employees never clears $280,000 a year?
So we appear to have a case in which you are penalized for being rich at the same time you are subsidized for not being rich enough.
But there is a method to Congress' madness, says Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX), as reported by Adam Brickley and Fadia Galindo for CNSNews.com. The Congressional majority's health care tax plan is designed to harm small businesses sufficiently to force them to cut their employees' health care benefits, thus forcing those employees onto the public health care plan.
So when it looks like Congress is taxing and subsidizing the same people in a completely nonsensical way, we can rest assured that there is a purpose behind it after all -- the purpose of driving as many of us as politically-possible into a substandard, inevitably insolvent public health care plan.
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Video of Tom Borelli on Obama's Corporatism Strategy on Glenn Beck
Here's the video of Monday's broadcast of the Glenn Beck Show on the Fox News channel in which Tom Borelli, director of the National Center for Public Policy Research's Free Enterprise Project and Wall Street analyst/Fox Business News commentator Charles Payne talk about GE's quasi-merger with the Obama Administration, GE's hiring of Linda Daschle as a lobbyist, the recent appointment of a GE executive to a top Obama Administration post at the EPA and how, as Glenn Beck put it in the segment, "the little guy gets screwed."
Although I don't endorse every sentiment in every sentence of this Associated Press article "PROMISES, PROMISES: Obama's Unkept Tax Pledge" by Stephen Ohlemacher, it's well worth reading.
The piece begins:
President Barack Obama promised to fix health care and trim the federal budget deficit, all without raising taxes on anyone but the wealthiest Americans. It's a promise he's already broken and will likely have to break again.
Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress have already increased tobacco taxes - which disproportionately hit the poor - to pay for extending health coverage to 4 million children in working low-income families.
Now, lawmakers are looking for more revenues to help pay for providing medical insurance to millions more who lack it at a projected cost of $1 trillion over the next decade.
The floated proposals include increasing taxes on alcohol, which could raise $62 billion over the next decade, and a new tax on sugary drinks such as soda, which could raise $52 billion...
Continuing my post about the Tea Parties in New York City and Washington, D.C. attended by National Center staff, here are photos of the July 4 Tea Party in Washington.
I estimate approximately 4,000 people attended the Tea Party in Washington D.C.
This post was written by David Almasi, executive director of the National Center for Public Policy Research. Write the author at info@nationalcenter.org. As we occasionally reprint letters on the blog, please note if you prefer that your correspondence be kept private, or only published anonymously.
A second round of "tea parties" took place across America this week. According to one organizer's web site, there were almost 1,500 scheduled events across America to protest the unabated growth of government, particularly since Obama took office.
On July 1, Project 21 fellow Deneen Borelli and her husband - National Center Free Enterprise Project Director Tom Borelli - attended the tea party in Times Square in New York City.
On July 4, National Center executive director David W. Almasi and his wife Nancy attended the tea party in Washington just steps from the Capitol.
Below are some photos from the New York City tea party. The next post will contain photos from the Washington D.C. tea party.
Deneen Borelli
This post was written by David Almasi, executive director of the National Center for Public Policy Research. Write the author at info@nationalcenter.org. As we occasionally reprint letters on the blog, please note if you prefer that your correspondence be kept private, or only published anonymously.
Quote of Note: Do We Now Need Government for Big Ticket Items?
"Health is potentially a big-ticket item, but so is a house and a car, and most folks manage to handle those without a Government Accommodation Plan or a Government Motor Vehicles System -- or, at any rate, they did in pre-bailout America."
"When President Obama tells you he's 'reforming' health care to 'control costs,' the point to remember is that the only way to control costs in health care is to have less of it."
Quote of Note: How Big Would a U.S. Health Bureaucracy Be?
"The British National Health Service is the biggest employer not just in the United Kingdom, but in the whole of Europe. Care to estimate the size and budget of a U.S. health bureaucracy?"
CBO: Kennedy's Health Care Bill Would Increase Deficit by $1.0 Trillion from 2010-2019
The Congressional Budget Office and Joint Committee on Taxation staff released this evening (PDF) a "preliminary analysis" of Title I of the draft of the Affordable Health Choices Act, which was created by Democrats on the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
...According to our preliminary assessment, enacting the proposal would result in a net increase in federal budget deficits of about $1.0 trillion over the 2010-2019 period. When fully implemented, about 39 million individuals would obtain coverage through the new insurance exchanges. At the same time, the number of people who had coverage through an employer would decline by about 15 million (or roughly 10 percent), and coverage from other sources would fall by about 8 million, so the net decrease in the number of people uninsured would be about 16 million or 17 million.
These new figures do not represent a formal or complete cost estimate for the draft legislation, for several reasons. The estimates provided do not address the entire bill—only the major provisions related to health insurance coverage. Some details have not been estimated yet, and the draft legislation has not been fully reviewed. Also, because expanded eligibility for the Medicaid program may be added at a later date, those figures are not likely to represent the impact that more comprehensive proposals—which might include a significant expansion of Medicaid or other options for subsidizing coverage for those with income below 150 percent of the federal poverty level—would have both on the federal budget and on the extent of insurance coverage...
The price tag is obviously the big news in this item, but the CBO/Joint Committee estimate that 15 million people would lose their employer-provided health insurance deserves some note.
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No Boo-Hoo-Hoo for California's Money Woes, If It Can Still Afford Public Parties
California's free-spending ways have led it to seek the money of federal taxpayers, but don't think that means Los Angeles is trying to stop spending money on frivolities.
The city intends to spend a million dollars on a victory parade for the Los Angeles Lakers, despite the city's need to cut its budget by hundreds of millions of dollars and the fact that unofficial celebrations turned criminal overnight, with crowds vandalizing buses and police cars and throwing rocks and bottles at police officers, resulting in five officers sustaining injuries.
The Lakers are a for-profit enterprise, and basketball is a game (it would be different if we were talking about a parade for returning war veterans). At a time when California is expecting federal taxpayers to bail it out of its own financial mess, the Lakers ought to be paying for its entire parade by itself.
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A liberal crusade for decades has been the transfer of the U.S. health care system to government hands.
So when the liberals are about to make their most serious run at their cherished prize in 16 years, you'd think they'd leave the pork out of their bill, wouldn't you? Because pork in the bill is a turnoff for many voters, regardless of their position on government-run health care.
I thought so. I was wrong.
According to Senator Mike Enzi (R-WY), who is Ranking Member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, the bill released by the Democrats of said committee last week has plenty of work.
According to Enzi, the bill includes:
A "Community Makeover Program" to spend billions to "beautify" streets, up to $10 per person in selected communities;
A federal government program to build new sidewalks and bike paths, and put up street lights;
Financing of new grocery stores and farmers’ markets;
Mandate that a new Washington health police bureaucracy dictate what local restaurants can offer their customers; and,
Subsidizing community projects such as jungle gyms in parks.
The big-spenders are so addicted to pork, they can't keep it out of anything.
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Bill McGurn of the Wall Street Journal writes: "Something's wrong when the president invokes a formula that makes it impossible for him to be wrong and it goes largely unchallenged."
Not quite. Two things are wrong. The White House shouldn't be making stuff up, and the media should be challenging the President over it.
Heck, according to the article, even the Democratic Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Max Baucus, is exposing the White House on this. If liberal Democrats can do it, why can't the media?
I'm sure some reporters are too dumb to realize they're being lied to flat-out, but surely not all of them are idiots.
What's the point of us paying the price of a newspaper if the President can lie and the media doesn't notice?
P.S. If you don't have a Wall Street Journal subscription and you're wondering what President Obama made up, it's a fake figure for the number of jobs his so-called "stimulus" spending bill has "saved." As the article explains, there's no measurement for anything like that. The White House had to have made it up.
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Outrage of the Day: Obama's Solar Powered Dishonesty
Speaking Wednesday at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada, President Obama bragged that a federal-government owned solar electric plant at the base saves taxpayers $1 million a year:
...right now, we're standing near the largest solar electric plant of its kind in the entire Western Hemisphere -- the entire Western Hemisphere. More than 72,000 solar panels built on part of an old landfill provide 25 percent of the electricity for the 12,000 people who live and work here at Nellis. That's the equivalent of powering about 13,200 homes during the day.
It's a project that took about half a year to complete, created 200 jobs, and will save the United States Air Force, which is the largest consumer of energy in the federal government, nearly $1 million -- $1 million a year.
My first thought: But what did it cost to build?
Courtesy of DRJ at Patterico, we have an answer: Over $100 million.
The plant opened 18 months ago, so President Obama's statement won't be true for 97 1/2 years.
Assuming no tax funds are spent on maintenance by then.
The only positive thing I can say here is that the President's statement probably wasn't technically a lie, because he most likely literally had no idea what he was talking about.
