Barney Frank Announces Retirement!

It was a red letter day yesterday. Longtime liberal Democratic Representative Barney Frank, a major co-architect of the financial crisis of 2007-08, announced his retirement from Congress.

It's an event that should bring joy to conservatives and, for that matter, all taxpayers, since the latter are who have paid for Barney's corruption and demands that Fannie and Freddie guarantee more housing loans to those too poor to actually afford the mortgages they received.

Then there was the abominable Dodd-Frank law, which will continue to burden all Americans with passed-through costs of excessive, largely-pointless over-regulation of the financial sector.

To be sure, all America will be better off with this liberal idiot gone from Congress.

Why do you think he chose this term as his last? Do you think he actually feared a loss of his seat next year? Or perhaps, having enjoyed four years in the majority recently, couldn't stomach continued service as a minority party Representative?

Whichever, let's all rejoice for a tiny step forward for better government as Barney Frank leaves Congress next year.

"No Off Ramps" for Congress, eh??!!

You have to laugh.


After spending the year impeding any sort of adult activity in Congress to cut spending, Wonderboy was rejoicing over the failure of the so-called SuperCommittee to deliver $1.5T+ spending cut deal.

The other day, he solemnly intoned, like some harsh school teacher, that he would veto any attempt by Congress to set aside the sequesters on spending in the wake of the failure of the special 12-member panel.

'There will be no off ramp' the First Rookie exclaimed.

Really? Sounds kind of like a dictator, doesn't he?

In reality, all Congress needs to do is decide, by veto-proof majorities, to simply repeal those provisions of the debt limit increase bill which created the SuperCommittee.

And, by the way, even if Congress doesn't, it's unclear that Wonderboy will even have the job would allow him to block any changes. It's quite likely that by January of 2013, the year in which the sequesters occur, Republicans will hold the House, the Oval Office, and perhaps the Senate. Or have enough clout to co-opt sufficient Democratic Senators to simply tear up the debt-ceiling increase bill and start over with a much tougher-minded GOP President at the helm.

Wonderboy's blowing smoke up everyone's ass on this one. He doesn't have a leg to stand on, and he knows it. He's just trying to energize every liberal, youth and minority he thinks will vote for him next year.

Rick Perry's Part-Time Congress Concept

I find Rick Perry's 'part-time Congress' idea to be a little too goofy to take seriously.

Texas isn't the United States, doesn't have a standing army, navy or air force, or embassies abroad. Back in the early 1800s, before the US was a world power, and communications were poor, a part-time legislature, both at the state and federal levels, was basically just reality.

But once America came into the 1900s, and the government, post-Civil War, had, for good or bad, Constitutionally or not, swollen in size and responsibility, it became unrealistic for Congress to only serve part of every year or term.

But one idea Perry has echoes my own- cut Congressional staffs. I don't know what details he proposed- probably none, knowing Perry.

If I'm not mistaken, I think it was even one of my 10 things I'd do to reform government.

But I believe I advocated only two aides per Representative or Senator. And no compensating budget to hire temps or consultants.

I want members of Congress themselves writing bills- not their hired, degree-heavy, detail-crazy, bribable staffs.

That's what I want...a lean Congress without staffs and coddlers, full of members who actually do all the work themselves.

Then, as the subheading of this blog suggests, we'll be a bit safer because those 435 elected members simply won't have the time and ability to write so much intrusive legislation that affects the rest of us and gives them such ongoing power.

Why The SuperCommittee May Not Matter

Despite the hand wringing of many media pundits and members of Congress concerning the fate of the work delegated to the 12-member Congressional supercommittee, there could be considerably less to the situation than they believe.

As we learned from FDR's NRA and much of Ronald Reagan's accomplishments, what one Congress does, a subsequent one may undo. Especially when one party controls both Houses and the White House.

When you read the presumed impacts of failure of the supercommittee to make the requisite cuts in the federal budget, they sound dire. Draconian cuts in defense and entitlements are mandated.

Yet, those cuts, while alleged to hit earlier than a successful supercommittee deal- which tells you something already about how effective such a plan would be- it still isn't until 2013.

Between then and now, of course, is next November's election. If the Republicans hold the House, regain control of the Senate, and, for good measure, the White House, all bets are off concerning the entire supercommittee deal. A new Congress and President could repeal the entire original deal which created the supercommittee and its attendant rules consequences as early as the afternoon of January 21st, 2013.

