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What is the President’s Jobs Agenda?

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What, exactly, is the President’s jobs agenda, now that he’s begun campaigning on one, a year ahead of the next election and three years into his administration—three years in which unemployment has been as high as 10% and has stagnated at 9% for the last two years?  Three years in which he has pushed through his Obamacare health care legislation and his Dodd-Frank Wall Street legislation.  Three years in which he has shaken his finger very firmly at America’s enemies as he has presided over our retreat from the world stage.

Let’s review the bidding.  His opening move, at the end of summer, was a $440 billion bill in which he collected parts of Stimulus I, with its spending imperative, added a push for higher taxes for his class warfare reelection campaign theme, and titled the collection “The American Jobs Act.”  What were the jobs?  There weren’t any, directly.  Much of that spending, though, was aimed at transfers of national taxpayer monies to state and local public service unions—teachers, police, and fire fighter unions—to retain their support in Obama’s campaign.

When that failed, his next move was to pull his jobs bill’s spend and tax legislation apart and push the spending piece parts—always paid for with higher taxes, rather than spending cuts elsewhere—separately.  He did this against the backdrop of his campaign for reelection.

In parallel with that, he’s been having his EPA write “clean” air rules that are Draconian in their effect on, for instance, coal-fired electricity generating power plants.  As Josiah Neely, an Analyst with the Texas Public Policy Foundation, points out, these rules threaten existing and future jobs in return for highly doubtful favorable effects on air quality.  The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, reports Neely, says that enforcing the Cross-State and related rules could result in power plant closures to the extent that 183,000 jobs could be lost every year until 2020.  Our president is unconcerned about this, however.  In 2008, Candidate Obama bragged that under his proposals “if somebody wants to build a coal plant, they can—it’s just that it will bankrupt them.”

Just last week, Obama has decided to punt on the Keystone XL pipeline, a project proposed—in 2008—to build a pipeline to carry oil from Canadian tar sands to refineries in Texas and along the Gulf coast.  He said that, after these three years of review, he wants yet more, “to ensure that all questions are properly addressed and all the potential impacts are properly understood.”  This delay will cost 20,000 construction jobs and potentially 100,000+ downstream, more permanent jobs in the US.

Finally, we have this announcement from the Stryker Corporation, a firm that makes implants and instruments for orthopedics and neurosurgery.  Stryker is reacting to Obamacare taxes that are soon to take effect, and their press release, presented 10 November, says in part [emphasis added]:

Stryker Corporation announced its intention to implement focused workforce reductions of approximately 5% of its global workforce and other restructuring activities….  The targeted reductions and other restructuring activities are being initiated to provide efficiencies and realign resources in advance of the new Medical Device Excise Tax scheduled to begin in 2013….

Obama’s Medical Excise Tax is an Obamacare tax that applies to revenues, as opposed to profits, and it is driving companies that want to do development work in this area to reduce effort in this area and to reduce associated employment.  Other companies will likely outsource jobs to overseas jurisdictions that don’t have such counterproductive employment policies.  (As an aside, it needs to be noted that Stryker’s implants now will be harder, and more expensive, for our wounded veterans to obtain.)

Finally, Obama’s do-nothing Democrat Senate is sitting on 15 jobs bills that would have a real impact on our unemployment and our unemployment rate.

What is Obama’s jobs agenda, then?  He doesn’t have one.  He’s still working on his tax and spend agenda, and pushing class warfare to get more of it imposed.

Some Miscellany

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Telling the truth at inconvenient times: The EU is considering banning rating agencies from publishing ratings on a member country’s sovereign debt whenever that country is in negotiation for a bailout.  After all, worries European Internal Market Commissioner Michel Barnier, who has made the proposal, a rating might be released at an “inopportune moment” and have “negative consequences for the financial stability of a country and a possible destabilizing effect on the global economy.”  M Barnier says that the ratings agencies don’t always publish accurate data.  Of course, the fact that the EU already has negligence (and fraud) laws that can be applied to this situation is unimportant.  It’s better simply to keep investors in the dark than to let them have a few unpleasant truths about European sovereign debt—especially when that debt is at its riskiest: the nation has only just recognized its debt to be worthless or approaching worthlessness, which is why it’s begging for bailouts in the first place.

