I’m predicting that, by Election Day, 2012, the unemployment rate will be in the mid-7′s but that thoughtful people will look at that as a negative. Yes, there’s a hint of sarcasm with that statement but it’s based on the fact that part of Friday’s job report isn’t getting the attention it should. Rick Santelli’s got it right with this report:
Here’s CNBC’s transcript of the video:
CNBC’s Rick Santelli: You know what I said at 8:30 Eastern? We want a million jobs an hour. That’s what we want. What we got looked like a good report. I said, ‘Let’s get the calculator out,’ and I did. And so did a boatload of my sources and big blogs that many people read like Zero Hedge. The labor force participation rate, if you look at non-seasonally adjusted, a fresh low going back to April of ’83. If you look at seasonally adjusted, a fresh low participation rate going back to December of ’81. What does that mean in English? Shrinkage. Shrinkage. 1.2 million people are now not considered unemployed anymore. They just have left the system. So, we need to concentrate on the internals, and eventually we want to watch the fixed income market to see if some of this sets in as people do their ciphering.
Listen, if I talk about a stock that had a great report, but I don’t point out the fact that there was a one-time tax credit that did it, am I doing my viewers a service or a disservice? Listen, when you look at the body counts on the establishment survey, we created jobs. That’s a good thing. There’s my perk. But I’m sorry, if you look at the other side, you look at the household survey, yes, we had this big seasonal adjustment. You can go to the BLS, you can see their economic release, you can see their situation summary. And we can see that ‘not in labor force’ moved from about 86.6 million to 87.8. There’s your 1.2 million. And we do see the asterisk, there’s been an adjustment on population. That’s the way it goes. We make an adjustment. The last 12 months needed to be adjusted. It is what it is.
Creating 243,000 jobs is a positive thing that can’t be spun as anything but positive. For those families, it’s a good day. Here’s hoping they can pay off their debts and start setting their financial house in order. Here’s hoping that they start laying the foundation for a prosperous life.
Another thing that can’t be spun, albeit this time as a negative, is the fact that 1,200,000 people quit looking for work. That’s anything but a positive. For those 1,200,000 people, they’re still facing terrible times. Their mortgages are still under water and they’re facing foreclosure. Their debts are still stacking up. They’re having difficulty making ends meet.
They’re no way to spin that as positive. Still, that’s precisely what this administration is attempting to do:
The unemployment rate fell 0.2 percentage point to 8.3%, from a high of 10% in October 2009. The drop in unemployment over the month was entirely due to employment growth, as the labor force participation rate remained constant, once new population weights are taken into account. The unemployment rate has fallen by 0.8 percentage point in the last 12 months. Private sector payrolls increased by 257,000 jobs and overall payroll employment rose by 243,000 jobs in January. Despite adverse shocks that have created headwinds for economic growth, the economy has added private sector jobs for 23 straight months, for a total of 3.7 million payroll jobs over that period. In the last 12 months, 2.2 million private sector jobs were added on net. Nonetheless, we need faster growth to put more Americans back to work.
Before I get to the statistics, can’t the White House find someone capable of putting out their message without using that big of paragraphs? They should start a new paragraph with “Despite adverse shocks…”
As for the “unemployment rate [falling] by 0.8 percentage point in the last 12 months”, much of that has to do with the fact that people know that there aren’t jobs out there for them. As a result, they’ve quit looking for work. This is the key part of Santelli’s analysis:
The labor force participation rate, if you look at non-seasonally adjusted, a fresh low going back to April of ’83. If you look at seasonally adjusted, a fresh low participation rate going back to December of ’81. What does that mean in English? Shrinkage. Shrinkage. 1.2 million people are now not considered unemployed anymore. They just have left the system.
I haven’t done the math but I’m betting that the unemployment rate would be north of 10% if they measured the rate by using the January, 2009 labor participation rate. In fact, it might be substantially more than 10%.
If you factor in the people who’ve quit looking for work, it’s quite possible that the unemployment rate hasn’t moved noticeably since the stimulus was passed. With that type of ‘performance’, what’s the logic behind staying the course with this administration?
This administration’s policies have been disastrous. They keep touting how many private sector jobs have been created since the recovery started. What’s interesting is that that number is consistently more than the total number of jobs created.
That’s because we’re running trillion dollar deficits. Those deficits are a direct result of the real unemployment, the one that’s driven by the 2009 participation rate, not today’s participation rate.