But what's his staff's excuse?
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Outrage of the Day: Keith Olbermann Got a Big Raise While His Employer Got a Bailout
Writing on U.S. News and World Report's website, Peter Roff notes that MSNBC's Keith Olbermann negotiated a $3.5 million raise at the very time his employer was receiving a taxpayer bailout.
While General Electric, the parent-company of your MSNBC network, was negotiating a $126 billion taxpayer-funded bailout, you signed a new contract raising your salary from $4 million to $7.5 million annually. You have used your show as a platform to call for the resignation of corporate executives accepting excessive bonuses on the backs of taxpayers who are picking up the tab for these atrocious bailouts, yet you yourself have no problem engaging in the same “class economic rape” that you accuse them of.
Please heed your own advice and stop accepting taxpayer money to subsidize your nightly diatribes. Resign or return the balance of your excessive raise to the U.S. Treasury.
Sincerely,
Go here if you'd like to sign it (and/or go if you'd like to watch a video the hilarious SNL send-up of Olbermann).
P.S. Here's a video of Keith Olbermann complaining about spending by bailed-out firms ("corporate pirates" ... who "need to be fired"). It's jaw-dropping to watch it knowing that he just got an extra $3.5 million in pay from a bailed-out firm.
Easton, Pennsylvania Tea Party Photo by Mychal Massie
Writing in his regular, independent column for WorldNetDaily, Project 21 Chairman Mychal Massie has strong words for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and no doubt others (such as David Axelrod) who belittle the Americans of all political persuasions who gathered across the country last week in "tea party" protests.
Said Mychal:
Any doubt about the condescending arrogance of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her ilk was laid to rest when she attacked the tea parties as being initiatives "funded by the high-end, we call it Astroturf -- it's not really a grass-roots movement -- its Astroturf by some of the wealthiest people in America to keep the focus on tax cuts for the rich, instead for the great middle class."
The Obama White House said those attending the tea parties were either disaffected, bitter Republicans, or voters acting out of frustration. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano characterized military veterans and the types of Americans attending tea party events as right-wing extremists and warned that said extremists (i.e., anyone that dares disagree with Obama policies) would use the bad economy and the election of a black man as president to recruit members. Government officials fomenting the agitprop that the rich white boogeyman is out to get you shows how far those in government are willing to go to increase their control over our rights, liberties and pursuits of happiness.
Americans are angry. Americans are disaffected, and voters are darn sure frustrated...
...I not only attended a tea party, I watched them develop and take root. I can assure the White House and Pelosi that those in attendance were of all political persuasions. I can assure Napolitano that we are angry, and we are recruiting members...
...The line in the sand has been drawn -- the pressing issue for those of us, from every political persuasion, who are fighting back is: What do we do next? We turned out by the hundreds of thousands across the nation -- but what now? What now is that we stay disgusted, determined and focused. Our enemy is worried because they know that if we do, they are in trouble.
They have insulted us as extremists, while Pelosi and the mainstream media referred to the illegal aliens that attempted to disrupt our economy by staging nationwide job walkouts as patriots.
We cannot afford to forget or relent. We have their attention and we must keep it...
...This isn't about Republican, Democrat, Libertarian or Independent -- it is about those of us who collectively have had enough of the wasteful spending and taxation. It is about those of us who are outraged over the debt that is being passed on to our children and grandchildren. It is about those of us who refuse to have foreign courts tell Americans in Kansas, Iowa or Kentucky what they can do with their land. We may not agree on every political issue -- but the tea parties are showing that we are united on those crucial issues...
Executive Director David Almasi and other National Center for Public Policy Research staff members were among the estimated 2,000 attendees at the Tea Party outside the White House today.
David took quite a few pictures, a few of which follow (see the note at the end of this post for reprint information; go here to see more pictures, a collection taken by staff member Devon Carlin):
And National Center for Public Policy Research staff members Jeff Temple and Devon Carlin...
Note: Bloggers, webmasters, journalists and others who would like to use any of these pictures are welcome to do so under the following conditions: We ask that you not sell them or deface them, and that they be credited as follows: "David Almasi/National Center for Public Policy Research," with a link back to this location.
Pictures taken by staff member Devon Carlin also are available on the same terms.
Research Associate Devon Carlin braved the rain today to attend the Washington, D.C. Tea Party outside the White House today (along with other other staff members from the National Center for Public Policy Research and Project 21's Kevin Martin, who spoke at the event).
An assortment of pictures Devon took at the White House Tea Party follows (see the note at the end of this post for reprint information; go here to see pictures taken by Executive Director David Almasi):
And, of course, a shot of some of the many tea bags...
Note: Bloggers, webmasters, journalists and others who would like to use any of these pictures are welcome to do so under the following conditions: We ask that you not sell them or deface them, and that they be credited as follows: "Devon Carlin/National Center for Public Policy Research," with a link back to this location.
More pictures, an assortment taken by David Almasi, are available here on the same terms.
If events in recent months have convinced you that what America needs is a new government bank, funded by tax dollars, to lend money to the production of so-called "green" technologies that don't merit a loan from a free-market bank, then you'll be pleased to know that Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), has introduced legislation to create such an entity.
If, on the other hand, you are less-than-pleased, you may want to watch the 5-minute Glenn Beck interview of Tom Borelli, co-director of The National Center for Public Policy Research's Free Enterprise Project, about this proposed government bank.
For additional information and links, please visit our sister blog, the Free Enterpriser.
Tom Borelli, director of The National Center for Public Policy Research's Free Enterprise Project, is scheduled to be a guest on today's "Glenn Beck" program on the Fox News Channel. He has been asked to appear to talk about proposed legislation to create a government-run "green bank" meant to help finance so-called green technologies.
Tom notes: "The last time the government got involved in banking we ended up with Fannie Mae and the housing bubble. Following that disaster, the last thing we need is to fund a green bubble."
"Glenn Beck" airs at 5:00 pm eastern on the Fox News Channel. Tom is tentatively scheduled to appear around 5:20 pm eastern. Check your local cable listings for channel.
To learn more about the "Glenn Beck" program, click here.
This post was written by National Center for Public Policy Research Executive Director David Almasi. To send comments to the author, write him at info@nationalcenter.org. Please state if a letter is not for publication or if you prefer that it be published anonymously.
On the other hand, he's given the high-profile position of "climate change czar" to former EPA Administrator Carol Browner, whose record leads many to suspect she believes that anti-lobbying laws are there to be broken.
As David Ridenour (full disclosure: my husband) of the National Center for Public Policy Research writes in Monday's Washington Times:
...Throughout her years as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency in the Clinton administration, EPA officials routinely violated the Anti-Lobbying Act - a law prohibiting federal employees from using agency money for "telephone, letter, printed or written matter, or other device intended or designed to influence in any manner a Member of Congress."
In 1995, the EPA flagrantly violated that law when it lobbied against the Job Creation and Wage Enhancement Act, a bill that would have curbed some of the EPA's worst abuses.
As James F. Hinchman, comptroller general of the United States, noted, EPA officials "distributed EPA fact sheets to various organizations ... directly lobbied the Congress." Not only that, but an EPA regional administrator wrote a strong Op-Ed designed to stop the bill's passage.
Four years later, Sen. Robert C. Byrd, West Virginia Democrat, accused the EPA of violating the Anti-Lobbying Act again. Mr. Byrd - who has made a career of steering pork to his state - complained that the EPA's Transportation Partners Program was coordinating and funding anti-road lobbyists against the law and his state's interests. Mrs. Browner was forced to terminate the program.
The following year Mrs. Browner was at it yet again. This time, her agency was accused of allowing special interests to improperly influence last-minute - so-called "midnight" - environmental regulations. U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth ordered the EPA to preserve communications with such groups. Instead, Mrs. Browner had her computer hard drive re-initialized, wiping it clean. Judge Lamberth subsequently held the EPA in contempt for "contumacious conduct."...
Did President Obama stern admonish Carol Browner that behavior of this sort would not be tolerated in an Obama Administration (and, if so, why take the risk of appointing her at all?)? Or are rules against "outside" lobbyists the only ones Barack Obama wants enforced?
* Note: In my view, the new directive to supposedly limit lobbyist influence on spending of the so-called stimulus won't mean much in the end. Businesses, unions, lobbying firms, lobbyist law firms, state and local governments and special interests wanting a piece of our tax dollars will simply lobby for it using personnel who are not required to register as a lobbyist under the terms of the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995 (or, in some cases, people who are required to, but didn't). The only way to keep lobbyists from going after federal money is to shrink the pot of federal money available as government-distributed handouts (for instance, by leaving it in the hands of those who earned it in the first place).
