The Wall Street Journal's editorial page noted earlier this week that John Boehner quietly deep-sixed Paul Ryan's attempt to force money cut from budgets to be sequestered in an untappable account until the fiscal year's end. Further, use of the money would be subject to a full House vote.
This way, Ryan reasoned, individual committee fiefdom's couldn't play bait and switch with budget cuts, using supposed-savings to grease other wheels in sub- or committee votes.
Before Ryan knew what was happening, according to the Journal, Boehner quickly gaveled the question to a voice vote and defeated it.
This is deeply troubling. Some say that Boehner appreciated the Tea Party movement early on and accommodated it. I never bought this line.
What Boehner did this week signals, to me, that my worst fears are coming true. Unless and until Boehner is braced, 24/7, by Eric Cantor on one side and Paul Ryan on the other, he's going to cave back into the arms of waiting old-line spending bulls in the GOP House caucus.
New brooms sweep cleanly. I always felt, and continue to feel, that Boehner's membership in the GOP House leadership that lost control of the chamber four years ago should have prohibited his becoming Speaker.
Eric Cantor is the obvious new face who should have been elected Speaker. Boehner's antics with floor votes and bushwacking his own Budget Committee chair, Ryan, tells you he's no true Tea Party friend, nor has he gotten religion about changing the way things are done in Washington.
Thursday, January 13, 2011
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Liberal Media Attacks On Conservatives Regarding Arizona Shootings
It's an unfortunate, and expected, outcome of the tragic shooting deaths and woundings in Tucson over the weekend that liberal media pundits have immediately blamed conservative politicians and media personalities.
I actually watched some of Monday night's MSNBC program featuring Keith Olberman. This was after I saw part of Bill O'Reilly's Fox News program. O'Reilly aggressively responded to Paul Krugman's New York Times editorial. Part of that text, which I found here, reads,
"We don’t have proof yet that this was political, but the odds are that it was. She’s been the target of violence before. And for those wondering why a Blue Dog Democrat, the kind Republicans might be able to work with, might be a target, the answer is that she’s a Democrat who survived what was otherwise a GOP sweep in Arizona, precisely because the Republicans nominated a Tea Party activist. (Her father says that “the whole Tea Party” was her enemy.) And yes, she was on Sarah Palin’s infamous “crosshairs” list. [...]
You know that Republicans will yell about the evils of partisanship whenever anyone tries to make a connection between the rhetoric of Beck, Limbaugh, etc. and the violence I fear we’re going to see in the months and years ahead. But violent acts are what happen when you create a climate of hate. And it’s long past time for the GOP’s leaders to take a stand against the hate-mongers."
Right now, I'm listening to Glenn Beck's Monday evening program. I missed the live telecast, but correctly figured he would focus on Krugman et.al. using the shootings as an excuse to politicize free speech. I was correct.
For his part, Olberman, when I tuned in, was interviewing some minor liberal at an outfit called, I believe, the Southern Poverty Law Project. Olberman quizzed the guy on whether right wing pundits and the GOP were inciting violence, which, of course, the interviewee confirmed. Without any evidential cites, of course. Then Olberman's stentorian voice solemnly declared that Sarah Palin's website had put the Arizona Congresswoman who was shot, in 'crosshairs' for electoral defeat. Nevermind that the webpage to which I provided the link above reproduced a DailyKos page also targeting the Representative in its own crosshairs.
By now, you, as have I, have probably learned that the shooter was, sadly, an unstable, mentally ill person whose political leanings, whatever they were, didn't have any obvious connection to his violent acts.
Beck coolly reminded his viewers of how the liberal media got the recent case of the black female HUD(?) employee all wrong by jumping to conclusions in advance of having the facts. And on Monday evening, one of O'Reilly's guests reminded his viewers that when the Muslim Army colonel shot up Fort Hood, the liberal media reprimanded the public not to assign any causality to his religious beliefs. Now, however, they are all over conservatives for alleged responsibility for the Arizona violence.
Need you know more to see how one-sided the liberal media forces are? How they look for the potential in any situation to muzzle conservatives and restrict free speech?
