Tag Archives: political parties

Obstruction and Understanding

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We’ve seen an example of how the Democrats of the Senate intend to obstruct everything Republican.

Now we get the Democrats’ intension to be knee jerk obstructive in the House.  The New York Times had a piece over the weekend concerning Congressman Keith Ellison’s (D, MN) desire to be both a Congressman and the chairman of the Democratic National Committee.  In making his argument that he could do both together, Ellison said this about the nature of being in the minority party in Congress:

All there is to do is to vote “no.”

There they are, two things in a single nutshell (yes, pun intended).  The Democratic Party has no intension of participating in Congressional deliberations.  All they’re going to do—no Democrat has objected to Ellison’s attitude—is just knee jerk obstruct.

The other thing? The Democratic Party now views representing their constituents as strictly a part time job, unworthy of their full focus.  It seems to me that the minority party would want to work harder, not less, so they could…stop being the minority party.

The men and women of the Democratic Party, with their decision to “misunderstand” their roles and duties in Congress, do their constituents and our nation a grave disservice.  The Democratic Party is unworthy of America.

Obstruction

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With full control of Congress and the White House, Republicans have anticipated being able to repeal the law using a special budget maneuver that would allow them to get around a filibuster by Democrats in the Senate.

Yes and no.  The budget maneuver is reconciliation, and it’s usable only on budget matters.  That means that Obamacare will be defunded pretty straightforwardly, but the law itself still will be on the books—for a future Progressive-Democratic Party-controlled Congress to re-fund using the same budget reconciliation maneuver.  The law itself needs to be fully repealed, too; defunding it can only be a stop-gap measure.

Eight honest Progressive-Democrats are going to have to find the moral courage to step up and support actual repeal.

And there’s this.

[T]o replace it, they likely would need the support from eight Democrats and all 52 Republicans in the Senate (if Republican John Kennedy wins a December 10 runoff in Louisiana) to reach the 60 votes needed to clear the chamber’s procedural hurdles.

That procedural hurdle is the filibuster.  For this, too, eight honest Progressive-Democrats are going to have to find the moral courage to step up and support replacement with legitimate health insurance market paradigms.

Fat chance, but the fight needs to be carried out loudly, with no room for Senate Progressive-Democrats to hide behind their excuses and their crocodile tears over Americans being too stupid to take care of themselves and so need these Know Betters to do for them.

Senate Minority Whip Richard Durbin, a Democrat from Illinois, predicts Republicans will have difficulty passing a replacement health law.

Yup.  Look for continuation of Progressive-Democrats’ past six years of obstructionism into the next two or more years.

Tax Cuts and Deficits

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The Wall Street Journal had a piece earlier in the week that focused on Republicans’ dismay over President-Elect Donald Trump’s tax cut plans, his infrastructure spending plans, and the deficits that would seem to result from the two.

However.

Once again, the pundit takes tax cuts (and individual spending items) in isolation. Of course, he knows better: broad spending cuts must accompany tax cuts—and isolated spending items—even dynamically, in order to achieve budget surpluses and so reductions in our debt.

The last two times Republicans reclaimed the White House from Democrats—in 1981 and 2001—they also successfully pushed for large tax cuts. Deficits nonetheless rose during their administrations.

This happened because both times Republicans accepted Democrat promises to support spending cuts “later,” and both times Democrats welched on their promises. Since Democrats cannot be trusted, the Republicans this time around will have to cut taxes and spending while arranging spending increases on particular items without Democrat “help.”  And they have the numbers to do that, including without Democrat involvement at all, since all those worthies are interested in is their knee-jerk obstruction of all things not Democrat.

Federal Green Expenditures

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Watts Up With That has some ideas for budget cutting in the next administration.  Or, actually, these ideas come from Salon (!) via WUWT (never mind that cutting isn’t what Salon meant).

  • Energy Department

2017 climate-related budget: $8.5 billion

  • Interior Department

2017 climate-related budget: $1.1 billion

  • State Department

2017 climate-related budget: $984 million

  • NASA

2017 climate-related budget: $1.9 billion

  • Environmental Protection Agency

2017 climate-related budget: $1.1 billion

  • National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

2017 climate-related research and development: $190 million

That works out to $13.8 billion of “useless waste.”  Yes, indeedy.

While we’re about it, let’s cut the “green” subsidies, too.  Every single one of them.  The fossil fuel (coal, oil, and gas) enterprises don’t need the $3-$5 billion (depending on who gets asked) in subsidies they get, either.  That’s yet more budget cutting.19+, although fossil fuels get much less than the “green” money being tossed down rat holes.

A Minimum Wage Mandate Demonstration

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McDonald’s, which already has ordering stations—kiosks at its restaurant tables from which diners can order their meals and have them delivered to them—at some 500 of its restaurants in Florida, New York, and California.  The Daily Caller, citing CNN Money, says more of these kiosks are scheduled to be added, next year, in McDonald’s restaurants in Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, Seattle, and DC.

Governor Andrew Cuomo (D) signed into law a new $15 minimum wage for New York State in 2016, and the University of California has proposed to pay its low-wage employees $15. Florida’s minimum wage will rise I January 2017. Seattle raised its minimum wage to $15 in 2014, followed by San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Notice that.  The additional kiosks are going into areas that have raised (Chicago and Boston in addition to San Fran and Seattle) or will raise soon their required minimum wage, instead of letting that be an item of negotiation between free workers and free employers.  It doesn’t cost $15 to operate one of these kiosks for an hour.  Even given the up-front costs of acquiring and installing the kiosks, their life cycle costs are much less than those of a $15/hr unskilled order-taking worker doing unskilled work, given the worker’s training (even if minimal) and high turnover rate costs.

Which is what the Left has known all along, because serious economists have been telling these Know Betters about these outcomes right along.  The Left’s policies are actively destructive of the prospects for those the Left claims it’s aiming to help, but those of the Left would rather virtue signal and feel good about themselves than do actual good for others.

Aparna Mathur, Resident Scholar for Economic Policy at the American Enterprise Institute [emphasis added]:

We know that we don’t really need someone to take an order…and we will eventually have machines do it. It is risky to fight for something that could put you out of work[.]

There’s an understatement.

 

H/t AEIdeas