June 10-13, 2009

Jun 10 03:59 PayGo, Obama Style
Jun 10 11:05 Will National Energy Tax Destroy Economies?
Jun 10 23:26 My Q & A With Rep. Paul Ryan On the Patients' Choice Act

Jun 11 04:38 Big Picture, Fine Points
Jun 11 05:43 An Insider Who Gets It
Jun 11 08:43 National Energy Tax vs. American Energy Act: A Dramatic Comparison

Jun 12 03:30 Dave Thompson, The Right Man For the Job
Jun 12 11:05 If Only They'd Work This Hard...

Jun 13 06:21 Law Enforcement vs. War On Terror

Prior Months: Jan Feb Mar Apr May

Prior Years: 2006 2007 2008

PayGo, Obama Style

President Obama has noticed that people aren't giving him high marks for his handling of the economy or on fiscal restraint. That's the biggest reason why he's attempting to sound like he's paying atttention. His biggest problem in convincing people is that articles like this keep popping up:

President Barack Obama on Tuesday proposed budget rules that would allow Congress to borrow tens of billions of dollars and put the nation deeper in debt to jump-start the administration's emerging health care overhaul. The "pay-as-you-go" budget formula plan is significantly weaker than a proposal Obama issued with little fanfare last month.

It would carve out about $2.5 trillion worth of exemptions for Obama's priorities over the next decade. His health care reform plan also would get a green light to run big deficits in its early years. But over a decade, Congress would have to come up with money to cover those early year deficits.

Obama's latest proposal for addressing deficits urges Congress to pass a law requiring lawmakers to pay for new spending programs and tax cuts without further adding to exploding deficits projected to total about $10 trillion over the next decade.

In other words, President Obama's version of Paygo doesn't have teeth. It's insulting that President Obama is talking like he'll get serious about the deficit now that his policies have added almost $1,200,000,000,000 to this year's deficit. ($1,197,000,000,000 to be precise but who's counting, right?) What's worse is that Paygo won't apply to President Obama's plans to destroy American health care. (Most people call it health care reform but that's a joke.)

President Obama's policies aren't just bankrupting America. They're destroying future economic growth. That isn't just my opinion. That's what the CBO said :

CBO, the official scorekeepers for legislation, said the House and Senate bills will help in the short term but result in so much government debt that within a few years they would crowd out private investment, actually leading to a lower Gross Domestic Product over the next 10 years than if the government had done nothing.

Here's the two important questions that President Obama hasn't answered:

Why institute policies that (a) hurt economic growth for the next decade and (b) cause interest rates and inflation to spike sharply? Are you anti-prosperity.

Past presidents have charted a course prosperity. Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan advocated different policies but both produced economies that helped Americans achieve prosperity. In his inaugural address , President Obama advocated something different:

But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions, that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.

I thought then that remaking was an odd choice of words. I thought it odd because past presidents would've used the opportunity to say it's time to rebuild America. It would've been appropriate to say it's time to rebuild America's economy or America's infrastructure. Instead, President Obama stated quite clearly that he wanted to remake America, presumably in his own narcisstic, ill-tempered private image.

Redstate's Brian Faughnan nails Obama's PayGo plan in this post :

You would be right to ask the question. But beyond that, you ought to note that PayGo doesn't even apply to one major category of spending: discretionary spending. It applies only to direct spending (ie, entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare). And Obama has also specifically asked for 4 exceptions

to the rule. As a result, the new 'PayGo' has more holes in it than swiss cheese :
The administration will submit a proposal to Congress to codify the rule into law, and Mr. Obama today called for a quick passage in the House and the Senate. The PAYGO rules will apply to new tax cuts and mandatory spending, with four major exemptions, any renewal of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, the continued efforts to "patch" the Alternative Minimum Tax, any effort to address physician's payments in Medicare, and modifying the estate tax.

In addition, discretionary spending, roughly 40% of the federal budget, is not covered by PAYGO.

"This is like quitting drinking, but making an exception for beer and hard liquor," said Maya MacGuineas, President of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB). "Exempting these measures from PAYGO would increase the ten-year deficit by over $2.5 trillion dollars. That's not fiscal responsibility!"