I actually watched some of Monday night's MSNBC program featuring Keith Olberman. This was after I saw part of Bill O'Reilly's Fox News program. O'Reilly aggressively responded to Paul Krugman's New York Times editorial. Part of that text, which I found here, reads,
"We don’t have proof yet that this was political, but the odds are that it was. She’s been the target of violence before. And for those wondering why a Blue Dog Democrat, the kind Republicans might be able to work with, might be a target, the answer is that she’s a Democrat who survived what was otherwise a GOP sweep in Arizona, precisely because the Republicans nominated a Tea Party activist. (Her father says that “the whole Tea Party” was her enemy.) And yes, she was on Sarah Palin’s infamous “crosshairs” list. [...]
You know that Republicans will yell about the evils of partisanship whenever anyone tries to make a connection between the rhetoric of Beck, Limbaugh, etc. and the violence I fear we’re going to see in the months and years ahead. But violent acts are what happen when you create a climate of hate. And it’s long past time for the GOP’s leaders to take a stand against the hate-mongers."
Right now, I'm listening to Glenn Beck's Monday evening program. I missed the live telecast, but correctly figured he would focus on Krugman et.al. using the shootings as an excuse to politicize free speech. I was correct.
For his part, Olberman, when I tuned in, was interviewing some minor liberal at an outfit called, I believe, the Southern Poverty Law Project. Olberman quizzed the guy on whether right wing pundits and the GOP were inciting violence, which, of course, the interviewee confirmed. Without any evidential cites, of course. Then Olberman's stentorian voice solemnly declared that Sarah Palin's website had put the Arizona Congresswoman who was shot, in 'crosshairs' for electoral defeat. Nevermind that the webpage to which I provided the link above reproduced a DailyKos page also targeting the Representative in its own crosshairs.
By now, you, as have I, have probably learned that the shooter was, sadly, an unstable, mentally ill person whose political leanings, whatever they were, didn't have any obvious connection to his violent acts.
Beck coolly reminded his viewers of how the liberal media got the recent case of the black female HUD(?) employee all wrong by jumping to conclusions in advance of having the facts. And on Monday evening, one of O'Reilly's guests reminded his viewers that when the Muslim Army colonel shot up Fort Hood, the liberal media reprimanded the public not to assign any causality to his religious beliefs. Now, however, they are all over conservatives for alleged responsibility for the Arizona violence.
Need you know more to see how one-sided the liberal media forces are? How they look for the potential in any situation to muzzle conservatives and restrict free speech?
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Democrats' Lies Regarding The Financial Consequences of Repealing Obamacare
It's been very frustrating to see Congressional Democrats and their out-of-office colleagues lying to the public every chance they get regarding the true costs of, and repeal of, Obamacare.
No less a public moment than John Boehner's assumption of the House gavel as Speaker allowed Frisco Nan to give an uncharacteristic major speech upon her demotion, complete with lies involving the cost of the recent health care monstrosity.
Howard Dean has been hectoring every conservative in sight on every cable program on which he can appear with lies involving the alleged $230B 'cost' of the repeal.
But the facts are quite different.
What one needs to understand is that the CBO is directed to assess the economic consequences of the bills it is given, not the reasonability of the bills' assumptions or projections.
In the case of Wonderboy's health care, all sorts of financial deceptions were employed to game an alleged reduction of government spending by imposing public health care and covering millions of new citizens.
Among the deceptions were:
-double counting $398B Medicare and Social Security revenues
-moving the so-called 'doctor fix' into a separate bill, so that the added-back costs of not imposing Medicare program cost controls on doctors' fees was not included in the health care bill.
-adding unrelated income tax hikes on dividends and capital gains, as well as other taxes, so that the bill would appear to be generating government revenues.
-counting 10 years of tax levies in the bill but only 6 years of provided health care services.
-failing to provide for the landslide of dumped, formerly corporate-provided health care consumers into apparently-cheaper government plans, thus overwhelming services and causing losses on the unrealistically-low initial government premiums.