Can’t trust those cops: They’re too anxious to Tase you, bro.  The New York Civil Liberties Union has their knickers in a twist because “[i]n 60% of cases, the circumstances did not meet standards recommended by experts.”  In their report (“Taking Tasers Seriously: The Need for Better Regulation of Stun Guns in New York”), they claim that “40% of the Taser incidents involved at-risk subjects” and that “people of color are overwhelmingly represented in Taser incidents,” yet the report contains no substantiating data for these claims.  Other beefs: 7% of those Tasered were handcuffed, and another 4% were fleeing. Hmm….  All handcuffed suspects are completely docile, are not kicking or biting risks, cooperatively enter the police car.  And, apparently, if a suspect is lucky enough to break free momentarily, he’s to be allowed to continue—potentially to pursue his misdeeds later.  And the obligatory tear-jerker: a poor 13-year-old boy was Tasered.  Never mind that he was fighting in a mall.  Never mind that the officer who Tasered the boy considered it necessary to “gain compliance.”  Apparently controlling a suspect isn’t allowed.  Of course there are bad apples in every police department, and they need to be weeded out.  And, of course, a few bad apples means we can’t trust the lot of them.

We got him?  The Daily Caller has this (follow the “Full Story” link) Reuters article indicating that in the process of finally gaining control over Sirte, Libya, Libyan fighters killed Muammar Gaddafi.  While the article itself seems clear about Gaddafi’s death (while acknowledging a lack of independent confirmation), the article does raise questions (at least in my grasshopper brain) about the timing of his wounds and of his killing relative to his capture, as well as the actual circumstances of his capture.  And I wonder at the Intelligence value that was lost with his death.

What did he know, and when did he know it?  Rep Jason Chaffetz (R, Utah) and Rep Trey Gowdy (R, South Carolina) are asking rude questions.  In a March interview with Univision, President Obama talked about “Fast and Furious,” and insisted that he “did not authorize it” and that “Eric Holder, the Attorney General, did not authorize it.”  This interview occurred a month prior to AG Holder’s Congressional testimony on the failed operation.  From this, Reps Chaffetz and Gowdy are wondering about things. “Would you inform us how you knew in March of 2011, 1 month prior to his testimony, that Attorney General Holder did not ‘authorize’ this investigation?  [I]f you knew the Attorney General did not authorize ‘Fast and Furious,’ how did you learn that and when did you learn that?  If you knew Attorney General Holder did not authorize it, inherent in that response is knowledge of who did authorize it. That information would be most helpful….”  Hmm….

The Campaign and Rick Perry, II

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With this post, I continue a short series consisting of my analyses of the Republican candidates for the nomination for President.  To recap, I’m limiting my discussions to three candidates: Mitt Romney, Herman Cain, and Rick Perry.  The structure of this series consists of a collection of posts concerning what I don’t like about the candidates and then a series of what I do like about them.  I’ll conclude with my endorsement of a single candidate.  At this point I’m in the series of what I like, and here I’ll talk about what I like about Governor Rick Perry.

Economy:  Some insist that the Texas job growth during the current Panic has little to do with Perry’s stewardship: he’s merely ridden the benefit of Texas’ wealth of oil and gas.  Perry, they say, has simply had Texas on autopilot these last 11 years (including the current Unpleasantness).  They’re right as far as it goes.  But Texas also has a burgeoning information technology and communications sector due to its well-educated and skilled work force.  However, that redounds to Perry.  Unlike other governments, including our own Federal government, Perry has kept his Texas government out of the way of the State’s economy, allowing Texas citizens and businesses do what they do far better than governments can: create wealth for themselves and their State.

Indeed, some 37%-40% of the jobs created since the official end of the recession (an aside: does anyone other than an economist poring over his numbers really feel like he’s out of the downturn and prospering again?) have been created in Texas.  That works out to around 260,000 jobs actually created since June 2009, and that’s also in a State economy that’s been growing about three times faster than the nation’s economy (admittedly, this is no large rate, given the anemic performance of the current administration’s national economy).

