GOP To Cave On Gun Control

It appears that the Party Of Stupid's Elite leadership is prepared to cave on gun control.  From a couple of reports, they will allow a national data base that will record all gun sales and ownership to be created.  This give the government quite literally a list of everyone who buys and sells guns across the country.

[The] Republican Majority Leader is leading the charge to cut a deal with President Obama.
The following are just some of the threats to innocent school children and our God-given 2nd Amendment liberties that Republicans are about to shove down our throats:
1.The NRA is cutting backroom deals to centralize gun owner data collection into the Obama/Holder massive government data base.
A centralized system is less costly to fight and far more lucrative for the NRA to appear to be “fixing“.
Like all establishment political lobbies the key to their job security is assisting in making problems they end up being called upon to “fix“.
2. Republican Majority Leader Eric Cantor is leading the charge to give Obama and Holder what they want in exchange for appearing to be “fixing” the problem of innocent children being butchered in our public and private schools.
3. Newly appointed Republican Judiciary Chairman, Bob Goodlatte R-VA 6th District, is providing political cover for the sneaky back room gun control deals and gun grabbing sell outs that his political masters - – John Boehner and Eric Cantor – - are cutting with Obama and his corrupt Attorney General, Eric Holder.

Political insiders have confirmed to me, that Goodlatte earned his brand new chairmanship by ignoring the constitutional demands and grievances of every Republican Unit Chairman in his own 6th district.

Eric Cantor and  Paul Ryan are the ones leading the charge on this one.  What makes this so onerous is that for the 1st time, the government will know WHO is buying and selling.  That's the first step towards confiscation.  For the 1st time, an American government will have the ability, if it so decides to take away firearms from lawful citizens.  That's the slippery slope.

This also calls into play the rumours that the Speaker of the House, John Boehner, was planning to pass laws without a majority of his GOP caucus.  The GOP ain't called the Party of Stupid for nothing.  Then there's this;

You might think that with Republicans in control of the US House of Representatives there would be no way ANY gun control legislation could reach the floor.

But sadly we are already beginning to see so-called “conservative champions” folding to pressure from the anti-gun media to sell-out gun owners.

Former Vice Presidential candidate, Congressman Paul Ryan, has stated that he would support legislation that bans private sales at gun shows.

In the House, Majority Leader Eric Cantor, along with the help of Rep. Scott Rigell (VA), Patrick Meehan (PA) and others, have stated openly that they will work together with anti-gun Democrats from Maryland and New York to tighten restrictions on private firearms sales and expand background checks.

Possibly even more upsetting has been Senator Tom Coburn’s willingness to work alongside anti-gunner Chuck Schumer (NY) to propose “bi-partisan” anti-gun legislation in the Senate.
Make no mistake, so-called “expansion” of background checks is little more than a blatant attempt by anti-gunners to register all firearms and gun owners in America.

That is why Representatives Steve Stockman (TX-36) and Paul Broun (GA-10) have drafted a letter to Speaker Boehner and the Republican leadership urging them to require the support of the majority of Republican members in the House before bringing any anti-gun bills to the floor.

This so-called “Hastert Rule” would mean that 117 Republicans would have to support a particular bill before it had any chance of getting a floor vote, not just the support of the anti-gun elitist in leadership.

If the Republican elite leadership really wanted to to destroy the party and go the way of the Whigs...this is surely it.  They were winning the hearts and minds of America, which has been hardening its position on defense of the 2nd Amendment.  By caving into Liberals & Democrats demands to do something "for the cheeldren"...will be the rock upon which the party crashes.

There can be no compromise upon America's right to defend ourselves against the tyranny of government.  The 2nd Amendment is the rock upon which that right stands.  To force any crack into is to lead to the loss of that right and therefore, NO COMPROMISE may be allowed.  None, nein, nyet, ni...NO COMPROMISE.

This issue could lead to taking back the US Senate...by forcing the Senators in red states, who are up for reelection to take stands that are against their consituents desires...it cost Dem's Congress in 1994...and will in 2014, but only if the Party of Stupid isn't struck by Stupid!  Don't listen to just me.  There are people all over the country that this will enrage.

Such political ploys would be unnecessary if the GOP weren’t filled with such weasels. I cannot vouch for the accuracy of these reports, but I have followed Cantor and Ryan for a while now on firearms freedoms and gun rights, and it doesn’t surprise me in the least.

It’s fascinating that the GOP leadership would be willing to sacrifice their careers on the altar of political correctness. And it will cost them their careers. I don’t know how else to say it other than to keep repeating myself. The gun owners who recently waited in lines for three or more hours to pay exorbitant prices for guns were not repeat buyers (long time gun owners like me already had most of the firearms we wanted and so we are purchasing ammunition now). They were first time buyers.

I’ve watched them at the ranges. I have overheard their conversations, I have watched them at the gun stores and gun shows. I have heard their relatively ignorant questions (not ignorant because they’re stupid, but because they’re in the process of learning). They are not us. We already have guns. These are new gun owners. The polls they are trotting out to show the number of gun owners decreasing are all lies.

I don’t know whether the questions aren’t being honestly answered or what other source there could be for the error. But the polls are in error. Don’t believe them. And as for older gun owners like me, and even the newer gun owners like I have monitored for the past half year, we have made it clear with our voices and wallets. No new gun laws. None. Period. Not one more inch. Not one.

I've been saying for a while that it's time to either get rid of the leadership of the GOP in Congress.  They've gone along to get along for so long, they don't know how to do anything else.  They've sold their principles for invitations to be on the "A" list for party invitations inside the beltway...forgetting that the Republican Party used to have ideas...ideas like small government...staunch support of America's right to defend itself from government tyranny...balancing the budget...

Principles are important...until you throw them out the window.  When you do that, you can forget why you were sent to Congress.  The GOP leadership has forgotten what they stand for.  It's time to either get rid of them, or get rid of the party they putatively represent and find new leaders who WILL stand for their principles.

What the tea party needs to do is read the history of the 1840's and 1850's.  The Whig party leadership got to the point where they believed they knew better than their base how to run not just their party, but the country.  Eventually, the political base of the party became disenchanted  with their leadership and began to flee the party.

By the early 1850's, the Whigs disintigrated as a coherent political force.  From those ashes rose the Republican Party...fast forward to 2010...

The GOP leadership made unrealistic promises to conservatives that if they were given control of Congress, they would reduce spending, repeal ObamaCare and roll back the regulatory brick walls that Democrats had raised against investment and business expansion.  Following the election, Congressional Republicans deliver "reductions in 'future spending'"...and nothing else.

The base, the Tea Party movement has been casting around for a leader...but instead found hundreds and thousands...because "all politics is local"...it's time for conservatives to realize that the GOP is both moribund and morally bankrupt.  They will do none of those things that are planks to the party, except to enrich themselves and their cronies...just as Democrats are doing.  The party Establishment will do everything in it's power to maintain their hold on the party...so...we must toss them out like dirty water...

...and start fresh.  The Tea Party has been played for a fool by the Estalishment of the GOP.  Republican "leaders' will pay lipservice to the ideals that the GOP stands for, but will continue to "go along to get along".

If we can complete the process started 2 years ago, in 2014, The Tea Party can present an entire slate of candidates who are uncorrupted by the current Republican Party Establishment, and in fact, shunt the GOP aside, and take it's place to make the very difficult decisions that are necessary to place this country back on a sound fiscal stance.

Mitt Romney & 25%

I've held off commenting on the GOP candidates for a while. Its not that I don't have very strong thoughts on them, but I wasnted to see what voters had to say before I actually put my 2 cents in. Ok...with Iowa under our belts and New Hampshire looming...here are my thoughts.

While he may have won the Iowa Caucuses by a slim 8 votes (there are doubts about that as well), Mitt Romney has a 25% problem. He can't seem to rise above that level of approval...out side of New England. In New Hampshire, he's at 40% according to recent polls, but that doesn't really mean much. He's been campaigning in NH for almost a decade, and spent upwards of $100 million dollars in that time.

Yet, he can't get above 25%. That should have alarm bells going off with the Republican "elite" leadership in and out of Washington. But it doesn't. He's the annointed favorite. Look at it from the opposite view, 75% of GOP voters don't like him. That's shocking. For over a year, we've been flailing about, flitting from one candidate to the next, tryiing to find, NOT ROMNEY. In DC...they don't see that. But, it could be the "elite" party leadership is sadly out of touch with the base. They keep talking about "electability", yet that's a myth.

