Says It All

Via-Reason

What the Tea Party Congress accomplished

Via-Washington Examiner

Conn Carrol

Liberal blogger Ezra Klein and conservative Rep. Tim Huelskamp, R-Kan., don't agree on much. But they both have made the case that the Republican House of the 112th Congress was a total failure.

It is easy to see why a committed progressive like Klein would be down on the 112th. After all, its liberal predecessor passed a trillion-dollar stimulus, enacted a government takeover of health care and institutionalized the power of Wall Street's Too Big To Fail banks by passing the Dodd-Frank financial regulation law. Compared with the 111th historic expansion of government into every aspect of American life, the 112th Congress was destined to be a disappointment for liberals.

But why is Huelskamp so upset?

On Jan. 1 of this year, Huelskamp released a statement explaining, "Despite a tremendous mandate from voters in 2010 to cut spending, get America's fiscal house under control, and restore proper procedure, this House of Representatives has achieved few or no real accomplishments. It is a disappointing ending to a disappointing two years."

If Huelskamp thought he and his fellow Freshman Republicans could waltz into Washington, reject every plan that wasn't perfect and remake the federal government's entire entitlement system in just two short years, he was always bound to be disappointed.

But if you look at the hard numbers -- if you look at the tax-and-spending trajectory that the United States was on before the 112th Congress was sworn into office, and then look at the path the U.S. is on now -- you'd see that Republicans in Congress have made tremendous progress in shrinking the size and scope of the federal government.

Just weeks after Huelskamp was first sworn in, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released its annual Budget and Economic Outlook for fiscal years 2011 through 2021. That document showed the federal government was on track to spend $3.7 trillion in 2011, or 24.7 percent of the entire U.S. economy, and a total of almost $50 trillion ($49.8 trillion to be exact) through 2021. At the same time, tax revenues were set to rise from just 14.8 percent of GDP in 2011 to 20.8 percent in 2021.

Huelskamp and his Republican colleagues changed all that. The 2011 Budget Control Act cut spending by $1.5 trillion, and the sequester cut it by an additional $1.2 trillion. At the same time, House Republicans were able to preserve nearly all of the expiring Bush tax cuts and cut the debt.

The CBO's Budget and Economic Outlook for fiscal years 2013 through 2023 shows just how much House Republicans have actually accomplished. The federal government is now on track to spend just $46.2 trillion through 2021. That is a $3.6 trillion spending cut. And instead of taxes eating up 21 percent of the U.S. economy in 2021, now the government is set to take in just 18.9 percent. The 2021 national debt is projected to be a bit lower, too, down from the earlier $18.25 trillion in 2011 to just $17.87 trillion today.

Despite all of this supposedly economy-killing "austerity," unemployment has steadily fallen, too. When Republicans took control of the House in 2011, the nation's unemployment rate was 9 percent. Today, it has fallen to 7.7 percent.

Conservatives have every right to be cynical about the Republican Party's track record on cutting taxes, spending and debt at the federal level. But since they regained control of the House in 2011, Republicans have actually done an admirable job on all three fronts, considering they face a hostile Senate and Obama in the White House.

Just three months ago, many in Washington were predicting Obama would steamroll Republicans into accepting higher taxes for millions of earners, undoing the sequester and maybe even passing new stimulus spending. Instead, Republicans have stayed unified, outfoxed Obama, preserved and made permanent most of last decade's tax cuts (including permanent indexing of the Alternative Minimum Tax) and let the sequester cuts occur on schedule. As a result, Obama's approval ratings have tumbled, and his entire second-term agenda is in jeopardy.

House Republicans still have to figure out how they will handle the debate over the debt limit this summer. But over this Easter break, they can take a minute to acknowledge how much they have already accomplished.

Why can’t Republicans enforce law against Harry Reid?

Via-Washington Examiner

Byron York

Many of the responses I’ve gotten to my article on the Republican plan to use the debt ceiling as leverage to force Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to pass a budget have been along these lines: If it is against the law for Congress not to pass a budget (and it is), and if Harry Reid is violating that law (and he is), then why can’t something be done about it? Why can’t Reid be charged with something? Or perhaps a lawsuit be brought?

The answer is the law requiring Congress to pass an annual budget, the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, doesn’t have an enforcement mechanism. Lawmakers are required by law to pass a budget each year by April 15, but there’s no provision to punish them, or even slightly inconvenience them, if they don’t. In Reid’s case, the Senate last passed a budget in April 2009, 1,351 days ago as of Wednesday.

“The law doesn’t have teeth,” says a Senate aide involved in the fight. “Sen. Sessions and others have proposed process reforms to give the budget law teeth (one reform would make it harder to pass spending bills without a budget), but the debt ceiling is the strongest leverage we have on this. This is the opportunity.”

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Congress should dive headlong off fiscal cliff

Via-Daily Caller

TUCKER CARLSON AND NEIL PATEL

Everyone in Washington fears the fiscal cliff. The White House has no interest in going over. Democrats understand they’ll never have more power than they do now. Delaying a budget deal until after January means getting less of what they want.

Republican leaders, meanwhile, live in fear of another 1995 government shutdown. When two sides fail to reach a deal, the media blame Republicans. That’s the lesson Republicans learned 17 years ago. They shudder imagining the headlines if negotiations were to break down next month: “Norquist-controlled GOP forces America off cliff.” Nothing terrifies them more than that. They’ll do anything to avoid it, as Obama knows well. (Hence his advantage.)

The business community fears the cliff too. Federal contractors stand to lose millions if budget cuts take effect. And nobody wants to see unemployment rise or the economy fall back into recession, both of which would likely happen if Republicans and Democrats can’t make a deal.

So there’s a lot to worry about with the fiscal cliff. Congress should leap off anyway. At a full run. Face first. Yes, it’s a scary prospect. But not as scary as the alternatives.



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My vote wouldn't count, but you got it....

Can We Replace John Boehner With Paul Ryan?

The Worthless Bill of Rights

Many, if not most Americans, mistakenly believe that United States citizens have enjoyed the freedoms and liberties that we do in large measure or completely due to the Bill of Rights which is written into our constitution. Actually nothing could be further from the truth.

Don't get me wrong our Bill of Rights are not only historically important they are in large measure, in the beginning at least, what set us apart from the rest of the world and began an age of political enlightenment that spread around the globe. But the truth is almost every nation has some form of "Bill of Rights" written into their constitutions most very similar to our own. Even the UN Charter which is supposed to guide its member nations has a very ambitious "Universal Declaration of Human Rights". Here are just a few of the thirty articles which all nations belonging to the United Nations allegedly are bound to promote and follow:

Article 1.

