Archive for the ‘Pelosi’ Category
A number of years back, I heard a joke, part of which I can’t remember. Still, I can remember enough of it to make a point. Historic military figures were looking at the Soviet Union’s military hardware. When the tanks rolled through Red Square, Alexander the Great replied, “If I had had these chariots, I would’ve ruled the entire world.” On his left stood Napoleon Bonaparte. After Napoleon read the current copy of Pravda, he replied “If I had this as the official newspaper, nobody would’ve heard of Waterloo.”
The point of the joke isn’t to get people laughing. It’s to make the point that there’s a more insidious type of Pravda operating inside the United States. For the last 5+ years, I’ve called that operation the Agenda Media. The Agenda Media doesn’t think it’s their responsibility to get people important facts. In their minds, their responsibility is to push their politicial agenda. If that means omitting important facts, that’s what they’re willing to do. This video is a perfect illustration of the Agenda Media’s selective editing:
Thankfully, citizen journalists with cell phones are recording things as they happened. Thankfully, citizen journalists with video cameras are informing people by filming protests like this, then posting the video to Youtube, then reposting the videos to their Facebook page, then posting the links to their videos to Twitter.
There’s a more important point to this. OFA isn’t just about protesting against constitutional conservatives. They’re identifying people in communities who might vote for progressives. Conservatives will show up to counterprotest against OFA. The big question is whether they’ll get into the neighborhoods and identify people that might appreciate the conservative/capitalist message.
Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, Tom Coburn, Ron Johnson, Paul Ryan and Rand Paul should be the blueprint for Republicans for 2014. They’re picking fights with President Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, which is essential to winning elections. They’re framing debates. For instance, Sen. Coburn is highlighting tens of billions of dollars of duplicative spending that should be eliminated in this budget. Sen. Johnson is highlighting how government is used as a weapon against the citizenry. Paul Ryan is fighting for a pro-growth budget that will eventually balance within a decade.
It’s despicable that the Agenda Media would distort what happened at a protest. As despicable as that is, that’s only part of this story. OFA is already identifying potential Democrat voters. Republicans need to start this week at identifying potential conservative voters.
Tags: Organizing for Action, Gun Control, Protests, Agenda Media, Censorship, Voter ID, Democrats, Tom Coburn, Sequester This, Ron Johnson, Victims of Government Project, Mike Lee, Cut This, Not That, Ted Cruz, Second Amendment, Paul Ryan, Balanced Budget, Rand Paul, TEA Party Conservatives, Election 2014
Today, Jim Graves made it official today by announcing that he’s running against Michele Bachmann again:
In a statement, the AmericInn Hotel chain founder took a veiled jab at his opponent’s national reputation as a lightning rod. “These days, Congress is all about scoring political points rather than actually solving problems, and Minnesota’s 6th District, my home, is losing out because of that more than anywhere,” he said. ”I’m not interested in celebrity, only in solutions.”
That last statement is rather rich considering the fact that Graves told me that he thinks the PPACA is a free market solution to our health care problem. The PPACA is a one-size-fits-all disaster. First, it isn’t a solution. Second, it’s an expensive disaster that’s getting worse with each new onslaught of regulations.
If Graves can’t even identify a disastrous policy like the PPACA, then he’s worthless. Getting the biggest things badly wrong isn’t a virtue. His happy talk about being a new Democrat is BS. New Democrats don’t attend fundraisers hosted by Barney Frank, one of the men who caused the housing bubble to burst. New Democrats don’t defend the PPACA, which Graves tried doing with me.
Graves’ schtick is spin. That doesn’t mean people should take him lightly. He came close to defeating Michele in 2012. Then again, that’s largely because of high voter turnout durning a presidential election and because Michele focused a bunch of attention on her presidential campaign.
Since getting re-elected, Michele Bachmann has focused on solving major problems in the district, including working on widening the I-94 and Highway 10 corridors, not to mention her work in getting the Stillwater Bridge rebuilt.
Another big question awaiting is whether Nancy Pelosi will let Jim Graves be a centrist. She’ll let him talk like a centrist during the campaign. The question is how long that’d last if he’s elected. If he’s elected, Pelosi would likely have a slim majority in the House, meaning she’ll need every Democrat’s vote on the big issue.