But if 75% of GOP voters want someone else as the nominee, doesn't it follow that Mitt will have trouble getting that all vote in the fall if nominated? ...

That's from Mike's America blog.and goes to the heart of the issue. Most of the rank and file don't like him, don't want him and won't vote for him, because at heart, they just don't trust the flip-flopping SOB. Mike Walsh in NR said recently,   

 As I said on the most recent NR cruise, if Romney is the nominee, he will lose. He has no idea what Axelrod & Co. are capable of, nor of the depths to which they will stoop to destroy him. They will attack him as a flip-flopper, as a panderer, as a rapacious and heartless one percenter, and, yes, as a Mormon. They will damn him with faint praise as a liberal accomodationist, as the spiritual father of Obamacare. He’s a gentleman in a mug’s game, and this is no time for gentlemen.

He hasn't yet taken an issue that he's not flipped in since he was governor of Massachusetts, one of the MOST LIBERAL STATES IN THE COUNTRY. A conservative there is a liberal pretty much everywhere else (excepting the West Coast or NY).    Another Micheal (Greene this time from the Boston Herald, Romney's back yard).

I’m ready to sell out, too. Like you, I’m ready to abandon my conservative principles, ignore Mitt’s big-government legacy and his obvious disdain for the right — if it means a guaranteed winner in November.

But before I lift my conservative skirts for another H.W. Bush/Dole/McCain moderate because I’m supposed to suck it up and “back a winner,” is it asking too much to expect the guy to, you know, win something first?
...
No, Mitt did not “win” Iowa. Winning is not getting eight more votes than a guy who, until recently, was best known as the victim of a campaign on Google to turn his last name into a disgusting sexual reference (trust me — you don’t want to know).
Winning is not spending 12 months and $10 million in Iowa in 2008 to get 30,021 votes, then campaigning another four years, spending another $2 million  . . . and getting just 30,015 votes.
Four years ago, Romney could blame his lackluster 25.1 percent on the fact that he’d never run before and faced formidable opposition: a longtime U.S. senator, a successful two-term Southern governor, a Tennessee movie star.
But this year, Romney is running against the cast of a bad TLC network reality show — and he’s still at 25.1 percent!
How do you go from running against McCain, Huckabee, and Thompson to running against Perry, Bachmann and Paul and getting fewer votes? When one foe is an angry former speaker who’s been married three times, took money from Freddie Mac and shares a name with a Star Wars villain, you should be running up the score.

And no, don’t say “it’s just Iowa.” Have you checked the latest polls? Less than 48 hours after Iowa, Rasmussen’s national poll had Mitt at just 29-21 over Rick Santorum. In South Carolina — which has picked every GOP nominee since Reagan — Romney’s stuck at 20 percent and he’s losing in Florida, too.
No doubt newer surveys will reflect rising Romney strength. But the fact is that Mitt vs. The GOP Klown Kar should be a cakewalk.

He was for health care before he was against it...and that's a huge problem. While I support his stance purely on 10th Amendment grounds alone(the states have the constitutional power to enact such legislation), the fact that he was the architect of the MA health care debacle (and steeply rising prices there), it will be difficult for him defend his position nationally. I'm predicting today, that if Mitt Romney is the GOP nominee, he will lose in November's general election.

From Mike's blog,

Republicans have the unfortunate habit of nominating the guy who came in second in a previous contest. That's how we got Bob Dole and John McCain. Neither of which had the stuff it takes to fight it out with the political thuggery that will be headed our way in a few months. Apparently, I am not the only one who worries whether Mitt would be the best nominee just because he came in second last time around! But I'm glad to know that guys named Mike seem to be making a lot of sense!

...and that's the problem, instead of picking winners, we in the GOP tend to go with last round's loser.  Mitt Romney will lose

President Obama Is Doomed....BUT,

There's a terrific article in Forbes today by John Tamny.  His premise is that Mr. Obama will be a one term president, but only if the GOP candidates can figure out why.  He argues that having a soft dollar will doom Obama because he's not done anything to defend the currency.  Mr. Tamny make many valid assertions, at leas in my opinion.  BUT, yes, that horrible word, Mr. Tamny doesn't take into account the following, which I added to the comments:

The One Big Thing you miss is presuming the GOP candidates are smart enough to catch on. After all, the leadership of the GOP in congress promised real spending cuts...and delivered "cuts in future spending." As if that means anything (since no Congress can restrict what a future Congress can do...without a Constitutional amendment.).

 

That being said, the media anointed "front runner," Mitt Romney is Obama "Light"...see RomneyCare, the blueprint for ObamaCare (not that I object of Massachusetts having a state mandated health care system...that's covered by the 10th Amendment). Rick Perry is faltering, and I don't really think that he has what it takes to puts things back on track. Herman Cain, has a clue, but I'm not certain he has the political experience to get things done either.

 

Soooo...never under estimate the ability of the GOP to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. The real problem with the GOP currently is that it's current leadership, has "gone along to get along" for so long, that they just don't know anything else. They've compromised (i.e. sold out to) with the Democratic Party on every item that's been passed through Congress over the past 50 years. I don't think they have what it takes to...right the vessel of state.

 

Congress if they really wanted to could pass a genuine austerity budget, and derail the Obama attempt at growing government by fiat and through the regulatory agencies (EPA, alphabet soup offices) by simply NOT FUNDING THEM...they can't pass new growth chocking regulation if they have no funds.

 

The GOP needs to pass a budget, a real budget and send it to the Senate and watch the Democratically controlled Senate, choke on it. 23 Democratic Senators are up for reelection...let them explain to their constituents WHY THEY VOTED AGAINST A BUDGET THAT WOULD MOVE THE COUNTRY FORWARD...unfortunately, Mr. Boehner doesn't have the courage, or character to do this...and the country will continue to suffer because both parties are playing politics.

If we could actually get the GOP in Congress to actually deliver on what they promised BEFORE the election of 2010, when the country gave them a majority  in the House of Representatives, and near parity in the Senate. 

• Vote to repeal ObamaCare...and send it to the Democratically controlled Senate so they can choke on it.
• Vote on a budget that either cuts funding altogether, or severely reduces funding on the alphabet soup regulatory agencies...as well as those useless cabinet level departments that simply waste money and provide employment to bureaucrats...and send it to the Democratically controlled Senate so those 23 Dem Senators would have to explain to their constituents WHY THEY VOTED AGAINST reducing the size and scope of government.
• Live up to the promises you gave in 2010...
• Pass a balanced budget amendment and send it to the states.
• Really screw the Senate and pass and send to the States an amendment repealing the 17th Amendment (direct election of Senators, instead of them being selected by the various state legislatures, and immediately remove a huge crutch of federalism)

If they GOP would do this...the Democrats would be painted into a corner they can't get out of...just looking at the meltdown in Europe and pounding home the simple lesson that what is happening there will happen here within 5 years if we don't do something NOW...would give us super majority in both houses of Congress as well as a president with a mandate to commit America to real change...change that would guarantee a return to prosperity for at least 20 years.

  

Republicans in Congress Betray The Tea Party & GOP Principles

We, in the heartland have long lamented that the GOP's "elite leadership" in Washington are clueless imbeciles, who regularly "go along to get along."  But as they say, the proof is in the pudding.  Very nearly all the current membership of Congress has spent the vast majority of their political careers as a minority party in either their state house, or in Congress.

Once upon a time, the GOP stood for things like keeping down taxation, regulation and the reducing the size of blouted federal government.  But  like all things political, GOP politicians who said they were for this, were only paying lip-service for the masses. Most recently, GOP opposition to ObamaCare was that it was beyond the purview of the federal government both in the Commerce Clause as well as the 10th amendment, which limits the scope of the federal government.  Then came politics...

Among other things, S.197 sets a statute of limitations for claims, caps damages and creates standards for expert witnesses. These may sound like great ideas, but they are not within the constitutional powers granted to the federal government for the very same reasons Obamacare is not.

The law’s own justification for its constitutional authority should be chilling to anyone committed to limited federal power. The bill’s findings state that health care and health insurance are industries that “affect interstate commerce,” and conclude that Congress therefore has Commerce Clause power to regulate them — even when it involves an in-state transaction between a doctor and patient, governed by in-state medical malpractice laws. Is there any industry that couldn’t be found to have an effect on interstate commerce? The agriculture and manufacturing industries, long considered the paradigmatic areas not covered by the Commerce Clause, certainly fall under federal power under this broad analysis.