If such electoral results don't occur, the subsequent ongoing political gridlock will make the mandated cuts look minor by comparison with the fiscal problems which will likely be visited upon the US. And if the Democrats keep what they control now and somehow retake the House, well, the US will take its place behind Italy as the next large OECD economy to face a fiscal disaster.

Big Brother Lance Is Watching

Sitemeter is wonderful. It gives so much information about my readers.

For example, as expected, my post yesterday concerning my hacked-up pol of a Representative, Leonard Lance, R-NJ, drew the expected visits from the US House's Information Systems. I have an IP address, but it's the same one for four different visits on my post about Lance, from computers using four different operating systems.

Two visits were touch n' go's, but the last two were for over two minutes, and one viewed two pages. I'm guessing perhaps yesterday's post, and the prior one about Lance.

Just so you know, though, a little political blog like mine publishes one post critical of a sitting US Representative and- WHAM!- the House or Senate webcrawlers are all over it.

In a way, it's a good thing. Maybe one of Lance's staffers who is smarter than he is- not too hard to imagine- will explain to the idiot that he shouldn't be favoring his crony capitalist housing campaign contributors when he will be exposed for it.

Regardless of what you think of him, Jefferson was right. Newspapers and their modern technological descendants shine bright lights on suspect, stupid behavior of our elected representatives.

In this case, perhaps Lance, dim-witted as he is, will realize his mistake and retract his signature on and support of this dumb idea of further empowering the two money-losing GSEs.

Why I Despise My Congressman- Leonard Lance

I don't respect my Congressman. Don't like him, either. He's one of those hacked-up former state pols who slithered into a largely red district, but was never ready for prime time on the Hill.

Yesterday's Wall Street Journal named him- Leonard Lance, R-NJ, as a signatory to a letter from Bill Posey, R-FL, asking to raise Fannie's and Freddie's maximum loan limits again.

This is the sort of boneheaded crony capitalism about which Paul Ryan spoke in a speech referenced in Peggy Noonan's weekend column in the Journal. About which more later this week.

I wish I could have voted for someone more conservative and less, well, hacked-up than Lance in 2010. He's an embarrassment to the GOP. His 'finest' moment had to be when he had question time in front of Ben Bernanke, and all he could manage was to stumble through the script written by his aides, which contained no questions, but, rather, video/sound bites for Lance's next campaign.

Disgusting.

So is Lance's empty-headed agreement to give two GSEs which have cost taxpayers $142B in losses more lending authority. I liked the Journal's comparison of Posey's claim that the amendment won't cost taxpayers "one dime," so reminiscent of Bubba Clinton's promise, in 1995, that doing the same back then wouldn't "cost the taxpayers on extra cent?"

Yeah. Right.

Wonderboy Tries To Rewrite History On His New Stimulus a/k/a "Jobs" Bill

'Go big, Go bold'


Those were the words Wonderboy used last week in describing his jobs plan as he began his 2012 campaign tour.

Well, trying that in 2009 got him a GOP-controlled House and slimmer Democratic majority in the Senate last November.


Far from 'running the GOP out of town' as he threatened voters will do for not passing Wonderboy's jobs bill, voters are likely to run them out for passing it.


This is just the latest attempt by Obama to try to confuse the electorate and rewrite history. In fact, he even managed to use the Trumanesque "do nothing" Congress line, conveniently omitting that the GOP House has passed bills which are stacked up in Harry Reid's Senate hopper, because the Senate Majority Leader is afraid to bring them to the floor for a vote.

Including, for weeks, the president's cherished jobs bill.


Bills like healthcare repeal, a budget, and spending cuts.
The truth is, voters have seen the trillion dollars wasted on the first stimulus, so they don't want the president and Congress to 'go big' or 'go bold.'


Republicans, both in Congress and those running for the presidential nomination, have sensibly offered as their job-creating actions: freeze/reverse excessive energy-, financial service sector- and healthcare-related regulation; cut spending by tens of billions in each of the next several years; reform the tax code to end preferences and lower rates; end the administration's war on business.

In response, only yesterday on his Virginia bus tour, Wonderboy characterized GOP economic plans as simply allowing companies to pollute and repealing Dodd-Frank, alleging, incorrectly, that "Wall Street" was the source of the 2008 financial crisis. His own plan was described as 'putting teachers back in classrooms.'