Graves will run another dishonest campaign this cycle because that’s his only shot at winning. Make no mistake: Jim Graves won’t hesitate in hitting below the belt if that’s what’s needed. We know that because it’s what he’s done in the past. Graves got a bunch of union workers to lie for him during a campaign ad. These displaced union workers accused Michele of political grandstanding and not giving a damn about them. KSTP ran Graves’ ad through their Truth Test:
Bachmann was in the district on Memorial Day weekend in Stillwater attending events when the explosion happened but didn’t go to the scene. However, a Bachmann staff member was there within an hour.
I know the Bachmann staffer who got to the Verson site within an hour of the explosion happening. Jim Graves didn’t care about this extraordinary performance. He had his sights set on winning an election. If he had to accuse Michele of not giving a damn, that’s what he’d do. If that meant ignoring the facts on the ground, New Democrat Jim Graves wasn’t about to hesitate in putting that disgusting, dishonest ad together.
Tags: Jim Graves, Smear Campaign, Barney Frank, Housing Bubble, Nancy Pelosi, PPACA, Regulations, New Democrat, Michele Bachmann, I-94, Highway 10, Stillwater Bridge, Transportation, MNGOP, Election 2014
The first part of this series dealt with Sen. Coburn’s criticism of the money being wasted on housing programs. Sen. Coburn’s criticism focused on the duplicative and overlapping programs, the overlapping jurisdictions between agencies and the overhead involved in administering these programs.
This part deals with the grant programs from the DoJ:
Here’s the transcript from Sen. Coburn’s presentation on the DoJ grant programs:
SEN. COBURN: Department of Justice grants. Now the Department of Justice is the only agency in the federal government that, if they don’t spend all their money, they get to keep that it. Most people don’t know that. They have 253 different grant programs and, outside of the Department of Justice, there are 9 other agencies involved in that. Most of them, these programs, these grant programs, don’t have any metrix, any measurement to say whether they’re accomplishing the things that the Congress established for them to accomplsish in the first place. So if, in fact, a prudent person were to say ‘We have these grant programs. What are they doing, what are they supposed to be doing and how are they measuring up?’, we don’t know because we don’t require the federal government to measure how effectiveness of their programs.
President Obama, Sen. Reid and Minority Leader Pelosi continue to pretend that there isn’t a penny’s worth of wasteful spending left in the federal budget. Technically, they’re right. They’re right in the sense that there’s tens of billions of dollars of wasteful spending left in the federal budget.
That leads to these important questions:
- If there are tens of billions of dollars of wasteful spending left in the federal budget, who are President Obama, Sen. Reid and Minority Leader Pelosi protecting?
- If there are tens of billions of dollars of wasteful spending left in the federal budget, why do President Obama, Sen. Reid and Minority Leader Pelosi insist that the only solution to this crisis is another tax increase?
There’s no justification for increasing taxes for a fourth time this year. Thus far, Americans have gotten hit with a tax increase when the payroll tax holiday expired on New Year’s Eve. The next morning, the tax increases from the Affordable Care Act kicked in. A day later, Congress passed a $600 billion tax increase on “the rich.”
After all thos hundreds of billions of dollars of tax increases, President Obama, Sen. Reid and Minority Leader Pelosi insist that the solution to their spending addiction is…another tax increase? Seriously?
President Obama, Sen. Reid and Minority Leader Pelosi insist on another tax increase to feed their spending addiction. That’s the only explanation that makes sense. They certainly haven’t shown any interest in making sure the taxpayers’ money is spent wisely. They certainly haven’t shown an interest in getting the deficits under control. There’s no denying the fact that President Obama and his administration have tried painting the most horrific picture imaginable.
Remember Arne Duncan insisting that teachers were already getting pink slips as a result of sequestration? Or Ray Lahood inisisting that waiting lines at airport check-ins would be longer? Better yet, remember President Obama telling the White House press corps that janitors in the White House would have their pay cut if sequestration went into effect?
There’s no reason to trust anything that trio of politicians say about taxes or spending. They’re proven themselve to be totally dishonest.
The most disgusting thing in the GAO report is the fact that, in instance after instance, there isn’t a metrix to measure whether the programs are doing what they’re supposed to be doing or whether they’re spending money efficiently.