Perry also has cut spending, including excess spending in education.  Critics have decried this, but they’re simply committing the Progressive error of conflating efficient spending with lots of spending for its own sake.  The cuts Perry has made to education spending (for instance) have been to the fat, and he’s required remaining spending to be done efficiently.  See above about the educated work force in Texas.

Business: Perry is plainly pro-business, which makes him pro worker, since thriving businesses are a thriving labor market.  He was able to push through, in 2003, an amendment to the Texas Constitution that caps medical malpractice awards.  This has led since then to a 30% reduction in medical malpractice insurance premiums.  Far from reducing the quality of medical care in Texas, that’s improved it: doctors are flocking to Texas, and medical service availability has never been higher.

He also pushed through serious tort reform.  As of this year, plaintiffs who lose their cases must pay court and attorney costs for the defendant.

Management Style:  He knows how to collect a competent staff and then let them do the job for which he hired them.  He is involved in decision-making, but he doesn’t micro-manage, delegating effectively instead.

Other: Perry successfully pushed through the 2011 Texas legislature a requirement for voters to present a photo ID in order to vote.  As of this year, one of the following five easily obtained photo IDs must be presented:  a driver’s license, a military ID, a passport, a concealed handgun license (did I mention that this is Texas?), or a special voter ID card which the State provides for free.

Finally, Perry well understands the 10th Amendment and its role in the federal nature of our governmental structure.  He pushes actively for a return to the sovereignty of the States within the framework of our federalism.

Happiness vs Happiness

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In the current contest between two views of the role of government in American citizens’ lives, it seems useful to talk about two views of Happiness and which of these seems more appropriate and will do us individually more good—and so achieve more for our country.  One of the two fundamental versions of happiness [sic] is the Progressive one: personal pleasure, or what makes a man the happiest and most (immediately) comfortable.

This is a view born in the ’70s’ hippy hedonism of “if it feels good, do it;” although it has evolved and its descriptions have grown more circumspect in the intervening 40 years.  It has become more a question of “what can government do for me?”  Proponents of this view insist that government will take care of them, so they don’t have to worry about the stress of the workaday world—they can simply follow their bliss without responsibility for the outcomes.

This is the view that it’s patriotic to pay (ever) more taxes, not so government can have the funds to do the things we originally created it to do, but so that government can have the funds to take care of us as we grow increasingly dependent on it.  This expanding wealth transfer generally is couched in the heart-wrench of assumed human need: we must keep social security going in perpetuity so that we might be taken care of by government (i.e., strangers) in our dotage; people are out of work, so government must pay us for being out of work (apparently in perpetuity—unemployment insurance is payable now for 99 weeks, up from an original 18 weeks or less, and our current President wants to extend that yet further); people belong to self-appointed special groups, and government must give them special treatment, also in perpetuity: “affirmative” action programs, for instance, are never-ending and ever-expanding, and atheists are increasingly looking for offense in religious ceremonies that they choose not simply to ignore.

While we could get away with this in the short term in an earlier time, we’ve seen dependency on government accelerate, and we’ve seen the transfer of our personal responsibility to government via that dependency blow up our economy in the present time.  In the current Panic, TARP, the 2009 Stimulus Bill, and Dodd-Frank all were, and are, intended to inure us from our failure by giving all of us recourse to others’ tax money.  Failed businesses were not to be allowed to fail; they were absolved of responsibility for their failure and propped up, for all the firm finger-shaking done in their direction by government officials.

This isn’t personal responsibility.  This is government assuming responsibility, taking it from us.  And at great peril, for as Nebraska Congressman Howard Buffett (the father of today’s Warren) said 55 years ago:

Will this legislation fulfill its promises? If you think so, consider this rarely mentioned fine print clause. If the government is to guarantee you what the consequences of your actions will be in this case, security, then the government must take control of your activities. For with responsibility—even self-arrogated responsibility—must go authority.

This means that if politicians are to supply your security, they must control your work, your spending, and your saving.

On the other hand, a modern Conservative’s view of Happiness is that of John Adams:

All men are born free and independent, and have certain natural, essential, and unalienable rights, among which may be reckoned the right of enjoying and defending their lives and liberties; that of acquiring, possessing, and protecting property; in fine, that of seeking and obtaining their safety and happiness.