Until the participation rate starts improving and job growth starts increasing, the U.S. economy will be stuck in neutral. That’s hardly anything to smile about.
Tags: Labor Participation Rate, Unemployment, Job Growth, White House, Spin, Stimulus, Democrats, Rick Santelli, CNBC, TEA Party
Another Reaganite economist unloads on Mitt. This time, Larry Kudlow took Mitt to task for his class warfare rhetoric:
Message to Mitt: A Rising Tide Lifts All Boats
That great phrase was coined by the late Jack Kemp, who believed that growth and opportunity for all is the answer to poverty. In fact, Kemp believed it was the answer to all things economic. And he was right. The best anti-poverty program is the one that creates jobs. The answer to large budget deficits? Grow the economy, create jobs, watch incomes rise, and let the tax revenues come rolling in.Partly from Jack Kemp’s work, and partly from his own experience, Ronald Reagan believed the same thing. He knew that growth is the single best solution for our economic ailments. And neither Reagan nor Kemp saw the world in terms of specific income classes or categories. They looked at the whole economy and realized that everyone is tied together. Dragging down the top earners will not help the middle class. And providing an ever larger safety net will not solve poverty. Reagan believed in the safety net, and maintained it. But he knew it was a stop-gap, not a solution.
Mitt’s shown no proof that he knows how, as the government’s CEO, to create jobs. There’s ample proof he knows how to both kill and create jobs as a corporate CEO. Massachusetts is proof that being a successful corporate CEO doesn’t automatically translate into being a successful governor. These sentences hurt Mitt with conservatives:
And neither Reagan nor Kemp saw the world in terms of specific income classes or categories. They looked at the whole economy and realized that everyone is tied together.
Here’s the question that Mr. Kudlow poses for Mitt:
Does Mitt Romney understand this?
Perhaps he does but I wouldn’t bet the ranch on that. What I’d guarantee is that he’s playing the Bill Clinton gambit of appealing to the biggest bloc of voters possible. Mitt’s economic plan is about political appeal, not time-tested conservative principles.
Incidentally, the safety net has been expanding at an alarming pace. Transfer-program spending has been soaring. It’s up $600 billion, or about 35 percent, in the last three years. Medicaid, food stamps, and unemployment insurance have seen benefit levels rise and eligibility expand. This is a huge drag on the economy. We are paying too much to not work, and rewarding too little to work.
Welfarism is not compassionate. Opportunity is.
This is the meat and potatoes of Reaganite conservatism. Despite all of his team’s spin that he’s a conservative, Mitt hasn’t shown a grasp of Reaganite conservatism.
Newt’s shown an overabundance of understanding of Reaganite conservatism. That’s why he’s proposed eliminating Capital Gains tax. That’s why Newt’s proposing to cut the corporate tax rate from 35% to 12.5%. That’s why Newt’s tax plan has been approved by conservative heavyweights like Thomas Sowell and Art Laffer.
Mssrs. Laffer, Kudlow and Sowell are heavyweights who’ve fought for more time-tested conservative economic policies than the next generation of supply-siders will. They’ve seen their initiatives build one of the most prosperous economies of the last century.
Mitt would do well to read, then internalize and trust, this op-ed of the greatest conservative thinkers of our lifetime. He’d benefit because he’d finally start connecting with conservatives. We The People would benefit because Mitt would implement policies that would cause the next great GDP explosion while running surpluses and paying off the debt.
Tags: Reagan, Jack Kemp, Larry Kudlow, Art Laffer, Thomas Sowell, Tax Cuts, Newt Gingrich, Supply Side Economics, Class Warfare, Mitt Romney, Bill Clinton, Liberalism, GOP, Election 2012
Mitt Romney’s campaign isn’t in a position to talk about another candidate’s record of failure. Still, that’s exactly what his press secretary did today:
The former Georgia congressman vowed to fight for the nomination all the way to Tampa, called Romney “Obama-lite,” and challenged him to another debate.
“It isn’t good enough for the Republican Party to nominate Obama-lite,” Gingrich told hundreds of cheering supporters at Stoney’s Rockin’ Country, a country music nightclub in Las Vegas.
Romney campaign spokeswoman Amanda Henneberg responded to Gingrich’s comments in an email Friday.
“Newt Gingrich’s flailing attacks are the sign of a candidate trying to distract from his own record to save his sinking campaign,” she said. “Newt Gingrich would rather make misleading statements about Mitt Romney’s record than tell Nevada voters suffering from the housing crisis why he took $1.6 million from Freddie Mac or why he filmed a climate change ad with Nancy Pelosi that was funded by George Soros.”