Tags: Sequestration, President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Tax Increases, Democrats, Tom Coburn, Duplication Nation, Department of Justice, Oversight, GAO Report, GOP
Remember when then-Speaker Pelosi said that the ACA was a job creator? Later, she said we’d have to read the bill to know everything that’s in it. Then she brought the bill to a vote before anyone had time to read it. Kerry Picket’s reporting shows Pelosi didn’t tell the truth:
Welch Allyn
Welch Allyn, a company that manufactures medical diagnostic equipment in central New York, announced in September that they would be laying off 275 employees, or roughly 10% of their workforce over the next three years. One of the major reasons discussed for the layoffs was a proactive response to the Medical Device Tax mandated by the new healthcare law.
Dana Holding Corp.
As recently as a week ago, a global auto parts manufacturing company in Ohio known as Dana Holding Corp., warned their employees of potential layoffs, citing “$24 million over the next six years in additional U.S. health care expenses”. After laying off several white collar staffers, company insiders have hinted at more to come. The company will have to cover the additional $24 million cost somehow, which will likely equate to numerous cuts in their current workforce of 25,500 worldwide.
Stryker
One of the biggest medical device manufacturers in the world, Stryker will close their facility in Orchard Park, New York, eliminating 96 jobs in December. Worse, they plan on countering the medical device tax in Obamacare by slashing 5% of their global workforce – an estimated 1,170 positions.
Boston Scientific
In October of 2009, Boston Scientific CEO Ray Elliott, warned that proposed taxes in the health care reform bill could “lead to significant job losses” for his company. Nearly two years later, Elliott announced that the company would be cutting anywhere between 1,200 and 1,400 jobs, while simultaneously shifting investments and workers overseas – to China.
Medtronic
In March of 2010, medical device maker Medtronic warned that Obamacare taxes could result in a reduction of precisely 1,000 jobs. That plan became reality when the company cut 500 positions over the summer, with another 500 set for the end of 2013.
Let’s be blunt about something. These layoffs will cause families’ incomes to drop. When President Bush left office, the average family income was just short of $55,000. Once these layoffs hit and other employees are reduced to part time status, we’ll be fortunate if average family income hits $48,000 a year.
That’s the economic reality of President Obama’s economic policies. Simply put, he’s a total disaster. His best job creation month hasn’t even hit 300,000. Reagan’s best month, job creation-wise, was in Sept., 1983. That month, the economy created 1,100,000 jobs. In other words, Reagan’s best month created slightly fewer jobs than were created in President Obama’s best year.
Thanks to President Obama’s disastrous policies, we’re now stuck with 4 more years of President Obama’s failed economic policies. None of President Obama’s policies is more disastrous than the ACA.
A frequent progressive commenter just asked if Republicans ever did anything for the public good. Considering the fact that President Obama’s policies were implemented via his my-way-or-the-highway tactics. More importantly, they’ve failed miserably.
I’ve said it before & I’ll repeat it again: there’s no virtue in agreeing with the left’s disastrous policies.
Tags: President Obama, Recession, Boston Scientific, Medtronics, Stryker, Welch Allyn, ACA Layoffs, Nancy Pelosi, Unemployment, Family Incomes, Outsourcing, Democrats
Jim Graves says he’s a new type of Democrat. Let’s remember that he was the guest of honor at a fundraiser hosted by Barney Frank. Likewise, Graves didn’t sound like a new Democrat in this video:
When Melissa Harris-Perry asks him about GOP extremism, listen to what Graves says:
Let me ask you this question. We’re trying to figure out if the extremes that are often represented by the woman that you are running against, whether or not that is ultimately going to bring down the republican party in the short term or if not in the short term, –
No question about it. Michele Bachmann epitomizes everything that’s wrong on the women’s issues. She has engaged in a war on women. She would like to take women back 50 years, go back to a male dominant society, control women’s reproductive rights, control everything about women. Definitely it’s a war on women and it will definitely be a very important issue in this election.
HARRIS-PERRY: It’s interesting to hear you say that because clearly Michele Bachmann is a woman. So you have sort of a complicated thing going on here where you’re saying she herself is a woman and mother and yet her positions are positions that don’t lead to sort of greater equality, fairness for women in general, who would be your constituents if you won.
GRAVES: You look at the her voting record, she votes against reproductive rights, she votes against even women to have access to birth control. This is a woman that would like to take that entire half of our society back 50 years and go back to a male dominant society. This is really why I came out of my comfort zone. I’m a strong believer in freedom and equality for everybody. And when you see…she’s endorsed Akin. She is on the wrong side of this issue right across the board. No question about about that.