There's nothing in this president's actions that suggest that he's the least bit interested in fiscal discipline. Quite the contrary, there's oodles of proof that he's utterly disinterested in exercising fiscal restraint.

Let's call this for what it is: a cheap political stunt aimed at restoring his sagging poll ratings on the economy. This video is a great exchange between Greta Van Susteren and Stephen Moore on President Obama's insulting the American people:

If President Obama continues insulting Americans' intelligence like he did in his speech, and if people like Greta Van Susteren and Stephen Moore keep busting him for his intellectual dishonesty, it won't take long for the people to turn on him and congressional Democrats. The American people are losing their jobs, their homes and their retirement accounts. They hired President Obama to fix this economy. Thus far, he's done nothing to this economy except to drive it deeper into the ground.

Instead of there 'only' being a crisis in the financial sector, we're now facing an unprecedented debt level, most of which is of President Obama's and Speaker Pelosi's making. High inflation and interest rates are imminent. Unemployment isn't levelling off, either. Spending is out of control.

What, pray tell, has this administration done right?

I wrote here that President Obama's ineptitude was showing, both economically and internationally. He's done little right to change that image.

BOTTOM LINE: Obama's notion of PayGo is much like everything else about him: an illusion totally divorced from reality.

Originally posted Wednesday, June 10, 2009, revised 14-Jun 10:42 AM

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Will National Energy Tax Destroy Economies?

If you ask Texans, they'll tell you that the Democrats' National Energy Tax will destroy their economy :

State comptroller Susan Combs said that if passed, a landmark climate change bill winding its way through Congress could cost the state 164,000 jobs and shave some $25 billion per year, or 2%, off the state's total economic output.

"Texas is the kitchen of the country. We cook up all of the products that are used elsewhere," said Ms. Combs, a Republican, referring to the state's large petrochemical and plastics industry. "The recipe for disaster is being cooked up in Washington D.C.," she added.

Ms. Combs joined Gov. Rick Perry, also a Republican, at a meeting with industry leaders in the state capitol to discuss the threat of federal climate-change policy and underscore the energy-producing state's skittishness towards the environmental concerns that are at the core of the Obama administration's policy-making.

"I happen to think that what they are discussing could wreck our traditional energy industry and put a very serious dent in our economy," said Mr. Perry. He repeated his view that the proposed provisions that recently passed out of committee in the House of Representatives amounted to the largest tax increase in history. The provisions would put a limit on emissions of the gasses blamed for climate change and require companies to pay for permits to pollute. As a result, "Every American that uses any source of energy would see their bills go up," he said.

It's shocking that Democrats would think of passing this bill, especially considering the minimal impact it would have on the environment. As Rep. Lee Terry told me yesterday, the Democrats' bill would classify CO2 as a pollutant . He also said that Democrats were making special allowances based on political affiliations, not science.

This leads to a bigger question of trusting Democrats. If Democrats are writing legislation based largely on political payoffs, rather than on sound policy, shouldn't we question whether their policies are solid? I understand that legislation will involve a fair amount of posturing for political advantage. It's just that I think that the biggest policies must be decided on science, not pure politics.

Originally posted Wednesday, June 10, 2009, revised 13-Jun 10:22 AM

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My Q & A With Rep. Paul Ryan On the Patients' Choice Act

Last night, I participated in a conference call hosted by the Heritage Foundation's Bob Moffitt, with featured guest Rep. Paul Ryan. Last night, Rep. Ryan unveiled the House GOP's health care alternative, which I think is significantly better than Ted Kennedy's intrusive 'reform' that will cost trillions of dollars to implement. Follow this link to listen to last night's call. It lasts approximately 45 minutes.

After the call, I had several questions that Rep. Ryan didn't cover during his presentation so I sent him my list of questions. His staff got me the answers I'd asked about. Here are the questions and Paul Ryan's responses.

1. Here in Minnesota, there are 65 separate mandates on health insurers, all of which drive up the cost of a health insurance premium. With Ted Kennedy & Co. writing health care 'reform', isn't it likely that their legislation will contain lots of expensive mandates? Wouldn't that necessarily drive up health care costs?