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Article 2.

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.

Article 3.

Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person....

Article 7.

All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination....

Article 10.

Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him....

Article 17.

(1) Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others.
(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property...
Article 20.

(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
(2) No one may be compelled to belong to an association.

Article 21.

(1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives.
(2) Everyone has the right of equal access to public service in his country.
(3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures....

Some pretty good stuff in there isn't there? Most nations have some pretty good stuff written into their Constitutions. Quite a few of these nations have rights written into their various constitutions to protect citizen's rights not unlike this from the former Soviet Union's Constitution

Article 50. In accordance with the interests of the people and in order to strengthen and develop the socialist system, citizens of the USSR are guaranteed freedom of speech, of the press, and of assembly, meetings, street processions and demonstrations.

Exercise of these political freedoms is ensured by putting public buildings, streets and squares at the disposal of the working people and their organisations, by broad dissemination of information, and by the opportunity to use the press, television, and radio....

Article 52. Citizens of the USSR are guaranteed freedom of conscience, that is, the right to profess or not to profess any religion, and to conduct religious worship or atheistic propaganda. Incitement of hostility or hatred on religious grounds is prohibited.

In the USSR, the church is separated from the state, and the school from the church.

All good stuff. but they were not worth the paper they were written on if, and here is what is important, if the government is not charged and willing to protect these rights.

Our Founding Fathers recognized this, that words were meaningless unless a mechanism is in place which would enable individual liberties to be protected.

Protected from what? What is the only entity in any nation which has the power to withhold or deny a citizen of their individual rights? Is it the fat cats on Wall Street? Big oil? Big Pharma? No, only one entity has the power to deprive an individual of the "right to life, liberty and security of person" and that is that nation's government.

What made the United States different was not that we had a Bill of Rights. it is that the Founders protected those rights by disabling the power of the government they created from impugning on those rights. They did this in many ways beginning with the Oath of Office which all government officials take which in one form or another binds the official not to the government or even the nation but rather to the Constitution which itself protects the rights of the individual. Our elected officials are not sworn to protect the United States per say but rather the document which protects the individual against the government they are about to join.

In affect government officials are honor bound to protect the rights of the individual "against all enemies foreign and domestic" through the mechanisms within the Constitution.

Whenever the Constitution is circumvented, even with good intentions as it's goal, what is actually being circumvented is the individual rights guaranteed within the Constitution though this may not be readily apparent. For example when the House and Senate used unorthodox and strong handed methods to overcome the minorities (Republicans) legitimate parliamentary check on Obamacare, they not only poisoned the well of their own institution, they undermined the very spirit of our Constitution and thus individual rights. Although the individual mandate is obviously a violation of the Constitution the far more damaging aspect of it is the degree to which elected representatives were willing to go with virtually no concern for the destruction of the very document which they not only swore an oath to, but which was designed to protect the rights of the individual.

The fact that these representatives of the people were elected by the people and were given by those citizens the consent to dilute if not destroy their very liberties is a testament to how naive and ignorant a large segment of Americans are to the fundamentals of their own freedom.

The US Constitution was designed to promote gridlock and the two party system when actually operational insures that it will. Why do we have Obamacare? We have Obamacare because for a time we had a one party system which was willing to trample on the traditional rights of the minority party in order to pass something which they felt was best for the nation.

The reason that the US Constitution was designed the way that it was, is to prevent exactly what has occurred over the past three years and to a large degree what has been happening over the past century. It was designed so that when the nation wishes to make significant changes in American society, politically or otherwise, well defined hurdles must be overcome to insure that it is in fact consistent with the "consent of the governed" without trampling on the rights of the minority. It is not to say that the minority view will always veto that of the majority, only that the minority will always have the opportunity to be a recognized and respected participant in the affairs of the nation. Only in this way can a minority view not only be heard, it can have an opportunity to sway the society to its view.

This process, the protection of the minority view point while seeking to ascertain what is the "consent of the governed" is not only a fundamental ingredient to our Republic, it is a key component to true freedom. It protects our society not only from the tyranny of the majority but also of the minority. It also insures the possibility that a minorities view point has an opportunity, which it has many times in our history, through "the battlefield of ideas" to win over a free society to its point of view. The majority is not always right but they are always the majority. If the majority is wrong it must be swayed to another point of view through a civil process. This civil process of political discourse is one of the most important and ingenious aspects of our form of government which is laid out in our Constitution. It is actually beyond ingenious it is inspired and rightly promoted and understood. it is inspirational.

Obamacare is a text book example of why our Founders designed our institutions to be more of a "do nothing" than a "do something!" form of government. They knew, and history has proven, that governments by their very nature will seek, grow and covet their power to the detriment of individual liberty.

What has transpired is as predictable as human nature, as government power and size has grown, not only have people's liberties been diminished, people's self reliance has been subjugated to a unhealthy reliance upon government. Nowhere is this contrast more evident than the two movements which now have arisen in America, The Tea Party Movement and The Occupy Wall Street Movement. One which is demanding that government do less while the other demands that government do more. One of these is the majority opinion and one is in the minority.

It is obvious by polling and other matrix that, in America at least, the less government ideal still holds the majority status though it has lost its once overwhelming dominance in the past century as progressiveism has infiltrated our culture. What is occurring now is a battle for the soul of the America ideal which is basically that man can rule himself without subjugating basic human liberties to a parental governing structure. Do governments exist to serve people or are the people the servants of their government? Both the Soviet and United States constitutions claimed the former but only one was written to promote and insure it.

One might wonder how it is that the majority view so often looses the battle to the minority view in this contest betweemn government authority versus individual liberty? There are many reasons but the most obvious is this, people do what they love. The people who love the idea of government control gravitate towards government while those who do not care for government control avoid government, on both sides of the political spectrum by the way. Those who oppose government control of the individual who do enter government are in effect working within and promoting ideals which are contrary and antithetical to the very nature of the institution in which they operate. This too is why so many small government advocates are swallowed up and become defenders to the very system they initially opposed. It is why many DC conservative pundits and politicians loose sight of the ideals that they profess to embrace and instead become cynical defenders of the status quo, having been absorbed into a process driven world rather than a principled one.

What is the solution? How do we get back to the American ideal of the key to that self evident truth of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness being the only true goal of a government for its citizens? It is as simple as it will be difficult to attain, as difficult as it was for founding generation to achieve. This generation must re-establish the Constitution as the law of the nation and hold our elected representatives at all levels accountable to the oath they swear to it. We must also in every way possible explain how important this is to the people who do not understand that their very freedom and their children's freedom is at stake-because it is.