Newt didn’t raise fees and taxes to the tune of $700,000,000. Mitt did. Newt didn’t approve of expensive CO2 emissions regulations that cost Massachusetts power plants tens of millions of dollars a year. Mitt did. Newt teamed with John Kasich and President Obama in balancing the budget and paying $405,000,000,000. Mitt didn’t.
The other thing that’s apparent is that Mitt’s spokesperson didn’t say a thing about anything positive conservative accomplishments of Mitt’s. That’s because his list of positive conservative accomplishments is tiny. Newt’s list of positive conservative accomplishments is substantial and lengthy.
Like paying $405,000,000,000 off the debt in 5 years. Like putting the plan in place that helped Republicans win a majority in the U.S. House of Representatives in 40 years. Like passing the biggest Capital Gains tax cut in U.S. history. Like passing Welfare reform, the only entitlement reform of the last half century.
If little Miss Sassypants wants to pick a fight, let’s have that fight. Mitt can’t explain capitalism. Mitt thinks that the minimum wage should be indexed to inflation. Mitt thinks that Romneycare is working fine but that Obamacare is a disaster. Romneycare is bankrupting Massachusetts but Mitt thinks it’s doing ok.
Mitt’s spokespeople are trained in deflection. Notice that they didn’t say a word about Mitt. It was all about dishonestly attacking Newt. Mitt’s plan is timid and won’t move the country forward. At best, it’ll give people a better view of the iceberg before it sinks the Titanic.
It’s worth noting that an intellectual heavyweight like Art Laffer endorsed Newt’s economic revitalization plan. Thomas Sowell, another intellectual heavyweight, endorsed Newt’s economic revitalization plan. They didn’t endorse Mitt’s timid plan.
In other words, Ms. Henneberg’s statement that Newt’s attempting to deflect attention away from his record is BS through and through. Why would Newt run from his lengthy history of major conservative accomplishments? I know why Mitt would attempt to deflect attention away from himself if the subject of major conservative accomplishments came up.
If the subject of impressive conservative accomplishments came up, I’d be surprised if Mitt didn’t flee the stage with the urgency of a vampire fleeing a wooden stake. The Mitt-Romney-is-a-conservative myth has been exposed.
The Romneybots on Twitter talk about how he was pro-enforcement against illegal immigration. They talk about how he’s anti-cap and trade. Their answers are more than a little slippery. They’re downright deceptive. This post is proof of that deceitfulness:
Romney: As governor, I authorized the state police to enforce immigration laws.
Here’s FactCheck’s response:
Well, yes. But, as we noted in August, he didn’t do so until he had less than a month left in his term. He was already considering running for president, and the new governor-elect was expected to rescind the arrangement.
Mitt, the hardliner is a myth. So is Mitt, the anti-cap and trade guy. While it’s technically true, this post exposes that Mitt myth:
Governor Mitt Romney today announced that Massachusetts will take another major step in meeting its commitment to protecting air quality when strict state limitations on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from power plants take effect on January 1, 2006.
Massachusetts is the first and only state to set CO2 emissions limits on power plants. The limits, which target the six largest and oldest power plants in the state, are the toughest in the nation.
In addition to reaffirming existing stringent CO2 limits, the draft regulations announced today, which will be filed next week, contain protections against excessive price increases for businesses and consumers. They allow power generation companies to implement CO2 reductions at their own facilities or fund other reduction projects off-site through a greenhouse gas offset and credits program.
The key features of Mitt’s CO2 emissions limits regulations are a) limiting CO2 emissions, b) establishing price controls on power plants so they have to eat the cost of Mitt’s expensive regulations and c) a “greenhouse gas offset and credits program.”
The Cap and Trade bill that was defeated in Congress is different in that it controlled all greenhouse gas emissions. It, too, featured a system of offsets and credits. Like Mitt’s regulations, it will drive coal-fired power plants to the brink of extinction.
It’s noteworthy that the federal cap and trade legislation doesn’t include price caps. In that sense, Mitt’s MMGW regulations are more restrictive than the federal cap and trade system would’ve been.
When Newt was rising, Newt was inspiring people to join the conservative cause. Bold programs that had succeeded in the recent past were the centerpiece of his program. More importantly, Newt kept the promises made in the Contract With America. Meanwhile, Mitt was running from the Contract With America like he ran from Reagan that same year.