Yes. That is one of the major problems with a public plan. Insurance shouldn't be one-size-fits-all. The public plans being proposed by Ted Kennedy and others will likely mandate a lot of coverage that not everyone needs, making it more expensive for everyone. We've seen this problem at a state level where a state mandates coverage for something like hair regrowth formula, that only a small percentage of the population even wants access to 'but ultimately, those mandates drive up the cost of insurance for everyone, even those who don't use much coverage at all. The Patients' Choice Act addresses this problem by allowing insurance plans that sell health insurance through state exchanges to be exempt from these mandates. These plans only need to meet the minimum benefit standard prescribed by the Federal Employee Health Benefits Plan. People need to be able to purchase health insurance that isn't heavily loaded with mandates.

2. Shouldn't people, working in concert with their physician, have the option of putting together a customized health insurance policy?

Yes 'that's a great idea and just the type of innovative thinking we don't want the federal government to squash. Patients have different needs, and that's exactly why health insurance shouldn't be run by the federal government. The government does not know what is best for patients. Patients and doctors should be able to make decisions together about the types of health plans that best suit their individual needs. That concept is exactly what motivated the Patients' Choice Act. We don't want the federal government taking over these decisions and we want to show people that there is another way that allows the individual to maintain control over these personal decisions.

3. Won't government run health care effectively put cost controls on hospitals, doctors & pharmaceutical companies? (I wrote about the American Medical Students Association, aka AMSA, study on single-payer in this post . They admit this in their study:
Increased access to preventive care and the ability of government to purchase prescription medications in bulk would also help drive down health care costs. However, the corresponding drop in revenue for pharmaceutical companies could lead to a reduction in overall research and development, slowing down technological advancement.

Shouldn't people demand great value instead of price controls & rationing?
Yes, and that's the core of the disagreement right now. Some Democrats like to accuse Republicans of not caring enough about health care to spend the trillions they claim is needed to fund health reform. But we don't need to spend more money to get better VALUE out of our dollars. We already spend over twice as much as any other industrialized country on health care, and we should focus on getting greater value from the dollars we currently spend rather than add trillions of dollars more. Lasik surgery is a great example of where market forces are at work to drive the cost down while improving the quality. Since there isn't much, or any, third party payment system for Lasik surgery, consumers have demanded better value for their dollars. And as a result, the quality has improved vastly and the procedure is far less expensive than it was 10 years ago. We need to make sure that every step we take in reforming the health care system supports research and technological advancement. The government making decisions for people about what is valuable and what is not will only stifle these advancements.

Health care reform done right doesn't cost trillions of dollars of transitional costs. PERIOD. It just takes a little innovation, a little willingness to admit that government's inflexibility hinders that innovation and that personal responsibility and healthy lifestyles will do more to shrink health care costs than price controls could ever produce.

While freedom from another government takeover is vitally important, it's equally important that we think in terms of value for each health care dollar spent.

QUESTION: Will people get a better value if they consult with their physician in putting an insurance policy together or if Ted Kennedy writes a one-size-fits-all policy in DC? Will people get better value for their health care spending if they aren't inundated with stupid mandates? Will people get better value for their health care spending if pharmaceutical companies keep producing 'miracle' cures?

The Democrats can't talk about their plan giving people more freedom because their system relies on top-down control. The Democrats can't talk about their plan giving people greater value for their health care dollars because their plan is all about quantity, not quality. The Democrats' plan isn't about innovation. It's about a race to the bottom in terms of quality because their priority is about getting everyone insured.

There's a difference between reform and cutting budgets. Reforms maintain quality and service levels while reducing costs. Budget cuts cut service levels to cut costs.

It's time we chose the plan that offers freedom and value, not one-size-fits-all and rationing.

Originally posted Wednesday, June 10, 2009, revised 27-Mar 9:32 AM

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Big Picture, Fine Points

I'll probably condemn Eric from Liberal in the Land of Conservatives by saying that he's a liberal I like. Be that as it may, his Your Turn editorial needs a little tweaking. Let's start with this statement:

2. The Per Diem Boogeyman rears its ugly head in the Gross reinterpretation of the data without so much as a mention of the fact that legislators are free to forego these payments. One might assume from his writing that it is only the DFL who takes these payments. If the Republican Party was so committed to this line of budget balancing, one wonders why they didn't unilaterally give back their portion.