Hat tip: I learned about the ACLU's position on the new lobbying directive from the Don Irvine Blog.
Tom Borelli on the Jerry Hughes Show - Listen Live
Tom Borelli, co-director of the National Center for Public Policy Research's Free Enterprise Project with Steve Milloy, will be a guest on the Jerry Hughes Show today from 3 - 4 PM Eastern.
The Accent Radio Network show is heard on 19 stations nationwide. Click here to see if it is broadcast in your area, or click "listen live" at the top of that page to hear the interview via the Internet.
Outrage of the Day: Congress Receiving TARP Funds as Campaign Contributions
Who's getting bailout money?
Michael Isikoff and Dina Fine Maron, writing in Newsweek's March 30 edition, say it just might be your Congressman:
There was plenty of outrage on Capitol Hill last week over the executive bonuses paid out by AIG after getting federal bailout money. But another money trail could make voters just as angry: the campaign dollars to members of Congress from banks and firms that have received billions via the Troubled Asset Relief Program.
A Newsweek review of recent filings with the Federal Election Commission found that the political action committees of five big TARP recipients doled out $85,300 to members in the first two months of this year—with most of the cash going to those who serves on committees who oversee the TARP program...
Businesses receiving bailout money, and/or businesses even partially owned by government, should not be making campaign or PAC contributions. Nor should Members of Congress or other candidates or officeholders accept these contributions if they are offered.
And while we're on the subject, government-subsidized or owned or partially-owned businesses should not lobby or employ lobbyists until they are privately-owned and completely off the dole.
George Will's 'Partial List of Recent Lawlessness, Situational Constitutionalism and Institutional Derangement'
I recommend George F. Will's column in the Washington Post and other papers Tuesday.
If it doesn't make you want to fight what's going on in Washington, nothing will.
The column begins:
With the braying of 328 yahoos -- members of the House of Representatives who voted for retroactive and punitive use of the tax code to confiscate the legal earnings of a small, unpopular group -- still reverberating, the Obama administration yesterday invited private-sector investors to become business partners with the capricious and increasingly anti-constitutional government. This latest plan to unfreeze the financial system came almost half a year after Congress shoveled $700 billion into the Troubled Assets Relief Program, $325 billion of which has been spent without purchasing any toxic assets.
TARP funds have, however, semi-purchased, among many other things, two automobile companies (and, last week, some of their parts suppliers), which must amaze Sweden. That unlikely tutor of America regarding capitalist common sense has said, through a Cabinet minister, that the ailing Saab automobile company is on its own: "The Swedish state is not prepared to own car factories."
Another embarrassing auditor of American misgovernment is...
Watch Tom Borelli Live on Fox's "Strategy Room" Monday
From David Almasi:
Tom Borelli, director of the National Center for Public Policy Research's Free Enterprise Project, is scheduled to speak about current events and breaking news as part of the group discussion on the Fox News Channel's online "Strategy Room" program on Monday, March 23 between 9:00 and 10:00 am eastern.
To access the live Internet broadcast, click here and then click the "STREAM THIS NOW" headline in the center or the page under the photo.
To learn more about Fox's "Strategy Room" Internet talk show, click here to see an article about the program that appeared in this past Monday's New York Times.
This post was written by National Center for Public Policy Research Executive Director David Almasi. To send comments to the author, write him at info@nationalcenter.org. Please state if a letter is not for publication or if you prefer that it be published anonymously.
We begin with the notion that journalism is a public good, that it has broad social benefits far beyond that between buyer and seller. Like all public goods, we need the resources to get it produced. This is the role of the state and public policy. It will require a subsidy and should be regarded as similar to the education system or the military in that regard. Only a nihilist would consider it sufficient to rely on profit-seeking commercial interests or philanthropy to educate our youth or defend the nation from attack. With the collapse of the commercial news system, the same logic applies. Just as there came a moment when policy-makers recognized the necessity of investing tax dollars to create a public education system to teach our children, so a moment has arrived at which we must recognize the need to invest tax dollars to create and maintain news gathering, reporting and writing with the purpose of informing all our citizens.
Can you imagine The Nation fretting that declining church attendance harms society, and as a result calling for $60 billion in subsidies to America's churches? Ha!
But it's just as well.
What government subsidizes, government owns.
If you have any doubt, ask certain executives at financial institutions that received bailout money.
Publicly-funded media is a dangerous idea. We shouldn't even be funding NPR.
Outrage of the Day - Congress Treats Death Threats Lightly
Today awarded to Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) for his callous response to death threats received by private citizens, including children, employed by or related to someone employed by AIG.
Sound public policy relating to AIG - whatever that might be and not that we can expect this Congress to enact it - does not require that Congress possess the actual names of AIG employees who received contractual bonuses. Even the farcical policy of handing out money only to tax it right back (really, how ridiculous can Congress get?) does not require that Congress have these names. (The IRS would take care of collections.)
Congress leaks. And leaks. And leaks. (Usually for very selfish reasons; once in a while due to stupidity or carelessness.) Anyone who cares a fig for the safety and peace of mind of these people should just err on the side if caution and leave people's names out of the debate.
Or maybe we've just reached a place in this country in which Congress doesn't care if children are the focus of death threats. ______________________________
Outrage of the Day: Obama Tries to Bill Young Soldiers for their Own Amputations
In a spirt of miserliness at odds with his usual willingness to spend tax dollars on anything and everything, President Obama is pushing a plan that would bill veterans for health care costs related to injuries suffered in combat.
If this White House plan is adopted and current spending trends continue, service-related health care costs soon will be the only thing in America not paid for by the federal government.
President Obama recently signed a bill with some 9,000 earmarks, yet now he wants to bill young soldiers for the cost of their own amputations.
Morally, the President could not be more wrong. Politically, he's insane.
[Craig] Roberts said the President's plan would increase premiums, make insurance unaffordable for veterans and impose a massive hardship on military families. It could also prevent small businesses from hiring veterans who have large health care needs, he said.
"The president's avowed purpose in doing this is to, quote, 'make the insurance companies pay their fair share,'" Roberts said. "It's not the Blue Cross that puts soldiers in harm's way, it's the federal government."
"It's a betrayal," said Joe Violante, legislative director of Disabled American Veterans, which signed the letter [veterans' groups sent] to Obama. "My insurance company didn't send me to Vietnam. My government did. The same holds true for men and women now fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. It's the government's responsibility."
Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) is making clear that it is not only veterans' groups and right-wingers like myself who find this proposal reprehensible:
"I believe that veterans with service-connected injuries have already paid by putting their lives on the line for our safety. When our troops are injured while serving this country, we should take care of those injuries completely. We shouldn't nickel and dime them with their care."
Rep. Michael Michaud (D-ME) makes it clear that Murray isn't the only member of the President's party to object:
"If that is in the budget, I will not be supporting the budget. It is unconscionable and is an insult to our veterans who've been hurt overseas. So hopefully, you will give that message to OMB as it relates to third party collections for disabled veterans, which is just unbelievable that anyone would ever think of doing that..."
Congressional Republicans also staunchly oppose the plan.
Adding insult to injury, when President Obama met with veterans' groups to discuss the issue Monday, he didn't appear even to be considering their -- and our -- point of view. As meeting participant Commander David K. Rehbein of the American Legion reported:
"It became apparent during our discussion [Monday] that the President intends to move forward with this unreasonable plan... He says he is looking to generate $540-million by this method, but refused to hear arguments about the moral and government-avowed obligations that would be compromised by it."
The least he could do -- and I literally do mean the least -- is listen to the soldiers' point of view.
But for Barack Obama, apparently, listening to the representatives of wounded soldiers is simply too much to ask.
Update 3/18/09: It appears that wiser heads (or, more likely, Congress) prevailed on the Obama White House to back down. It remains amazing that the White House floated this at all. It must be chaos over there. ___________________
* Increase spending by $1 trillion over the next decade;
* Include an additional $250 billion placeholder for another financial bailout;
* Likely lead to a 12 percent increase in discretionary spending;
* Permanently expand the federal government by nearly 3 percent of GDP over pre-recession levels;
* Raise taxes on all Americans by $1.4 trillion over the next decade;
* Raise taxes for 3.2 million taxpayers by an average of $300,000 over the next decade;
* Call for a pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) law despite offering a budget that would violate it by $3.4 trillion;
* Assume a rosy economic scenario that few economists anticipate;
* Leave permanent deficits averaging $600 billion even after the economy recovers; and
* Double the publicly-held national debt to over $15 trillion ($12.5 trillion after inflation).
Federal spending was $24,000 per household before the recession. President Obama would raise it to $32,000 per household by 2019 (after inflation).