More pork-barrel, union-jobs spending isn't going to provide any lasting economic stimulus. And, frankly, neither will a focus just on "jobs." By the way, if teachers were hired by companies that ran outsourced public education, do you think the First Rookie would be so eager to re-employ them?

And why do we want federal funding for local teachers? States and municipalities often must balance budgets. Thus, they make informed tradeoffs regarding local government services affordability. And many states have seen teacher and associated employment growth outpace that of students for years. To simply sidestep sensible local spending constraints by borrowing the money for excess public sector unionized teachers from China, at the federal level, is a bad idea.


What's needed is economic growth, which is brought about by business expansion. Which can, and probably will, entail job creation.


But placing employment growth before economic growth misses the point and reverses cause and effect.


Wonderboy also has become more openly dictatorial, proclaiming in a recent campaign speech,


'If Congress won't pass my jobs bill, we can't wait. We'll find other ways to do it'


Charming.

More Reflections On The "Super Congress"

In Sunday's post I expressed my initial reaction to the so-called Super Congress being bandied about by Harry Reid to resolve the federal spending crisis,

"On that theme, I find the Senate's floating of the concept of a 'Super Congress' of a dozen members drawn from the two parties and each chamber, equally, to wrestle with spending and debt problems, to be the height of both arrogance and evasion of responsibility.



I think American voters are tiring of so many important fiscal decisions taking place among a few legislators behind closed doors. If I were cynical, I'd suggest this Super Congress is an attempt to freeze out the influence of the Tea Party movement.


Of course, one wonders if it's even Constitutional. For sure, it's yet another sign that our elected Congress members can't seem to just do their job, and look to endlessly pass the buck to various Commissions, study groups, committees and such."


I'm writing this on Sunday evening, so there may have been subsequent repudiation of the idea before this publishes. No matter.

As I've mulled the concept over this afternoon, I find it increasingly repugnant and indicative of a chamber totally out of touch with the American electorate.

Of course, only 33 or so members were elected, leaving the Democats in control, so that may explain the Senate's failure to comprehend the scope and nature of the Tea Party-triggered insistence of so many voters for deep, lasting spending cuts.

The House, being totally elected every two years, is much closer, by design, to the voters' impulses. I don't think the GOP House members will countenance such an abrogation of it's chamber's Constitutional power to originate spending bills. Handing this off to a commission half-composed of Senators isn't going to sit well with them.

Moreover, it seems to me that only hoary Senators could possibly miss the disgust of most voters with Washington's way of doing business. Thinking that by officially closeting a few Senators and Representatives behind closed doors, the very weighty issues of cutting spending and entitlements can be re/solved.

These are the very cornerstones of liberal Democratic idiocy dating back to 1935. There's no way that their restructuring will be legitimate if conceived in secret by 12 members of Congress.

Better, instead, to nominate a spectrum of private sector and academic cognoscenti to suggest an array of options.

The last people you'd trust with knowing how to handle fixing such poorly-designed programs are 12 members of Congress- Democratic or Republican.

But the larger issue is that Reid and other Senators are so conceited as to think that creating a sub-Congress to do what they don't seem to be able to do is acceptable to voters. They duck doing their jobs, then think that by some sleight of hand, they can fool voters.

Let's replace every one of the bastards in the Senate- or House- who dares vote for such a contemptible way out of just fixing the massive entitlement mistakes in Congress, in the open, as they all were elected to do.

The Debt Limit Talks- Again

Following on this recent post about the debt limit talks, I'm pleased to have awoken this morning to news that the so-called 'grand bargain' is off the table.

Fortunately, as a recent lead staff editorial in the Wall Street Journal hoped, Boehner wisely rejected the 'give something now for nothing later' tactic that Wonderboy was trying to lure him into accepting.

Democrats really don't seem to accept that people behave according to changes in taxes and regulations, as I wrote here in the prior linked post,

"What nonsense! That seems to be where Democrats show their innate stupidity. They treat tax rates arithmetically, never seeming to comprehend that you get less activity of what you tax. That consumers and producers respond to minimize taxes paid, which is why the long run average is 18% of GDP."