Now, the Senate GOP is for big government, because it's something that they want...for political jockeying. So, which is it? They have no principles that matter, and should adhere to, or they're just political hacks who say one thing one day, and something diametrically opposite the other? This is hypocrisy that is often laid at the feet of Congressional [Social] Democats...and a bat that should be used to beat the GOP political leadership.

No wonder Rush Limbaugh took to the airwaves at the close of last week, an advance copy of this article in his hand, to say in essence -- and sadly -- that he was coming to the conclusion that in fact there were a number of Republicans who were on the other side -- as in those who once supported the conservative argument having jumped the fence to play in some fashion for Clark Clifford's old team

Making them, as we will call them here, "Clark Clifford Republicans."

"Clark Clifford Republicans" defined as those who really don't believe in the Reagan/Coolidge view -- the conservative view and once upon a time the Republican view -- of the world at all. Even if they give good lip service to the idea in public, it is clear from this piece that in the quiet corners of this or that Washington bistro they are muttering their equivalent derogations for Tea Partiers that match in some fashion Clifford's "amiable dunce" derisive. Although, it appears, they have dropped the "amiable."

It's not simply that they have a Thomas E. Dewey/Nelson Rockefeller view of the world or, to use Barry Goldwater's pithy description, they favor a "dime store New Deal."

The real problem here is that all of Clark Clifford's friends across the decades have so rooted Big Government in the psychology of Washington that "Republican Elites" have elected to accept the whole premise -- and for reasons having to do with self-preservation simply cannot bring themselves to get seriously Reaganesque or Coolidge-like because to do so gnaws at their own economic vitals and capacity for influence. Both now hopelessly entangled with the concrete boxes of bureaucracy that literally litter the Washington landscape. [Emphasis is mine, Ed.]

This is a bad bill and should never have been written this way.  You can't scream about a massive government over-reach in one minute...then try and extend the reach of government in another.  This is what DEMOCRATS DO...and is a gross betrayal of core principles of the Republican Party.

GOP Leadership: Still Going Along To Get Along...

Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit fame has an excellent post on Mr. Obama's Jobs Bill.

THE HILL: Democrats scramble to save face on President Obama’s jobs bill.“Democratic leaders in the Senate are scrambling to avoid defections on President Obama’s jobs package, which appears headed for defeat on Tuesday. A lack of Democratic unity on the president’s bill would be embarrassing for the White House, which has been scolding House Republicans for refusing to vote on the measure. Obama has been touring the country, aiming to put pressure on the GOP to act. But Senate Democrats have indicated they are feeling some heat. Last week, Democratic leaders revised Obama’s bill, scrapping his proposed offsets. Instead of raising taxes on families making more than $250,000 annually, Senate Democrats lifted that figure to $1 million. Despite the changes, the legislation still does not enjoy the support of all 53 senators who caucus with the Democrats. A handful of Democrats are undecided or leaning no on the bill.”

Reader Pual Burich's take is excellent,

“The GOP is showing its absolute fecklessness right now when it should be on the offensive. The GOP should have LONG AGO produced a bill to counter Obama’s ‘Jobs Bill’ and marketed it relentlessly: roll back the last 5 years of regulations, a simplified flat tax for both corporations and individuals, roll back spending to 2008 levels via an across the board CUTS (not reductions in the rate of growth). The GOP has fallen into the Waiting for Godot (Supercommittee) trap. Does anybody actually believe that a group that includes John Kerry et al is going to produce anything meaningful? This is all very distressing–but not at all surprising. The GOP is only slightly less venal than the Dems, and considerably less bold.”

While Mr. Burish's assesment is acccurate, he too misses a key point.  The GOP leadership in Washington, as well as many state capitals where they've been in the minority for most of the last century has been "Going along to get along" for so long they don't have a clue of what else to do.  That's the problem.  Instead of attempting to get out a real message, much as Paul Ryan has tried to do, they continue to believe that the media will give them a  chance to voice their opinions.  That's just not so.

The MSM is so much in the bag for the Democratic party in general, and Barack Obama in particular, that they can't allow any other narrative to escape thier messaging.  Just turn on any of the three (or if you include PBS) non-cable  news broadcasts and you'll see a repeat of very nearly all the DNC's weekly talking points.  It's even worse on the cable news networks, excepting only FoxNews.

Because the GOP continues to operate on the same game plan they used in the 1970's and 1980's, when media bias wasn't nearly as blatant as it is today.  This won't cut it today.  Now, with city and national editors who won't publish stories that go against their political biases and world views, the only way to get out a message that's diametrically opposed to the social democratic line is to use the internet and citizen journalists....like Mr. Reynolds at Instapundit.

But, our current "elite GOP leadership" will inevitably snatch defeat from the jaws of victory if they continue to think the Liberals will allow them access to the national media.

The Fix Is In

The GOP leadership is part of the problem and not part of the solution. That's why the Tea Party movement has grown so quickly.  They just don't seem to get it.  It seems like the charade this week was their "anger" over the deficit ceiling. It looks like the fix is in, and all that is happening is that the GOP will be able to say 'we won'...when America lost.

Over at Big Government.com, Andrew Breitbart's blog that cover's the government, they're reporting that that GOP has rolled on not raising the debt ceiling.  The GOP Leadership keeps on "going along to get along"...and they still are.

Here is a theory that many believe on Capitol Hill. The walk out by Senator Jon Kyl (R-Arizona) and Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Virginia) from the Vice President’s debt limit negotiations on Thursday was staged and agreed to by both parties as a means for Republicans to look tough before they cave on increasing the debt limit.

Vice President Biden has been meeting behind closed doors with a bipartisan bicameral group of politicians for weeks in an effort to cut a deal on a package to increase the statutory $14.3 trillion debt limit. These meeting have been extremely secretive and not many specifics of the negotiations have been provided to the public. One of the few details leaked was that liberals were putting tax increases on the table as a means to balance the budget.

If this is the case...then the GOP has done it again.  They've FUBAR'd in a way that will hurt the country immesurably.  What we need, isn't to raise the debt ceiling, but a significant roll back of government spending.  When the Demcrats took control, first of Congress in 2007, and then the White House in 2009, the increased federal spending by 40%.
 
What we need to do, isn't just window dressing spending cuts (which is what we've had this year), that are called "victories" by the GOP leadership, but a return to 2006 spending levels...and then reduce those across the board by 20%.  If we do that, we will see a significant shift in the economy from the wallowing we have now, to serious growth.
 
We won't see that of course, because the GOP leadership is more intent on "window dressing" than in actually delivering anything that can  shift the course of economic suicide that the Democrats has set us upon...at least until after the 2012 election...but even then, that will be too late for many people.
 
U6 unemployment is rising steadily (if "unexpectedly"), as will full unemployment.  With the EPA on course to put in place "carbon emission control" by executive-bureaucratic fiat, we'll see a sharp increase in energy prices, especially electricity and gas prices...
 
The GOP leadership seems intent on snatching defeat from the jaws of victory once more.

UPDATE:  From National  Review:  Here's what Kevin Williamson has to say, "How Much Credibility Does The GOP Have On Taxes"

I don’t want taxes or spending at 21.3 percent of GDP. I don’t want them at 18.5 percent, for that matter. I might go for spending at 14.2 percent and taxes at 16.1 percent as a good start, which would take us to the savage Darwinian conditions of . . . 1951, not exactly the Dark Ages or a time of notable national austerity. As I hear it, 1951 was a pretty good year. From 1950 to 1955, our average real GDP growth exceeded that magic 5 percent threshold that Tim Pawlenty and Larry Kudlow and the optimists are talking about, and that includes a little recession in 1954. (Granted, there are excellent reasons to believe that the postwar boom is not easily replicable. Here’s one. Here’s another. And one more. Not a unicorn in the bunch.)
But here’s the thing: If you want spend 21 percent, you really need to tax 21 percent. If you want to tax only 18.5 percent, you can only spend 18.5 percent. So far, Republicans have been pretty insistent about taxes, and not without reason (this probably is not the optimum moment to announce a large tax increase). But if you are not willing to move one variable, then you have to show yourself willing and able to move the other variable far enough to bring things into balance. The Republicans have been moving in the right direction, but they aren’t quite there. You want to take taxes off the table, then show me you can get the job done with cuts alone — not on paper, but in Congress.