The gross total sums of these financial deceits make any claims of saving taxpayers money ridiculous and simply false.
What's really disappointing is that we have elected officials, and former elected officials, widely spreading these lies as if they were solemn facts. No matter that these Democrats know they are abetting US financial self-destruction. The goal of a universal, public health care entitlement is more important to them than the continued health of the Republic.
No less a public moment than John Boehner's assumption of the House gavel as Speaker allowed Frisco Nan to give an uncharacteristic major speech upon her demotion, complete with lies involving the cost of the recent health care monstrosity.
Howard Dean has been hectoring every conservative in sight on every cable program on which he can appear with lies involving the alleged $230B 'cost' of the repeal.
But the facts are quite different.
What one needs to understand is that the CBO is directed to assess the economic consequences of the bills it is given, not the reasonability of the bills' assumptions or projections.
In the case of Wonderboy's health care, all sorts of financial deceptions were employed to game an alleged reduction of government spending by imposing public health care and covering millions of new citizens.
Among the deceptions were:
-double counting $398B Medicare and Social Security revenues
-moving the so-called 'doctor fix' into a separate bill, so that the added-back costs of not imposing Medicare program cost controls on doctors' fees was not included in the health care bill.
-adding unrelated income tax hikes on dividends and capital gains, as well as other taxes, so that the bill would appear to be generating government revenues.
-counting 10 years of tax levies in the bill but only 6 years of provided health care services.
-failing to provide for the landslide of dumped, formerly corporate-provided health care consumers into apparently-cheaper government plans, thus overwhelming services and causing losses on the unrealistically-low initial government premiums.
The gross total sums of these financial deceits make any claims of saving taxpayers money ridiculous and simply false.
What's really disappointing is that we have elected officials, and former elected officials, widely spreading these lies as if they were solemn facts. No matter that these Democrats know they are abetting US financial self-destruction. The goal of a universal, public health care entitlement is more important to them than the continued health of the Republic.
Monday, January 10, 2011
The Constitution, Federal Government & Individuals
Fox News' contributor and program host, former judge Andrew Napolitano, often repeats his contention that in the Constitution, the federal government doesn't have a direct relationship with the individual. Specifically, he advances the view that the Framers did not intend for the federal level of our government to intercede through or around the states to establish direct relationships with all individuals.
It took income tax to do that.
Now we have massive federal intervention in the lives of individuals, rather than the federal government perhaps legislating services to be furnished by individual states, along with the provision of funding. The obvious large programmatic examples are Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and, at least in the past, ADC.
Why is this? And aren't these programs really radical departures from the limited federal government as much for their direct connection with individuals as their establishment of expectations by individuals of direct benefits from Washington?
Come to think of it, was the federal draft for military service in the 1860s also an instance of improper reach by the federal government through the states?
Whether one agrees with Napolitano, or not, it's refreshing to consider his contention, i.e., that somewhere in the history of the US from its early years to now, qualitatively different powers became part of the federal government. And one of the hallmarks of this qualitative change has been its construction of individual relationships with individuals which, prior to that, gave us a different type of government.
One wonders if so much of the Progressive movement depended upon this individual connection. Without it, the federal government is more sterile, less focused upon legislation that, as Napolitano often notes, is unconstitutional on its face, because it does not apply to all Americans.
It's probably wishful thinking to hope we can ever turn this clock back. But I suspect it would do a great deal to reduce federal power and spending if we could.
It took income tax to do that.
Now we have massive federal intervention in the lives of individuals, rather than the federal government perhaps legislating services to be furnished by individual states, along with the provision of funding. The obvious large programmatic examples are Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and, at least in the past, ADC.
Why is this? And aren't these programs really radical departures from the limited federal government as much for their direct connection with individuals as their establishment of expectations by individuals of direct benefits from Washington?
Come to think of it, was the federal draft for military service in the 1860s also an instance of improper reach by the federal government through the states?
Whether one agrees with Napolitano, or not, it's refreshing to consider his contention, i.e., that somewhere in the history of the US from its early years to now, qualitatively different powers became part of the federal government. And one of the hallmarks of this qualitative change has been its construction of individual relationships with individuals which, prior to that, gave us a different type of government.