Suddenly, Mitt’s the conservative and Newt’s the liberal? That’s something only a liberal from an alternative universe could believe.
Tags: Politics of Personal Destruction, Mitt Romney, Romneycare, Cap and Trade, Price Controls, GHG, Immmigration, Tax Increases, RINO, Newt Gingrich, Contract With America, Tax Cuts, Thomas Sowell, Art Laffer, Endorsements, GOP, Election 2012
This morning, I found this tasty tidbit of information about the importance of aviation to the economy:
“This measure is key to advancing the nearly 8 percent of our nation’s economy impacted by the aviation industry,” said House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman John L. Mica, Florida Republican.
Couple that information with the fact that there’s a significant worldwide pilot shortage and it isn’t difficult to see that there’s a need for accredited collegiate aviation programs. Except if you’re Earl Potter. When it comes to President Potter and the soon-to-be-defunct Aviation Department, he’s as blind as a bat.
This article was written in 2009. Even then, people were predicting a pilot shortage. It contains these disturbing projections:
For the first five years after 2012 to 2017 we’ll see retirement rates of 3% per year at my airline, climbing from 4 to 7% in the following five years and, starting in 2022, up to 10% of our pilots will retire every year until 2027.
Precisely at the time when the need for pilots from accredited programs is increasing, President Potter is eliminating the last accredited Aviation program in Minnesota.
That doesn’t fit with Chancellor Rosenstone’s publicly stated goals:
For more than 150 years, our colleges and universities have prepared Minnesota’s workforce; we have supplied skilled employees for new and growing companies; we have graduated entrepreneurs who have started businesses in every town of our state; and we have educated the Minnesotans who knit together the fabric of our communities, from teachers and social workers to police officers and nurses.
That role cannot diminish in the face of current financial challenges.
Quite the contrary, our role as a driver of Minnesota’s economy is more important than ever, and the priorities we set over the next few weeks must enrich the education and lives of our students; must create jobs; and must contribute to the prosperity of businesses and communities across the state.
How is killing a program that’s poised to train pilots, air traffic controllers and airport managers fit with Chancellor Rosenstone’s edict? How can Minnesota eliminate a program that’s likely to create tons of aviators right at the time when airline pilots are retiring at the dramatic rates described above?
Read this statement and tell me there isn’t a need for pilots:
Pilots will have the opportunity to learn more about this burgeoning market and be interviewed for positions currently available. Qualified applicants may receive on-the-spot conditional offers for jobs for the following aircraft: The Boeing 777, Boeing 747-400, Boeing 767, Boeing 737NG and EFIS, Airbus A340, Airbus A330, Airbus A320, Embraer EMB190, and Embraer EMB145.
President Potter is shutting down the Aviation Department at the exact time that there’s a pilot shortage, a mechanics shortage and private companies are buying their own jets to increase their executives’ productivity while travelling.
The thought that Potter’s getting paid $300,000+ to make foolish decisions like this is infuriating. I won’t attempt to tell people that he hasn’t done any good. I’ll just attempt to prove that he’s gotten alot of big decisions badly wrong.
Thanks to his attitude that he only answers to Chancellor Rosenstone, which technically is true, he’s losing respect on campus. If President Potter doesn’t change his attitude soon, he’ll lose all respect.
If that happens, he will have earned it.
Tags: Earl Potter, SCSU, MnSCU, Chancellor Rosenstone, Pilot Shortage, Air Traffic Controllers, Aviation, Job Fair, China, John Mica, House Transportation Committee, Economy
Progressives have argued for years that voter fraud doesn’t exist, especially in Minnesota. The truth is that it exists. It’s that they refuse to look for it. Yesterday, a progressive named Adam argued in the comments that the PVC cards that got returned weren’t the result of voter fraud. He argued that they happened because of the biggest data entry problem in government history:
Perhaps the Big E understands that Atur Davis has never lived or worked in politics in Minnesota?
Also, errors in data entry in the SVRS are evidence of fraud? How?
Wouldn’t someone trying to commit fraud use an actual address? It’s not exactly hard to do, you know.
Think of what Adam said. First, he said that the data entry people were the most incompetent data entry people in government. Next, he admitted that SecState Ritchie’s system doesn’t have safeguards to catch typos. Third, he admitted that it isn’t difficult to commit fraud using a real address.
That’s quite a mouthful in a paragraph.