In reality, 24 percent of DFL senators (including Assistant Senate Majority Leader Tarryl Clark) and 19 percent of Republican senators voluntarily reduce their per diem payments.

Here's what I wrote in my Your Turn editorial :

3. Under Speaker Margaret Kelliher's leadership, the House collected $181,120 in out-of-session, tax-free per diem. Under DFL Leader Larry Pogemiller's leadership, senators collected $143,500 in out-of-session, tax-free per diem.

I mentioned the "out-of-session, tax-free per diem" because the DFL whined about not having enough time to put a budget together :

Kelliher notes that the governor had all of the state's commissioners and finance experts working on the budget for months. The Legislature does not have those resources.

"He's had 7+ months. It's unrealistic to expect us to respond in just a few days," she said.

Here's what I noted in that post:

Speaker Kelliher, why didn't the House use all those out-of-session hearings for which Democrats collected outrageous amounts of per diem to craft a counterproposal? Will you now admit that these meetings were a waste of time?

The per diem collected was outrageous because nothing got accomplished during last summer's meetings. It's also disingenuous for Speaker Kelliher to say that it's "unrealistic to expect us to respond in just a few days" because they had all summer to put a budget together.

This statement also needs addressing:

Minnesota did not have a $2.2 billion surplus. It was an illusion created by the governor by counting one-time money as ongoing and by ignoring inflation.

Here's what King said about ignoring inflation back in 2007:

You can look at this two different ways. One, if you believe that any level of government activity budgeted once is budgeted forever, then not budgeting government spending with inflation adjustment would be seen as a cut, and you'd want to portray expenditures with the inflation adjustment. But why would you choose this as the basis? If private companies always budgeted costs to rise with inflation without any increase in activity -- and ergo, revenue -- these firms would soon dry up of money.

King later summarized things this way:

Even if you could agree to a particular index, the question then is how to forecast it. Every forecaster deals with a loss function -- what is the cost of an error? And in particular with government budgeting, the cost to the political system of an error that requires a tax increase or spending cut in the second year of the biennium to balance the budget is much greater than cost of overbudgeting in year one and holding a surplus in year two (all the better for giving away in an election year run-up. Nice deal there -- they take credit for borrowing money from you and paying you back with zero interest!) The budgeting process would then have an inherent bias towards conflict in politics and likely to overspending and overtaxing.

The bill should be rejected -- the current system actually works quite well, protecting almost all of government spending while allowing gradual adjustment of the budget to shifting priorities.

I didn't see any mention of one time money in King's post but it's possible there was some. What's important to note is that Minnesota state law was followed to arrive at that $2.2 billion surplus figure. The DFL didn't like that law because they tried getting Gov. Pawlenty to sign HF0011 into law so they could justify a raft of tax increases that they proposed later.

Just because you don't like a law doesn't mean you can ignore it. The $2.2 figure was accurate according to the law.

The big picture we shouldn't lose track of is that the DFL legislature didn't pass a balanced budget until there were 8 minutes left in the session. Despite all their whining about Gov. Pawlenty vetoing their tax increases, the reality was that none of their tax increases were big enough to eliminate the deficit.

Don't Minnesota's taxpayers deserve leadership that won't wait until there's 8 minutes left in session before producing their first balanced budget?

Posted Thursday, June 11, 2009 4:38 AM

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An Insider Who Gets It

I don't think Norm Ornstein would object if I called him a Washington insider. He's one of the rare Washington insiders who pays attention to what's happening across America. His latest article for Roll Call is a nice piece of writing. Still, his opening paragraph misses an important point:

One of the main reasons why the Democratic Party lost control of the House in 1994 was that House Democrats responded too late to growing public dissatisfaction with their actions. The 111th Congress, though very active in its passage of legislation, needs to pay attention to the current rise in populist sentiment in the electorate. In order to effectively curb these feelings, Congress should implement reforms to increase transparency in government.

It isn't that I think that Washington isn't in need of reforming. Considering the fact that John Murtha, Jim Moran and Pete Visclosky still roam that end of Pennsylvania Ave., it's clearly in need of a massive chlorine bath.