One wonders if so much of the Progressive movement depended upon this individual connection. Without it, the federal government is more sterile, less focused upon legislation that, as Napolitano often notes, is unconstitutional on its face, because it does not apply to all Americans.
It's probably wishful thinking to hope we can ever turn this clock back. But I suspect it would do a great deal to reduce federal power and spending if we could.
Friday, January 7, 2011
About That "Fairness" Thing
Liberals, especially Wonderboy, make much of "fairness." To hear them, it's not fair if one person in America is poorly-off while anyone else is wealthy from the sweat of their own brow.
But let's consider another type of fairness for a moment.
What about fixed-, defined-benefit social transfer payment programs? How are they fair?
Sure, most well-intended Americans want to help the less well-off. But consider what has happened since our idiotic Congress, in 1932 or thereabouts, enacted Social Security.
Between that program, and its descendants, Medicare and Medicaid, the US Congress bestowed upon society fixed-promise payment schemes, regardless of the means of the country to afford them.
Yet, ironically, even paradoxically, those working Americans who pay taxes to fund these programs are exposed to all sorts of income risks. Being America, few of us are guaranteed jobs, or lush unemployment benefits if we lose a job.
So we have the bizarre situation, which, in my opinion, only Congresses full of mediocre civil servants who couldn't make a living the honest way- working in the private sector- have designed welfare programs which require fixed payouts from taxpayers who assume all the risk.
Any sensible person would have designed the three programs differently. Ideally, they'd have been individual-account, defined contribution schemes from the start. Further, and this is the really important part which I've never seen elsewhere, annual payout levels would be contingent upon the relative health of the US economy, in real terms.
By this I mean some benchmark year, with a benchmark GDP/person, GDP growth rate, and price level, would be used from which to calculate a standard real dollar benefit/person for each program. Thereafter, the effects of the three measures would attenuate how much money each payee received each year.
This way, we wouldn't have the current fiasco, whereby the country's infrastructure and defense spending, to name two important governmental tasks, are subject to cuts due to budget deficits, but social welfare spending is seen as fixed, sacrosanct, and on auto-pilot.
Why shouldn't the country's poor bear as much burden as the taxpayers funding their generous stipends via Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid?
It seems only right that all society's members bear the pain of recessions and inflation. That nothing in the federal budget is fixed and off-limits during periods of financial pain.
Doesn't that seem truly fair?
But let's consider another type of fairness for a moment.
What about fixed-, defined-benefit social transfer payment programs? How are they fair?
Sure, most well-intended Americans want to help the less well-off. But consider what has happened since our idiotic Congress, in 1932 or thereabouts, enacted Social Security.
Between that program, and its descendants, Medicare and Medicaid, the US Congress bestowed upon society fixed-promise payment schemes, regardless of the means of the country to afford them.
Yet, ironically, even paradoxically, those working Americans who pay taxes to fund these programs are exposed to all sorts of income risks. Being America, few of us are guaranteed jobs, or lush unemployment benefits if we lose a job.
So we have the bizarre situation, which, in my opinion, only Congresses full of mediocre civil servants who couldn't make a living the honest way- working in the private sector- have designed welfare programs which require fixed payouts from taxpayers who assume all the risk.
Any sensible person would have designed the three programs differently. Ideally, they'd have been individual-account, defined contribution schemes from the start. Further, and this is the really important part which I've never seen elsewhere, annual payout levels would be contingent upon the relative health of the US economy, in real terms.
By this I mean some benchmark year, with a benchmark GDP/person, GDP growth rate, and price level, would be used from which to calculate a standard real dollar benefit/person for each program. Thereafter, the effects of the three measures would attenuate how much money each payee received each year.
This way, we wouldn't have the current fiasco, whereby the country's infrastructure and defense spending, to name two important governmental tasks, are subject to cuts due to budget deficits, but social welfare spending is seen as fixed, sacrosanct, and on auto-pilot.
Why shouldn't the country's poor bear as much burden as the taxpayers funding their generous stipends via Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid?