Our Bill of Rights is only as good as those who are willing to stand up for it and to defend the the Constitution which defends those rights, otherwise it is just worthless words on a paper.

Muvaney on Budget

Justice Scalia's Timely Advice

Via-American Spectator


By Ron D. DeSantis & Adam Paul Laxalt

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia offered the members of Congress who attended his "constitutional seminar" some timely advice: read The Federalist Papers. This advice, if heeded by members of the 112th Congress, would represent a welcome change in the priorities of our national legislature. From the defeated Phil Hare, who admitted he "didn't worry about the Constitution" to then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who reacted in disbelief when asked whether the Constitution constrained her ambitions, the 111th Congress was conspicuous for the number of members that exhibited a blissful disregard for the Constitution they swore to support and defend.

Of all of the handiwork of the 111th Congress, no single act displayed its members' indifference to Madisonian constitutionalism more than ObamaCare. Because of the nation's fiscal crisis, the budget-busting quality of ObamaCare is, understandably, the focus of many critiques of the law. But if members of Congress heed Justice Scalia's advice and consult the writings of Publius, they will find that, irrespective of its costs, ObamaCare is an affront to the ethic of constitutionalism that Founding Fathers like James Madison embraced.

The provision mandating the purchase of private insurance, which has received the most attention because it is the focus of strong challenges in the courts, threatens to wipe away any discernible limitations on the scope of the federal government's authority to regulate commerce. As Madison famously explained in The Federalist No. 45, the "powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined."

 As a congressman, Madison warned against constructions of the Constitution that rendered the government "no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one, subject to particular exceptions." If inactivity can be characterized as commercial activity, then virtually anything is ripe for federal supervision, converting the Constitution into an "unlimited government," which is precisely what the Founding Fathers tried to prevent.

While the individual mandate affirmatively violates the Constitution, other aspects of ObamaCare conflict with the philosophy underlying it. The sheer enormity of the law undermines self-government. In The Federalist No. 62, Madison remarked that "It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood." ObamaCare checks in at a cool 2,700 pages of dense, legislative jargon; can a citizen really be expected to understand the inner workings of this colossal law?

Though 2,700 pages long, ObamaCare intentionally left a large number of critical questions unanswered, delegating vast authority to executive branch agencies. This enables the bureaucracy to issue dense, lengthy rules that spell out the thorny details of "transformational change." According to Madison, such easily mutable rules give an "unreasonable advantage…to the sagacious, the enterprising, and the moneyed few over the industrious and uninformed mass of the people." The advent of ObamaCare "waivers" has vindicated Madison's warning, for such "waivers" have been issued to politically-connected entities like the Service Employees International Union, which spent $27 million in support of Obama's presidential campaign and is adept at influencing pliable public officials. Incredibly, the same powerful groups who flexed their political muscle in favor of "transformational change" are now able to exempt themselves from its enactment. This is precisely the type of politics that American voters rejected in the 2010 midterms.

Such rank favoritism notwithstanding, allowing executive branch agencies to impose far-reaching restrictions and mandates on the American people, such as dictating the minimum "essential benefits" that Americans are forced to maintain under penalty of law, further corrodes the political accountability that is a prerequisite for liberty. In The Federalist No. 63, Madison identified the need to structure the government in a way that "a ready and proper judgment can be formed by the constituents" respecting its actions. ObamaCare delegates legislative authority so dramatically that unaccountable executive branch officials possess boundless discretion to institute policies that affect the medical care and livelihood of millions of Americans. By subcontracting important legislative decisions to bureaucracies, elected officials insulate themselves from the political responsibility that is the hallmark of a government of, by and for the people.

Though challenges to ObamaCare in the courts show promise and should be pursued, the constitutionalist critique of the law should not be confined to the judicial sphere. Judicial decisions are final but they are not infallible. James Madison understood that supine courts would not always enforce the Constitution, and explained in that, in such instances, "a remedy must be obtained from the people," through ordinary politics. The 2010 elections demonstrated that the people are intent on exercising this remedy.

Opponents of ObamaCare should continue to press the political case for repeal in a way that goes beyond mere dollars and cents. Repeal is also about preserving an ethic of constitutionalism rooted in limitations on government, political accountability, and equal justice under the law.

Let's hope that members of Congress listen to Justice Scalia. By governing in a way that is faithful to the philosophy of limited government articulated in The Federalist Papers, the 112th Congress has a unique opportunity to earn the reputation as the "Constitutional Congress" and, in the process, save our nation from the ambitions of its rulers.

ObamaCare's Repeal Has Begun

Via-WSJ

This week's Senate vote to scrap an IRS reporting requirement is the start of a piece by piece approach.

By KIMBERLEY A. STRASSEL

Mark this date: On Feb. 2, 2011, a Democratic Senate killed the first piece of the health-care law it passed less than a year ago. Bowing (finally) to reality, 34 Democrats rushed to be among the 81 senators who axed the bill's odious 1099 tax reporting requirement.

Let the ObamaCare dismantling begin.

The White House and Democrats have worked hard in recent weeks to suggest that this first casualty of their signature legislative achievement was no big deal. President Obama went so far as to make the idea his own in his State of the Union address, offering up the end of 1099 as an example of his willingness to "improve" his health legislation. And the death of 1099 was indeed overshadowed by this week's headlines that the Senate GOP had failed to repeal the larger bill.

It is nonetheless worth recalling the 1099 saga. The entire arc of this tale—from Democrats' initial defense of the provision, to this week's full-scale rout—is an example of how dramatically politics has shifted. It has also starkly laid out the real threat that the White House faces over ObamaCare in the coming year. It's not full repeal. With 1099, Republicans have shown they intend to rip it up piece by piece.

The 1099 provision was a new requirement that businesses report to the IRS annual purchases from any contractor above $600. The provision targeted 40 million businesses and other organizations, crushing them under a costly bookkeeping mandate. But hey, desperate Democrats needed funds to pay for their $1 trillion healthathon. By closing this "loophole," they claimed, the IRS could commandeer a whole $17 billion in previously uncollected taxes.

This was symbolic of the entire slapdash process and rotten substance of ObamaCare. Like so many provisions, it mysteriously appeared in Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's 2,000-plus page bill; to this day, no Democrat has claimed authorship.

Like so many provisions, it received no due diligence, and no attention until after it became law. Only then did National Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson, a federal employee, explain that its giant costs would likely outweigh any new tax compliance. The requirement, it turns out, doesn't just crush businesses—it also crushes churches, charities and municipalities.