It's that that's hardly the thing motivating people here in the Heartland. What's motivating heartland voters is the sense that Washington-bound Democrats love spending irrational amounts of money on really silly things :

$650 million for digital TV coupons .
$6 billion for colleges/universities, many which have billion dollar endowments.
$166 billion in direct aid to states, many of which have failed to budget wisely.
$50 million in funding for the National Endowment of the Arts .
$44 million for repairs to U.S. Department of Agriculture headquarters .
$200 million for the National Mall, including grass planting .
$400 million for "National Treasures."

Another thing people are getting upset about is that the UAW is getting treated with kid gloves while secured bondholders for GM and Chrysler are being threatened with political retribution by President Obama. People see this as President Obama going the extra mile for his union allies.

People are outraged that President Obama is now trying to portray himself as a fiscal hawk after he's spent $787,000,000,000 on ARRA and another $410,000,000,000 on the omnibus bill to fund the government for the rest of FY2009. They'll be totally incensed to find out that PayGo has enough exemptions in it to pay for ObamaCare without finding offsets to pay for that monstrosity.

If the Obama admministration doesn't stop spending like a madman and if they don't stop bailout out their political allies, Democrats will suffer mightily in 2010. That isn't just my opinion, either. It's what Eric Cantor predicted :

"I really believe we've got a shot at taking back this House because you see what's gone on here with the unfettered ability of this administration and Nancy Pelosi to run this Congress," Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va., the No. 2 Republican in the House, told ABC News in an exclusive interview . "The American people see that this agenda is way far out of the mainstream. They want a check and a balance on this power. And I think at the end of the day that's what rules come November 2010."

I'm not making predictions at this point. I'm just seeing alot of anti-liberal anger out here. That anti-tax-and-spend angst was confirmed when Californians rejected tax increases by 2:1 margins. If the Democrats keep behaving like they're currently behaving, alot of them will soon be looking for work in another occupation.

Posted Thursday, June 11, 2009 5:52 AM

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National Energy Tax vs. American Energy Act: A Dramatic Comparison

Democrats have held many a committee hearing marking up the Waxman-Markey National Energy Tax Bill. While they were doing that, House Republicans were putting an alternative plan together that actually addresses our energy needs. Their plan is called the American Energy Act. The AEA breaks down into these six titles:

Title I-American Energy

Title II-Conservation and Efficiency

Title III-New and Expanding Technologies

Title IV-Nuclear

Title V-Environmental Review & the EPA

Title VI-Legal Reform

In other words, the House GOP has, again, put an 'all of the above' energy plan together. It invests in the baseline energy we'll need to power our economy. Title I deals with the Outer Continental Shelf, the Arctic Coastal Plain, Oil Shale and the Refinery Permit Process. Title II addresses Tax Incentives for Fuel Efficiency, Tapping America's Ingenuity and Creativity and Home and Business Tax Incentives. Title III includes alternative fuels, tax provisions and creates the American Renewable and Alternative Energy Trust Fund.

Meanwhile, the National Energy Tax is about creating a massive tax increase in the name of saving the planet. Don't pay attention to the fact that there isn't proof that the planet needs saving. Don't pay attention to the fact that many of the allowances weren't based on scientific findings but were part of a political negotiation.

During last fall's campaign, then-Candidate Obama said that he'd drive coal-fired power plants into bankruptcy with his National Energy Tax :

So if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can; it's just that it will bankrupt them because they're going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that's being emitted.

Let's also consider the fact that Rep. John Dingell, (D-MI), said that the National Energy Tax was "Cap and Trade is a tax a great big" tax increase :

REP. DINGELL: Nobody in this country realizes that Cap and Trade is a tax a great big one, too."

Finally, let's consider that this isn't about the environment, that it's about a tax increase. Here's what Professor Bob Weisman, a professor of meteorology at St. Cloud State said about Cap And Trade:

Despite disagreeing with him "100 percent, politically," Weisman said he agreed with Horner that the Obama administration's cap-and-trade program likely won't do anything to effect climate change. "Like the Kyoto treaty, it won't bring down global warming," Weisman said. "You'd need something more like a 40 percent cut in emissions (to do that)."

In the final summary, the House Republican's American Energy Act is about supplying the nation with enough energy for a century or more while the Democrats' plan does nothing about energy but it does raise taxes while doing nothing for the environment.