President Obama harshly criticized President Bush's budgets. Yet his budget actually *accelerates* Bush's policies – more runaway spending, more bailouts, and even bigger deficits.
The President is not repudiating Bushism – he's doubling down on it.
Outrage of the Day: Obama Administration Says Some Americans Are Deadbeats
Courtesy of the Wall Street Journal, we see this line in the President's budget:
"While middle-class families have been playing by the rules, living up to their responsibilities as neighbors and citizens, those at the commanding heights of our economy have not."
Reminds me of a certain U.N. Secretary General, who considers the country he gets the most money from to be a "deadbeat" nation.
The more money an American makes, the higher his taxes are; not just in the amount of dollars, but in the percentage of his income taxed. If you pay more taxes than your neighbor, and a higher percentage of your income goes to taxes, how is it that, on the matter of taxation, your neighbor is living up to his "responsibilit[y] as a neighbor and a citizen," and you are not?
Hat tip: Tim Graham on Newsbusters. ___________________
I've Seen More Detail in an Elementary School Book Report
Is it just me, or is the White House's Recovery.gov "Your Money at Work" website vapid and uninformative?
I know it's early, but there's already a lot more information available about where the "stimulus" funds are going than one can glean from this website, which reads like a campaign brochure. That is, nice and pretty sounding, but no specific details. Dressing up the incredibly general line items into just eight expense categories for an expenditure of $787 billion dollars is insulting enough, without giving us the choice of viewing the eight items in balloon or tabular form.
Does the White House think we are so dense, we need two ways of looking at eight line items to be sure we've grasped it?
Watch the Borellis Live Online on Fox's "Strategy Room" Wednesday
By David Almasi:
Project 21 Fellow Deneen Borelli is scheduled to discuss ACORN and the so-called "stimulus" bill and other current events as part of the group discussion on the Fox News Channel's online "Strategy Room" program on Wednesday, February 18 between 9:00 am and 10:00 am eastern.
Tom Borelli, the director of the National Center's Free Enterprise Project, is set to be participating in the"Strategy Room" discussion later on the same day - 3:00 pm to 4:00 pm eastern - to discuss the detrimental economic effects of "cap-and-trade" regulatory policy and breaking news.
To access the live Internet broadcast, click here and then click the "STREAM THIS NOW" headline in the center or the page under the photo.
To learn more about Fox's "Strategy Room" Internet talk show, click here to see an article about the program that appeared in this past Monday's New York Times.
This post was written by National Center for Public Policy Research Executive Director David Almasi. To send comments to the author, write him at info@nationalcenter.org. Please state if a letter is not for publication or if you prefer that it be published anonymously.
The Democratic leaders were in such a big hurry to get the stimulus bill passed, they couldn't even wait 48 hours (as the members of the House of Representatives requested) to hold the vote. Yet, Emily Pierce reported Friday night for RollCall:
...the Senate gave final approval to a $787 billion economic stimulus bill on a 60-38 vote at 10:46 p.m. Friday. President Barack Obama plans to sign the landmark recovery package into law on Monday.
Too much of a hurry to let the House and Senate read the bill -- or even look it over much -- before voting. Not in enough hurry, though, for the President to lift a pen before Monday.
The Left is Afraid of America - the Rush to Vote on the Stimulus is the Proof
Rep. Jerrry Lewis (R-CA) just spoke on the House floor to say that the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office had just scored the so-called stimulus bill, releasing its report a few minutes past noon (a little more than an hour ago).
Lewis reports that the CBO says less than half the spending in this bill will occur over the next two years, and 11 percent of it will occur this year.
Given these numbers, how can it possibly be imperative to our economic recovery (to avoid a "permanent recession," in President Obama's infamous phrase, as if such a thing is even possible) for the Congress to vote on all of this spending immediately? Unless something nefarious is going on, at the very least, even those who believe this bill is needed for stimulus purposes should be willing to defer debate and passage of three-quarters or more of the spending in this legislation so legislators can read and refine it.
But they aren't. Barack Obama, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and the others who lead the left in our nation's capitol are unwilling to wait -- even to wait 48 hours as the House of Representatives unanimously urged -- because they are afraid. Afraid of permanent recession? No, they are afraid the American people will find out what's in this bill.
John Hinderaker at Power Line has posted a chart showing the federal deficit (or surplus) as a percentage of GDP from 1965 to now, including an estimate of what the 2009 deficit will be if the stimulus bill is adopted.
Today we have shown that, working together, we can address the enormous economic crisis affecting our country. I am particularly pleased that we have produced an agreement that has a top line of $789 billion dollars. That is less than either the House- or Senate-passed bills. It is a fiscally-responsible number that reflects our efforts to truly focus this bill on programs and policies and tax relief that will help turn our economy around, create jobs and provide relief to the families of our country.
I am also very pleased that we were able to increase the amount of funding for infrastructure. That is the most powerful component in this bill to create jobs. Overall, there is about a hundred and fifty billion dollars in infrastructure this bill when you add together transportation, environmental, broadband, and other projects.
Note that, 40 seconds into the video, just an instant after Senator Collins says "working together," the three Democratic Senators standing directly behind Collins crack up.
I have to agree with the Democrat Senators that any pretense of bipartisanship on bill this one was a joke -- a $789 billion dollar sick joke on the American people that definitely is not, Senator Collins, in any way, "fiscally responsible."
And, say what you will about Senator Specter (really, please do!), in this video he at least has the presence of mind to look absolutely grim. _____
Facebook Bans Anti-Stimulus Petition; Implies It May Be Porn
Edwin Mora of CNSNews.com is reporting this morning that the social networking site Facebook has removed a conservative group's anti-stimulus petition from its website:
Facebook, one of the Internet’s top social networking sites, has kicked out a conservative group’s Web site --“NoStimulus.com” -- from its paid advertising space.
NoStimulus.com, which is promoting a petition to stop President Obama’s economic stimulus bill, is sponsored by the nonprofit conservative group Americans for Prosperity.
Phil Kerpen, national policy director for Americans for Prosperity, said the paid ad had been running for days on Facebook with no problem.
“They had already screened it and approved it,” says Kerpen.
The petition featured in NoStimulus.com allows for those who oppose the stimulus bill to voice their objections, which are then sent to their respective lawmakers...
Amazingly, according to CNSNews.com, Facebook told Americans for Prosperity that one of the reasons it withdrew the ad was because it allegedly violated Facebook's Rule 8, which says "that ads may not 'contain, facilitate or promote 'adult' content or content that is 'offensive, profane, vulgar, obscene or inappropriate' or 'defamatory, libelous, slanderous and/or unlawful.'"
Since, this week anyway, Americans are still allowed to express an opinion on legislation, one must assume Facebook thinks opposing the stimulus is pornographic or potentially libelous. (I'm going with pornographic, since it is metaphysically impossible to libel Congress.)
During the first hour of her syndicated radio show today, Laura Ingraham is citing projects Facebook does allow. Among them: "F--- the Troops" (yes, the American troops) and projects supporting the release of terrorists from Gitmo.
Good going, Facebook. Guess you must have thought you had too many satisfied members.
Amazing Video of Senators on Health Care Provisions of Stimulus
Ed Morrissey at Hot Air has posted some amazing video from Youtube (shown above) of Fox News anchors interviewing Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA) and Senator Jon Tester (D-MT) on the health care provisions on the trillion dollar stimulus bill nobody's read.
Anchors Megyn Kelly and Bill Hemmer did a great job with these interviews; holding each Senator to account when it was painfully obvious that neither Senator knew what was in the bill they each were about to vote for. Kudos to each of the anchors.
Project 21's Deneen Borelli Joins Discussion on Fox's "Strategy Room" Friday - Watch Live Online
By David Almasi:
Project 21 fellow Deneen Borelli will discuss the so-called "stimulus" bill and other current events as part of the group discussion on the Fox News Channel's on-line "Strategy Room" program on Friday, February 13 between 9:00am and 10:00am eastern.
To access the live Internet broadcast, click here and then click the "STREAM THIS NOW" headline in the center or the page under the photo.
This post was written by National Center for Public Policy Research Executive Director David Almasi. To send comments to the author, write him at info@nationalcenter.org. Please state if a letter is not for publication or if you prefer that it be published anonymously.
Brian M. Riedl: Stimulus Bill Should Not Bail Out States
Brian M. Riedl says it is a bad idea for Congress to bail out what he terms "irresponsible states" in the stimulus bill:
...Congress already sends $467 billion a year to state and local government--up 29 percent after inflation since 2000. This is well beyond what is needed to reimburse states for federal mandates (and Washington has imposed few new unfunded mandates on the states since 1996). The feds continue to give heavy subsidies to state health, education, and transportation programs. But apparently that is not enough.