Nebraska Sen. Mike Johanns and California Rep. Dan Lungren turned the issue into a cause. By last July, the business community was in an uproar, and both Republicans had introduced 1099 repeal. Yet Democrats refused to back down.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi held a vote on a House bill that would have repealed 1099 but also imposed costly new taxes on multinationals. She knew Republicans wouldn't vote for it (they didn't), which allowed her to keep 1099 while blaming the GOP.

Senate Democrats flat-out defended the provision. When Mr. Johanns got a September vote on repeal, he lured just seven Democrats—not enough for passage. In truth, many Democrats simply liked the provision, as evidenced by their votes for Florida Democrat Bill Nelson's amendment to keep 1099 but to raise the threshold to $5,000. (That, too, failed.) The White House remained opposed to repeal.

Only after their November rout did vulnerable senators begin to jump to Mr. Johanns. Yet Mr. Reid obstructed. In late November, Mr. Johanns marshaled 61 votes for repeal—including 21 Democrats—but Mr. Reid set the rules so that he needed 67. As for the nay votes, they were now balking at cutting even $17 billion from unused government money.

By January, the pendulum had swung. The White House, eager to put on a centrist smile, adopted 1099 repeal as its own. Senate Democrats followed this week. Mr. Reid, knowing he'd be hard-pressed to stop another vote, deputized Michigan Democrat Debbie Stabenow (who needs some re-election help) to steal Mr. Johanns's bill.

She changed five words and offered it as her own amendment to the Federal Aviation Authority reauthorization bill. Mr. Reid then allowed a vote on her amendment, while blocking Mr. Johanns's.

With a Democratic sponsor, 1099 repeal got 34 Democrats. Thus does the leadership that wrote the offensive provision, voted for it, and defended it, now take credit for exterminating it.

Republicans aren't exactly bitter. If the GOP is to dismember ObamaCare, it must pressure Democrats into helping. That's what Republicans did this week. Next up for debate will be other odious elements: the individual mandate, taxes on kids' braces, restrictions on health savings accounts, cuts to Medicare. The GOP will highlight each one and then ask 2012 Democrats what they are willing to defend.

What does the White House do then? Some Democrats are already jumping ship on these other issues. This week also showed that—unless Mr. Reid intends to halt all legislation—Senate Republicans may be able to force ObamaCare votes. The White House gave its sanction to 1099 repeal, but that won't end the debate on "fixing" ObamaCare. That debate has just begun.

Overwhelming majority of Americans in both parties tell GOP to heed the 'tea party'

Via-LA Times

Remember that Constitution-citing "tea party" rabble that puzzled the media so terribly last year and helped dump so many deaf Democrats from the House of Representatives in November?

Turns out, an overwhelming percentage of adult Americans think Republicans should take heed of the upstart movement's positions and concerns as they plot to dump President Obama and even more Democrats come the 2012 election, now just 645 days away.

A new Gallup Poll out this morning finds that 71% of Americans, even many who do not think highly of the "tea party," say it's important that Republicans should take the its positions into account.

Gallup appears puzzled by its findings: While only 6% of Democrats call themselves "tea party" supporters and only 11% hold a favorable view of it, more than half of Democrats still....

... think it's important the GOP work the movement's views into Republican programs. Perhaps some hope the tea party will help weaken the GOP, despite increasing support for the tea party's fiscal conservatism as deficit fears mount.
Among Republicans, not surprisingly, 88% say including the tea party is at least somewhat important, while a majority (53%) say it's very important.

Last week, you'll remember, the "tea party" even had its own short response to Obama's State of the Union speech, given by Rep. Michele Bachmann, who formed the House Tea Party Caucus, following the usual GOP response, given by Rep. Paul Ryan, who heads the House Budget Committee.

The dominant media theme, perhaps wistfully, was that this showed a split or, worse a schism, in the GOP. This despite denials all around and an impression among many who listened to the responses that Ryan's broad overview and Bachmann's detailed Perot-like charts complemented each other in a kind of Obama double-team.

The new Gallup findings seem to indicate that by a lopsided margin, regardless of their "tea party" impressions, Americans see such cooperation or teamwork as a good thing. Developing support for tea party positions as well as listening could augur large trouble for Obama's reelect next year.

An earlier post-speech Gallup Poll found the president's assertion that the troubled economy is "poised for progress" was rejected by a majority of Americans, who say the economy is actually still worsening. Obama will try his economic pitch again Wednesday on a sales trip to Pennsylvania.

Although historically relatively little of State of the Union speeches actually come to fruition, Gallup found widespread doubts about some other assertions by the Democrat:

They don't like the idea of replacing No Child Left Behind, preferring just revision.

Contrary to the Obama administration's offshore drilling moratoriums, two-thirds of Americans favor a new energy bill to expand domestic exploration and drilling.

The president outlined a vast new program to rebuild what he called a "crumbling" infrastructure. Americans oppose more stimulus spending and think reducing the deficit is much more important.

Americans oppose giving existing illegal immigrants "a path to legal status" and prefer halting the flow of illegal immigrants before addressing the problems of those already here.

And on Obama's proudest achievement, his signature healthcare legislation, only 13% like the idea of keeping it as is. Everyone else favors minor changes, major changes or tossing out the entire thing.

Other than that though, the president's 62-minute speech seems to have gone over really well.

No! Real World problems with Obamacare

Via-

A Congress that reasserts its power

Via-WAPO


By George F. Will


Unlike most of the 111 that preceded it, the 112th Congress must begin the process of restoring the national regime and civic culture the Founders bequeathed. This will require reviving the rule of law, reasserting the relevance of the Constitution and affirming the reality of American exceptionalism.

Many congressional Republicans, and surely some Democrats with institutional pride, think Congress is being derogated and marginalized by two developments. One is the apotheosis of the presidency as the mainspring of the government and the custodian of the nation's soul. The second is the growing autonomy of the regulatory state, an apparatus responsive to presidents.

The eclipse of Congress by the executive branch and other agencies is Congress's fault. It is the result of lazy legislating and lax oversight. Too many "laws" actually are little more than pious sentiments endorsing social goals - environmental, educational, etc. - the meanings of which are later defined by executive-branch rule-making. In creating faux laws, the national legislature often creates legislators in the executive branch, making a mockery of the separation of powers. And Congress makes a mockery of itself when the Federal Register, a compilation of the regulatory state's activities, is a more important guide to governance than the Congressional Record.