I'm beginning to believe that, with the end of the cold war and the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Democratic party has stepped in to take the place of the USSR in trying to destroy the United States.

Certainly, the Dems have eagerly embraced the old Soviet Union's habit of assuming what they have is theirs, then negotiating to take what is the other party's. In this case, Wonderboy assumes taxes should rise to punish those who've succeeded financially, while offering phantom, future spending cuts.

Why, with decades of evidence demonstrating that tax revenues simply do not rise above 18% of GDP, would any sane, intelligent, informed federal official believe that raising tax rates and creating new taxes will do anything but drive more job- and investment-killing, tax-avoiding behavior?
Let's hope that we get, instead, small-ball along the lines of what John Taylor wrote recently in the Journal. Something like a $2-3T spending cut deal for raising the debt limit now by slightly less, then return to the topic after November, 2012.

The Debt Limit Talks Accelerate

Only two days ago I wrote this post regarding the debt limit talks between Congress and Wonderboy. Since then, he's held yet another press conference after an emergency Thursday morning session, declaring that progress is being made. But he also lashed out at Republicans once again, claiming they were trying to steal money from seniors via Medicare and Social Security to give to wealthy Americans in the form of tax breaks for private jets and the like.

The guy doesn't know when to shut up, does he? Would you negotiate in good faith with a guy who demonized you in public?

Neither would I.

Still, Boehner had claimed that he was optimistic a deal will be made which he can sell to his members, including those who won't vote for tax increases. The new language being used regarding taxes is 'no net revenue increases.'

Sounds like a fig leaf for somebody. Either tax rates and items taxed increase, or they don't. Then people will behave accordingly and the federal government will still collect no more than about 18% of GDP.

I'm so sick and tired of listening to Bloomberg's liberal political retread, the wizened, not-too-bright Al Hunt, and CNBC's "Red" John Harwood telling viewers that taxes just have to be raised because you can't cut spending enough to eliminate deficits.

What nonsense! That seems to be where Democrats show their innate stupidity. They treat tax rates arithmetically, never seeming to comprehend that you get less activity of what you tax. That consumers and producers respond to minimize taxes paid, which is why the long run average is 18% of GDP.

This morning's unemployment news has apparently affected the talks. Boehner has now said no deal is in sight, while June's monthly jobs were a horrifyingly small 18,000 and the unemployment rate is now up to 9.2%.

Wonderboy's labor secretary was on Bloomberg this morning blaming Bush and calling for even more "infrastructure stimulus" spending. The woman just has no clue.

Personally, I was not happy at the thought of a last-minute, desperate grand bargain on the tax code, spending cuts and the debt limit. Too much badly-designed legislation too quickly, all to satisfy a megalomanical president with no real legislative or governing experience.

Oddly, I'm feeling less worried now that Boehner issued his statement that no deal is now imminent.

Allegedly, there's supposed to be another meeting between Congressional leaders and Wonderboy on Sunday.

Stay tuned....

Kim Strassel On GOP War Powers & Libya

I typically find Kim Strassel's editorials in the Wall Street Journal to be on the mark. But her recent piece about House Republicans and Libya, entitled The GOP's War Powers Opportunism, was quite wide of that mark.

Echoed by today's third Journal staff editorial, Strassel basically blames House GOP members for failing to support Wonderboy's ill-conceived and poorly-explained Libyan adventures, labeling this opportunistic.

I disagree.

What Strassel and others at the Journal fail to appreciate or acknowledge is that we don't really know who we're backing against Gadhafi. Back in March, I had lunch with an old friend who is culturally and hereditarily, but not religiously, Jewish. Even he backed Gadhafi against more extreme Arab fundamentalist rebels, suggesting we ask the Libyian dictator what he needed to kill the Muslim extremist seeking to overthrow him.

In occasional moments of lucidity, Strassel and the Journal staff admit that Wonderboy offered no compelling reason to risk American lives and money in Libya, then compounded that by saying NATO is running the show and, finally, we aren't really in combat.

This isn't about War Powers procedure anymore, but a serious lack of understanding of who we are backing if we oppose Gadhafi. It's no longer enough to say we want him out. What if the result is a rabidly-fundamentalist so-called democracy that wants Israel wiped off the map?

Until House members are provided more certain information assuring them that backing the Libyan rebels isn't going to create a Libyan Muslim fundamentalist, anti-American state, there's no harm or shame in simply stepping back and being neutral.