States depend on volatile tax sources such as income taxes, so common sense suggests building rainy day funds during booms to cushion the inevitable recessions. And yet states keep responding to temporary revenue surges with permanent new spending programs. Between 1994 and 2001, states flush with new revenues shunned rainy day funds and instead expanded their general fund budgets by 6.2 percent a year.
All booms eventually end, and these free-spending states left themselves totally unprepared for the 2002-2003 economic slowdown. Yet instead of sufficiently paring back their bloated budgets, the states demanded--and received--a $30 billion bailout from Washington in 2003.
Bailing out someone who has behaved irresponsibly encourages future misbehavior. And that is just what happened: After the 2003 bailout, states went right back to spending--with annual budget hikes averaging 7.2 percent over the next four years.(Some also built up their rainy day funds, but not enough.)...
Project 21 says there are at least three provisions in the so-called "stimulus" bill that could funnel money to the radical left-wing activist group ACORN:
Black Activist Slams "Stimulus" Spending Making Billions Available to ACORN
In the nearly trillion dollars in spending contained in the so-called "stimulus" bill the U.S. Senate is now considering are programs that could go into coffers of the left-wing group ACORN (the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now).
"It's outrageous that potentially billions of taxpayer dollars may end up aiding a group instrumental in causing the economic crisis in the first place," said Deneen Borelli, a fellow with the Project 21 black leadership network.
ACORN became infamous during the 2008 presidential campaign when it's involvement in fraudulent voter registration efforts and ties to the presidential campaign of Barack Obama were revealed. ACORN lobbying and intimidation tactics targeting financial institutions are also blamed for helping to create the current mortgage crisis.
In an analysis of the Senate bill by Matthew Vadum of the Capital Research Center on the web site of The American Spectator, there are at least three provisions in the "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009" that could be used to funnel money to ACORN:
* Title XII would make $1 billion available for Community Development Block Grants (CDBG). Vadum writes: "The [CDBG] program gives [local politicians] wide latitude... to use federal dollars on local projects that they wouldn't dream of spending their own local tax dollars on. ACORN loves CDBG because it is adept at lobbying for CDBG funds."
* The Self-Help and Assisted Homeownership Opportunity Program would provide $10 million for rehabilitating low-income housing.
* The 4.19 billion Neighborhood Stabilization Program would help with foreclosure relief. $3.44 billion would be available to states, localities and nonprofit groups such as ACORN, while $750 million would be available to exclusively to groups.
ACORN has been linked to multiple vote fraud investigations. 63 percent of voter registrations submitted by ACORN in St. Louis in 2003 were determined to be invalid. In Washington last year, only six of 1,800 voter registrations filed in Seattle were valid. Washington Secretary of State Scott Reed called the incident "the worst case of voter-registration fraud" in state history.
Additionally, in a New York Post commentary on the mortgage crisis, University of Texas at Dallas economics professor Stan Liebowitz wrote: "From the current hand-wringing, you'd think that the banks came up with the idea of looser underwriting standards on their own, with regulators just asleep on the job. In fact, it was the regulators who relaxed these standards - at the behest of community groups and 'progressive' political forces" such as ACORN.
Project 21's Borelli added: "Just imagine the havoc ACORN could accomplish with as much as $5 billion in taxpayer money. It's obvious that giving ACORN billions of dollars will do nothing to stimulate the economy - but it will guarantee left-wing political success. It seems like little more than a political payoff, and it is just plain wrong."
Project 21, a nonprofit and nonpartisan organization sponsored by the National Center for Public Policy Research, has been a leading voice of the African-American community since 1992. For more information, contact David Almasi at (202) 543-4110 x11 or project21@nationalcenter.org, or visit Project 21's website at www.project21.org/P21Index.html
Tom Borelli, PhD, director of the National Center's Free Enterprise Project, will be a guest of Bruce Elliott on WBAL-Baltimore at 8:35 am eastern on Saturday (February 7) to discuss the Senate's so-called economic stimulus legislation.
In a press release earlier this week, Tom said about the legislation:
In reality it's a left-wing spending plan masquerading as economic stimulus. Only about 5 percent of the current bill will be used for infrastructure costs while millions of dollars are earmarked for other pet projects, such as renovations for the Department of Commerce headquarters, digital television coupons, the National Endowment for the Arts and the liberal group ACORN...
The plan is really a rewards program for the left-wing groups that got Obama elected. The only thing stimulating about this plan is the anger it's arousing among Americans.
In the Baltimore-Washington area, WBAL can be found at 1090 AM.
You can also listen to Tom from anywhere in America by going to the WBAL web site and clicking the "Listen Live" tab that can be found at the top left of the page.
This post was written by National Center for Public Policy Research Executive Director David Almasi. To send comments to the author, write him at info@nationalcenter.org. Please state if a letter is not for publication or if you prefer that it be published anonymously.
"Scaring People is Not Leadership... Having Lunch is Not Leading... Doing TV Interviews is Not Leading"
If you've heard about Senator Lindsey Graham's comments yesterday about President Obama being "AWOL" on the stimulus debate and how the entire stimulus process "stinks," but haven't seen it, the Ocean State Republican Blog has the video. ____
Both Tom Borelli, senior fellow of the National Center for Public Policy Research and co-director of our Free Enterprise Project, and and Mychal Massie, chairman of Project 21, have been doing a good bit of local and national radio on our behalf on the so-called "stimulus" plan.
I've got links to podcasts to two of the national radio interviews conducted of Tom this week. These links permit you listen to all or part of these interviews at your convenience:
* The G. Gordon Liddy broadcast, February 5. The show's podcast page is here; a link to the actual feed of Tom being interviewed by Gordon Liddy is here.
* Radio America's Dateline Washington, Greg Corombus, host, February 4. Podcast page here; direct link to MP3 podcast file here.
If I acquire podcast links to any of the other immediate past or future broadcast media interviews our folks do on the stimulus, I'll try to add them, schedule permitting. Unfortunately, most shows, even major ones, do not make interview podcasts available. ____
Ak'Bar Shabazz: States and Localities Should Be Wary of Federal Strings
Columnist and spokesman Ak'Bar Shabazz of Project 21 says states and localities should be very wary that huge federal infusions of cash don't bring with them a decline in local autonomy. ____
Open Letter to the U.S. Senate on the So-Called Stimulus
Along with other individuals from a variety of organizations, I signed the following letter, distributed today to members on the Senate, urging them not to spend hundreds of billions of dollars in a so-called stimulus plan. The plan has been rushed; it is wasteful, and it won't work.
In my view, a true plan to stimulate the economy would cut taxes, trim regulations where possible and help make energy more accessible and thus, more affordable.
The text of the letter and the list of signers follows:
February 4th, 2009
To the Members of the U.S. Senate:
We the undersigned public interest organizations, representing millions of members and supporters nationwide, hereby call upon you to reject the $819 billion spending bill that passed the House of Representatives last week.
This legislation will total some $1.2 trillion when interest is calculated over the next decade, and represents an unsustainable growth of government.
In addition, the Congressional Budget Office calculates that the budget deficit will already be $1.2 trillion for 2009. On January 3rd, the Washington Post reported that the deficit could total as much as $2 trillion. In part, it depends on how badly the recession hits the U.S., but also on how much productive capital the government takes out of the broader economy.
The irresponsible expansion of the budget to bail out state governments from their own budget deficits, expand Medicaid, boost education spending, food stamps and unemployment benefits, build federal buildings, provide more for public housing, construct climate change supercomputers, erect trade barriers overseas, create refundable tax credits, and make special interest payouts will not stimulate sustainable economic growth.
Instead, the astronomical growth of government spending, coupled with further monetary easing and protectionism, will discourage investment, savings, and capital creation, because in the longer term it means higher taxes, higher interest rates, and inflation. It will destroy jobs in the private sector, thus increasing individual dependency on government.
Importantly, it will steep American taxpayers ever deeper into a spiral of debt, now nearly $10.7 trillion. That includes $4.3 trillion owed in the form of unfunded obligations to Social Security, Medicare, and other commitments, and $6.4 trillion held privately, $3 trillion of which is held overseas. 40 percent of the debt held privately comes due this year. The only way for the government to pay it is to borrow yet more money.
As a result, the federal government is running the serious risk that it will default on its financial obligations, as the nation's creditors during the current economic downturn may be unable to continue sustaining the uncontrolled growth of spending, leaving the nation in financial ruin.
America needs a plan now to begin paying down the national debt, not an ill-conceived scheme that will make that task impossible for our children and our children's children. The nation needs to tighten its belt, and learn how to live on less credit, less borrowing, and less debt.
This is a change that must occur at the individual level, at the county level, the state level, and the national level. It is not a change that should begin by doubling down on a hasty, careless gamble.