It’s apparent that Mr. Graves is a one trick pony. Actually, that isn’t true. He’s a totally unreliable one trick pony.
It’s apparent that Mr. Graves will say and do whatever Nancy Pelosi tells him to do if he gets that far. Michele, on the other hand, has stood up against the GOP when they got things wrong.
The bottom line is this: Jim Graves sounds like a new Democrat when nobody’s paying attention. Otherwise, he’s just another DFL chanting points machine.
Tags: Jim Graves, Barney Frank, Nancy Pelosi, Progressives, DFL, Michele Bachmann, TEA Party Caucus, Conservatism, GOP, Election 2012
This morning, USA Today published Nancy Pelosi’s op-ed of incessant whining from the Queen of “We won” about Republicans saying no to President Obama’s agenda. Here’s an example of Pelosi’s whining:
With the economy weakening and two wars underway, there were significant policy differences between Democrats and the Bush White House. But from Day One, Democrats focused on moving our nation forward. Rather than set up roadblocks, we worked across the aisle with President Bush and many Republican colleagues.
The Democrats ignored the American people to the extent that they threw Democrats out after 4 years in the majority. It wasn’t a gentle nudge that sent the Democrats packing, either. The Democrats lost 63 seats in the 2010 midterms, the biggest loss for a political party in three quarters of a century.
One of the things that Ms. Pelosi thinks of as a major accomplishment is passing the ACA. People flocked to townhall meetings to express their disgust with the ACA in August, 2009. Ms. Pelosi’s puppets ignored the will of the people, especially women who hadn’t been interested in politics.
That’s what started the Momma Grizzly movement.
A majority of people, especially entrepreneurs, think it’s an albatross around their necks. That’s why they’re poised to throw President Obama from office.
Saying no to spending money on failed policies that reward President Obama’s political allies isn’t failure. It’s an accomplishment that they’ll be rewarded for this November.
To promote the industries of the future and safeguard national security, we enacted the comprehensive Energy Independence and Security Act, raising fuel-efficiency standards for the first time in 32 years, investing in renewables and biofuels while creating clean energy jobs. We followed up with the COMPETES Act to support high-tech jobs, extend math and science education and boost research.
Passing these green energy bills hasn’t lowered gas prices or electric bills. Many companies that got federally guaranteed loans through the stimulus went bankrupt.
Again, Republicans saying no to the failed policies of the past 4 years is a virtue. It isn’t failure.
The accomplishments of the Democratic Congress of 2007-09 demonstrate how Democrats worked with a Republican president to address serious issues despite partisan differences. It is a lesson not learned by the current Republican House leadership.
Ms. Pelosi is implying that House Republicans haven’t passed any bills. She’s implying through her teeth. Harry Reid is the do-nothing ‘leader’ who’s done nothing.
House Republicans have passed over 30 bills that would get our economy growing, starting with repealing the ACA. Until that bill is repealed, jobs won’t get created and the doctor shortage will continue.
Democrats, from this White House to Harry Reid’s Senate to Ms. Pelosi’s puppets, have shown a willingness to keep proposing more spending that won’t get the economy going.
President Obama’s policies have led to month after month of feeble job growth and shrinking GDP figures.
Saying no to failure is success. To retrofit Nancy Reagan’s phrase from the war on drugs to fit the Obama economy, just say no to President Obama’s and Nancy Pelosi’s failed policies.
With 23,500,000 people who are unemployed or underemployed or who’ve just quit looking for work, it’s indisputable that President Obama’s policies failed. With 46,000,000 people on food stamps, there’s no questioning that President Obama’s policies have failed.
Saying no to repeating this president’s failed policies is the patriotic thing to do.
Tags: President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Do-Nothing Senate, Affordable Care Act, Stimulus, Unemployment, Democrats, Election 2012
Jonathan Alter is one of the least persuasive opinion writers because he passionately believes in an Alter-native reality. Alter’s latest column is filled with that type of BS:
Some Democrats now dare to wonder if Romney’s pick for vice president could even undermine Republican control of the House of Representatives. Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has said for months that the Democrats can take the House; no one believed her. Although it’s still a steep challenge, Ryan’s addition to the ticket makes the climb easier.
