Tag Archives: political parties

Progressives and the Law

Posted on by
Reply

I wrote about the Progressives’ attitude to the law last fall.  Here’s another demonstration of their view.

By now it’s well known that, in direct contravention of the law, the Democratic Party-controlled Senate has declined to produce a budget for over 1,000 days.  Now the Senate Majority Leader, harry Reid (D, UT) has openly stated that he will refuse to allow the Senate to produce anything related for FY2013.  Budget?  We ain’t got no budgets.  We don’t need no budgets!  I don’t have to show you any stinkin’ budgets!  What Reid actually said was just as fictitious.  Referring to last summer’s debt-limit deal, he claimed:

We do not need to bring a budget to the floor this year — it’s done, we don’t need to do it[.]

And his other pet, Senator Charles Schumer (D, NY) chimed in:

We have a budget. … It is a total falsity to say we haven’t passed a budget.

Despite this Progressive disdain, though, a budget resolution in the Senate is both legally necessary and highly useful.  Such a resolution serves as a blueprint for spending, and it provides a broad outline for the Senate Appropriations Committee’s spending choices.

Congressman Paul Ryan (R, WI) pointed out that the Senate Democrats

fell far, far short of solving this country’s fiscal problems.

and those Democrats

confirm they’ve given up on budgeting. What a disgrace. Reid’s refusal to budget is a recipe for crisis.

Senator Jeff Sessions (R, AL) said, as well (his complete statement is here),

Budget Control Act spending caps [that debt-limit deal], crafted behind closed doors and rushed to passage at the 11th hour under threat of panic, do not even approach the definition of the budget process that the law requires. They are not in any way or any sense a Senate Democrat budget plan.

Stand by for another year of Progressive disdain.  Remember it in November.

How Does the Reverse Play?

Posted on by
Reply

The Democrats are once again complaining of Republican obstructionism.  Let’s see how their arguments play from the other side of the question.

Here’s the Democrats’ plaint:

Reid blasted Republicans for bogging down the payroll tax conversation Thursday morning with a debate about Boiler MACT rules, regulations designed to rein in toxic emissions from boilers that the GOP and some Democrats say are overly-burdensome on small businesses and could kill thousands of American jobs as currently written.

Here’s another view of that:

Republicans objected to Democrats bogging down the payroll tax conversation Thursday by spending time arguing against Boiler MACT rules, regulations designed to rein in toxic emissions from boilers that the GOP and some Democrats say are overly-burdensome on small businesses and could kill thousands of American jobs as currently written.

Reid again:

I want everyone put on notice – we’re not going to walk away without some tough votes. If they can’t do something, we’ll do it[.]

Another view, putting words into Mitch McConnell’s (R, KY) mouth:

I want everyone put on notice – we’re not going to walk away without some tough votes. If they can’t do something, we’ll do it[.]

Oh, wait—the House already is, as they’ve done for over a year, only to have Harry Reid (D, NV) actively block those bills from even getting a debate in Senate committees, much less public discussion on the Senate floor.

Sander Levin (D, MI) said

Families cannot afford a repeat trip toward the brink that House Republicans took them to in December and over and over again last year.

Another view:

Families cannot afford a repeat trip toward the brink that Senate Democrats took them to in December and over and over again last year.

Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi (D, CA) weighed in.  She still thinks, in all seriousness, that the payroll tax holiday extension that’s the proximate subject of the present discussion even needs to be paid for.  Uncle Sugar can just borrow more.  (As an aside, I have to wonder whether this profligate borrowing is really just the Dems’ saying they have no intention of paying for anything—our grandchildren, who are being stuck with this exploding bar tab, can just borrow in their time.)

Hmm….

The Coming Economic Situation

Posted on by
Reply

Doug Elmendorf, the CBO Director, was talking to the House of Representatives’ Budget Committee the other day.  What he presented was a demonstration of the level of understanding of economics possessed by the present administration.