In addition, permanent tax cuts that change incentives are much more effective than temporary targeted tax incentives and spending. What economists call the "permanent income hypothesis" shows that individuals and businesses only change their spending and investment habits significantly when they expect policy changes to be permanent. It takes more than one-year, for instance, to build a factory, and businesses may not do so if they think that tax incentives are only temporary.
Preventing tax increases on individual income, capital gains and dividends, changing the tax code to allow full-cost, first-year expensing for business equipment rather than the arbitrary IRS depreciation schedule, and lowering the U.S. corporate tax rate, among the highest in the world, would yield much more bang for the buck in ensuring a rapid economic recovery than the current package of massive spending with a sliver of targeted tax cuts.
Again, on behalf of our members nationwide, we the undersigned urge you to reject the $819 billion spending bill now being considered. Instead, we ask you to promulgate a real plan for change, to finally set the nation's fiscal house in order, to provide permanent tax relief to businesses and individuals, to free the American people from the boom-to-bust economic cycle, and to at last retire the national debt.
Sincerely,
Fred L. Smith, Jr. President Competitive Enterprise Institute
Gary Aldrich Chairman CNP Action, Inc.
William Wilson President Americans for Limited Government
Mark Williamson Founder and President Federal Intercessors
Thomas McClusky VP for Government Affairs Family Research Council
David N. Bossie President Citizens United
James L. Martin President 60 Plus Association
Duane Parde President National Taxpayers Union
Mark Chmura Executive Director Americans for the Preservation of Liberty
Thomas Schatz President Council for Citizens Against Government Waste
Dr. William Greene President RightMarch.com
Ken Blackwell Chairman Coalition for a Conservative Majority
John Berlau Director Center for Investors and Entrepreneurs
Ron Shuping Executive Vice President of Programming The Inspiration Networks
Alex-St. James Chairman African American Republican Leadership Council
Cliff Kincaid President America's Survival, Inc.
Richard Falknor Chairman Maryland Center-Right Coalition
Amy Ridenour President National Center for Public Policy Research
At least $8.6 billion of President Obama’s proposed $1.2 trillion stimulus plan is meant to fund dubious special interest policy initiatives of environmental activists and should immediately be jettisoned, says Deneen Borelli, full-time Fellow with the Project 21 national black leadership network.
"It's outrageous that taxpayer money is slated to be used to fund the agenda of environmental special interest groups. These special interest groups are using global warming alarmism to fund dubious projects while discouraging the use of fossil fuels," says Borelli. "If liberal lawmakers really cared about stimulating the economy, they would remove rules and regulations that block the development of more fossil fuels. This would provide good-paying jobs and lower energy costs for Americans. Instead, they appear only interested in using their combined force of money, power and influence to fleece taxpayers of their money and their freedom."
Among the green earmarks in the bill legislation cited by Borelli:
* A $2 billion expenditure for "near zero emissions powerplant(s)." This money apparently will be used to revive the FutureGen coal-fired power plan in Mattoon, Illinois. Federal funding for FutureGen was cut off by the Department of Energy in 2008 due in part to excessive construction costs. Reviving funding has been a goal of Senator Richard Durbin (D-IL), and is included despite past criticism of coal-based power generation by President Obama, Vice President Biden and Energy Secretary Stephen Chu.
* $600 million set aside to purchase new hybrid vehicles for federal employees. While there is no documented need for the replacement of vehicles in the federal motor pool, hybrid vehicles have been criticized for performance, cost, safety and the environmental risks created through the production and disposal of their batteries.
* In a December 6, 2008 address, then-President-elect Obama called for a "massive effort" for “replacing old heating systems and installing efficient light bulbs" in federal buildings. The stimulus bill would earmark $6 billion to address this by, among other actions, changing the use of conventional incandescent light bulbs to riskier compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs), which pose a risk of mercury poisoning if broken.
Borelli added: "Lawmakers are cramming a feel-good energy and environmental agenda into this so-called stimulus bill. Investing in FutureGen, hybrid vehicles and light bulbs will only stimulate the special interest groups that are inflating the 'green bubble' that could be the next thing to threaten our nation's economic stability."
Project 21, a nonprofit and nonpartisan organization sponsored by the National Center for Public Policy Research, has been a leading voice of the African-American community since 1992. For more information, contact David Almasi at (202) 543-4110 x11 or project21@nationalcenter.org, or visit Project 21's website at www.project21.org/P21Index.html
Free Enterprise Project Director Tom Borelli on the Stimulus Plan
Statement by Tom Borelli, PhD, director of the Free Enterprise Project of the National Center for Public Policy Research on the stimulus plan:
The adage 'haste makes waste' applies to Obama's massive stimulus plan. In response to our economic crisis the liberal majority is rushing to spend taxpayer money without regard to the consequences of its plan. We've seen this movie before - when Congress panics, taxpayers suffer. Just a few months ago, billions were spent on TARP with little effect on the economy.
In reality it's a left-wing spending plan masquerading as economic stimulus. Only about 5 percent of the current bill will be used for infrastructure costs while millions of dollars are earmarked for other pet projects, such as renovations for the Department of Commerce headquarters, digital television coupons, the National Endowment for the Arts and the liberal group ACORN.
Even worse, according to the Congressional Budget Office, most of the infrastructure projects for roads and bridges will not happen for two years or more. This spending will not provide immediate help to our floundering economy.
The plan is really a rewards program for the left-wing groups that got Obama elected. The only thing stimulating about this plan is the anger it's arousing among Americans.
Maiden Speech of a New Senator: Will History Erase Our Debt?
Freshman Senator Mike Johanns (R), a former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture and Nebraska governor elected last November, gave his maiden speech on the floor of the U.S. Senate just now on the topic of President Obama's controversial stimulus plan.
A choice quote from the speech, as jotted down quickly by me:
It's as if some thought we could just use a credit card, and history itself would somehow forgive the debt.
Senator Johanns made other good points I was not able to get down, but I wouldn't be surprised if his office soon posts the text of his remarks on his Senate web page, which can be found here, and, of course, it will appear later in the Congressional Record. _____
From Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK), on the stimulus plan:
We got into this mess by spending and investing money that didn’t exist. We won’t get out of this mess by doing more of the same.
Dr. Coburn also said:
...the American people will be nauseated by the numerous and shameless special interest projects that have been slipped into this bill in spite of President Obama’s call to keep this bill free of earmarks. Including a $246 million earmark to bailout Hollywood when Hollywood just enjoyed its biggest January ever is insulting to the millions of American families who are struggling to make ends meet. This bill also contains the biggest earmark in history – a $2 billion handout to the not-ready-for-prime-time ‘FutureGen’ near-zero-emission power plant in Matoon, Illinois that has been called ‘prohibitively expensive’ by the Washington Post and is not supported by scientists at MIT..."
Washington, D.C.: Responding to GAO estimates that the full cost of the so-called "stimulus" legislation under consideration now on Capitol Hill could reach $1.2 trillion over 10 years, Chairman Mychal Massie of the Project 21 black leadership network is condemning this collection of earmarks, saying it is less about economic growth and more about growing government at the expense of future generations.
"The pretense that passage of this bill will in some way stimulate the economy is an attempt to obfuscate and deceive on a scale not witnessed since Satan suggested Eve try an apple," said Massie. "There seems to be very little in this abominable bill to stimulate our economy. It looks like more of the same congressional pillage and payback that voters have rejected in the past. How is spending $75 million on stop-smoking programs going to jump-start our economy? How is giving Hollywood $246 million in tax breaks for buying film going to create jobs for laid-off autoworkers? How will spending $200 million to lease alternative energy vehicles keep open small businesses in my area, much less protect us all from terrorists? Senators have yet to explain these things as they rush to a vote."
According to the office of Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK), egregious spending provisions include a combined $1 billion for construction and renovation of buildings for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Public Health Service and National Institutes of Health, $150 million for Smithsonian Institution museum facilities and $400 million more to the CDC for sexually-transmitted disease screening and prevention programs.
Taxpayer money also is earmarked for "youth" job programs for "youths" aged 21-24 and federal home "winterization" assistance for households 200 percent above the poverty level.
"It is refreshing that President Obama has chosen to speak out in favor of people being self-reliant, but the Senate's so-called stimulus bill flies in the face of his encouraging words," added Massie. "These earmarks - planned or not - will only make people more reliant on the government while putting us all further in debt. We must keep in mind that proponents of this legislation are many of the same people who have long aided and abetted the culture of financial corruption and malfeasance that put us in this crisis. Now, they propose to correct it by mortgaging the future of our children and grandchildren."