The Democrats retaking the House isn’t “a steep challenge.” It’s impossible.
First, Democrats would need a wave election to swing 25 House seats from red to blue. There isn’t proof that this is a wave election, mostly because Democrats suffer from a significant enthusiasm gap.
In 2006 and 2008, there was a 100% chance that Democrats would’ve run through brick walls to get their candidates elected. This year, there’s only a 50-50 chance that they’re willing to walk across the street to get their candidates elected.
Another important factor that Alter didn’t consider is the 2010 election. A significant number of seats that Republicans won that year were seats that Democrats had only held for 4 years. Republicans won back Republican seats because voters realized that the newly-elected Democrats weren’t the centrists that they campaigned as.
Reality matters except if you’re living in an Alter-native universe.
A third factor that Mr. Alter ignored is the fact that the 2010 midterm flipped a ton of legislatures into GOP control. This article lays that out nicely:
Republicans picked up 680 seats in state legislatures, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, the most in the modern era. To put that number in perspective: In the 1994 GOP wave, Republicans picked up 472 seats. The previous record was in the post-Watergate election of 1974, when Democrats picked up 628 seats.
The GOP gained majorities in at least 14 state house chambers. They now have unified control, meaning both chambers, of 26 state legislatures.
That control is a particularly bad sign for Democrats as they go into the redistricting process. If the GOP is effective in gerrymandering districts in many of these states, it could eventually lead to the GOP actually expanding its majority in 2012.
Republicans now hold the redistricting “trifecta”, both chambers of the state legislature and the governorship, in 15 states. They also control the Nebraska governorship and the unicameral legislature, taking the number up to 16. And in North Carolina, probably the state most gerrymandered to benefit Democrats, Republicans hold both chambers of the state legislature and the Democratic governor does not have veto power over redistricting proposals.
That means many of the seats the GOP won in 2010 were made stronger GOP districts through redistricting. The Democrats will likely retake some of the seats they lost in 2010. It’s also likely that the GOP will take new seats in 2012.
At this point, it isn’t unreasonable to predict the House to be close to a wash, with a few seats switching hands in either direction possible.
This sentence made me laugh uncontrollably:
The Obama camp is guarding against overconfidence and still betting the U.S. presidential race will be close.
Guarding against overconfidence? That’s like the Germans saying they were guarding against overconfidence in north Africa after a string of Patton victories.
The recent spate of polling of likely voters from Purple Strategies and Rasmussen indicates that President Obama should be worried. Here’s Purple Strategies’ polling:
Mitt leads President Obama in Ohio, Florida and Virginia while President Obama leads Mitt in Colorado. Each of those polls is within the MOE, with Virginia being Mitt’s biggest swing-state lead and Colorado being President Obama’s biggest swing-state lead, both at 3% points.
The latest Rasmussen polling has Romney-Ryan leading President Obama in Wisconsin.
At what point will Jonathan Alter consider the possibility that the House will stay in GOP control and that President Obama is in trouble? Will there be a point when Jonathan Alter will admit those things?
Some Republicans lament that Ryan’s emergence makes it easier for the Obama campaign to keep the campaign focus away from jobs by shifting it to entitlements. Republican strategist Mike Murphy posted on Twitter that someone should do a Nexis search to see whether “economy” or “Medicare” appeared more often in the news media in the 72 hours after the Ryan announcement. His point was clear: Any day the country is talking about Medicare instead of unemployment is a good day for Democrats.
That’s why it isn’t a good idea to trust idiots that haven’t left DC for any appreciable amount of time. All that needs to be said about Murphy’s credibility is that he’s a former McCain campaign insider. We saw what kind of campaign that was.
Outside the DC echochamber, Medicare solvency is a big issue, not by itself but because it’s a way to attack the ACA. With the ACA being hated by a significant majority of voters, attacking the ACA is almost as good as attacking President Obama on the economy and jobs.
In fact, if put together properly, it’s a way to to tie the ACA together with the economy and unemployment. Small businesses across the country aren’t expanding to stay under the 50 employee threshhold. I spoke with 2 St. Cloud businesspeople this week that confirmed that fact.
Alter is a DC creature. He wouldn’t know anything about America’s heartland if his life depended on it. That’s why I usually ignore his columns. I couldn’t ignore this one, though, because some BS just has to be destroyed. This was one of those times.