I'll bet that most Americans wouldn't have a difficult time making that decision.

Posted Thursday, June 11, 2009 8:43 AM

Comment 1 by Joyce Balcom at 25-Jun-09 08:05 PM

I vote NO on the Waxman-Markey

National Energy Tax Bill

Comment 2 by Richard A. Jones at 26-Jun-09 06:52 AM

Another screw- the -public- Obama tactic

Comment 3 by darrel spors at 26-Jun-09 07:08 AM

Vote NO on the national energy tax bill. It's ill conceived and will be very harmful to all US citizens!

Comment 4 by Jerome Roberts at 27-Jun-09 12:34 PM

I vote NO on the Waxma-Marley National Energy Bill. Stop bankrupting America; Let those who want this bill bear the entire financial burden and not put it on the backs of us good citizens

Dave Thompson, The Right Man For the Job

On April 21, I told Dave Thompson that I wanted him to be the next chairman of the Republican Party of Minnesota. My support of Dave hasn't wavered. During that first interview, I noticed that Dave was an attentive listener, which helped him make smart decisions quickly.

In that first post, I said that Dave was a great communicator. Now more than ever, we need a leader who is both a great communicator and a passionate advocate for the conservative movement. Some commenters questioned why we need a great communicator as our leader. To those people, I'd simply say this: It's important that we have someone who can tell people how conservative principles will positively impact their lives.

During that first interview, Dave said that he had a plan to re-invigorate the Repulbican Party in every part of the state. He talked about the need to stay in touch with BPOUs on a regular basis. That's something that's been missing the last few years.

Dave's communications skills aren't just smooth enunciation like that guy in DC. Dave's understanding of conservatism solid. Because he's thought things through, and because he's committed to consistently making the most compelling arguments on the most important issues of the day, Dave's communications skills are vitally important to the health of the Republican Party of Minnesota.

Talented leaders like Dave don't come along very often. When they do, it's important that we put them in leadership positions. With the sparse population of Republican legislators in St. Paul and with an open governor's seat, we need to put the right people in the right positions to make the case for electing alot of Republicans in 2010.

For me, that means electing Dave Thompson as our next Republican Party Chairman.

Posted Friday, June 12, 2009 3:30 AM

Comment 1 by J. Ewing at 12-Jun-09 06:29 AM

If we can find a strong conservative leader that can articulate conservative values and draw people to elect Republicans, I want that person running for Governor, not Party Chair. For Party Chair I want someone who can speak intelligently when needed, but who otherwise gets all the nuts and bolts right. Dave is not a nuts and bolts guy, that I can see.

I'm more excited about the guy with the plan to make all of these good things happen, and that person is Tony Sutton.

Response 1.1 by Gary Gross at 12-Jun-09 08:13 AM
I want strong, articulate conservatives in both positions. In fact, I want strong, articulate conservatives running for governor, the legislature & state party chair. I even want strong, articulate conservatives as activists. This shouldn't be an either/or thing.

Comment 2 by J. Ewing at 12-Jun-09 03:00 PM

Heh. We're having trouble finding even ONE strong articulate conservative, it seems. Where we're going to find a whole army of them, I don't know. My point is that I don't want someone running a massive organization, involving millions of dollars and requiring a massive strategic plan, whose principle qualification is that he talks good. We've seen how that works out after Jan. 20th.

Comment 3 by Gary Gross at 12-Jun-09 04:35 PM

Jerry, You aren't looking hard enough then, because they're around. Laura Brod, Marty Seifert, David Hann, Steve Gottwalt, Mike Beard & Tom Emmer are just a few of the legislators who articulate the conservative message pretty well.

BTW, the dude that got sworn in on 1/20/09 is a great orator. He isn't a great communicator. There's a huge difference.

If Only They'd Work This Hard...

Eric Black's post is a great example of why the DFL is a party of whiners, not a party of leaders. Here's what's got me fuming:

DFL legislative leaders, union officials, attorneys and representatives of some of the groups that expect to be hammered by Gov. Tim Pawlenty's "unallotment" plans have been meeting to strategize ways to fight back.

A legal challenge is under discussion, as well as political counterattacks.

