SOTU 2011 Post-Game Analysis - Spend Spend Spend

To summarize Obama's SOTU, stay the course on spending and don't change the substance of the agenda. As Rand Paul noted, Obama still sees government as the solution to all of our problems (both real and imagined, I would add). If anyone heard in Obama's SOTU speech a move to the center, they were listening to the mellifluous tone of Obama's voice and not paying any attention to the lyrics of his siren song.

Obama stepped up to the teleprompter at a time when our economy is in deep trouble. Growth is tepid and far below where it should be coming out of a recession. A record forty one million people in the U.S. are on food stamps. Housing prices have sunk faster and lower than Katy Couric's Nielsen ratings. The cost of basic commodities - oil, gas and food - are going through the roof. Real unemployment, UH-6, is at 16.7% - and that is actually up from a year ago. So how does Obama address these problems in the opening of his SOTU speech? He puts a happy face on it:

“Two years after the worst recession most of us have ever known, the stock market has come roaring back. Corporate profits are up. The economy is growing again.”

It was a disingenuous start to a disingenuous speech.

Two days ago, I forecast what Obama would say in his State of the Union speech with fair accuracy. The majority of Obama's speech was given over to justifying more spending for his radical green agenda, to hire more teachers, and to pay for another stimulus under the guise of infrastructure spending. And when it came to deficit reduction, Obama tried to portray Obamacare as the heart of deficit reduction. To my surprise, he mentioned entitlements, but he did so only in passing. Obama also offered a freeze of entitlement spending in an act of symbolism over substance. Lastly, when it came to “reforming government,” Obama hyped reducing the regulatory burden, yet said nothing about the tsunami of regulations waiting in the wings.

To give the devil his due, Obama did make some very good proposals in his speech:

: Reforming the corporate tax – As a general principal, this is a positive step. Obama said he wants Congress to reduce our corporate tax from the current rate of 35%, the highest in the developed world. He did not propose a new rate, but said that any such reform should be “revenue neutral." That is bad news, as it means it will not promote growth. That said, if it means getting rid of ALL the subsidies that special interests have worked into our tax code, then great. But Obama made crystal clear that he wants to heavily subsidize his favored industries, particularly the green ones. So it would seem that Obama's call for tax reform may in reality be a backdoor way to soak businesses in America to fund Obama's version of crony capitalism. We have to see the details on this one.

: Medical Malpractice reform – this is incredibly important if we are ever to bend down the cost curve of medical expenses. I am glad that he mentioned it, but it is likely a red herring. The left, owned in part by the trial lawyers lobby, would sooner chew off their right arm than pass national med mal reform. To date, neither Obama nor Congressional Dems have shown the slightest interest in anything beyond lip service to med mal reform.

: Race to the Top – this relatively inexpensive program program, $4 billion, is in fact a good program aimed at encouraging reform in state educational systems. It deserves full support from both sides of the aisle.

: Earmarks – Obama announced that he won't sign any bills with earmarks in them – weeks after the House promised not to send him any bills with earmarks. This was like watching the movie Dragonslayer, where at the end of the flick, the King walks up to the recently slain dragon, puts his sword through it, and has himself proclaimed "King Casiodorus, Dragonslayer." What a tool.

: A Reorganization and streamlining of our regulatory agencies – On the surface, this sounds like a very good idea. But I suspect there will be an infinite number of devils in the details.

Okay, now on to the ridiculous assertions and other low points of the speech:

I. Innovation -

Obama called for “innovation,” using the symbolism of a “Sputnik moment,” the point when America turned its attention to manned space flight and a lunar landing. He then stated that government spending was a necessity for innovation and made clear that his main concern was funding his radical green agenda:

"This is our generation's Sputnik moment."

The irony here is amazing. Our efforts at manned space flight did pay a lot of dividends for America – velcro, teflon, robotics, scanning technology, and scratch resistant lenses to name just a few. Yet Obama, who now calls for a “Sputnik moment,” is the man who killed off our manned space program so that he could spend more money on Obamacare – no doubt to increase innovations in socialism.