Tags: DC Beltway, Jonathan Alter, Media Bias, Mike Murphy, John McCain, Establishment, President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Democrats, Mitt Romney, Redistricting, House of Representatives, Mediscare, GOP, Election 2012
It’s difficult to think of any successes that the Democratic Party has had the past 4 years. The annual deficits have been the biggest deficits in US history. That’s because President Obama’s policies have failed. The stimulus, the ACA, Cap and Trade and the green energy transformation have failed miserably.
Add into that the EPA’s heavyhanded regulations that are shutting down coal-fired power plants while waging war against the coal industry. Add to that the corruption being uncovered when people look into the loan guarantees given to Solyndra and other likeminded companies headed for disaster.
Harry Reid’s Senate hasn’t produced a budget in years. Nancy Pelosi is the picture of ideology-driven stupidity. They’ve essentially been rubberstamps for the policies that’ve led to the worst economic ‘recovery’ in US history.
That makes them the worst leadership team in US history. Their record of exploding deficits, increasing unemployment, chronic unemployment and a government so big that it’s strangling the most prolific economic system in the history of the world testifies against their proclaimed competence.
When was the last time anyone trusted this administration’s predictions? Has anyone trusted Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi beyond their caucuses? I don’t think so.
Here in Minnesota, Gov. Dayton and the DFL have done nothing except protect the public employee unions while refusing to tell the militant environmentalists to take a hike. As a result, Iron Rangers suffer with a median household income $12,300 less than the state average.
Rep. Thissen and Sen. Bakk could spend $188,000 on redistricting personnel and equipment but they couldn’t be bothered to put a set of redistricting maps. Rep. Thissen and Sen. Bakk insisted on a $1,400,000,000 tax increase that led to the longest state government shutdown in US history.
Who’d trust that type of stewardship to improve Minnesota’s economy?
Back at the federal level, this administration predictably sided with the militant environmentalists when they refused to build the Keystone XL Pipeline project.
Thanks to that decision, China will have a stable supply of oil to fuel their economic growth.
Giving carte blanche run of the government to the Democrats and the DFL is a scary thought. Higher taxes, higher regulations, bigger deficits and more unemployment is their agenda.
That’s a recipe for historic disaster.
Tags: President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Keystone XL Pipeline, Militant Environmentalists, EPA, Coal-Fired Power Plants, Unemployment, Deficits, Affordable Care Act, Crony Capitalism, Corruption, Mark Dayton, Paul Thissen, Tom Bakk, Government Shutdown, Redistricting, Tax Increases, Democrats, DFL, Election 2012
I’ve heard enough from what’s best described as the ‘it isn’t Obama’s fault crowd’. Conservatives can probably mumble the left’s argument in their sleep. For newcomers, it goes something like this (in no particular order):
- Bush put 2 wars on the national credit card.
- President Obama inherited a mess.
- The rich aren’t paying their fair share.
That’s nothing more than a steaming pile of BS. While the first 2 points are true, they’re also irrelevant.
Putting 2 wars on the national credit card has nothing to do with this administration’s hostility towards the business community. It has nothing to do with the EPA’s inflicting pain on families and power plants through an out-of-control regulatory regime. Those wars have nothing to do with the EPA’s attempt to shut down the coal industry in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Virginia and Indiana.
Those wars have nothing to do with President Obama’s decision to push the biggest job-killing bill in US history, the ACA, down our throats against the will of the American people. Those wars didn’t prevent companies from putting their capital at risk during the Bush years.
Capital didn’t start redeploying to places other than the American economy until this administration took over. The left still hasn’t explained why that ‘redeployment’ happened. I don’t think we’ll hear an explanation until after the election.
The deficits didn’t start increasing until after the election disaster of 2006. The deficits didn’t start skyrocketing until President Obama laid out his misguided economic blueprint. Democrats can’t blame President Bush for President Obama choosing not to start the Keystone XL Pipeline. In fact, if President Bush was still the president, it’s a lead pipe cinch he would’ve approved the project, thereby creating tens of thousands of construction jobs while reducing U.S. dependence on Saudi oil.