It's a fact that Wonderboy's administration chose to stick it's thumb in the GOP-held House's eye by failing to play along by the War Powers Act rules while insisting it need not, because the Act is unconstitutional. Instead, Wonderboy just flipped Congress the bird and went ahead without even attempting to build a consensus behind its policies and actions in Libya.

I don't think the House GOP is being cowardly nor opportunistic on Libya. Rather, they are behaving prudently in the face of a failure of leadership from the Oval Office, even as troops and money are squandered overseas without explanation.

Congressional Aide Income from Private Corporations

Wednesday's edition of the Wall Street Journal carried a long article discussing the practice of Congressional aides being retained by, and receiving large payments from, firms which have business with the committees on which the aides' Representatives or Senators sit.

Several examples were cited by name, with Senate Majority Leader Reid's aide, David Krone, being paid $1.2MM by Comcast. The table in which the information was highlighted attributed the payment notionally to "reimbursement for a condominium," but you'd have to be an idiot not to expect that, after all the paper trails and laundering are parsed, Krone basically got paid for Comcast's access to his boss, Harry Reid.

The article, and quotes accompanying the various, bi-partisan examples of Congressional aides enriching themselves for access to the members for whom they work, all swear that appropriate conflict-of-interest policies were followed.

But that isn't the point, and it never has been. Which is, I suppose, what these Representatives, Senators and aides all choose to ignore.

I don't care whether David Krone directly helped Comcast in exchange for the $1.2MM in a way that is or was a "conflict of interest."

I care that David Krone is allowed to personally enrich himself way beyond anything sensible simply because he is Harry Reid's aide.

Krone is a federal employee whose job is, or should be, assisting his boss to do the public's business. It isn't right to the other 200MM+ employable Americans that David Krone should make $1.2MM simply because he's a key aide to the leader of the Senate. That's obscene, offensive and insulting to every other American.

If David Krone wants to make millions, he should pursue work in the private sector. Being a federal employee who is gifted such a large sum by a private corporation tells you that influence and/or access is for sale in Washington.

I seriously doubt Brian Roberts and Comcast simply decided that they like David Krone and decided to do him a $1.2MM favor for nothing.

I'm not in favor of numerous laws policing the behaviors of federal employees and elected officials, but when I read of Krone's magical good fortune, I think it's high time for at least one more.

Aides to members of Congress should be prohibited from receiving money from other sources, above some limit (perhaps $25,000), that does not arise from sale of an asset or previously-owned wealth. Sale of real estate and the like should be audited for possible evasion of the policy if the amounts exceed the limit.

It's sad that such mechanisms would have to be considered. But it's evident that it never occurred to Harry Reid that allowing his aide to book a $1.2MM income from a private firm while employed by the Senator looks bad and corrupt, and further lowers the public's trust of Congress.

Has Harry Reid no sense whatsoever? Or does he condone a 'grab all you can while you're here' attitude for members of Congress and their aides? Either way, it's disgraceful for Reid and the other Congressional members mentioned in the Journal piece, including Olympia Snowe and Barney Frank, to be allowing their aides to pad their incomes in such questionable manners.

It's emblematic of the low ethics which obviously rule in Washington, and which so many of us voters realize govern how our tax dollars and the public's business is done by our elected Representatives and Senators- of both parties.

The Verdict On the NY-26 Congressional Race

Earlier this month, I wrote a post discussing the NY-26 District Congressional special election.

Kim Strassel had done a great job reporting on the details of the coming election, including a spoiler Democrat-turned-faux-Tea-Party conservative, a timid Republican and a vicious attack-dog Democrat.

Well, the Democrat won with 47% of the vote. The spoiler, Davis, got 9%, while the Republican received 43% of the vote. Hardly a wholesale rejection of Paul Ryan's Medicare ideas, is it?

While Strassel's point, which I reiterated, was that firing-line GOP House candidates have to be equipped to argue Ryan's points and plan, it seems to me that there's another point to be made here.

Remember how another NY special election within the last two years went Democratic due to a hissy fit by local conservatives over the choice of the Republican candidate?

I think Republicans had better decide whether they embrace Tea Party sensibilities of spending cuts, lower taxes and serious entitlement reform, or not. Because if they do, then some old-line liberal GOP candidates are history.