Congressman Tom McClintock (R, CA) asked Elmendorf whether more or fewer people were working today than at the start of 2009.    Elmendorf’s answer was unequivocal:

I believe the answer to that is there are fewer people, Congressman.

That was just one item.  The CBO director had lots more to say:

The pace of the recovery has been slow since the recession ended two and a half years ago.  And we project that it will continue to be slow for the next two years.

Elmendorf went on:

[E]conomic growth will be only 2 percent this year — and 1.1 percent next year. … [T]hat will leave the unemployment rate at 8.9 percent at the end of this year, well above current the current rate of 8.5 percent….  [I]n 2013, CBO estimates unemployment will be even higher — at 9.2 percent.

And

“…the fundamental fiscal challenge during this decade and beyond remains the aging of the population and rising costs for health care.  The number of people aged 65 or older will increase by one-third in the coming decade, substantially raising the costs of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.”

In addition, he said, the new federal health care overhaul will significantly increase the number of non-elderly people receiving assistance through federal health care programs, such as Medicaid.

All of that is likely to balloon current levels of debt.

Despite this, though, Progressives refuse to allow Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid to be fixed, or altered in any way.  President Obama, for instance, has said through his Press Secretary Jay Carney, the Republican effort to reform Medicare contained in the House-passed budget would “end Medicare as we know it,” as if that’s a bad thing.

The CBO did forecast a shrinking budget deficit over the coming years “under existing law.”  But existing law has the Bush tax cuts ending next year—for everyone, including those of us and small businesses with incomes under $250 thousand per year.  Existing law also has the that required 30% reduction in doctor reimbursement under Medicare reimbursement schedules.

And the Progressives are attempting to spin this coming disaster with distortion.  Congressman Bill Pascrell (D, NJ) insists

…there are people here that want to destroy the government, that it has no responsibility and it can’t live up to the obligations….

Of course, this elides the destructiveness toward our individual liberties from an ever expanding, ever intruding government.  This elides the destructiveness of government’s arrogating to itself responsibilities that ought to be ours, decisions that ought to be ours.  And it ignores the fact that among those obligations that government “can’t live up to” are those Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid programs that the Progressives won’t allow to be altered.

Congressman Chris Van Hollen (D, MD) has his distortion, also.  He insists that absent Progressive policies and President Obama’s “stimulus” plan, things would have been much worse.

The Recovery Act did serve its purpose.  It’s kind of like when you’re walking up an escalator that’s going down very quickly.  If you take no action you will go down very fast[.]

This would be amusing under other circumstances.  It ignores the fact that our economy now would be much better off had it not been for Big Government’s interference with it.  Indeed, in Van Hollen’s terms, if you’re walking up the down escalator, it might actually be better to get off that one and get on the up escalator.

No wonder the Progressives are running away from their records, away from our country’s future.

Two Mandates

Posted on by
Reply

We’re well aware of the Individual Mandate that is the core of Obamacare.  We’re well aware of that “requirement’s” immorality and of its unconstitutionality.  We’re well aware of the naked power grab that this “requirement” represents for the present administration.  But it’s only background.

Here’s another naked power grab, as the present administration seeks to dismantle our Constitution and replace it with an unfettered government populated by Progressive Know Betters.

We have another mandate, a set of Obamacare regulations that deliberately attack, not the Commerce Clause that is the target of the Individual Mandate, nor the Establishment Clause of the 1st Amendment, but the immediately following Free Exercise Clause: “nor prohibiting the free exercise [of religion].”

The Obama administration has just implemented new rules under his Obamacare that force

Catholic universities, hospitals, and charities to provide insurance for their employees covering contraception — even though that violates church teachings.

Moreover, these new rules expand “required” coverage to include the “morning after pill” and potentially sterilization and abortion.  Having tried once to dictate to a religious group who will be permitted to speak for them, now this administration is attempting to dictate to all religious groups what they will be permitted to believe, and how they will be permitted to act on those beliefs.  So much for free exercise.