Why haven’t I mentioned the Democrats? They control the Senate and the White House, holding a far stronger hand than do the Republicans. The reason is that the Democrats are a lost cause. Their commitment to maintaining the current path of entitlement spending and public-sector expansion will ensure national bankruptcy at virtually any level of taxation. (Don’t believe me? Have a gander at what a $30 trillion deficit looks like.) Removing Democrats from power probably is a precondition for averting a national fiscal meltdown. A necessary condition, but not a sufficient one.

The emphasis above is mine, not Kevin's.  He makes a good point.  If you want to spend level X, then you have to tax at level Y...or you spend your grand children's money...which we've been doing for 70 years.  When the Soviet Union did that...they went the way of the dinosaurs....maybe it's our turn to collapse as a nation.  That's not out of the question until we get spending into the realm of sanity. 

Jason C in the comments has this to say...and he does make some excellent points: 

Here is the problem with base year comparisons - we don't have the population structure we had in 1999, let alone in 1951.


In 1999, payroll contributions covered 80% of federal transfer payments for the big entitlements - social security, medicare, and medicaid. Payroll taxes brought in 7% of GPD and spending was 8.75% of GDP. Already out of balance, and accounting for most of the persistent deficit, but still in some reasonable relation to each other.

In 2010, payroll contributions covered only 63% of those transfers. Contributions brought in only 6.7% of GDP - down in yield, not up. Spending on them meanwhile ran %10.6% of GDP. There is a 4% of GDP structural gap between payroll contributions and transfer expenditures -and no it isn't being funded out of general revenue - there isn't any. It is all being borrowed.

Demographics push the federal government 0.2% of GDP further into the red every year. Every decade, government spending takes 2% more of GDP and payroll contributions bring in a marginally smaller share - because a smaller portion of the population are of working age, and a larger portion are in the receiving age categories, and are living longer and costing more each.

Similarly, all the means tested programs grow like topsy as people learn to get on them, regardless of economic growth or anything else. There are 50% more people on medicaid today than in 1999, for example. SSI today is as big as medicaid was then. Etc.

Just to balance this portion of the federal fiscal train wreck would require an immediate 58% increase in payroll taxes. Counting employer side, that would be a jump from 18.3% of gross pay to 29% - which amounts to a 13% fall in after tax payroll kept.

This would still leave the 0.2% demographic headwind; it only makes up for the past headwind not faced squarely or paid for. To deal with that remaining headwind, payroll tax *rates* would have to continue to climb by about 2% per year. This would consume essentially the entire increase in real wages we can expect from future productivity increases.

In other words, present Americans would need to drop their standard of living by about an eighth and sign away all future real increases in their income, to keep the present (frankly, certifiable) promises to give everyone a lavish retirement and free healthcare - which we have not remotely paid for.

We ought to offer the American people a clear choice between that path and Ryan's alternative. The present "let's pretend" path of borrowing huge shortfalls to cover the difference between what payroll taxes are collecting and what we are giving away on middle class entitlements, is not an option. It leads straight to national bankruptcy

Just take a look at the Greeks, they've had their 12 or 13th bailout, and are STILL going to founder, economically.  (follow the link and "read the whole thing.")

No one will be bailing us out...keep that in mind.

Storm Warning

Over the past couple of days, the ratings agency Stardard & Poor's has warned that they will down-grade the US bond rating from AAA...if this does in fact occur (and I see no reason for it not to, with the moribund stupidity of our ruling class thinking that they can spend without consequences) then it will cost vastly more for America to borrow money to pay for government services...The Wall Street Journal's editorial says,

Chief White House economist Austan Goolsbee declared that S&P had made a “political judgment,” and we’d have to agree, though probably not for the same reasons. The bulk of S&P’s analysis is taken up with repeatedly citing what it sees as next-to-no chance that Washington will do anything significant on deficit reduction this year or next.


“The outlook reflects our view of the increased risk that the political negotiations over when and how to address both the medium- and long-term challenges will persist until at least after the national elections in 2012,” said the credit rating outfit. S&P’s announcement is almost wholly a political analysis of the budget outlook.

There is only one reason the rating agency could suddenly have turned this dark on politics in Washington: President Obama’s speech at George Washington University last Wednesday. Mr. Obama’s “fiscal policy” speech may have sent progressive pundits cart-wheeling, but its political effect was to poison the prospect for budget negotiations.

Think about that.  It willl cost much more to fund our government.  Yet, politicians in DC are arguing over cutting less than .35% out of this year's budget.  The Democrats are calling it extreme cuts, while those of o the GOP leadership are calling them "historic."  Both sides are leading us to disaster...the deck chairs have been rearranged enough, it's time to completely balance the budget and stop spending money we don't have.

Don Surber put's it bluntly;

President Obama is a fool. He has been given everything in life and never had to earn it and so he is ignorant about how the financial world operates — and is blissfully incurious about the subject.  He sees business life in cartoonish stereotypes that date to the 1890s. Oh those grand industrialists with their [broken sentence??] He T-totally misjudged the economy in 2009. At a time when smart people would have reined the government in and quit printing money, he went full Keynesian.  Rather than put people back to work, he gave them a federally paid two-year vacation through an extension of unemployment benefits to 99 weeks. Unemployment is earned for 26 weeks. That’s what unemployment insuranc buys. After that it is welfare. Now we have this chump ignoring the reality of the inflation and stagflation he has unleashed upon the Republic. His partisan budget speech was an embarrassment to his supporters and an insult to the American People who in last November’s referendum on Obamanomics overwhelmingly said NO!  Republican gains in Congress were historic, a rebuke of this president’s policies. In January, he piously called for civility. In April, he acted as if he were a ward healer in Chicago. Maybe that is his true aptitude.

That is the state of our leadership.  They are leaderless and floundering with a clue as to what to do.

Omnibus Spending Bill

Show to just how tone deaf the Democratic leadership in Congress, they have introduced an Omnibus spending bill the fund the federal government until October of 2011 (Fiscal 2011) that shoots past $1,200,000,000,000.00.  All of which will be funded...by bonds, you've got it, we'll have to BORROW the money!  Included in that bill are 6488 earmarks used as payoffs by corrupt politicians that total $8.3 billion dollars.  While that's basically chump change, it's corrupt chump change in a time we should be looking at fiscal austerity.

This is the bill that Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid refused to bring to floor before the election because they feared what the public's reaction would be...as if losing 7 seats in the Senate, and 64 in the House weren't bad enough.  They were afraid that the tsunami would have been worse if the public had been able to peruse this bill before hitting the polling booth.

The $1.2 trillion bill, released on Tuesday, includes more than 6,000 earmarks totaling $8 billion, an amount that many lawmakers decried as an irresponsible binge following a midterm election in which many voters demanded that the government cut spending.
"The American people said just 42 days ago, 'Enough!' . . . Are we tone deaf? Are we stricken with amnesia?" Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), a leading earmark critic, said on the Senate floor, flipping through the 1,924-page bill as he pounded his desk.

The bill includes $18 million for two nonprofits associated with deceased Democrats, the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy and Rep. John P. Murtha; $349,000 for swine waste management in North Carolina; and $6 million for a rural Iowa school program named after Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa).

 While Mitch McConnell has agreed to a moritorium on earmarks...

the legislation includes provisions requested this year by McConnell, including $650,000 for a genetic technology center at the University of Kentucky, according to an analysis of the bill by Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonpartisan watchdog.

That's the height of hypocrisy...even for a jaded GOP leadership that no one in this country trusts.  On the plus side, John Boehner did release this: 

"If President Obama is truly serious about ending earmarks, he should oppose Senate Democrats' pork-laden omnibus spending bill and announce he will veto it if necessary. This bill represents exactly what the American people have rejected: more spending, more earmarks, and more big government. Republicans strongly oppose this last-ditch spending spree, a smack in the face to taxpayers at a time when we're borrowing 40 cents of every dollar we spend. Senate Democrats even go so far as to plow more than $1 billion into implementing ObamaCare, despite a growing national revolt against this job-killing health care law. . . .Senate Democrats should stand down so we can get to work on cleaning up Washington's fiscal mess"

The need to stop Washington’s job-killing spending binge may be lost on Senate Democrats, but it will be a top priority for the new Republican majority in the House. We have already banned earmarks and made a pledge to America to end the practice of omnibus bills like this disgrace and cut spending to pre-‘stimulus,’ pre-bailout levels. Instead of making reckless spending decisions in the waning days of the lame-duck session, Senate Democrats should stand down so we can get to work on cleaning up Washington’s fiscal mess.