When Joe Mansky insisted that the compliance rate was fantastic, he was either spinning the truth or he’s just that intellectually incompetent. Here’s what he said:
ESME: We just heard from Rep. Kiffmeyer, who said the system needs voter ID. How do you feel about that?
JOE MANSKY: I don’t think that’s the case. If you just look at the numbers and the business of the people under felony sentences voting that’s been in the news. But let’s take a look at that a minute. Our compliance rate, the rate at which voters comply with our law, is 99.99 percent. In Ramsey County, we had 28 people charged out of 278,000 people voting. I don’t think that there is a problem. There will always be a small number of people who won’t comply with the law. But again, 99.99 percent is probably not a bad place to be at.
Mansky can’t know what the compliance rate is because they can’t verify that the people getting ballots are who they say they are. Mr. Mansky, like all faithful DFL operatives, refuses to look for voter fraud.
You can’t find what you refuse to look for. Minnesotans have rejected the notion that Minnesotans are too honest to commit voter fraud. That’s why 75-80% of Minnesotans support a constitutional amendment requiring a photo ID. That figure isn’t from Minnesota Majority, either. Whether it’s the KSTP-SurveyUSA poll or the Minnesota poll, the numbers are the same. Here are some demographic breakdowns:
- Age demographics – The lowest level of support in age groups comes from seniors, who back voter ID 69/23. The best support comes, surprisingly, from the youngest voters (18-34YOs) at 82/12.
- Party affiliation – Yes, 92% of Republicans support voter ID. So do 76% of independents … and 59% of those wingnutty Democrats in Minnesota, too. Among Tea Party “members,” voter ID enjoys 93% support. And for those who don’t identify with the Tea Party, support plummets all the way to … 74%. Along ideological lines, liberals were least likely to support it — at 67%, the second-lowest level of support among all demographics.
- Education – Surely, support must be coming from the mouthbreathers, right? High-school graduates give a 79% level of support, almost the same as the 78% among those with some college education. Those with degrees are a little more discerning … at 75%.
- Income level – It won’t be much of a surprise to know that those making six figures support voter ID 73/25. It will be a surprise to Dayton to find that those making less than $50K per year support it even more, 78/14.
- Region – Like all of the other demographics, there isn’t much difference between the Twin Cities demo (76/19) and the rural area of western Minnesota (81/15). In each region, support is at 75% or higher.
Whichever way you slice it, support for Photo ID is strong. The bottom line is that a)voter fraud really exists and b) there’s proof that photo ID doesn’t disenfranchise voters.
Tags: Photo ID, Voter Fraud, Data Entry, Mark Ritchie, Joe Mansky, Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, Democrats, DFL, SCOTUS, Judge Barker, Elections, Election 2012
Art Laffer is certainly a somebody when it comes to assessing tax plans on their job creation potential. Yesterday, Laffer wrote this WSJ op-ed saying that Newt’s plan is superior to Mitt’s plan:
Mr. Gingrich has a significantly better plan than does Mr. Romney, and he has twice before been instrumental in implementing a successful tax plan on a national level—once when he served in Congress as a Reagan supporter in the 1980s and again when he was President Clinton’s partner as speaker of the House of Representatives in the 1990s. During both of these periods the economy prospered incredibly—in good part because of Mr. Gingrich.
Jobs and wealth are created by those who are taxed, not by those who do the taxing. Government, by its very nature, doesn’t create resources but redistributes resources. To minimize the damages taxes cause the economy, the best way for government to raise revenue is a broad-based, low-rate flat tax that provides people and businesses with the fewest incentives to avoid or otherwise not report taxable income, and the least number of places where they can escape taxation. On these counts it doesn’t get any better than Mr. Gingrich’s optional 15% flat tax for individuals and his 12.5% flat tax for business. Each of these taxes has been tried and tested and found to be enormously successful.
Mitt’s repeatedly said that his time in the private sector has informed him how the economy works. Mitt’s insistence that he alone understands what it takes to create jobs just got torched by Art Laffer.
Laffer’s argument appears to be that anyone who’s read about Hong Kong’s prosperity knows how to create wealth. Newt’s modeled his tax initiatives after Hong Kong’s tax structure.
When Mr. Laffer said that “each of these taxes has been tried and tested and found to be enormously successful”, what he really said is that anyone who can read and is a student of history knows that Hong Kong’s tax system works wonderfully. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that out.