Unfortunately, courts long ago made clear that they will not seriously inhibit Congress's scandalous delegation of its lawmaking function to others. So Congress should stop whining about the actions of the EPA (emissions controls), the FCC ("net neutrality"), the Interior Department (reclassifications of public lands) and other agencies and should start rereading Shakespeare: "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves, that we are underlings."

Conservative senators passing through the Capitol reception room should ponder the portrait of Ohio's Robert Taft (d. 1953), who was conservatism when it stressed congressional supremacy. America was born in recoil against an overbearing executive's "repeated injuries and usurpations" (the Declaration of Independence); modern conservatism was born in reaction against executive aggrandizement, first by Franklin Roosevelt, then by his acolyte Lyndon Johnson.

But beginning in 1968, Republicans won five of six and then seven of 10 presidential elections, and experienced rapture with Ronald Reagan. Then they lost their wholesome wariness of executive power. Today, conservatives should curl up with a good book by a founding editor of National Review - James Burnham's "Congress and the American Tradition."√

Regarding the relevance of the Constitution, you must remember this: Rep. Nancy Pelosi, asked about the constitutionality of the health-care legislation - a subject now being seriously litigated - said, "Are you serious? Are you serious?" She was serious.

She seriously cannot comprehend that anyone seriously thinks James Madison was serious when he wrote (Federalist 45), "The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined." Unfortunately, for too long too many supine courts have flinched from enforcing the doctrine of enumerated powers, and too many Congresses have enjoyed emancipation from that doctrine. So restraint by the judiciary must be replaced by congressional self-restraint.

The idea of American exceptionalism is obnoxious to progressives, who, evidently unaware of the idea's long pedigree (it traces to Alexis de Tocqueville) and the rich scholarship concerning the idea, assume it is a crude strain of patriotism. America, Tocqueville said, is unique because it was born free - free of a feudal past, free from an entrenched aristocracy and established religion.

The American Revolution was a political, not a social, revolution; it was about emancipating individuals for the pursuit of happiness, not about the state allocating wealth and opportunity. Hence our exceptional Constitution, which says not what government must do for Americans but what it cannot do to them.

Americans are exceptionally committed to limited government because they are exceptionally confident of social mobility through personal striving. And they are exceptionally immune to a distinctively modern pessimism: It holds that individuals are powerless to assert their autonomy against society's vast impersonal forces, so people must become wards of government, which supposedly is the locus and engine of society's creativity.

Two years into Barack Obama's presidency, we now know what he meant about "hope" and "change" - he and other progressives hope to change our national character. Three weeks into his presidency, Newsweek, unhinged by adoration of him and allowing its wishes to father its thoughts, announced that "we are all socialists now" and that America "is moving toward a modern European state." The electorate emphatically disagreed and created the 112th Congress, with its exceptionally important agenda.

Here Comes Trouble

Via-The American Spectator


By W. James Antle, III

Before the voters in Utah elected him to the U.S. Senate, Mike Lee caught the media's eye. Lee's campaign headquarters prominently displayed the famous painting of George Washington kneeling in prayer by his horse at Valley Forge. The portrait served as an apt illustration of two Lee convictions: that the federal government must be limited by the Constitution and that the nation's founding was guided by the hand of Providence.

Not everyone thought it was such a pretty picture. In a New York Times Magazine essay on the "radical constitutionalism" of the Tea Party, Jeffrey Rosen wrote that Lee "offered glimpses of a truly radical vision of the U.S. Constitution." One that, horrors, "views much of what the federal government currently does as unconstitutional."

According to Rosen, the "scattershot right-wing hostility to government" known as the enumerated powers doctrine could only have been gleaned from the obscure writings of W. Cleon Skousen, the alleged "constitutional guru of the Tea Party movement" who died three years before there was such a thing and who most Tea Partiers have almost certainly never heard of. But there was that constitutional seminar attended by 25 people -- "most of them over 50," Rosen warns -- at the Omni Shoreham.

Lee will be joined in the Senate by Rand Paul, the Kentucky Republican about whom even more hysterical things were written and said. An article in New York cited the younger Paul's election as one of its few pieces of evidence that libertarians "haven't been this close to power since 1776." Paul has been using the devil's music, rock 'n' roll, to send the electorate subliminal messages about libertarianism -- "he entered to the strains of Rush, the boomer rock band famous for its allegiance to libertarianism and Ayn Rand."

Jonathan Chait of the New Republic also reminded us that Paul liked Ayn Rand, which made him "exactly tantamount to a candidate whose worldview was shaped by Karl Marx." Chait further suggested that this proves Paul "harbors a private contempt for Christianity." Well, his name is Rand! Some even say Paul's god is Aqua Buddha.

All this goes without mentioning the scores of mini-Pauls and mini-Lees scheduled to take control of the House of Representatives. Do you know what those wild and crazy guys plan to do? "When Republicans take over the House next week, they will do something that apparently has never been done before in the chamber's 221-year history," reports the Washington Post. "They will read the Constitution aloud."
What next? Will those Tea Party radicals conduct a séance with the Founding Fathers, perhaps using a Skousen-autographed ouija board?
The reality, of course, is that most of Congress's new recruits will quickly acclimate themselves to Washington and revert to the depressing Republican norm of talking constitutionalism while voting for big government. As Kevin Gutzman, a conservative history professor at Western Connecticut State University, told the Post, "It looks like this will be business as usual -- except for the half-hour or however long it takes to read the Constitution out loud."
As we sadly learned with all the sound and fury that attended the Republican Revolution of 1994, the real risk isn't that a tidal wave of right-wing kookery will wash over the land. The greater likelihood is that the GOP rebels will quickly lose their reformist spirit after a few fizzled confrontations with the bipartisan Beltway establishment and end up governing much like the Democrats they replaced.

Still, the midterm elections did bolster the noble ranks of trouble-makers on Capitol Hill. In the Senate alone, Lee, Paul, Pat Toomey, Marco Rubio, and Ron Johnson will join Tom Coburn and Jim DeMint in shaking things up. Paul has already proposed to tack spending cuts to most major pieces of legislation -- a suggestion that will no doubt annoy the Democratic leadership and probably irritate more than a few Republican bigwigs too.

It may also be the case that grassroots conservatives now have a greater appreciation for the fact it will take more than one 1994 or Reagan landslide to right the country. Continued engagement, even after putative allies of conservatism are in power, will be necessary to accomplish anything worthwhile. Righting the country's finances, restoring its Constitution, and repealing Obamacare are long-term projects.

The Republican freshmen storming Washington are scaring the right people. Only time will tell whether they'll do the right things.