What the GOP leadership must emphatically remember, the country didn't choose the Republican Party because we like an trust them, they were chosen because "they suck a little bit less" than the Democrats.  Here's some of the pork in the Senate version

• $247,000 - Virus free grapes in Washington State
• $413,000 - Peanut research in Alabama
• $125,000 - Fishery equipment for the Guam Fisherman’s Cooperative Association
• $349,000 - Swine waste management in North Carolina
• $277,000 - Potato pest management in wisconsin
• $246,000 - Bovine tuberculosis treatment in Michigan and Minnesota
• $522,000 - Cranberry and blueberry disease and breeding in New Jersey
• $500,000 - Oyster safety in Florida
• $400,000 - Solar parking canopies and plug-in electric stations in Kansas
• $165,000 - Maple syrup research in Vermont

Here's John McCain on the floor of the Senate, commenting about this bill.

 

 Basically, what it comes down to is this Democratically led Congress is telling America, and the just past election results, a resounding "fuck you."  They obviously haven't been listening, much less paying attention to what We The People want out elected representatives to do.

It's well past time to put an end to "lame duck" sessions, unless there is a pressing national emergency.  It's only been in the past 30 or so years that lame duck sessions have become the norm, and that norm has only been in the past 12 or so years.  Prior to the early 1980's, lame duck sessions were only called when pressing issues needed attention.  This Congress, and it's leadership, has ignored the will of the people long enough.  I believe that they don't think that we will remember what they've done in two years.  I don't think that they are taking the Tea Party movement seriously enough.  2012 is coming, and we WILL remember.

H/T Instapundit as always

UPDATE:  Congressman John Sarbanes answered with this:

Thank you for contacting me about deficits and the national debt. The national debt is a serious problem that requires our attention; I agree that we must act decisively to right our present fiscal course.

The irresponsible fiscal policies of the last decade left our nation on precarious fiscal footing as we slid into the worst recession in a generation. The impact of these policies cannot be reversed immediately and, without sustained economic growth, draconian spending cuts and tax increases will be required. That is why there has been general consensus among economists and policy experts that in the near term, as a response to the recession, targeted tax cuts and government spending are a desirable form of economic stimulus. Although balanced budgets must be an essential piece of any long-term economic strategy, the responsible use of short-term stimulus provides a much-needed "shot in the arm" for our struggling economy.

As the economy returns to sustainable growth, and once we have pushed closer to full employment, we must take a serious look at all elements of spending and tax revenue in order to return to fiscal responsibility. Last year, we made progress by enacting a statutory Pay-As-You-Go law to ensure that non-emergency spending or tax cuts are fully paid for elsewhere in budget. Pay-Go was applied during the 1990s and, along with strong economic growth, helped us achieve the budget surpluses of that decade. But the law was allowed to expire in 2002. I am also encouraged by the President's decision to create a national commission to make independent recommendations to the Congress about policies to get our fiscal house in order. The Commission's recommendations include tough choices about entitlements, tax revenue, and discretionary spending. Although I do not agree with every aspect of this proposal, these recommendations serve as a starting point as we begin to debate a comprehensive deficit-reduction package in the coming months. Make no mistake, enacting measures that will truly improve our fiscal condition will require shared sacrifice and real tradeoffs between government services and tax policy. I will come to this debate with the perspective that our budget policies should reflect our nation's values— ensuring opportunity and strengthening communities, promoting private enterprise and innovation, and sharing the costs of government equitably. I look forward to your continued input on this issue and I will keep your views in mind when the Congress considers relevant measures.

Again, I appreciate hearing from you. Please do not hesitate to contact me about other issues of concern to you in the future.

Sincerely,

John Sarbanes
Member of Congress

and I...being an angry Tea Partier answered him thusly: 
message dated 12/15/2010 6:01:44 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, md03ima@mail.house.gov writes:

"The irresponsible fiscal policies of the last decade left our nation on precarious fiscal footing as we slid into the worst recession in a generation. The impact of these policies cannot be reversed immediately and, without sustained economic growth, draconian spending cuts and tax increases will be required."

But when Nancy Pelosi took up the Speaker's gavel in 2006, she said she would be a good steward of "The Peoples" money...yet on her watch, and yours, you have added 1/3 to the national debt, with over $4 trillion dollars added in the past 23 months. How can you justify wasted 1 trillion on 'stimulus' that was now acknowledged by the White House to be an abject failure? How can you justify a two year average deficit of $1.4 trillion dollars per year? Answer that, without political wishy washyness and explain in simple language how...

Richard A. Vail
Pikesville, MD 21208
ravail136@aol.com
http://thevailspot.blogspot.com/

The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.--Thomas Jefferson

 

It's time to find a candidate who can oppose this sort of political corruption and do so while not being "captured" by the corrupt Washinton DC system.

GOP: We're Watching You...

McConnell Gives In On Earmarks...

A little bit ago,  Mitch McConnell, the leader of the GOP minority in the Senate entered the Senate chamber and gave the following speech.

I have seen a lot of elections in my life, but I have never seen an election like the one we had earlier this month. The 2010 midterm election was a “change” election the likes of which I have never seen, and the change that people want, above all, is right here in Washington.

Most Americans are deeply unhappy with their government, more so than at any other time in decades. And after the way lawmakers have done business up here over the last couple of years, it’s easy to see why. But it’s not enough to point out the faults of the party in power. Americans want change, not mere criticism. And that means that all of us in Washington need to get serious about changing the way we do business, even on things we have defended in the past, perhaps for good reason.

If the voters express themselves clearly and unequivocally on an issue, it’s not enough to persist in doing the opposite on the grounds that “that’s the way we’ve always done it.” That’s what elections are all about, after all. And if this election has shown us anything, it’s that Americans know the difference between talking about change, and actually delivering on it.

Bringing about real change is hard work. It requires elected officials — whether they’re in their first week or their 50th year in office — to challenge others and, above all, to challenge themselves to do things differently from time to time, to question, and then to actually shake up the status quo in pursuit of a goal or a vision that the voters have set for the good of our country.

I have thought about these things long and hard over the past few weeks. I’ve talked with my members. I’ve listened to them. Above all, I have listened to my constituents. And what I’ve concluded is that on the issue of congressional earmarks, as the leader of my party in the Senate, I have to lead first by example. Nearly every day that the Senate’s been in session for the past two years, I have come down to this spot and said that Democrats are ignoring the wishes of the American people. When it comes to earmarks, I won’t be guilty of the same thing.

Make no mistake. I know the good that has come from the projects I have helped support throughout my state. I don’t apologize for them. But there is simply no doubt that the abuse of this practice has caused Americans to view it as a symbol of the waste and the out-of-control spending that every Republican in Washington is determined to fight. And unless people like me show the American people that we’re willing to follow through on small or even symbolic things, we risk losing them on our broader efforts to cut spending and rein in government.

That’s why today I am announcing that I will join the Republican Leadership in the House in support of a moratorium on earmarks in the 112th Congress.

Over the years, I have seen presidents of both parties seek to acquire total discretion over appropriations. And I’ve seen presidents of both parties waste more taxpayer dollars on meritless projects, commissions, and programs than every congressional earmark put together. Look no further than the Stimulus, which Congress passed without any earmarks only to have the current administration load it up with earmarks for everything from turtle tunnels to tennis courts.

Contrast this with truly vital projects I have supported back home in Kentucky, such as the work we’ve done in relation to the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Western Kentucky.

Here was a facility at which workers, for years, were unaware of the dangers that the uranium at the plant posed to their health or how to safely dispose of the hazardous materials that were used there. Thanks to an expose about the plant in the 90s by the “Washington Post”, the danger was made known and I set about forcing the government to put a cleanup plan in place and to treat the people who had worked there. Through the earmark process, we were able to force reluctant administrations of both parties to do what was needed to clean up this site and to screen the people who had worked there for cancer. These screenings saved lives, and they would not have happened if Congress had not directed the funds to pay for them.