Hong Kong, where there has been a 15% flat income tax on individuals since 1947, is truly a shining city on the hill and one of the most prosperous cities in history. Ireland’s 12.5% flat business income tax propelled the Emerald Isle out of two and a half centuries of poverty. Mr. Romney’s tax proposals—including eliminating the death tax, reducing the corporate tax rate to 25%, and extending the current tax rates on personal income, interest, dividends and capital gains—would be an improvement over those of President Obama, but they don’t have the boldness or internal integrity of Mr. Gingrich’s personal and business flat taxes.
Imagine what would happen to international capital flows if the U.S. went from the second highest business tax country in the world to one of the lowest. Low taxes along with all of America’s other great attributes would precipitate a flood of new investment in this country as well as a quick repatriation of American funds held abroad. We would create more jobs than you could shake a stick at.
The consensus in the business community is that Mitt’s plan is timid. Laffer’s opinion is proof of that. Newt’s tax reform initiative is bold reform, the type that’d spur the type of growth that’d rival Reagan’s.
Newet’s right in saying that this contest is about deciding if you want the GOP presidential nominee to manage the decay or if you want someone that’s prepared on Day One to change Washington, DC for the better with bold, time-tested policies that’ll get America’s economy growing again.
This shouldn’t be ignored in the cost of taxes:
When it comes to economic efficiency, nothing holds a candle to a low-rate, simple flat tax. As I explained in a op-ed on this page last spring (“The 30-Cent Tax Premium,” April 18), for every dollar of net income tax collected by the Internal Revenue Service, there is an additional 30¢ paid out of pocket by the taxpayers to maintain compliance with the tax code. Such inefficiency is outrageous. Mr. Gingrich’s flat taxes would go a lot further toward reducing these additional expenses than would Mr. Romney’s proposals.
It’s time to implement bold, time-tested tax policies. Timid plans like Mitt’s should be rejected.
Tags: Flat Tax, Art Laffer, Newt Gingrich, Hong Kong, Pro Growth, Reagan, Conservatism, Mitt Romney, Middle Class, Class Warfare, Republicans, Election 2012
Mitt’s tried making the case that you can’t take a chance on Newt because he’s likely to say something stupid and kill his campaign. Yesterday, Mitt did something that went beyond anything Newt’s ever said. This morning, Mark Steyn jumps all over Mitt’s idiotic statement about the poor:
Romney’s is a benevolent patrician’s view of society: The poor are incorrigible, but let’s add a couple more groats to their food stamps and housing vouchers, and they’ll stay quiet. Aside from the fact that that kind of thinking has led the western world to near terminal insolvency, for a candidate whose platitudinous balderdash of a stump speech purports to believe in the most Americanly American America that any American has ever Americanized over, it’s as dismal a vision of permanent trans-generational poverty as any Marxist community organizer with a cozy sinecure on the Acorn board would come up with.After half-a-century of evidence, what sort of “conservative” offers the poor the Even Greater Society? I don’t know how “electable” Mitt is, but, even if he is, the greater danger, given the emptiness of his campaign to date, is that he’ll be elected with no real mandate for the course correction the Brokest Nation in History urgently needs. In last Monday’s debate, Newt said he wasn’t interested in going to Washington to “manage the decline”. Mitt’s just told us that he’s happy to “manage the decline” for the poor, but who knows who else?
It’s time America woke up to the fact that Mitt’s a) totally wooden and b) policy perscriptions are timid and aren’t conservative. He’s a cross between John Kerry and Al Gore.
Conservatives have questioned Mitt’s electability argument literally for years. Candidates that have lukewarm support of the base are, at best, in hot water. Mitt’s disregard for the TEA Party is foolish. Mitt’s political instincts are almost nonexistent, as Mitt’s “I’m not worried about the very poor” statement proves.
The comparison is stark. Mitt’s supporters talk about how presidential he looks. (They said the same thing about John Kerry.) They’ll cheerfully tell you that Mitt’s private sector experience is essential to understanding how the economy works and creating jobs.
What they won’t tell you is that he’s had public sector success. That’s because he hasn’t had any public sector successes.
Predictably, Newt jumped at the opportunity to criticize Mitt:
“I am fed up with politicians in either party dividing Americans against each other,” said Gingrich, at his first Nevada event before Saturday’s caucuses. Drawing a sharp distinction between himself and Romney, he added, “I am running to be the president of all of the American people, and I am concerned about all of the American people.”