Project 21, a nonprofit and nonpartisan organization sponsored by the National Center for Public Policy Research, has been a leading voice of the African-American community since 1992. For more information, contact David Almasi at (202) 543-4110 x11 or project21@nationalcenter.org, or visit Project 21's website at www.project21.org/P21Index.html.
A British government environmental minister is warning that recycling "could be adding to global warming."
Furthermore, this Daily Telegraph article notes that some local governments in Britain have "admitted using anti-terrorism legislation to snoop on householders who fail to recycle properly."
And then there's the report that Britain's National Health Service (socialized medicine system) is going to cut back on serving meat to patients in order to help combat global warming. That's the rationale, anyway, but the NHS is always looking for ways to save money, and it often comes at the cost of patient welfare.
Another British National Health Service recommendation is that patients be encouraged to get diagnoses from their doctors by telephone consultation instead of by in-person examination. This too is being sold as an effort to combat global warming.
Finally, in other global warming-related news, James Hansen's former supervisor at NASA has told Marc Morano of the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works that James Hansen "violated NASA’s official agency position on climate forecasting" because the agency "did not know enough to forecast climate change or mankind's effect on it." He also says Hansen "embarrassed NASA by coming out with his claims of global warming in 1988 in his testimony before Congress." Read all about it here.
An e-mail from Joe Roche, writing from Operation Iraqi Freedom:
Amy,
I'm reading John Steele Gordon's book on an economic history of the US. Great book, and fascinating reading. And it strikes me...
What is missing in countering all the massive "stimulus" spending and legislation is perspective. That is what the Obama campaign and the liberal press succeeded most in doing, the single most important impact of the past several months: the perspective of the American people on the economy has been completely distorted.
In doing this, "we" can be fooled into thinking this is the Great Depression and that it is "unprecedented" and all sorts of baloney like that, thus cornering the Republicans and empowering the Democrats.
Thus, it strikes me that restoring perspective is one tool that would be profoundly effective in putting on the brakes to all this "stimulus." There is no talk about what Reagan faced in 1980, or of how deep the recession was in the '80s. There is no prespective whatsoever of the economic shocks of the '70s. And there is complete historical amnesia about the depressions and economic collapses that happened about every 20 years in our nation's past.
It is very revealing and sobering to re-learn about the economic disasters that hit after Jefferson's presidency, in 1837, in 1857, in 1873, in 1896, the short depression of 1921, and about how all of these were sparked by gov't monopolies and bad monetary policies that all had their roots in liberal populist gov't "solutions." Also, pointing out that the four mega-packages of the New Deal did nothing to aleviate the Great Depression but instead prolonged it instead, is vital to re-teach. Go back to Charles Murray's book on the failure of the Great Society and the War On Poverty.
A short fact sheet accompanying a survey, well foot-noted, would be a great resource for all the nerds out there like me who will pick up on such a report to write about it in their college newspapers and argue on it.
Perspective! This is what is missing. Returning perspective to the American people, I think, is the achillees heal to all this liberal "stimulus" crap. Put it into perspective and then hit them w/ the question: will all this "stimulus" restore the economy? And, "what is really happening with all this stimulus?" Perspective perspective perspective. The GOP is completely inept at doing this. Conservative organizations should be jumping all over this.
Steve Milloy Picks Apart Paulson Plan on WBAL at 1:30 on Thursday - Listen Live!
By David Almasi:
Steve Milloy, a director of the National Center's newly-announced Free Enterprise Project, will be a guest of Clarence Mitchell IV on WBAL radio in Baltimore this afternoon at 1:30 pm eastern. Steve will discuss his comments yesterday warning Congress that it would be unwise to grant excessive new powers to Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulson and other cabinet officials (and their successors) under any financial "bailout" legislation.
You can listen to Steve from anywhere in America by going to the WBAL web site and clicking the "Listen Live" tab that can be found at the top left of the page.
In a release on the topic of Paulson and the bailout yesterday, Milloy noted:
Paulson should not be given more opportunities to punish his enemies and promote his friends. Engineering the sale of Bear Sterns at a fire sale price and allowing Lehman Brothers to go bankrupt while making efforts to save Goldman Sachs should raise serious questions about Paulson's personal agenda. Having served in the Nixon Administration it seems Paulson took careful notes in the creation and execution of an enemies list. Let's not forget that under Paulson's leadership Goldman Sachs made millions by creating the mortgage crisis.
The full press release can be read by clicking here.
This post was written by National Center for Public Policy Research Executive Director David Almasi. To send comments to the author, write him at info@nationalcenter.org. Please state if a letter is not for publication or if you prefer that it be published anonymously.
Billionaire Warren Buffett famously says taxes should be increased.
Well, no wonder! He's trying to get on -- if he isn't already on -- the moral equivalent of welfare himself by buying into Goldman Sachs at a time when that firm's former CEO is lobbying Congress furiously for a tax-funded bailout package that will benefit Goldman Sachs.
More on Buffett benefiting from a bailout in a Lawrence B. Lindsey article here ____
Project 21 Chairman Mychal Massie on Federal Bailout Controversy
By David Almasi:
Mychal Massie, the chairman of the Project 21 black leadership network Project 21, has this to say about our nation's current financial mess and those willing to do anything but let free market mechanisms bring things back to normal:
Our nation's current financial turmoil should be no surprise to those charged with overseeing our financial system, yet those yelling the loudest about our not being prepared seem to have been the ones with their heads in the sand the longest.
Case in point: When the Bush Administration suggested a regulatory overhaul of the housing finance industry in 2003, Representative Barney Frank (D-MA) said: "These two entities - Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac - are not facing any kind of financial crisis. The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing." (Source: "New Agency Proposed to Oversee Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae,"New York Times, September 11, 2003) The Fox News Channel is broadcasting a similar pronouncement by Frank made in 2005.
At the time, Frank was the ranking member of the House Financial Services Committee. Today, he is the chairman. He is part of the crowd seeking the bailout that will probably cost taxpayers well over a trillion dollars to correct. It could and should have been prevented by something he refused at the time to acknowledge.
To add further insult to this epic fiscal injury, lawmakers and members of the Bush Administration are seeking ways to game the free market to correct the very problem that government negligence allowed to happen in the first place.
It is unwise for the government to presume American taxpayers do not have a breaking point. It is a misrepresentation of that which is being proposed to portray this - as they are - as a "recovery plan." It is a "bailout," and a wholesale bailout of industries ad nauseam at that.
It is simply unfair and unjust for taxpayers to essentially be the financial safety net for those responsible for foreseeable economic misdeeds on a gargantuan scale.
This post was written by National Center for Public Policy Research Executive Director David Almasi. To send comments to the author, write him at info@nationalcenter.org. Please state if a letter is not for publication or if you prefer that it be published anonymously.
A note on the fight to protect property rights from National Center for Public Policy Research Senior Fellow R.J. Smith:
To all --
Once again freshman Congressman Paul Broun from Georgia's 10th is on the House floor fighting for property rights.
Congress has been sending lots of bad Green Federal land grab bills to the floor under suspension of the rules, allowing no amendments, and very limited debate, and trying to sneak them by on a voice vote. This has given cover to a surprising number of GOP members, including supposed conservatives, who have been attempting to sneak some Green earmarked pork to their districts with no recorded vote.
Good ol' Paul Broun is down there making certain there are recorded roll call votes taken. The strategy: Stop the bills if you can. Make people think twice with a recorded vote. Hold the RINOs' feet to the fire.
If you haven't visited Paul Broun's website and seen his Congressional Property Rights Action Caucus and the weekly e-letter that his staffer Stephen Kraly sends out, do so. And get on the mailing list for the newsletter. And for those of you who remember Aloysius Hogan and all the great work he did with Senator Jim Inhofe: Aloysius is chief-of-staff for Rep. Broun. You've got some friends in an increasingly hostile Congress.
-- RJ
R.J. Smith is a senior fellow at the National Center for Public Policy Research. To contact him directly, write him at rsmith@nationalcenter.org.
Keriann Hopkins is reporting for CNS News that the current gap between what's been allocated to pay Medicare and Social Security benefits and what's needed is $41 trillion.
With the number that high, one would expect the relevant Capitol Hill committees to be working this issue almost full-time (House Ways and Means and Senate Finance), but they appear to have other fish to fry. _____
Husband David will be a guest on the G. Gordon Liddy Show today about 11:30 AM Eastern, talking about ethanol.
Interested folks can listen live on the Internet or hear the show anytime over the next couple of weeks by downloading a podcast of this broadcast from the show's website.
Senator John Warner to Fox's Neil Cavuto: "Just why [gasoline] prices have skyrocketed, we know not."
Shouldn't the co-sponsor of the Lieberman-Warner global warming bill, which several independent econometric studies have concluded would significantly raise consumer gasoline prices, have bothered to learn the mechanics of gasoline pricing before creating, co-sponsoring and promoting his bill?