President Obama won’t attempt to rebut my ‘indictment’ against their economic policies because the indictment is airtight. It’s true that President Obama inherited a mess. It’s verifiable that President Obama promptly made things worse. Here’s how he ‘accomplished’ it:
- pursuing an agenda filled with hostility towards businesses large, small and in between,
- unleashing the EPA to demolish the coal industry and coal-fired power plants,
- starting a war against fossil fuels,
- pushing the biggest job-killing bill in US history down our throats and
- pursuing a strategy that created economic uncertainty at the very time we needed economic and regulatory certainty.
If you’re looking for a blueprint to destroy a nation’s economy, you needn’t look further.
Tags: President Obama, Keystone XL Pipeline Project, Unemployment, Recession, Deficits, The Rich, Fair Share, EPA, Affordable Care Act, Wars, Democrats, Election 2012
Eleven days ago, DFL-endorsed candidate Jim Graves stopped at the Oxpitality Tuesday gathering at the Red Carpet. When Mr. Graves stopped past my table, we talked about his thoughts on energy independence and health care. In my opinion, those are the two biggest things preventing the economy from taking off.
My article in the Examiner about the conversation must’ve gotten under Mr. Graves’ skin because he sent me an email last weekend. Here’s something that he said that caught my attention:
Another point you seem to have brought up is how someone could be for a free market and not be totally opposed to the ACA. You imply that the ACA is completely incompatible with the free market. I know the ACA is long and complex, but one really needs to take a close and objective look at it and, of course, it is not perfect nor the final solution by any means. However, one must acknowledge that insurance companies are still independent entities. The various layers of health care providers are still independent entities.
First, it should be noted that he told me that “Whether people like it or not, government is already part of the health care system.” Government interference in the form of telling health insurance companies, or any companies for that matter, what products they must sell to stay licensed can’t be reconciled with free market principles.
Whether you think that’s a good or bad thing, it doesn’t fit the principles of a free market.
Here’s the statement Mr. Graves’ campaign released on the ACA:
St. Cloud, MN – “Rather than continue politicizing the extremely serious health care issue, Jim Graves believes it is time to come together in a bi-partisan manner to address bending the health care cost curve” said campaign spokesperson Donald McFarland. “Jim believes in working towards real solutions by pursuing an outcome based reimbursement model that incorporates prevention, transparency and free market principals. All Americans want the same things for themselves and their families. We all want sick children to get the care they need and our seniors to be protected. Working together across party lines, we can bring down the cost of health care so that it is both affordable and accessible.”
That’s some of the finest Klobucharspeak this side of Sen. Klobuchar I’ve seen in months. Since he doesn’t have an issues page outlining his policy perscriptions for our nation’s most difficult challenges, I don’t know what that statement means.
I know some of the things it might mean. It might mean he’s willing to scrap the ACA, though I doubt that. It might mean he thinks expanding Medicaid to cover children is a positive thing. It might mean he’s prepared to renounce the ACA and the process that led to it. That isn’t likely because that’d mean standing up to Nancy Pelosi and getting kneecapped by a ruthless autocrat.
The ACA is the worst piece of legislation of our generation by a country mile. It was crafted in Nancy Pelosi’s office and Harry Reid’s office. The amount of consultation with people from the Cleveland Clinic and other innovation leaders within the industry was miniscule.
The fact that Mr. Graves won’t put his policy perscriptions on his website is akin to him telling us to just trust him, that we don’t need to know the specific things he’d champion.
Graves’ interview with MPP’s Bill Prendergast doesn’t paint a picture of moderation:
GRAVES: So I’m not going to sit back when she says that there isn’t such a thing as global warming. I’m going to say “Uh, Ms. Bachmann have you had an opportunity to fly over the North Pole? I haven’t but I’ve seen pictures, and global warming is factual.” Ninety-nine point nine per cent of the scientists agree to that, and I guess I go with the science.
Perhaps Mr. Graves should read this article and the list of scientists that once believed in AGW who’ve switched. This isn’t exactly a fresh off the printer study, either. It was published in 2007.
Since then, scandals have riddled the scientific community. The IPCC report has been challenged as being more of a political document than scientific document. At this point global warming is a theory, not fact. The fact that Mr. Graves thinks this is settled science speaks volumes about the intellectual rigor that he’s used in reaching his opinion.
I won’t vote for a person who doesn’t have the confidence in his policies to publish them on his website because it tells me he’s hiding something. Fair or unfair, that’s life.
Tags: Affordable Care Act, Climate Change, Free Markets, Nancy Pelosi, Democrats, Election 2012