Newt wasn’t the only conservative who criticized Mitt:
Romney’s comment also drew condemnation from Obama partisans who have repeatedly exploited the candidate’s quotes to argue that Romney is out of touch. And Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), who endorsed Romney four years ago, encouraged him to “backtrack,” saying the very poor needed jobs, not welfare programs.
Mitt didn’t make a conservative argument because he’s a progressive. This article is proof of that:
The influential conservative group Club for Growth PAC criticized Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s position on the minimum wage, calling it “disappointing.”
“Indexing the minimum wage would be an absolute job killer,” Club for Growth President Chris Chocola said. “Mitt Romney’s proposal is anti-growth and would harm our economy. It’s disappointing to hear that the leading candidate for the Republican nomination believes that the government can set the price of labor better than the free market.”
Club for Growth’s critique was made after a reporter asked Romney aboard his campaign plane Wednesday if he still believed the minimum wage should be indexed to account for inflation, essentially increasing the minimum wage each year to keep up with the cost of living.
Romney failed to expound on his position, but said he has “the same thoughts as in the past.” Since he was governor of Massachusetts, Romney has said he supports automatic hikes in the minimum wage.
I wish I could honestly say that Mitt’s support for indexing the minimum wage surprised me but it doesn’t. What would surprise me is if he actually started supporting conservative principles.
It’s become clear. The GOP can support Mitt, who doesn’t stand a chance of winning, or they can support a dynamic Reaganite conservative like Newt.
Based on what we’ve seen, Mitt isn’t dynamic, conservative or electable.
Tags: Poor, Mitt Romney, Minimum Wage, Safety Net, Progressives, Reagan, Newt Gingrich, Jim DeMint, Chris Chocola, Club for Growth, GOP, Election 2012
If anything is obvious, it’s that Gov. Dayton’s reaction to Ellen Anderson’s rejection was similar to that of a 3-year-old throwing a temper tantrum. As a Minnesotan, I’m embarrassed that a Minnesota governor would be that unhinged.
The truth is that Ellen Anderson isn’t a friend of fossil fuels. She’s been a green energy activist her entire legislative career. The thought that she’s capable of setting aside her passion is foolish. Militant environmentalism isn’t what she believes. It’s part of who she is.
The other reality is that rejecting commissioners isn’t rare. I’d argue that senators have the affirmative responsibility to reject appointees who aren’t part of the mainstream. Sen. Anderson was a controversial pick from the outset. She didn’t hide her activism. With her lengthy history of environmental activism, why shouldn’t the Senate reject her?
What’s more disturbing than Gov. Dayton’s appointment of Sen. Anderson is his temper tantrum in reaction to the Senate taking their advise-and-consent responsibilities seriously.
Gov. Dayton’s temper tantrum is what we’d expect of three-year-olds, not the governor of a state. When was the last time Minnesotans saw their governor act like that? Has Minnesota’s governor acted that childish?
HINT: Minnesota’s governors haven’t acted that childish in my lifetime.
Building an environmentalist-filled cabinet isn’t in Minnesota’s best interest. That’s why the Senate said no. Minnesota’s environmental movement has killed enough jobs already. We don’t need Gov. Dayton appointing more movement environmentalists to the PUC or the MPCA.
We need thoughtful people who look out for the best interests of all Minnesotans. Sen. Anderson can’t do that because of her history of activism.
That’s why the Senate would’ve been irresponsible had it not rejected Sen. Anderson’s appointment.
Tags: Militant Environmentalism, Ellen Anderson, PUC, Paul Aasen, MPCA, Mark Dayton, Regulations, Enforcement, DFL, Advise and Consent
This American Spectator article is just the latest in a growing anti-Mitt chorus. It’s a chorus that spells defeat this November. Here’s the heart of the article:
The “electability” argument is bankrupt on both philosophical and practical grounds. It destroys the party’s soul and guarantees defeat.
Even though Romney paid for this Florida win on his debit card, outspending Newt by millions, he still couldn’t nail down the rank-and-file vote. Seven out of ten self-described conservatives didn’t vote for him. This foreshadows the boredom and disgust that will keep conservatives home in the fall.
Mitt’s been identified as not being a conservative by the base. He’s won enough votes to win a couple primaries but exit polling from Florida shows he’ll lose this November. The activists that man phone banks and do GOTV won’t show up. They need a candidate who inspires people with the right policies.
Visions of a former Paul Tsongas voter and Planned Parenthood supporter won’t exactly blast them out of bed in the morning. The confederacy of weasels that is the GOP establishment couldn’t even find a moderate with an engaging personality to run. They settled on a robotic bore.