Our free enterprise system is what drives innovation. But because it's not always profitable for companies to invest in basic research, throughout history our government has provided cutting-edge scientists and inventors with the support that they need . . .

Apparently our corporations are incapable of conducting research and coming up with ideas without government intervention and massive infusions of our tax dollars. One, Obama wants to pick winners and losers in our economy – he fully embraces crony capitalism. Two, the proposition that our scientists and businesses cannot innovate without government subsidies and direction is simply too ludicrous to seriously entertain. Perhaps Obama should do some research on the issue over his I-pad, or make a call to the patent office on his cell phone.

In a few weeks, I will be sending a budget to Congress that helps us meet that goal. We'll invest in biomedical research, information technology, and especially clean energy technology . . .

Already, we are seeing the promise of renewable energy. Robert and Gary Allen are brothers who run a small Michigan roofing company. After September 11th, they volunteered their best roofers to help repair the Pentagon. But half of their factory went unused, and the recession hit them hard.

Today, with the help of a government loan, that empty space is being used to manufacture solar shingles that are being sold all across the country. In Robert's words, "We reinvented ourselves."

The left destroyed our housing industry – and with it, many of the businesses involved in that industry. Yet Obama has the audacity to hold out two failed roofing manufacturers as shining icons of our new economy. These would be green entrepeneurs had the sense to take some of the massive government subsidies Obama is passing out like candy to open up a solar panel manufacturing plant. Solar power, which provides less than 1% of our energy needs and is not price competitive, is a massive boondoggle. Heavily subsidized solar power has nearly bankrupted Spain and is having negative impacts throughout every other economy in Europe. And the day the subsidies for solar power end in the U.S. is the day Robert and Gary Allen declare bankruptcy and close up shop.

With more research and incentives, we can break our dependence on oil with biofuels, and become the first country to have 1 million electric vehicles on the road by 2015.

One, electric cars are not going to lessen our dependence on fossil fuels. The electricity to run them has to be generated by . . . hint, its not unicorn excreta. Two, a major concern with electric cars is the destabilizing impact large numbers of these vehicles would have on our energy grid.

Biofuels are another major boondoggle (well, but see here). None have proven cost-effective at scale and, in the case of ethanol, Obama has us pitting fuel against food. Over a fourth of are farmland is now given over to producing fuel that is inefficient, expensive, ecologically worse for the environment than fossil fuels, and driving food prices to world records. It is insanity. And that is what Obama wants more of?

[J]oin me in setting a new goal: by 2035, 80% of America's electricity will come from clean energy sources. Some folks want wind and solar. Others want nuclear, clean coal, and natural gas. . . .

Is this guy nuts? We should be embracing nuclear power for the future of our electrical needs, but we haven't broken ground on a new nuclear plant in decades – and Obama insured that we wouldn't be doing it at any point in the future when he closed off our only nuclear waste repository. Clean coal is both untested and looks to be far too expensive. Wind and solar are absolute pipe dreams. The bottom line is that, if we are getting 80% of our electricity from “clean energy sources” by 2035, our nation will be broke and half of our nation will be blacked out.

And as predicted, Obama is continuing his brutal war on our domestic oil production:

We need to get behind this innovation. And to help pay for it, I'm asking Congress to eliminate the billions in taxpayer dollars we currently give to oil companies. I don't know if you've noticed, but they're doing just fine on their own. So instead of subsidizing yesterday's energy, let's invest in tomorrow's.

Regardless of Obama's radical green dreams, we aren't getting off oil at any point in the near future. Obama's policies will only make oil and gas prohibitively expensive in America and make us ever more dependent on foreign oil. In the not too distant future, that will prove catastrophic for our economy.

II. Education:

I said Obama would make a pitch for sending even more money into the black hole of public education, and lo and behold . . .

over the next ten years . . . we want to prepare 100,000 new teachers in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and math.