It seems only right that all society's members bear the pain of recessions and inflation. That nothing in the federal budget is fixed and off-limits during periods of financial pain.
Doesn't that seem truly fair?
Thursday, January 6, 2011
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.
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.
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
CNBC's "Big Brother" Media
We don't need to wait for a government-controlled media to see 'Big Brother' style media in action.
Simply watch CNBC.
The network seems to be aiming to make mediocrity its watchword. Consider this morning's program.
For two hours, upward failure Jon Corzine was a guest-host. Constantly referred to as "Governor," Corzine primped and opined with an assumed wisdom which belies his actual record.
Originally a Goldman Sachs bond trader, Corzine first stumbled by trying to take the firm public when co-running the place. Although many outside the finance world don't understand, Corzine was deposed by his partners, who subsequently sold the firm to the investing public for much more than Corzine wanted, via an IPO.
From this failure, Corzine moved to ape New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenberg, promptly buying the next Senate seat up for election. Eventually tiring of serving in the minority, Corzine again showed his awful sense of timing by leaving the Senate to buy the NJ governorship just before the Democrats retook the upper chamber in Washington. So instead of chairing a Senate committee, Corzine ended up with the real headache of wrestling with the finances of his dysfunctional state. He lost re-election this past November.
Why anyone would invite this clown onto a major business cable television program is beyond me.
Joining Corzine, for 'balance,' for one segment, was Howard Dean, the failed Democratic presidential candidate.
Corzine sagely nodded his bearded head and tut-tutted over incoming House Speaker Boehner's being advised by this mornings lead staff editorial in the Wall Street Journal to lay the basis for a GOP president in 2012. Dean continued his mad-dog, illogical ranting on higher taxes.
For his part, Corizne, who claims to read the WSJ, evidently missed this editorial, and went on to claim that deficit reduction just has to include hefy tax increases- there's no other way!
You might ask yourself what a business network is doing using explicitly political icons- failed, at that- on its lead morning program? Good question.
If analysis of governmental actions and their impacts on business were the point, surely there are less-partisan, more qualified guests/hosts.
Who needs a government-run media when CNBC does the job so nicely in the private sector? Thank God you can also watch Fox News.
Simply watch CNBC.
The network seems to be aiming to make mediocrity its watchword. Consider this morning's program.
For two hours, upward failure Jon Corzine was a guest-host. Constantly referred to as "Governor," Corzine primped and opined with an assumed wisdom which belies his actual record.
Originally a Goldman Sachs bond trader, Corzine first stumbled by trying to take the firm public when co-running the place. Although many outside the finance world don't understand, Corzine was deposed by his partners, who subsequently sold the firm to the investing public for much more than Corzine wanted, via an IPO.
From this failure, Corzine moved to ape New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenberg, promptly buying the next Senate seat up for election. Eventually tiring of serving in the minority, Corzine again showed his awful sense of timing by leaving the Senate to buy the NJ governorship just before the Democrats retook the upper chamber in Washington. So instead of chairing a Senate committee, Corzine ended up with the real headache of wrestling with the finances of his dysfunctional state. He lost re-election this past November.
Why anyone would invite this clown onto a major business cable television program is beyond me.
Joining Corzine, for 'balance,' for one segment, was Howard Dean, the failed Democratic presidential candidate.
Corzine sagely nodded his bearded head and tut-tutted over incoming House Speaker Boehner's being advised by this mornings lead staff editorial in the Wall Street Journal to lay the basis for a GOP president in 2012. Dean continued his mad-dog, illogical ranting on higher taxes.
For his part, Corizne, who claims to read the WSJ, evidently missed this editorial, and went on to claim that deficit reduction just has to include hefy tax increases- there's no other way!
You might ask yourself what a business network is doing using explicitly political icons- failed, at that- on its lead morning program? Good question.
If analysis of governmental actions and their impacts on business were the point, surely there are less-partisan, more qualified guests/hosts.
Who needs a government-run media when CNBC does the job so nicely in the private sector? Thank God you can also watch Fox News.
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