Three meetings have been held over recent days, including one Wednesday. House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher seems to be running or at least coordinating the effort. She presided over two of the three meetings and another legislator close to the speaker represented her at the third.

The group has been looking to former U.S. Attorney David Lillehaug, who has recently been part of Al Franken's recount legal team, for legal advice and analysis of the unallotment statute.

In addition to DFL elected officials and labor leaders, representatives of cities and counties and representatives of health care organizations that serve lower income Minnesotans -- all groups that expect to lose state aid under unallotment -- were at the meetings.

If the DFL worked as hard at finding solutions as they work at whining, we'd be much better off. This session, and throughout their out-of-session meetings/hearings, the DFL didn't produce much of anything of value in terms of solving the deficit. They didn't put together any meaningful reforms. They didn't identify any wants that were overfunded.

Now that a leader has made a decision, though, they've jumped into action on behalf of their special interest allies. They're thinking in terms of lawsuits. I'd bet that they're thinking of another Whining Campaign with their media allies, too.

They're about everything except putting solutions together. They're against, against, against. What are they for? We don't know until after a decision is made. That isn't leadership. That's the route that whiners take until they don't get what they want.

Seide said that even if the courts blocked Pawlenty from unallotting, it wouldn't solve the budget crisis because Pawlenty will use his much better established line-item veto power to remove funds from key state functions. There is talk of more federal "stimulus" money that could shelter some states from budgetary shortfalls in key areas. But ultimately, Seide said, if Pawlenty sticks to what he has threatened, the real solution would be to muster the votes to override Pawlenty's line-item vetoes.

After all their whining, they still haven't provided a solution. They still haven't put together a compelling set of priorities.

I won't hold my breath waiting for that to happen, either.

They've had the numbers the last 2 cycles but they don't have solutions or ideas now.

Posted Friday, June 12, 2009 11:05 AM

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Law Enforcement vs. War On Terror

It appears as though the Obama administration is back to treating terrorism as a law enforcement matter instead of taking it seriously:

A senior Republican on the House Intelligence Committee is accusing the Obama administration of quietly ordering the FBI to start reading Miranda rights to suspected terrorists at U.S. military detention facilities in Afghanistan.

The move is reportedly creating chaos in the field among the CIA, FBI and military personnel, according to Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich. The soldiers, especially, he says, are frustrated that giving high value detainees Miranda rights, the right to remain silent, the right to an attorney, is impeding their ability to pursue intelligence on the battlefield, according to a story first reported by the Weekly Standard.

"What I found was lots of confusion and very frustrated people on the front lines who are trying to, well, make Afghanistan successful for the United States and its allies," said Rogers, who serves on the House Intelligence Committee.

Rogers, a former FBI special agent who served in the U.S. Army, just returned from Afghanistan and a visit to Bagram Air Base, where he said the rights are being read.

"I witnessed it myself, talked to the people on the ground," he said. "What you have is two very separate missions colliding in the field in a combat zone. Again, anytime that you offer confusion in that environment that's already chaotic and confusing enough, you jeopardize a soldier's life."

The thought that terrorists captured in Afghanistan are being read their Miranda rights is assinine because it gives terrorists the option of not telling us what they know about local terrorist organizations.

I never thought I'd live long enough to say this but here goes: President Obama's national security policies almost make Jimmy Carter look competent and strong. I've asked this before and I'll repeat it again and again: There's little in terms of actions that President Obama deserves praise for. His apologies while abroad haven't strengthened relations, either.

People say that President Obama is pursuing a foreign policy of weakness. While I don't disagree with that opinion, I think that's understating things. President Obama's policies are creating a permissive attitude in which terror-supporting nations like Iran and North Korea and that terrorist organizations like Hamas are exploiting.

That's because he hasn't employed the Reagan Principle . In negotiations that essentially brought the USSR to its knees, President Reagan didn't start negotiating until he'd scared them with a display of power and steadfastness. Once the other side understood that President Reagan was a man of his word and that his word packed a wallop, the negotiating table slanted significantly in the United State's direction.

That's a principle that Bill Clinton never learned and that President Obama likely doesn't want to learn. God help us all for the next 36 months.

Posted Saturday, June 13, 2009 6:23 AM

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