Priorities for a New Congress

Via-National Affairs


James C. Capretta

The struggle to place meaningful limits on government — on its reach into economic life, its influence over how we manage our private affairs, and especially its staggering expense — has been among the most important animating principles of the Republican Party for the past half-century. But it is a struggle that even most Republican leaders would admit has not gone very well.

To be sure, President Ronald Reagan’s two terms in office slowed the march toward ever more expansive government. And the transformation of the welfare system undertaken by the Gingrich Congress in 1996 proved to be the most successful social-policy innovation in a generation. Still, even when Republicans have been dominant in Washington, the size, scope, and reach of the federal government have expanded. As more Americans have become dependent on federal programs — and thus opposed to significant reform of them — the federal government has morphed into an unwieldy, self-perpetuating Leviathan. It tries to do everything for everyone — and does almost none of it well.

All of this was true even before the most liberal president in four decades, Barack Obama, took office. But he has since made matters worse. Obama became president just as the American economy was falling into a severe recession, and he used that opportunity to step heavily on the accelerator of government activism. In his first two years, he has pushed through Congress the largest federal entitlement expansion since the 1960s (in the form of the new health-care law), an $800 billion “stimulus” program that enlarged federal and state bureaucracies, and a new regulatory law that tasks Washington with micromanaging the entire financial sector.

It was always expected that the 2010 congressional election would provide something of a speed bump for President Obama’s agenda. That is the norm for mid-term elections, particularly in a president’s first term, and especially when his party is also dominant in Congress. But the 2010 election was no ordinary mid-course correction. Republicans gained more than 60 seats in the House of Representatives and now hold their largest working majority in that chamber since just after World War II. They also picked up six seats in the Senate, 675 seats in state legislatures, and now hold 29 governorships. This was a Republican rout of historic proportions.

Moreover, the election did not turn on trivialities. It was a contest between two competing visions of America’s fiscal future and government’s role in our national life. Voters — including an unprecedented grassroots movement built around a desire to restrain spending and debt — sided decisively with those who favor smaller, less intrusive, and less expensive government.

Republicans have clearly won a major battle, but they are still very far from winning the war for limited government and fiscal sanity. They now have a House majority, but still confront a Democratic Senate and a Democratic president. Given these constraints, and given their new opportunities, what should Republicans do when the 112th Congress begins? How should they use the resources at their disposal to best address the looming economic and fiscal challenges the country now faces, while also restoring government to its proper place?

GROWTH AND REFORM

The most obvious place for Republicans to start is with the budget — an area in which their House majority can have meaningful influence, can pick and choose important battles, and can actually help pare some of government’s excess. When the small army of newly elected House and Senate Republicans arrives in Washington, they will find an intimidating combination of budget decisions awaiting them.

To begin, the operations of the federal government will not yet have been funded for fiscal year 2011. The Democratic majority in the 111th Congress chose not to take up the annual appropriations bills before the mid-term election, out of fear that passing spending legislation would only hurt them further with voters. As it turned out, punting did not help them much at the ballot box — but it did lead to a situation in which a lame-duck Congress was asked to decide on full-year appropriations levels for the entire federal government in a matter of weeks — a process that normally takes Congress the better part of a year. After trying unsuccessfully to push through a massive budget bill crammed with earmarks and pet projects, however, members of that outgoing Congress ended up forced to punt too, by passing a temporary continuing resolution (or CR). This measure effectively puts federal appropriations on cruise control — funding the government at a uniform rate tied to last year’s level until the new Congress can make full-year funding decisions. The result is that, if they so choose, members of the new 112th Congress can start their budget-based reforms by taking up the fiscal year 2011 work left undone by their predecessors.

Far more daunting a challenge, however, is the nation’s rapidly deteriorating fiscal outlook. In 2009, the federal government ran a budget deficit of $1.4 trillion, or 10% of the nation’s gross domestic product. That was followed by a deficit of $1.3 trillion in 2010, or 8.9% of GDP. The 2011 deficit is expected to reach about 10% of GDP again. While revenues have declined because of the recession, this massive increase in deficits has been driven mostly by enormous growth in spending: Between 1990 and 2008, annual federal outlays averaged 20% of GDP, but in 2010 spending reached 23.8% of GDP — a difference of about half a trillion dollars per year. To see where such reckless imbalances lead, consider that, at the end of 2008, federal debt stood at $5.8 trillion; on its present course it will be $20 trillion by 2020.

To make matters worse, these frightening figures do not even fully reflect the cost of paying out entitlement benefits to the retiring Baby Boom generation. Between 2010 and 2030, the number of Americans age 65 and older will increase from 41 million to 71 million. The Congressional Budget Office projects that spending on the nation’s largest entitlement programs — Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid — reached 10.3% of GDP in 2010, up from 5.4% in 1975. By 2030, the combined costs of these programs (including the provisions of the new health-care law, if it is fully implemented) will have risen to 14.7% of GDP, or nearly $3 trillion. In other words, over the next two decades, the federal budget is scheduled to absorb new entitlement spending commitments that are roughly the size of the entire Social Security program today.

The only real options for closing the budget gap are to lower spending, increase revenues, or pursue some combination of both. Republicans won the 2010 election in large part because most Americans do not trust the Democrats to solve this problem: They believe that unified Democratic control of the executive and legislative branches will mean a heavy tilt toward tax increases to reduce deficits and borrowing. Americans would prefer their elected leaders to come at the deficit problem from the other side, cutting government spending so that it does not exceed available revenue.

By ending earmarks, Congress can show it's not a game show

Via-Washington Examiner

Want to know what's wrong with Congress? Just read what Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., told The Examiner's Susan Ferrechio about the prospect of an earmark-free world: "What's the role of a member of Congress then? Should we just go home after we cast the vote for speaker?" Rahall speaks as though he's not in Congress at all, but instead on the set of a 1960s game show in which he has 60 seconds to stuff his shopping cart with as many items as possible from the federal Treasury.

Unfortunately, our Founding Fathers did not have "Supermarket Sweep" in mind when they wrote the Constitution. Nor did they expect to see "The Price is Right," the game of selling earmarks for bribes that landed former Republican Rep. Duke Cunningham in federal prison. Nor could they have expected the House and Senate chambers to become the set of "Let's Make a Deal," in which multiple earmarks are traded for "yes" votes on Obamacare and other bad legislation.