New York is a good example of this sort of choice, because, as a Northeastern state, it tends to elect moderate-to-liberal Republicans. So Tea Party values really give party regulars angst.

Well, things happen for a reason, and what should happen, usually does happen. If a lot of Congressional districts with moderate Republican party hacks continue to ignore genuine Tea Party conservatives, then the House GOP majority might either shrink, or vanish completely again.

Beyond making sure that each GOP House candidate is prepared to explain, defend, and vigorously sell the Ryan agenda, the various local GOP party pols have to decide which side of history they are on.

If too many continue to choose the supposedly-safe middle ground, they'll be swept out. Maybe a few more years of Congressional Democratic control is necessary to convince Americans that entitlement reform is no longer a choice- it's a necessity.

If a lot more GOP party operatives don't get religion on Tea Party values soon, that's what they are going to be enduring come 2012.

Defending Fiscal & Social Conservatism in 2012

Kim Strassel wrote another of her typically excellent pieces on Friday discussing the challenges facing Republicans in the special election for New York's US 26th district seat.

Once more, as in the last such New York special election, the state's rules prohibited a primary, so discontented Tea Partiers felt snubbed by the party's officials who were responsible for choosing a candidate. There's more chicanery than that going on, as well.

But the interesting element which Strassel highlighted was the GOP's candidate, Jane Corwin's lack of sensible defense of the Ryan budget.

Strassel warns,

"This is the lesson of NY 26 for Republicans. Having boldly jumped into the entitlement defbate, the party had better be willing and able to define its reform- or the other side will do it for them. The risk was never Mr. Ryan or other veteran Republicans, who capably explained the plan at recent town halls and came away with largely positive experiences. The risk was always the hundreds of less-seasoned Republican members and candidates, who may be eager but who remain unequipped to have a rousing Medicare debate.

The GOP should thank Democrats for spotlighting this problem, so Republicans can think through the political challenges."

Well put. Given how sobering the truth of the Ryan budget is, it will take more than your average local political hack/wannabe Congressman to convincingly defend it. That's because, as I've written before, the existing so-called options are not sustainable, nor real options at all. But that has to be driven home with conviction, or the average Republican candidate will appear to be simply mean-spirited and cheap, rather than refreshingly candid and prudent.

As with so many social situations, including politics, better people/candidates make a difference. Ideas count, but the more articulate and passionate candidate is likely to win over one supporting better ideas with less passion and knowledge.

Wonderboy's Budget Solution- Another Unelected Panel

Somewhere within Wonderboy's budget speech last week, given in reaction to Paul Ryan's 2012 budget, was the inclusion of yet another unelected governmental body to handle what our elected Congress should do.

Essentially, in order to be able to have taxes raised without Congressional action, he wants a special panel established that will take measures to close budget deficits. You can bet that, if a Democrat is in the White House, the measures will rely more on tax increases than on spending cuts.

This, to me, is the most insidious and egregious element of the First Rookie's budget. Hasn't it been enough to have some 15 unelected 'czars' in this administration? I don't approve of them in any administration of either party.

But this latest invention is without question the most harmful to our Constitution? How on earth can a president propose an unelected panel to do what Congress is elected to do? If Congress doesn't have the will or ability to pass fully-funded budgets, so be it. Then voters will elect one that does.

But there's absolutely no place in our federal system for an unelected, appointed panel to suddenly become the last word on tax and spending policies. I can't even believe it's Constitutional, but shame on Wonderboy for even suggesting it.

If you doubted his desire to damage our country, look no further than this invention of his. It's completely antithetical to our form of government.

About Congress, the Constitution & Detailed Powers Attribution for Legislation

Much has been made recently, especially by Congressional Democrats, of today's reading in the House of the Constitution.

One Democratic Representative derisively snorted that the GOP is treating the Constitution 'like some sacred document.'

As Monica Crowley observed on Fox News yesterday, sometimes these Democrats make the Tea Party's task almost too easy.

But, seriously, there's a legitimate issue here. In the lead staff editorial in today's Wall Street Journal, California's ultra-liberal Representative Henry Waxman was quoted as saying he was taught in law school that the Constitution means, or is, 'whatever a judge says it is.'

Thus, Waxman inadvertently explains the Progressive approach to legislation, i.e., Constitution be damned, just pass what you want and leave it up to a judge to decide.