Another success story is the Bluegrass Army Depot, which houses some of the deadliest materials and chemical weapons on earth. As a nation we had decided that we would not use the kind of weapons that were stored at this site; and yet the federal government was slow to follow through on safely dismantling and removing them, even after we’d signed an international treaty that required it. But thanks to congressional appropriations we are on the way to destroying the chemical weapons at this site safely and thus protect the community that surrounds it.

Administrations of both parties have failed to see the full merit in either of these projects, which is one of the reasons I have been reluctant to cede responsibility for continuing the good work that is being done on them and on others to the Executive Branch.

So I’m not wild about turning over more spending authority to the executive branch, but I have come to share the view of most Americans that our nation is at a crossroads; that we will not be able to secure the kind of future we want for our children and grandchildren unless we act, and act quickly; and that only way we will be able to turn the corner and save our future is if elected leaders like me make the kinds of difficult decisions voters are clearly asking us to make.

Republicans in and out of Washington have argued strenuously for two years that spending and debt are at crisis levels. And we have demonstrated our seriousness about cutting spending and reining in government. Every Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee, for instance, voted against every appropriations bill in committee this year because they simply cost too much. Most included funding for projects in our home states. We voted against them anyway.

Banning earmarks is another small but important symbolic step we can take to show that we’re serious, another step on the way to serious and sustained cuts in spending and to the debt.

Earlier this month voters across the country said they are counting on Republicans to make tough decisions. They gave us a second chance. With this decision, I’m telling them that they were right to put their trust in us. And it’s my fervent hope that it will help demonstrate to the American people in some way just how serious Republicans are about not letting them down.

Republican Leaders in the House and Senate are now united on this issue, united in hearing what the voters have been telling us for two years — and acting on it.

This is no small thing. Old habits aren’t easy to break, but sometimes they must be. And now is such a time. With a $14 trillion debt and an administration that talks about cost-cutting, but then sends over a budget that triples the national debt in 10 years and creates a massive new entitlement program, it’s time for some of us in Washington to show in every way possible that we mean what we say about spending.

With Republican leaders in Congress united, the attention now turns to the President. We have said we are willing to give up discretion; now we’ll see how he handles spending decisions. And if the president ends up with total discretion over spending, we will see even more clearly where his priorities lie. We already saw the administration’s priorities in a Stimulus bill that’s become synonymous with wasteful spending, that borrowed nearly $1 trillion for administration earmarks like turtle tunnels, a sidewalk that lead to a ditch, and research on voter perceptions of the bill.

Congressional Republicans uncovered much of this waste. Through congressional oversight, we will continue to monitor how the money taxpayers send to the administration is actually spent. It’s now up to the President and his party leaders in Congress to show their own seriousness on this issue, to say whether they will join Republican leaders in this effort and then, after that, in significantly reducing the size and cost and reach of government. The people have spoken. They have said as clearly as they can that this is what they want us to do.

They will be watching.

Yes, Mr. McConnell we will be watching.  Mr. McConnell wants very much to be Majority Leader in 2012...but he wants even less a hard primary campaign which would leave him vulnerable to a loss...because the people of this country really are pissed at the irresponsibility of Congress in their spending habits.  But, when it's all said and done...it's our fault for allowing them to do so...by continually re-electing them to office. 

Yes, Mr. McConnell we will be watching everything you in Congress do over the next two years...the Tea Party movement isn't going to go away any time soon.  The grown up are going to take back control of Congress from the irresponsible children who have over the past 100 years, but even more so in the past 30 years, driven us into a ditch and nearly off of the cliff.

via Instapundit

GOP Rank & File Prefer Tea Party To GOP Leadership

It seems that the run of the mill member of the Republican Party perfers those who were elected with the support of the Tea Party movement to those of their own leadership.  One leader says that voters have put the GOP on "probation" following the election of last Tuesday. 

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele said Republicans were “on probation” after their tremendous wins in Tuesday’s midterm elections.  “Big government Republicanism is not innate to us, it’s not part of our DNA and yet we tried to force ourselves into that box and instead we wound up forcing people out of the party,” said Steele on Fox News Thursday.  Echoing the sentiment of other top Republicans, Steele said the favorable election results for the GOP did not translate to “oh gee, we love Republicans.” The message, said Steele, was that voters wanted the GOP to return to its founding principles of limited government, free markets and less spending.

This is being supported by recents polls as well as exit polls.  Nearly 31% of those polled said they would support a 3rd party candidate who was part of the Tea Party movement.  In another poll, 72% say that the leadership of the party has lost touch with those party planks that the base of the party believes to be important.

Seventy-nine percent (79%) of likely GOP primary voters hold a favorable opinion of the Tea Party movement, while only nine percent (9%) view the smaller government, lower taxes movement unfavorably.

 This reflects reality as a number of "mainstream" Republican politcians lost their primary bids to Tea Party backed candidates in this year's political primaries prior to last Tuesdays elections. 

Republicans Leaders of Yesterday & Tomorrow

America Rejects Socialism

Yesterday's election results will be spun in various ways by various groups, but what it comes down to this this:  America has rejected the socialist agenda of the Democratic Party.  Even a dullard like our current Vice President, Mr. Biden understands this. 

Vice President Joe Biden on Monday said if Republicans succeed in winning back the House in 2010, it would be the "end of the road" for the White House's agenda.

My real concern is that the GOP leadership in Congress won't understand the very shakey "mandate" they've  been given by an angry citizenry.  They must, without hesitation, begin rolling back both the enormous size of our current federal government, but also must vastly reduce it's intrusion in both business as well as that of they people. 

American government is designed around one small but significant idea, that our government must be,  

“A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.”  Thomas Jefferson, First Inaugural Address, 4 March 1801.

That's by the founder of the Democratic party.  A party that's forgotten it's roots and drifted so far away from what the founder's intended that's it's nearly indistinguishable from European socialist parties.  Indeed, here's video of important members of the Democratic party saluting and declaring solidarity with the European Socialist Parties at their EU convention last year.

 
But, the leaders of the GOP must understand this:  If they fail to even attempt the task for which American has entrusted them, they too will be swept aside in 2012...take heed!

If Full Senate Were Up For Election: GOP Would Take Filibuster Proof Majority

The Raw Story is reporting that Nate Silver, a top pollster who writes a blog at the NY Times, recently released information that should shock the Democratic Party.  If the entire Senate were up for reelection, like the House of Representatives, the GOP would gain a fillibuster proof majority. 

Take a look at our Senate forecast map. There’s a lot of red there. Part of that, yes, is because Republicans tend to do better in the middle of the country where the states are physically larger — but that kind of misses the point.  Right now, among the 37 Senate elections, we have Republicans favored in 25, Democrats favored in 11, and one other (Colorado) that’s too close to call. If Democrats have a relatively good election night, they will win about one-third of the available Senate races. And if anything, the states that are voting for Senate this year are slightly blue-leaning. If the entire Senate were up for re-election in this political climate, the Republicans would be favored to earn a filibuster-proof majority, and might even earn a veto-proof majority! Fortunately for Democrats, that’s not how the system works. (Maybe some of our readers could go though the list of 63 Senators that are not up for re-election and guess which ones they’d expect to lose if they were. It could be kind of fun.) [Emphasis is mine, ed.]

Think about that...the "little people" are pissed enough at our "political elite" that they would hand the opposition party a majority large enough to overturn everything the Democratic Party has done in the past four years.  Thus has Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid hav wrought...on the other hand...if the GOP screws this up by returning to what they did during 2002-2006, aka,  "going along to get along" then they will have forced We The People to create a political party that is genuinely fiscally conservative, and 2012 will make this years elections seem mild by comparison.

Via Instapundit

Debt Has Increased $5 Trillion Dollars Since Mrs. Pelosi Took Control Of The House

Since 2007, when Nancy Pelosi declared that there would be no new deficit spending, the United States Debt has added $5,000,000,000,000.00...that's a hell of a lot of money passed through the Democratically controlled Congress...

When Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) gave her inaugural address as speaker of the House in 2007, she vowed there would be “no new deficit spending.” Since that day, the national debt has increased by $5 trillion, according to the U.S. Treasury Department.


"After years of historic deficits, this 110th Congress will commit itself to a higher standard: Pay as you go, no new deficit spending,” Pelosi said in her speech from the speaker’s podium. “Our new America will provide unlimited opportunity for future generations, not burden them with mountains of debt."