The Framers entrusted Congress with several limited powers -- including the power of the purse -- in order to "promote the general welfare," not the particular welfare of powerful local interests and contractors. When members of Congress "bring home the bacon" at the expense of the general welfare, they violate at least the spirit of this constitutional requirement. Congressional Republicans' new earmark ban will not solve the budget problem, nor will it end government waste overnight. But it is a step in the right direction -- finally. It is also more than any of the past five Congresses accomplished in promoting fiscal responsibility.

Rahall himself recently admitted he used his office letterhead -- effectively exploiting his position -- to help his troubled son avoid jail time for a home-invasion robbery in Fairfax County. Lobbyist Tanya Rahall, his sister, has been sued for allegedly threatening her former lobbying firm that her congressman brother would blacklist its clients if she were fired. But Congress isn't "Family Feud," either, and Rahall seems to use his office for everything except the powers entrusted to him and other members of congress by our Constitution. Let's hope that the 90-plus members of the congressional freshman class show more respect than Rahall for the Constitution. And let's put an end to the game show Congress by banning earmarks.

Time to stand up and vote all the Rangels out

Via-NY POST

Michael Goodwin

It's official: Charlie Rangel is a crook. A liar. And a tax cheat.

The guilty finding by a bipartisan group of his peers lays to rest any illusion the flimflam man's disgraceful conduct was an aberration or mere sloppiness. The case revealed a decades-long pattern of willful deceit and intentional evasion.

In a better world, we would be bidding him good riddance. He would be expelled from Congress, and a federal prosecutor would be waiting at the door, ready to pounce on the ton of evidence that convicted him. A grand jury would be going through the bank accounts bulging with cash, the sources of which remain suspiciously unclear.


In that better world, his colleagues, shocked and embarrassed by how he flaunted his violations of tax laws and ethics rules, would immediately tighten the screws and increase the penalties. They would denounce him from the floor, ashamed to have accepted his friendship and favors.

They would call for a vote on term limits, conceding that permanent incumbency magnifies the corruption of power. Rangel, after all, was just elected to his 21st term, and men and women of goodwill would proudly shout "aye" to eliminate the temptations that pile up in a job for life.

Of course, that's not the world we live in. What justice we have in this one is too often corrupted by a double standard, one for the public and one for our government masters.

Any ordinary American who scammed the IRS the way Rangel did would be socked with fines and probably jail. Any private worker who cheated his employer the way Rangel cheated taxpayers would get fired and arrested.

Rangel will most likely get a letter of reprimand. Tsk, tsk.

And where are the prosecutors? Quaking in their hideaways, afraid to take on someone so big. Cowards all.

Try a little experiment. Walk into a government building -- a courthouse, motor vehicles, unemployment -- and take note of how you, the taxpayer, are treated. My experience is that it quickly becomes clear who is working for whom.

Most government workers don't believe they work for you or me. They know we work for them. Public servants? Grow up, sucker.

That's the overarching lesson of the Charlie Rangel moment. His unruffled arrogance, his air of entitlement, his lack of remorse personify everything wrong with Washington in particular and government in general.

He was shocked -- genuinely, I believe -- that anybody would dare accuse him of doing anything remotely wrong. Don't we know who he is!

In fact, we do know his kind all too well, and that was the point voters made two weeks ago. President Obama and Democrats in Congress lost the consent of the governed, just as Republicans sitting in their seats lost it in 2006 and 2008.

Members of both parties believed their own smoke until it was too late, then took turns being shocked to find themselves cast from the temples and into the shadows.

They lost their jobs, but too many who have them still don't get it. There are thousands of Charlie Rangels in Washington and Albany and in state capitals and city halls across America who believe they are above the law. They have convinced themselves they are public rulers, not public servants.

For too long, we let them get away with it. We the people always deserve the government we get. If we want a better one, we have to earn it by working like crazy for it. We have to relentlessly demand a single standard of justice and refuse to accept anything less.

Above all, we must root out all the Charlie Rangels until all the people in those jobs know they work for us.

We can do it. Yes we can.

Deficit Reduction

Via-Human Events

by Thomas Sowell

Another deficit reduction commission has now made its recommendations. My own recommendation for dealing with deficits would include stopping the appointment of deficit reduction commissions.

It is not the amount of money that these commissions cost that is the issue. It is the escape hatch that they provide for big-spending politicians.

Do you go ahead and spend the rent money and the food money-- and then ask somebody else to tell you how to escape the consequences?

If President Obama or the Congress were serious about keeping the deficit down, they could have had this commission's recommendations before they spent hundreds of billions of dollars, handing out goodies hither and yon to their pet constituencies.

I don't know why people agree to serve on these bipartisan commissions, which save the political hides of the big spenders after they have run up huge deficits. Back in the 1950s, there was a saying: "If you didn't invite me to the take-off, don't invite me to the crash landing."

Deficit commissions make it politically possible to spend money first and get somebody else to recommend raising taxes later. They are a virtual guarantee of never-ending increases in both spending and taxes.

Why provide political cover? Leave the big spenders out there naked in front of the voters! Either the elected officials will change their ways or the voters can change the officials they elect.

There is no special information or wisdom available to unelected deficit commissions that is not available to elected officials. Nor are they more far-seeing than politicians.

Cutting defense spending to save money? That is one of the oldest moves in the liberal play book. Some soldiers may pay with their lives for this, but that could be years from now-- and after the next election, which is as far as most politicians think.

The biggest immediate tax issue is whether the Bush tax cuts will be extended for everyone. Here, as elsewhere in politics, sheer hogwash reigns supreme.

Nancy Pelosi claims that the "tax cuts for the rich" cannot be continued because it would be "too costly." Although former Republican Majority Leader Dick Armey says, "Demagoguery beats data" in politics, here are some data anyway.

The first big cut in income taxes came in the 1920s, at the urging of Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon. He argued that a reduction of the tax rates would increase the tax revenues. What actually happened?

In 1920, when the top tax rate was 73 percent, for people making over $100,000 a year, the federal government collected just over $700 million in income taxes-- and 30 percent of that was paid by people making over $100,000. After a series of tax cuts brought the top rate down to 24 percent, the federal government collected more than a billion dollars in income tax revenue-- and people making over $100,000 a year now paid 65 percent of the taxes.

How could that be? The answer is simple: People behave differently when tax rates are high as compared to when they are low. With low tax rates, they take their money out of tax shelters and put it to work in the economy, benefitting themselves, the economy and government, which collects more money in taxes because incomes rise.

High tax rates which very few people are actually paying, because of tax shelters, do not bring in as much revenue as lower tax rates that people are paying. It was much the same story after tax cuts during the Kennedy administration, the Reagan administration and the Bush Administration.