That's wrong. That's not upholding the oath we all heard the entire House swear yesterday.

Instead, as Waxman mistakenly illustrated, Progressives will keep passing unconstitutional laws, knowing that they only need a few judges, serially, to expand Congressional powers via judicial writ, while they have unlimited time and attempts to achieve that objective.

However, if they were held to a higher standard a priori, i.e., providing a detailed, public justification from the Constitution, for legislation, much of their power-expanding agenda would be revealed for what it is.

You see, until we get term limits for the federal bench- all of it- Waxman's approach is a major loophole in our system of checks and balances.

When 435 Representatives and 100 Senators have to publicly justify voting on the existence of a Constitutional source of power for legislation, they are liable to removal for supporting legislation of overly-expansive Congressional and federal power. But when they can pass anything, and force a lawsuit to allow a judge to rule on the Constitutionality, they both evade responsibility, while also moving the issue from one of a vote among 535 elected legislators to one life-appointed federal judge. Perhaps a few more, if the case is appealed up through the federal chain to the Supreme Court.

So requiring Congress to be more specific in identifying the source of power for new legislation is actually quite important in our system. It's about 'sunshine,' transparency, and the clear articulation by legislators of their views on limited versus expansive federal powers as described and enumerated in our Constitution.

Bucking these issues to the courts, knowingly, is subterfuge and a conscious undermining of the system's designed checks and balances.

Will They Ever Learn?

The sorry spectacle of the pork-laden bill containing extensions of the Bush-era tax rates demonstrates how little members of Congress have learned from the November election results.

You have liberals complaining about taxpayers making over $200K being given an undeserved break. They never seem to be able to grasp that fact that many independent businesspeople do business through LLC's or other entities that roll up into 1040 returns. Thus, what appears to be a very wealthy person is, in reality, a business' tax return.

These same liberals then castigate businesspeople for not hiring and expanding their businesses. With rates in limbo or set to rise, what's the incentive for the independent capitalist?

Meanwhile, middle-of-the-road Democrats larded on the pork to what should have been a simple tax bill. Ethanol subsidies were protected, unemployment benefit extensions were included without any countervailing budget cuts elsewhere, and even $1B for implementing Obamacare was stuffed into the bill.

I don't now know the exact tab for all of the extra spending, but Mitch McConnell, among others, reminded voters that this looked a lot like last year's Christmas Eve rush into voting of a health care bill so fresh that nobody could read its thousands of pages prior to the vote. This bill now runs to at least hundreds of pages, as well.

You'd think merely extending tax rates and maybe unemployment benefits, in the bargain, could be done in about two pages.

These people simply don't understand why voters are so outraged. Even a simple tax policy extension attracts earmarks and pork, with neither current House or Senate leaders, nor Wonderboy gutting all the extra padding and simply passing  the tax rate extensions.

Perhaps this is a sign that taxpayer and voter ire will remain raw and fresh well into the 2012 campaigns. They should.

Joe Crowley's Nonsensical Rant On CNBC

Yesterday morning, I witnessed an interesting exchange between Steve Forbes and NY Democratic Congressman Joe Crowley.

Forbes was a guest host for an hour, mostly to discuss the current support building in Congress for a sweeping tax code overhaul. If you recall, Forbes ran for president some years ago on the flat tax issue. Or perhaps just simplified- I don't recall the details anymore. But I do recall tax comprehensive tax reform as his salient issue.

Crowley, however, exhibited the type of behavior which makes you realize why you want small government. He ranted a now-familiar line about how Bill Clinton was a god-like president leaving a budget surplus. George Bush, of course, spent it all, and then some, leaving Wonderboy with a sorry mess.

Taxes, of course, must rise, as must spending.

Crowley must be an idiot. His refusal to listen to Forbes' reminders of the context of the various points that Crowley made showed him to be a mindless demagogue. No acknowledgement of the booming, post-Reagan economy Clinton inherited. Nor the famed 'peace dividend' from the Soviet Union's collapse.

Nor Bush' inheriting a war on terror, thanks to Clinton's turning a blind eye to the building pressures and events.

When you hear guys like Crowley spout such ill-informed, small-minded nonsense, you realize why you want Congress doing as little as possible, influencing as little of American life as possible, and generally keeping focused on spending, taxes and foreign affairs. Not business, wealth transfers, nor other important social issues.