Warner, in the same interview, called concerns that his bill would raise gas prices "purely a scare tactic." One wonders how he could possibly know.
Ben Lieberman at the Heritage Foundation doesn't think gas increase fears result from a scare tactic.
Says he:
A recent study by The Heritage Foundation estimates a cost increase of at least 29 percent by 2030, or $1.10 per gallon based on current gasoline prices. The Environmental Protection Agency is a bit less pessimistic, estimating a price boost of 53 cents per gallon by that year. But others predict an earlier impact - a National Association of Manufacturers' study projects as much as $1.07 more per gallon by 2014.
Anyone want to pay anywhere from .53 - $1.10 more per gallon of gas just to have an outside chance -- a very remote outside chance -- of reducing global warming by 0.013 degrees (C)?
Should Earmarks be Spent on Lobbying? Should Lobbyists Represent Congressmen?
Should earmarks paid for with public funds be spent promoting projects under consideration by Congress?
Is it OK for a lobbyist to represent a Congressman at a meeting about one of the Congressman's bills?
As far as I know, these things as legal, but are they proper?
Husband David has an op-ed on TownHall today that examines at a case in which both seem to have happened.
At issue is the creation of the Journey Through Hallowed Ground National Heritage Area, which will run from Gettysburg, PA to Charlottesville, VA, unless President Bush vetoes the Consolidated Natural Resources Act of 2008 (S. 2739), which is now on the President's desk.
Heritage areas are National Park Service preservation zones in which environmentalists, federal officials and local activists influence local land-use decisions, frequently in ways that restrict the rights of private property owners and make property ownership more difficult for those of low or moderate income.
The Consolidated Natural Resources Act of 2008 is the same legislation that would allow taxpayer money to be spent studying places "that are significant to the life of Cesar E. Chavez." Chavez was, of course, the ultra-militant leader of the United Farm Workers and a man who, as Project 21's Joe Hicks has said in Congressional testimony, "did or said little to reign in the violence" against workers by union organizers. Members of Congress who find this form of domestic terrorism worthy of honor are trying to use tax funds in an effort to make Chavez seem like another Martin Luther King, Jr.
As Joe Hicks pointed out on May 5, "To say the jury is still out on the legacy of Cesar Chavez is an understatement. Unlike other individuals who have been honored in the manner suggested by this earmark, the politics behind and the consequences of Chavez's activism remain dubious."
Hicks, once a member of the Communist Party USA, trained UFW members in "revolutionary theory" and marched arm-in-arm with Jesse Jackson at Cesar Chavez's funeral in 1993.
If you have an opinion on using earmarks to promote legislative proposals, Congressmen being represented by lobbyists, national heritage areas or even the use of tax dollars to honor dubious labor union organizing techniques, drop by TownHall.com to learn more and leave your views.
Addendum, May 8: The White House has signaled its comfort with the above, signing the bill into law today. The full text of the White House statement:
On Thursday, May 8, 2008, the President signed into law:
S. 2457, which authorizes the Mashantucket Pequot (Western) Tribe to lease certain land to entities for up to 75 years, rather than 25 years as under current law,
S. 2739, the "Consolidated Natural Resources Act of 2008," which designates the 106,000-acre Wild Sky Wilderness in Washington State; designates three new National Heritage Areas; expands several national parks; authorizes funding for specified water projects; modifies two existing energy programs; applies U.S. immigration law to the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands; and grants the Commonwealth a non-voting delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives.
I can't say I'm surprised President Bush signed this, if only because he's signed a lot of bills that appear to be contrary to a limited government philosophy, and it is his Administration's National Park Service that worked in favor of the legislation and failed to fully comply with a Freedom of Information Act request regarding its activities (not that I am under any illusion that National Park Service officials thought they were doing the bidding of the man the voters elected when they did these things). When it comes to expanding government's size, "just say no" has not been the hallmark of this Administration or its agencies.
On a more positive note, however, it's almost a miracle the Journey Through Hallowed Ground National Heritage Area was not adopted two years ago. When proponents of legislative proposals get a million bucks worth of help in tax money from Congress before they are even incorporated, its a pretty clear sign they've got Congressional support and a leg-up over those of us who rely on voluntary donations to pay our bills. Before we started this fight to remind Congress that federalism and the Fifth Amendment right to private property are worth defending, national heritage areas tended to sail right through Congress. Even genuinely conservative Members hadn't stopped to think about the contradiction between their beliefs and what national heritage areas do and are. Now opposition to them is the new, though for all that, fairly strong conservative position on Capitol Hill. We may not have been able to stop the wasteful (and far worse) behavior surrounding the Journey Through Hallowed Ground National Heritage Area, but we've most likely slowed the creation of more of these elitist boondoggles.
Those interested in more information about national heritage areas -- as this particular policy battle is far from over -- might find the following resources helpful:
"The Journey Through Hallowed Ground National Heritage Area: An Example of How Pork-Barrel Politics Can Threaten Local Rule and Property Rights," by Peyton Knight for the National Center for Public Policy Research, available here
"Another Federal Assault on Property Rights: The Journey Through Hallowed Ground National Heritage Area Act," by Ron Utt for the Heritage Foundation, available here (this is the paper in which Dr. Utt revealed that the private organizers of this heritage area have "acknowledged that they are contemplating additional wealth-enhancing opportunities through the creation of a privately owned, for-profit real estate investment trust (REIT) to acquire properties in the heritage area and presumably develop them for the benefit of the REIT's shareholders...")
To read a coalition letter signed by over 110 organizations, elected officials and concerned citizens about heritage areas sent to Congress in September 2007, go here (pdf)
For a short handout-style document on heritage areas, "What People Are Saying about National Heritage Areas," suitable for distribution at public meetings, go here (pdf)
Or, simply go to the National Center for Public Policy Research's search page and type in "national heritage areas" -- we've got 80 documents so far, and, no doubt, more to come.
Thanks to all who joined us in this effort. While supporters of limited government had a setback today, because of our work together on the Journey Through Hallowed Ground, our support for the next battle federalism and property rights battle is much deeper. I'm confident that victories lie ahead. _____
True Emancipation Would Be Something New to Celebrate
From David Almasi:
April 16 is a public holiday unique to the District of Columbia. It's "Emancipation Day" - the commemoration of President Abraham Lincoln's signing of the Compensation Emancipation Act in 1862. The Act freed the approximately 3,100 slaves in the nation's capital months before the Emancipation Proclamation freed them in Confederate states.
Along with the closure of public offices and the government-run schools, parades and performances mix are sometimes mixed with political action. Most notably, the day is often used as a rallying point for efforts to make the federal district a full-fledged state with two senators and a representative.
But how about using Emancipation Day to call for an emancipation from burdensome government, rather than demanding more of it?
As pointed out in a Washington Times commentary by Project 21 member and new National Center Policy Analyst Casey Lartigue, Jr. on April 16:
The focus was - as it is usually is in D.C. - on political power rather than policies to make citizens freer. Not to take away from the oppression of slavery, but Emancipation Day is more than an opportunity to celebrate the end of the oppression of slavery. It also is a good time to note that lawmakers typically look backward at liberty's advances rather than forward to find ways citizens can enjoy more personal freedom.
For example:
It won't be until a week after Emancipation Day that Americans will observe "Tax Freedom Day," the date when people essentially stop working to pay off their tax obligations and begin working for themselves. According to the Tax Foundation, April 23 is the national average. D.C. residents celebrate their particular Tax Freedom Day last - after all 50 states - on May 3...
Wouldn't it be a pleasant surprise today, Emancipation Day, if Mr. Fenty and the D.C. Council announced cuts in government spending or extended the occasional "tax-free" shopping periods?
Another way city leaders could expand freedom is to extend school choice, at a minimum, to every low-income student living in the District. Andrew Coulson of the Cato Institute recently pointed out that when all costs are divided by the number of students, the District of Columbia is spending close to $25,000 per child. The District essentially is providing mediocre public schooling at elite private school prices.
Casey did point out one bright spot on the horizon. Unfortunately, if this happens, this reform will not be by the hands of the District's leadership but rather through a legal mandate from the U.S. Supreme Court:
When D.C. leaders can't be relied on to extend freedom, others may help. The Supreme Court may soon step in to help D.C. residents by ending the city's ban on firearms.
Since 1976, ownership of virtually all firearms in the District has been illegal. The gun ban hasn't curtailed gun-related crimes against D.C. residents, but it robs them of the means of self-defense. The Supreme Court is expected to rule by June on a lower court's rejection of the ban.
To see the full version of Casey's commentary, click here.
Project 21 Fellow 
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