We desperately need better teachers in each of these areas. But the answer is not to hire more teachers – as I pointed our here, we know empirically that neither more teachers nor more per pupil spending have improved the quality of our science and math education. We need people competent in their fields and who perform well as teachers. To get there, we need to end the stranglehold of teachers unions on our public school system. Obama studiously ignored that point.

Obama's call for more teachers is nothing more than a push to further strengthen teachers unions and, thus, the Democratic Party. Expect this issue to be demagogued to the fullest over the coming months.

III. Illegal Aliens – Obama made a one paragraph pitch for amnesty. It was a shout out to the Hispanic Caucus.

IV. Infrastructure:

Over the last two years, we have begun rebuilding for the 21st century, a project that has meant thousands of good jobs for the hard-hit construction industry. Tonight, I'm proposing that we redouble these efforts.

Yeah, let's do that again since it worked so well in 2009 to help our economy. This is just Obama wanting to do more Keynesian spending without mentioning the word "stimulus."

V. Deficit Reduction:

Obama is a magician at deficit reduction - all misdirection and illusion. His points and proposals were one joke after another. Obama did as predicted, pointing to his regulatory review and Obamacare's fairy tale CBO numbers as "proof" that he is focused on deficit reduction.

Beyond that, Obama added a promise to freeze current discretionary spending – 7% of our spending – at current levels for five years in order to save $400 billion. Given that he increased discretionary spending by an incredible 20% over the past two years, that is like an alcoholic saying he won't pay for another drink after he just stocked a 5 year supply of rum.

Our deficit is over $14 trillion and is on a trajectory to hit a crisis number of $20 trillion in less than a decade. What we need is deficit reduction. What Obama offers instead is a slightly slower march to Armageddon. Not exactly a profile in leadership.

Obama did manage to work in a criticism of the right's proposal to save $2.5 trillion by actually reducing discretionary spending:

“let's make sure that we're not doing it on the backs of our most vulnerable citizens.”

Let there be no doubt of the new Democratic meme – any and all cuts proposed by the right will hurt the poor and/or the children.

That is just so insane. What poor people need are decent jobs, low fuel prices, low food prices and reasonable housing costs. EVERYTHING this administration is doing is falling heaviest on the poor. We are hemorrhaging good jobs, fuel and food are going through the roof, and housing is a mess. Obama and the left are the enemies of the poor. They give a little with the left hand and take away twice as much with the right.

VI. Entitlements:

Medicare, Medicaid and Obamacare

In the only prediction I got wrong, Obama did mention entitlement spending and the need to reform entitlements. He mentioned the need to make savings in Medicare and Medicaid, then segued into a claim that Obamacare would reduce the deficit. What he didn't say was that every bit of savings he just made in Medicare and Medicaid is being pumped into Obamacare. It was a shell game, just like the Obamacare CBO numbers.

Entitlements: Social Security

We should also find a bipartisan solution to strengthen Social Security for future generations. And we must do it without putting at risk current retirees, the most vulnerable, or people with disabilities; without slashing benefits for future generations; and without subjecting Americans' guaranteed retirement income to the whims of the stock market.

Someone explain to me how, under those conditions, any reform to Social Security is possible.

Charles Krauthammer, in his post-speech analysis, noted that Obama paid only lip service to entitlement reform, thus indicating that Obama would not initiate any effort at entitlement reform over the next two years and that any attempt by the right to do so would be demagogued. Bottom line, Obama has no intention of doing anything to reduce our deficit and is daring the right to even make an attempt.


VII: Foreign Policy:

Obama's comments on foreign policy seemed like they were appendix to his speech. We face real foreign policy challenges, but you wouldn't get any of that from the SOTU speech. Are we in the Afghan war to win it? Obama gave no answer. He did not address the problem of nuclear proliferation. The Middle East is on fire. Lebanon just became a satellite state of Iran. Iraq may yet become a satellite state of Iran. China is arming at an alarming rate to challenge us militarily. And what about Wikileaks and the greatest assault on our state secrets in the history of our nation? If you expected Obama to substantively address any of that, you were sorely mistaken. Obama considers foreign policy a mere annoyance. He sees himself as Clement Attlee, not Winston Churchill.