The stakes are clearly understood.  Timothy Dolan, New York Cardinal-designate, describes the stark nature of this Progressive assault.

Never before has the government forced individuals and organizations to go out into the marketplace and buy a product that violates their conscience.  This shouldn’t happen in a land where free exercise of religion ranks first in the Bill of Rights.

But this isn’t just a Catholic issue.  President of the Catholic League, Bill Donohue, said he’s been contacted by Protestants, Mormons, Jews, and others who want to join forces with the Catholic League and with the bishops to overturn the new rules.

I’ve never seen anything like it.  They are lining up single file.

President Obama’s reaction to the objections is breathtaking in the cynicism he displays.  At his daily press conference, where Press Secretary Jay Carney recites Obama’s words, he insisted that he still offers

strong support for existing conscience protections, including those relating to health care providers….

and he went on to claim that the new rules don’t change that.  Then Obama, again speaking through Carney, dismissed the objections.

We understand that not everyone agrees with [the new rules].  All I can tell you is it was made after very careful consideration based on the need to balance…[religious rights and] the necessity to provide access to preventive services for women was an important consideration.

But Obama and his rule writers didn’t consider very carefully.  Hospitals can only invoke the “conscience clause,” and get an exemption from these new rules, if they turn away patients of other faiths, something that also is anathema to men of faith.  Theodore McCarrick, a retired Cardinal, points out the fallacy of Obama’s “rationale.”

That means we can’t say what we’ve been saying for 200 years, “Are you hungry?”  We have to say, “Are you Catholic?” We don’t do that.

But this latest move isn’t even just about religious freedom.  It’s about individual freedom, generally.  Government incumbents who will attempt these two pütschen will assault our freedoms everywhere.

Remember this in the fall.

Progressives, Occupiers, and Free Speech

Posted on by
Reply

Recall the eagerness with which President Obama and his fellow Progressives in our Federal government embraced the Occupier movement.

The most important thing we can do right now is those of us in leadership letting people know that we understand their struggles and we are on their side[.]

And Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D, NY), among others, had this to say:

The city’s actions to shut down OWS last [November] raise a number of serious civil-liberties questions that must be answered….

Now observe the Occupiers’ current behavior (I won’t recount the litany of murders, rapes, child abuse, and so on that went on in Zuccotti Park and elsewhere last fall).  In their Oakland riot earlier this week, police officers were pelted with bottles, metal pipe, rocks, spray cans, improvised explosive devices, and burning flares.  These Occupiers also broke into Oakland’s City Hall, where among other activities they broke an electrical box and damaged several art structures, including an art exhibit created by children and made from recycled materials.

On the other side of the country, the Occupiers behaved little differently.  The Executive Director of the Rhode Island Right to Life organization, Barth Bracy, said a Right to Life rally inside the Rhode Island state capital building had to be cut short as a result of Occupiers deliberately breaking up their rally.  These protestors “began screaming and refused to allow a…priest to deliver a prayer.”  Bracy noted further,

This is their idea of civil speech but we believe it’s an outrage.  They started heckling, chanting and blowing whistles.

The misbehavior deepened when an Occupier purposefully climbed onto a third floor balcony and dumped a box of condoms onto girls from a Catholic school.  These worthies even attacked a State Representative who was present for the original rally.

At one point they even attacked State. Rep. Doreen Costa. …  Costa said a female Occupier hit her on the head with a sign….

These aren’t isolated occurrences.  They’ve been getting increasingly violent since last fall, when it became clear the Occupiers weren’t going to get their way instantaneously.  And plainly, free speech, freedom to protest, means Occupiers get to speak, Occupiers get to protest, but no one else does.  An American’s speech is dependent on what the Occupier movement will permit, and nothing else.

Here is what Obama and his fellow Progressives have to say today about their allies, now that the Occupiers have shown their true colors.

…

These Progressives seem to share the Occupiers’ view of our free speech and our property rights.  Still.