Mitt’s supporters can’t even make a positive case for Mitt. Listening to this tape is painful but it’s highly instructive:
The worst caller said Romneycare was good because Mitt governed in Massachusetts. Another caller said that it’s what people wanted at the time. When Mr. Levin said that Romneycare, “whether it’s implemented at the city level, the state level or the federal level”, infringes on the rights of individuals.
Nowhere in any constitution or city charter does government have the right to infringe on a person’s individual sovereignty. It’s all the more difficult to tolerate when a ConLaw professor like Hugh Hewitt doesn’t just criticize Mitt’s defense of O’Romneycare. At minimum, Hugh could take Mitt aside off air and explain why O’Romneycare is unconstitutional.
Chris Christie is a former federal prosecutor. Ann Coulter is a lawyer, too. Neither has the spine to confront Mitt about O’Romneycare. I’d argue that that’s proof of a major character flaw on their behalf.
Almost two years after energy from the Tea Party swept Republicans back into congressional power, a politician who embodies the antithesis of that spirit stands on the verge of victory. This is regress, not progress, and the GOP will pay a severe price for the Faustian bargain of “electability” that it entails. A party that chooses power over principle will lose both.
The TEA Party busted their hump to get principled conservatives elected. If Mitt doesn’t have an instant and sincere transformation, he’ll lose just like McCain did.
Tags: Sovereignty, Romneycare, Mitt Romney, Hugh Hewitt, Chris Christie, Ann Coulter, GOP, Mark Levin, TEA Party, Conservatism, Activism, Election 2012
It’s painful reading the lefty blogs because they can’t think their way out of a wet paper bag. MnPublius’s Big E is a prime example of the ABM-inspired, Chanting Points progressive blogger. Despite mountains of proof, he’s still insisting that proof of voter fraud doesn’t exist:
Vote suppression organization MN Majority is still trying to find some vote fraud in Minnesota. They’re having quite a hard time of it. They’ve always found a few cases here and there but never the systemic fraud they so desperately seek.
It’s difficult, if not impossible to argue that the SVCs that the USPS returned because the address doesn’t exist isn’t proof of voter fraud:
Minnesota Majority today released a report on voters flagged for challenge in the statewide voter registration system (SVRS) because of official election mailings to their listed addresses being returned as undeliverable by the United States Postal Service. The mailings, commonly known as postal verification cards (PVCs) are sent to newly registered voters as a means of confirming their provided address and residence at that address. Thousands of voters were flagged for challenge following the 2008 and 2010 general election in Minnesota.
“The PVC is the only real test we have for confirming a voter’s residence, and we often don’t perform that verification until after a person has voted,” said Minnesota Majority president Jeff Davis. “After the 2008 election, over 6,000 Election Day registrants were found to have provided addresses that were undeliverable and after 2010 there were over 1,200 more that remain unexplained even after accounting for voters who moved shortly after voting. This is a strong indicator of the possibility of voter fraud.”
It’s time to call the left out on this. They’re liars when it comes to voter fraud. If you don’t believe Minnesota Majority, then it’s time you were confronted by a liberal like Artur Davis. Here’s what Democrat Artur Davis said about voter fraud:
I’ve changed my mind on voter ID laws; I think Alabama did the right thing in passing one; and I wish I had gotten it right when I was in political office.
When I was a congressman, I took the path of least resistance on this subject for an African American politician. Without any evidence to back it up, I lapsed into the rhetoric of various partisans and activists who contend that requiring photo identification to vote is a suppression tactic aimed at thwarting black voter participation.
The truth is that the most aggressive contemporary voter suppression in the African American community, at least in Alabama, is the wholesale manufacture of ballots, at the polls and absentee, in parts of the Black Belt.
Voting the names of the dead, and the nonexistent, and the too-mentally-impaired to function, cancels out the votes of citizens who are exercising their rights; that’s suppression by any light. If you doubt it exists, I don’t; I’ve heard the peddlers of these ballots brag about it, I’ve been asked to provide the funds for it, and I am confident it has changed at least a few close local election results.
What part of “I’ve been asked to provide the funds” for voter fraud doesn’t the Big E understand? Is it that he understands it perfectly but isn’t willing to admit that the Left’s chanting points are lies?
Either way, the proof exists. The Left is just too dishonest to admit it.
Tags: Photo ID, Voter Fraud, Artur Davis, USPS, HAVA, Chanting Points, Blogs, DFL, Elections