Pelosi has served as speaker in the 110th and 111th Congresses.

At the close of business on Jan. 4, 2007, Pelosi’s first day as speaker, the national debt was $8,670,596,242,973.04 (8.67 trillion), according to the Bureau of the Public Debt, a division of the U.S. Treasury Department. At the close of business on Oct. 22, it stood at $13,667,983,325,978.31 (13.67 trillion), an increase of 4,997,387,083,005.27 (or approximately $5 trillion).

Pelosi, the 60th speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, has added more to the national debt than the first 57 House speakers combined.

The $4.997-trillion increase in the national debt since she took the gavel is more debt than the federal government amassed from the speakership of Rep. Frederick Muhlenberg of Pennsylvania, who became the first speaker of the House on April 1, 1789, to the start of the speakership of Rep. Newt Gingrich of Georgia, the 58th speaker, who took up the gavel on Jan. 4, 1995...[emphasis is mine, ed.]

Now, the GOP has one last opportunity to walk the walk, not just talk the talk that they forgot from 2002-2006...if they don't the Republican Party is finished...and so is the United States, because we will have not walked off the cliff, we will have jumped off of it. 

A Plea From A Moderate Republican

Via Instapundit comes this...

The chest-thumping that is prevalent today among conservative pundits is justified by polling data that seems to spell doom for the Democrats in November. Still, I can’t help but feel like I’m having déjà vu. And you know what they say about those who don’t learn from history.

In the last few years of the Bush administration, the President’s poll numbers crept ever downward. Democrats in politics and the press rejoiced that Americans were finally “waking up” to the fact that they had been right about Bushitler all along. They boasted loud and often that Republicans were losing the country because of their unpopular decisions to go to war in Iraq, establish new national security protocols, lobby for Social Security reform, stress border security, etc. Liberals started at the ideological position that those policies were immoral (if not illegal), and when Bush’s poll numbers dropped, they inferred causality. It never occurred to them that Bush’s poll numbers were dropping because many on the right didn’t think his policies went far enough. Conservatives wanted him to put more emphasis on border security, not less; they wanted to see a more aggressive approach to entitlement reform, not a Medicare prescription boondoggle; they wanted a comprehensive immigration solution that started with border security first, not blanket amnesty. The list could go on. The left, especially liberal journalists, just assumed that their criticisms of the right were being validated by the greater populace with each and every poll. It was wrong at the time, and it’s the main reason that so many of them today can’t understand what happened to their “mandate.”

Conservatives are making the same mistakes right now.

Obama’s poll numbers are dropping and more people than ever are self-identifying as Republicans. Naturally, conservatives believe this means that the public has finally “woken up” and decided that Obama and the Democrats are closet socialists hell-bent on “eroding the bedrock of American prosperity.” They started at the ideological position that the stimulus was a mistake, that health care reform was an overreach, , that the auto industry bailouts were a disaster, that we have to win in Afghanistan at all costs, etc. Every time Obama’s approval rating drops another point, they infer validation that more and more people are seeing the light. It doesn’t occur to them that his poll number are (among other reasons) dropping because liberals are angry that Obama/Reid/Pelosi haven’t worked harder to advance the progressive agenda. Liberals disapprove of the fact that that Obama settled for Obamacare instead of embracing a true, single-payer system; because they watered down financial oversight instead of going for the corporate jugular; because they escalated the war in Afghanistan instead of forcing the new government to sink or swim on its own. The list could go on.

You’re probably asking, “What about independents identifying as Republican? That’s true validation, right?” My answer would be, where else are Independents supposed to go? Their affiliation shift is a protest, and a fickle one at that. Right now, people are unhappy with the present course, specifically when it comes to national fiscal policy. If Republicans make great gains in the November elections, which it seems like they will, they need to govern with perspective and humility. If they mistake their electoral success for a “mandate” to challenge social norms, they’ll be swept out of office again soon. Ironically, the loss of independents from the Republican coalition over the next couple of years would probably provide the boost Obama needs to win reelection in 2012.

If in two years, conservatives are scratching their heads and saying, “What happened to our movement,” they’ll have only themselves to blame.

Humility and perspective are the most underrated commodities in modern politics. Just because people are trending Republican at the moment, it doesn’t mean that they’re particularly conservative. Every time I read a story about how the conservative death knell was greatly exaggerated in 2006 and 2008, or how independents are finally coming back into the conservative fold, I feel like there’s no doubt the right will screw this up again. Conservatism isn’t really back in vogue. Anti-incumbency is. And it will be again when the Republicans are back in charge. You know, déjà vu and all that.

I suspect the the leadership of the GOP will make all the mistakes the possibly could.  They've done it before in 2002-2006.  But George Bednekoff's comment is VERY  pertinent

I believe that the federal system allows Americans across the political spectrum to get along in a politically diverse country, but only if the size and role of government is relatively small at the national level. With more government functions at the state and local level, voters in different regions can agree to disagree. As an example, Massachusetts chose to have lots of government intervention in their medical insurance market and their choice has very little impact on my life in Texas. However, expand similar government intervention in health insurance to the national level, Obamacare, and political debate is elevated to 1850s level of divisiveness. A Republican congressional majority could help turn down the heat of American politics if they resist the urge to make a federal case of everything. They need to learn from their mistakes in the Terri Schiavo case, No Child Left Behind, TSA stupidity, the TARP bailout slush fund, and reckless earmarking.

...never underestimate the GOP leadership's ability to snatch stupidity from the jaws of victory and cause another defeat.  Read the whole thing.

Ohio Voters Long For Bush

In a new poll, voters in Ohio would prefer to have George Bush in the White House.  Public Policy Polling, a staunch liberal polling organization just posted this: 

We'll start rolling out our Ohio poll results tomorrow but there's one finding on the poll that pretty much sums it up: by a 50-42 margin voters there say they'd rather have George W. Bush in the White House right now than Barack Obama.


Independents hold that view by a 44-37 margin and there are more Democrats who would take Bush back (11%) than there are Republicans who think Obama's preferable (3%.)

A couple months ago I thought the Pennsylvanias and Missouris and Ohios of the world were the biggest battlegrounds for 2010 but when you see numbers like this it makes you think it's probably actually the Californias and the Wisconsins and the Washingtons.

There's not much doubt things are getting worse for Democrats...and they were already pretty bad. Somehow the party base needs to get reinvigorated over the next two months or there's going to be a very, very steep price to pay.

 All emphasis is mine...I'm holding to my prediction of 100 seats lost by the Democrats in November.   I also think that the GOP will pick up at least 10 seats in the Senate, perhaps 13...if Feingold in WI is in trouble, as well as the Dem's hold on the WA seat is now tenuous...then  it's more than possible that they will lose control of the Senate as well.

My biggest concern, however, is that the GOP leadership will FUBAR it all.  That's not out of the question.  Especially when you consider how little confidence the rank and file membership has in the party leadership now.  The Tea Party, frankly, is the future of the GOP now.  They are holding to those precepts that stood in good stead for more than a century.  If we can get enough people elected who will hold to them...then we have a chance to roll back the "big government" bull shit that has been put  in place over the past 60 years.

SEC Exempt From FOI Requests

"It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood ."--James Madison

Congress recently passed another 2000+ page bill to "reform" (actually it institutionalized "too big to fail" companies) Wall Street.  But the very same bill specifically exempts the Securities and Exchange Commission from Freedom of Information Act requests.  Patrick Leahy (D) the senior senator from Vermont vigorously pushed for passage of this bill...but never read, much less understood what it would do, just as most Congressmen and Senators didn't read the provisions of ObamaCare.  Now he's whining that it wasn't intended to exempt the SEC from FOI requests. 

The Freedom of Information Act is our nation’s premier open government law, and a powerful guardian of the public’s right to know. The Wall Street reform bill that has now become law makes great strides toward enhancing transparency in our financial system. However, I am concerned that an overly broad Freedom of Information Act exemption, originally drafted in the House of Representatives and which was included in the final law, is contrary to the very important goals of the Wall Street Reform bill – restoring accountability and transparency to our financial markets. The SEC should immediately issue guidance narrowly interpreting this FOIA exemption in a manner that is both consistent with the President’s policy of government transparency and with Congressional intent. I will work with the Obama administration and others in Congress to ensure that the SEC remains subject to FOIA and accountable to the American people.