The New York Times reported in 2006: "An unexpectedly steep rise in tax revenues from corporations and the wealthy is driving down the projected budget deficit this year."

Expectations are in the eyes of the beholder-- and in the rhetoric of the demagogues. If class warfare is more important to some politicians than collecting more revenue when there is a deficit, then let the voters know that.

And spare us so-called "deficit reduction commissions."

Feisty Republican freshmen vow to fight GOP leadership if asked to compromise conservative principles

Via-Daily Caller

By Chris Moody


On the first day of orientation for the incoming congressmen, newly-elected Republicans vowed to give establishment GOP leaders a rough ride if pushed to compromise on their conservative campaign promises. The soon-to-be members, who are spending the week in a congressional crash course, were optimistic about their opportunity to “change Washington,” but are keeping a sharp eye on their own party’s incumbents.

“I’m a team player,” said Florida Rep.-elect Steve Southerland, who owns a funeral home in Panama City. “But I will say that I’ve never been a ‘yes man’ in my life. I’ll be honest with you, I’ve met several other members in this class that are like-minded. They’re not ‘yes people.’”

Interviews with other fresh-faced future lawmakers reflected Southerland’s assessment. Talk, as they say, is cheap, but they appeared to be a class that is leaving little room for compromise, even within their own party.

“I’m an independent thinker,” said Rep.-elect Allen West, also of Florida. “Sometimes maybe I’ll do some of the things that the Republican Party establishment up here may not want.”

The former Army lieutenant colonel joined the new class of lawmakers for a series of speeches and seminars, using his camouflage U.S. Army helmet bag that once carried military equipment during his tours in Afghanistan and Iraq as a tout bag for pamphlets, letters and freshman orientation packets.

Tea Party groups that backed candidates like West have said they would keep close tabs on the freshman class. Given their treatment of centrist Republicans with strong chances of victory, (see: Delaware’s Mike Castle), the Tea Party groups appear to care deeply about the purity of members.

That puts a lot of pressure on new lawmakers who are likely to find that the legislative process in Washington cumbersome and complicated. About 40 new members have claimed ties to the Tea Party movement and now that the future-members are in Washington, they’re still happy to talk Tea Party.

“We’ve been tea partyin’ in the 7th District of Missouri before the Tea Party was cool,” said Missouri Rep.-elect Billy Long, a fast-talking professional auctioneer who had never been to the U.S. Capitol before his congressional orientation.

Long, who arrived at the orientation without his trademarked wide brimmed cowboy hat, said Republicans lost their way the last time they came into power.

“If you always do what you’ve always done you’ll always get what you’ve always got and if we keep doin’ the way things have been done in Washington, how can we expect anything different?” he said, adding that when Republicans took over in 1994, “principles sold out to politics.” “We’ve got a large freshman class that is not going to let that happen this time.”

But what if it does happen?

“Well I’ll tell you, that’s my nightmare,” said Texas Rep.-elect Blake Farenthold, an attorney and former talk-radio host. “I’m going to try to work within the system, but when the system doesn’t go the way I think the people who elected me want it to go, I’m going to be right here in front of you guys yelling and screaming.”

Some members of the new class are so optimistic, they won’t entertain the thought that a leader in their party would lead them astray.

“I think that’s an unfathomable prospect that this Republican leadership would veer away from less government, less taxes and less regulation,” said Florida Rep.-elect David Rivera.

From the start, it is clear that the stern-talking new kids on the block have allies within the ranks of more senior members: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, for example, put his support behind a ban on earmarks Monday afternoon. Last week, presumed House Speaker John Boehner made it clear that he will refuse to compromise on whether to raise taxes. And speaking to a crowd of supporters in Washington Monday, Indiana Rep. Mike Pence echoed what many of the new members said throughout their campaigns. “For my fellow Republicans, let me say as we gather in this lame duck session in the coming weeks: There must be no compromise."

It's good to be the John Boehner

It's good to be the John Boehner

Via-Don Surber

Memo to McConnell: Congress, not the president, has the final say

Via- Washington Examiner

By: Mark Tapscott

Kim Strassel has a meaty piece in today's edition of The Wall Street Journal on Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's game plan through the 2012 election. For the most part, it ought to be encouraging for anybody who hopes to see Leviathan cut down to size.

But then comes this paragraph:

"[McConnell]and House Speaker-elect John Boehner seem acutely aware of the perils of over-promising, and came out of the gate this week intent on managing expectations. One challenge will be reminding an impatient public that ultimate power still rests in the White House, not Congress. 'We are not spiking the ball in the end zone, or acting like we took over the government when we didn't,' says Mr. McConnell."

Uh, no, Congress has the ultimate power in the federal government, the president only thinks he does. As Willmoore Kendall said, the Founders wisely gave Congress all of the ultimate weapons and thus empowered it to win any showdown with either the president or the federal courts.

Yes, McConnell no doubt characterized the political correlation of forces between now and 2012 as resting upon the presidential veto. Perhaps that makes tactical political sense, since it puts the final onus on President Obama in the event, for example, an Obamacare repeal or modification bill is sent to the White House.

But Congress under both Democrats and Republicans has for so long acted like the second branch of the federal government that it's become a truism that the guy in the White House is the single most important individual in town. He's not and here are just five of the reasons why:

* Congress holds the purse strings. No money appropriated means no presidential programs go anywhere.

* Congress can withhold confirmation of presidential appointees and defund any executive branch position it chooses.

* Congress determines the jurisdiction of federal courts.

* Congress has the most powerful media show in town - oversight hearings.

* Congress can override presidential vetos.

In short, again as Kendall, with Georgetown Prof. George Carey, argued in The Basic Symbols of the American Political Tradition, ours is a legislative supremacy system, not a unitary presidential regime. Congressional GOP leaders would do well to rediscover this fact.

McConnell has come in for a lot of uninformed criticism for his statement that his number one goal is to make sure Obama is a one-term president. But he is exactly right on the point. Reversing the damage done by the Obama-Reid-Pelosi regime since 2008 will take time and will likely require solid Republican majorities in the Senate and House, as well as a GOP president.

The key to congressional power and to the prospects for undoing the destruction wreaked by Leviathan is whether there is a unified will to do that. Besides dividing power among the three branches, the Founders also divided power within Congress. The Senate and House must choose to act in unison.

There's no guarantee that they will act in unison even if Republicans sweep the 2012 elections as deeply as they did the 2010. But talking as if Congress does not have the final say is a good way of insuring that the needed unity of will never will come about.

You can - and should - read the full Strassel piece here