One of the early appearances of this is in Adam’s “A Declaration of the Rights of the Inhabitants of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts;” it’s also included in Massachusetts’ 1780 Constitution as Article I of Part the First.

This is Bill Gates and the late Steve Jobs making themselves stinking rich (and more power to them and others like them)—and employing others in the bargain—on the strength of their own hard work and skills.  This is Joe the Plumber and others like them earning a living—and employing others in the bargain—on the strength of their own hard work and entrepreneurial ambition.  This is the mom and pop business that lets parents put their children through college on the strength of the hard work and personal initiative of those moms and pops.  This is the worker employed by Gates and Jobs and Joe and mom and pop who, lacking the talent, perhaps, or the interest, to work for himself, nevertheless has the ethic to earn a living in a job that helps him to see to his future and that of his children, rather than looking to Big Government to take care of him.

My parents came out of the Depression more determined than ever to rely on themselves for their welfare and not on their government.  Near the home in northern California where my parents lived for part of their retirement, stands a large house—a mansion—that has the busiest, most detailed, gingerbread-laden Victorian architecture and decoration, and the ugliest, I’ve ever seen.  All that complexity and detail work, though, was not because the man who built it, a local lumber magnate around the time of the Depression, liked that sort of thing.  On the contrary, his lumber business was declining, and the loss of business was threatening his labor force.  But he didn’t want to lose them.  Optimistic capitalist that he was, he knew the economy would recover, and he wanted to be part of that recovery.  For this, he needed a skilled labor force readily available; he didn’t want to lose time to having to find, and likely to train, employees after having laid off the ones he had, with their subsequent scattering to the winds looking for new jobs.  Also, these were his labor force, and he felt a measure of responsibility for them.  So he built his monstrosity of a house, and he used his lumber enterprise workers to do the construction.  He kept them employed through the worst of the downturn, they kept jobs through the downturn, and they were available when his lumber business began to recover.

This was done, not by government, but by an individual.  Where true responsibility lies.

This is Happiness.

Atty Gen Holder’s Letter

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Caution: long post….

Attorney General Eric Holder has sent a letter to various Congressional leaders defending his Department of Justice’s mishandling of the “Fast and Furious” operation; you can read it here, originally located through FoxNews, so I’ll just offer some observations about a few of his claims in this post.

The first claim of Mr Holder is early in his letter:

I cannot sit idly by as a Majority Member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform suggests, as happened this week, that law enforcement and government employees who devote their lives to protecting our citizens be considered “accessories to murder.”

The “suggestion” was by Rep Paul Gosar (R, AZ), and what he actually said in a telephone interview with The Daily Caller was this:

We’re talking about consequences of criminal activity, where we actually allowed guns to walk into the hands of criminals, where our livelihoods are at risk.  When you facilitate that and a murder or a felony occurs, you’re called an accessory. That means that there’s criminal activity.

We impugn the private sector, we impugn main street America, and the bureaucracy cannot be held to any different standard whatsoever.

TheDC summarized other parts of the telephone interview thusly: Congressman Gosar said the government should be held to the same standard as everyone else.  Fast and Furious weapons were used to kill U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry, as well as scores of Mexican citizens, and he thinks administration officials should be held accountable.  Congressman Gosar further told TheDC that Justice Department and ATF officials “intentionally—intentionally—violated the law.”

Congressman Gosar clearly was talking about Mr Holder and his immediate subordinates who ran—and apparently covered up—this botched operation.  He was not at all referring to any other “law enforcement and government employees” than himself and his immediate subordinates.  Plainly, this is nothing more than Holder’s rank, Alinsky-esque attempt to obfuscate and change the subject.

…in 2011, after the controversy about this matter arose, I took decisive action to ensure that such operations are never again undertaken.  First, I referred the matter…to the Department’s [IG]….  Second, I instructed the Deputy Attorney General to reiterate to our prosecutors…that Department policy prohibits….  In addition, new leadership is now in place….

Why did Mr Holder wait until the failure had become public before he took any action?  Oh, wait, he’s only the guy in charge; he had no way of knowing the operation even existed, much less was a bungling failure with murderous results.