Just as Nancy Pelosi said about ObamaCare: 

You’ve heard about the controversies within the bill, the process about the bill, one or the other. But I don’t know if you have heard that it is legislation for the future, not just about health care for America, but about a healthier America, where preventive care is not something that you have to pay a deductible for or out of pocket. Prevention, prevention, prevention—it’s about diet, not diabetes. It’s going to be very, very exciting.


But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy. [emphasis added]

Yet, once more, we have a huge piece of legislation that will fundamentally change how things are done in this country, yet none of the legislators actually understand what is in the bill, but more importantly JUST DONT UNDERSTAND it's ramifications.  Not even the bills sponsors understand the bill,

"No one will know until this is actually in place how it works," said Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., of the Senate's slapdash financial reform bill. He ought to know: He co-sponsored the bill along with Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass.

 I would say that if you don't understand the damn thing, or don't understand what it will do, DONT PASS IT YOU MORONS!!! Congress just doesn't understand what it has done, what it is doing.   They no longer have the support of voters yet continue to pass legislation they neither understand nor have read. 

What To Do About Our Governing Elite?

Some excellent advice from Glenn Reynolds, of Instapundit, on how to return our government back "to the people".  I firmly believe that it's well past time time that We The People give those who are putative "betters" a lesson and remove them from eating at Uncle Sam's trough.  The leadership of both the GOP and the Democratic Paties have spent us into the poor house.  We need to kick them all out and return our government to a managable size.

July 18, 2010

WHAT TO DO? In response to this piece by Angelo Codevilla on America’s ruling class, readers wonder what to do. Well, a few things suggest themselves.

• First: Mockery. They are very mockable, and they are very thin-skinned. That leads them to erupt in embarrassing ways. Use their sense of entitlement against them.
• Second (and related): Transparency. One-party government makes you stupid, and although composed of both Democrats and Republicans the political class is basically its own party, and these people are pretty stupid. Point it out, repeatedly. Use FOIA, ubiquitous videocameras, and other tools to make the stupidity show.
• Third: Money. Codevilla writes: “Our ruling class’s agenda is power for itself. While it stakes its claim through intellectual-moral pretense, it holds power by one of the oldest and most prosaic of means: patronage and promises thereof.” The coming budget crisis — already here, really, but still largely denied by the rulers — is an opportunity to defund a lot of this patronage stuff. They’ll try, of course, to cut the muscle and preserve the fat, but that won’t work very well if they’re closely watched (see above). Cut them off in other ways, too. Don’t support the media, nonprofits, and politicians who support them with your money.  Also, make sure that money flows TO things you like: Businesses, alt-media, politicians who aren’t part of the problem, etc. Build up countervailing institutions that don’t depend on the government to survive.
• Fourth: Organize and infiltrate. Take over party apparats from the ground up. Create your own organizations that can focus sustained attention — the “ruling class” relies on others having short attention spans while it stays focused on amassing and protecting power. 

Finally: Don’t act like a subject. Rulers like subjects. Don’t be one. As a famous man once said: Get in their face. Punch back twice as hard. Words for the coming decade?

UPDATE: Reader Stephen Clark writes:

All the things you’ve listed are good. However, one of the most important is to get involved with politics. Local and state politics are the most accessible to citizen movements. Take advantage of that. This is one of the most important features of the Tea Party movement, in my opinion. Many of these organizations are focusing as much on local and state party apparatus as on the higher profile national offices and races. Local and state government is, or at least can be, the defense in depth needed to take on the class and its ambitions described in Codevilla’s piece. As he makes clear, this is not the work of a few election cycles.

A few other items I would add to your list: Get to know your representatives and their staffs well and make sure they know you. Don’t fall for the suggestion that the task of government has grown so very complicated that only professional legislators and staff are fit to govern. Apart from being self-serving on its face, it’s a damn good argument for cutting back and decentralizing the tasks of government at all levels. Frequent changes in legislative seats not only can bring fresh faces and new ideas, it builds a reservoir of talent and knowledge that can augment that defense in depth meant to keep representatives on a very short leash.

Indeed. And let’s be honest — the claim that only “professional legislators and staff” are smart enough falls apart once you meet a few of these people.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Andrew Wharton emails:

“Be armed, both intellectually and especially with guns. The ruling class hates it, but more importantly, it mitigates their baser instincts.” Yes, they’ll do whatever they can get away with, so it’s important to be sure they can’t get away with too much.

MORE: Reader Joan Varga writes:

What to do? Have a back-up plan for your information web. Do we really think that the powers that be will allow us unfettered access to information for much longer? What’s our plan for staying in touch, for finding out, for gathering information, for disseminating information after the Internet becomes too big to fail and too sweet for Obama to resist?

Why we aren’t taking over television stations and Hollywood studios is beyond me. They did it in the 60’s because they knew where real power comes from. Focusing on politicians and politics is not going to win the day.

You answer audacity with something more audacious. And “serious” people will be trampled by the mewling mob of gored oxes and spoiled public sector unions.

Hmm.

MORE: Steve White of Rantburg writes:

A practical application of the point made by reader Joan Varga today was seen last year in Tehran. When the Mad Mullahs of Iran wanted to shut down the anti-government demonstrations, they did everything they could to interfere with cell phones, internet service, and Twitter. It largely worked, too, not that the western press pointed it out at the time.

A backup plan for communication for the day that the government becomes serious about stifling the free flow of information is a good idea, because if push comes to shove our ‘ruling class’ will indeed lock down communications. It might not be as abrupt as what happened in Tehran, either, it might be cloaked instead in a serious of interlocking decisions such as ‘network neutrality’, anti-porn, anti-hate speech, and so on. They have ways.

Well, this isn’t Iran, and there’s no Revolutionary Guard here. But backup plans are always good. There’s always ham radio, and probably a lot more out there. I believe some geeks are working on this.

STILL MORE: Reader Donald Golgert writes:

his piece finally codified what I’ve been seeing/feeling/living for some time now. I’ve been uncomfortable with Republican politicians and hated the Democrats as a whole.   I’ve done two things. I’m now the Republican PCO for my precinct. I’ll attempt to fix the problems from inside. At 46, I’m the youngest acknowledged (out?) Republican in my very blue district in Seattle. I’ve launched a Cafe Press store. The 1st design is built on the phrase “Depose the Ruling Class”. More to follow. Snarkier to be sure. Mockery laden even. 

Snark and mockery?

MORE STILL: Reader John Steakley writes:

The founding fathers had the idea of checks and balances before parties emerged. Parties undermine C&B because we can’t expect the White House to keep Congress in check (or vice-versa) when they are both of the same party.

We need a third party (or maybe a fourth, too) dedicated SOLELY to either Congress or the White House. Let’s call them the “White House Party” and the “Capitol Party.” Each one fields candidates only for that branch of government, immunizing themselves of influence peddling from another branch. They could openly campaign against the excesses and abuses of the other branch, free from fear of party retribution.

Can you imagine the power a President would have if he could truly serve as a check and balance on Congress regardless of which party controlled it without fear of losing votes in the upcoming election? Can you imagine the power Congress would have if controlled by a party with no eye on the White House?

Since the third branch – Judicial – is unelected, the Supreme Court candidates would, by definition, have to be approved by BOTH parties.  

Posted by Glenn Reynolds at 8:16 am

This is much more the thing.  Unfortunately, it won't be an easy fix, it will take, perhaps, as long as a generation to utterly upset the balance of power...as it now exists.  But it's not too late to do something, but we must do something now...

UPDATE:  Powerline has something along these lines as well...

The main currents of our contemporary politics involve ordinary citizens rebelling against their masters in the political class. While by no means the only manifestation of this rebellion, the Tea Party movement is the most notable. What has happened to the Tea Party is instructive. It was first ignored, then ridiculed. Agents of the status quo like news services, newspapers, network news operations and the NAACP have been enlisted to lodge absurd charges of "racism" against Americans who protest out-of-control government spending. The Empire is striking back.


It remains to be seen whether the American people can finally break the grip of a political class that remains determined to run their lives and misappropriate trillions of dollars of their wealth. It will be, I think, a close-run thing. In the meantime, there is no mystery as to why most Americans do not regard the federal government as legitimate in Jeffersonian terms.