Crowley exemplifies the type of mediocre people who populate Congress, because the smarter, more motivated among us are busy making money and pursuing our American Dreams. Leaving morons like Crowley minding the government, and making mischief by increasing their power over the lives of the rest of us.

Ending Lame Duck Congressional Sessions

Betsy McCaughey, former New York lieutenant governor and health care legislative pundit, wrote an insightful editorial in the Wall Street Journal recently entitled This Lame Duck Session Should Be the Last.

McCaughey reminds us that, prior to 1933, Congress didn't reconvene until March 3rd. The 20th Amendment cut the lame duck period by three months, leaving just a two-month stub of a session. But, as McCaughey emphasizes, back then, "no one imagined that the old Congress would return to the capital during that time."

She helpfully explains that only in extreme circumstances, such as the Korean War and WWII, did Congress ever reconvene after November elections, until two decades ago. Now, the lame duck session has become one of vindictive legislation jammed through by a party which lost on the first Tuesday of that November.

She recommends that,

"When John Boehner, the presumptive House Speaker, takes charge in January, he should introduce a bill providing that Congress will not meet between the November 2012 election and Jan. 3 2013. That simple change in the law will put the voters back where they always belong: in charge."

Fine for now. Is it each Congress' inability to bind future Congress' that prevents legislation, rather than Constitutional Amendments, from solving this problem permanently?

If so, it should be done. Along with, while they're at it, term limits on Congress and all Federal judges.

The Election's Aftermath

By now, everyone knows that the Republicans, thanks to Tea Party activism and general voter outrage at the administration's and Congressional Democrats' socialist legislation and excessive spending of the past two years, retook control of the House with a net gain of some 66 seats. By Fox News' count, the largest change of seats in the House since 1946. The Senate saw GOP gains of 6 seats.

Not accidentally, several media pundits weighed in yesterday with advice on how Wonderboy can rebound from the anticipated, now real "thumping," to use George W. Bush's term, the president and his party took at all governmental levels.

The Wall Street Journal's Gerald Seib wrote extensively on how Reagan came back from the mid-term losses of 1982. CNBC held a panel in which they once again (over)used the analogy of Wonderboy as national CEO and Congress as his 'board of directors.' Various organizational behavior mavens, including Yale's Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, chimed in with their views. As you might expect, the two most frequently-mentioned 'solutions' for the current administration is to triangulate/compromise with the newly-empowered House Republicans, and to focus on economic and job growth.

Seib at least noted that Reagan's Republican's didn't lose the House, but merely seats in the House. And only about 25, at that.

There's a problem though. Whether you believe our First Rookie is capable of compromise- and it seems like he's not- his basic values run to socialism, not capitalism.

So if he can't compromise on economic issues, and his are, as we have seen, wrong-headed and prone to fail, he can't really do what the various observers recommend.

Everybody seems to have missed this point. Reagan's approach worked because, well, as Seib at least acknowledged, it led to economic and job growth unrivaled in decades. Now, we have the reverse, and no prospect in sight for anything remotely Reaganomic. Even the decade-old Bush tax cuts are to become Obama tax increases in two months.

My point is, I don't think this president can or will compromise his few, core, socialistic values to re-ignite robust US economic growth.

That said, all the pundits mouth the 'compromise' platitude. Even Frank Luntz' focus group on Fox News last night nearly universally called for Congress to simply 'get the job done,' and 'listen to us.'

How do you get compromise when one party has dumb, unworkable ideas, and the other wants to change that?

Boehner's speech last night at least noted one important fact come January. Something Gingrich found out the hard way as Speaker.

The president has to lead, because his veto of divided-chamber legislation makes the House unable to enforce its majority's will. It's true that the new GOP House majority can de-fund and selectively hamper various programs, perhaps even including Obamacare. But it can't lead the country.

Where this will all shake out is anybody's guess. But I suspect that even if Boehner isn't sufficiently astute to avoid Gingrich's mistakes, having Eric Cantor, Paul Ryan and other GOP House "young guns" on his team will go a long way to prevent a rerun of the 1990s government shutdown while Gingrich faced off against Clinton.

The new House GOP leadership is probably better positioned and informed to effectively deal with the split-power government which will sit in Washington come late January.