Oh, and the AG sicced his IG on the matter.  That’ll show ’em.  And he reiterated policy to his prosecutors.  What effect does he expect from this, exactly?  If his policy were worth a hoot, or if his authority had any substance, the policy wouldn’t need repetition; it would have been followed in the first place.  And he put new leaders into a couple of slots.  What has he done about the folks he (can’t quite get around to) hold responsible for their inadequate reporting up the chain?  About the leadership who hatched this idea and then, apparently, executed it without any guidance from above?  Are they still on the Federal payroll?  Are they being investigated for any criminal charges?  Mr Holder is oddly silent on this.  No, instead he’s actually suggesting that his idle chit chat and Very Stern Finger Shaking is “decisive action.”

Prior to early 2011, I certainly never knew about the tactics employed…and it is my understanding that the former United States Attorney for the District of Arizona and the former Acting Director and Deputy Director of ATF…were unaware of the tactics employed.  …they never briefed me or other Department leadership….

How does that work?  Are we seriously to believe that these men were as cut out of the loop and isolated as Mr Holder claims to be?  Doesn’t his Department have any reporting requirements at all?  Aren’t his juniors required to report up the chain what they’re doing, or contemplating doing, in the name of the United States Government an international operation?

On a weekly basis, my office typically receives over a hundred pages of so-called “weekly reports” that, while addressed to me, actually are [read and handled by others]….  Please note that none of these summaries say anything about the unacceptable tactics employed by ATF….  [G]iven the volume of material to which I must devote my attention, I do not and cannot….  As Attorney General, I am not and cannot be familiar with the operational details of any particular investigation being conducted in an ATF field office….

There are so many things wrong here.  When I was in the USAF, I had the good fortune to have an assignment that made me the Director of Radar Operations for a Wing in the FRG.  In that staff capacity, I was responsible for 19 combat units.  In that job, I read an inch thick stack of message traffic twice a day—a bit more than “a hundred pages” a week.  I also knew what my units were doing in that international environment, and what relevant sections of those units were doing.  And I was just a poor, dumb Air Force Captain, not a high-powered attorney nominally in charge of an entire Federal Government Department.  How is it possible that Mr Holder didn’t even know what his ATF was doing?  Oh, those reporting “requirements,” and the degree of practical authority this man has.  He’s only the guy in charge.  Not somebody who matters.

A telling moment in this regard [concerning the Obama administration’s effort to use border gun violence as an excuse to get legislation infringing on Americans’ 2nd Amendment rights]….  Representative Maloney was cut-off in mid-sentence [of an effort to discuss “potential reforms to our laws”] by Chairman Issa, who then “cautioned” the witness that it would not be “valid testimony” to respond to such questions because the Committee was not interested in “proposed legislation and the like[.]”

The Chairman attempted to keep the Committee and the witness focused on its purpose of the hearing.  How petty and irrelevant a beef is this?

Finally, I have a few questions.  Where was the Department of State in this cross-border operation?  With whom did Mr Holder coordinate in the Department of State on this operation?  Which of Mr Holder’s subordinates coordinated with State, and with whom in State did they coordinate?  What were the outcomes of those coordination activities?

And why, since Mr Holder was listening to Congressman Gosar so assiduously, did Mr Holder choose to ignore Congressman Gosar’s question of State’s involvement in this international operation?  Or was this, in fact, another task passed off to a junior, who then decided for Mr Holder that the matter wasn’t important enough to trouble the busy man with?

I also have a question for Secretary Clinton: why is the State Department so silent on this international operation, especially now that is so blindly public?

If Mr Holder really is as ignorant of the activities of his Department as he claims himself to be, his incompetence is breathtaking.  He owes it to those who serve in the ranks of law enforcement for whom he bleeds so much to stop sullying their good names and their reputations with his presence.  He owes it to the American people which his Department serves to desist from so steadfastly misleading us.  He owes to all of us to resign.

Update: Updated the link to AG Holder’s letter to go directly to a .pdf of the letter and not to FoxNews’ display of the letter.  FoxNews remains the source through which I located the letter.