Conclusion: Two years ago, the general consensus was that Obama, if elected, would serve out Jimmy Carter's second term. That was overly optimistic. Obama makes the disastrous Carter seem a paragon of Presidential prudence and competence in comparison. 2012 can't get here fast enough.

Update: Patterico makes a great point:

Obama said . . . in the speech . . .:

The bipartisan Fiscal Commission I created last year made this crystal clear. I don’t agree with all their proposals, but they made important progress. And their conclusion is that the only way to tackle our deficit is to cut excessive spending wherever we find it – in domestic spending, defense spending, health care spending, and spending through tax breaks and loopholes.

(emphasis added).

You got that? When you are allowed to keep your money, that is considered “spending” by the Federal Government. Because in reality all of the fruits of your labor belong to us, the government.

Is it wrong to say it almost the attitude of a master toward his slaves? . . .

Also see the AP, that surprisingly has a passable fact check of SOTU: "The ledger did not appear to be adding up Tuesday night when President Barack Obama urged more spending on one hand and a spending freeze on the other."

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Thoughts On The First Debate

The first debate is in the record books.

McCain appeared confident. Any questions about his age or his mental agility have been answered. He was aggressive without being overbearing, and he won the debate on foreign policy hands down. The difference in experience and knowledge on foreign policy issues was readily apparent.

That said, it is economic issues at the top of the list today, and Obama did better on the economic issues than McCain. McCain did poorly in response to several of the questions on the economic issues, and I am left wondering whether he was saving the attack on “regulation” and the cause of our current fiscal crisis until after a deal is reached in Congress on the bailout. At any rate, given the importance of economic issues today, it is no surprise that, according to a CBS poll, undecideds gave the night to Obama.

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Obama did well on some of the questions, and he won the economic portion of the debate on at least an emotional level. In a Fox News survey of undecided voters, the majority thought Obama won the night because he seemed to understand and connect more with "Main St." I suspect that perception was likely set in the opening statements, before the first question was even asked. Obama's statement was a consise itemization of his priorities to address the fiscal crisis. McCain's statement, was not focused on the economy. First impressions and emotions matter to a large swath of people - and at seems a lot of them are among the undecideds.

In substance, Obama was on the defensive much of the night. He attempted to interrupt McCain on several occasions and seemed on the edge of anger at least once. McCain got under his skin. And while I did not think that Obama repeatedly stating his agreement with McCain’s positions sounded bad during the debate itself, cut and spliced onto a Youtube video even before the end of the debate, it sounds pretty cutting.



The debate format was very good. Jim Lehrer did an excellent job as moderator.

My thoughts on some the specific questions and responses:

McCain did a very poor job of explaining why his economic policies would be better for “main street” than those of Obama.

Obama kept trying to tie McCain to Bush’s economic policies, but McCain fairly well neutralized that. And indeed, later in the debate, McCain tied Obama to Bush.

McCain allowed Obama to pin the current fiscal crisis on “eight years of bad economic policies” without any substantive rebuttal. This is an issue McCain could rebut and explain clearly in ten sentences or less – and it would be a devastating indictment of the socialist policies of the left as well as Sen. Obama’s inaction. That was the low point of the evening, and it occurred within the first minutes of the debate. If McCain repeats that in the next debate, I think he can kiss his presidential aspirations goodbye. People are too upset about the economy, and if he lets them wrongly blame he or Republicans generally, he will lose a close election. Thankfully, McCain will get another bite at that apple in the next debate. I hope that his reticence in making a rebuttal this time around was in respect to the negotiations going on in Congress over the subprime rescue operation.

McCain’s comments on reigning in spending and earmarks were good. They will play to the base. But he has the base with him now. A lot of Middle America will be somewhat swayed by this, but again, McCain needs to do a better job of explaining why it is far more to their advantage than Obama’s plan to increase spending by $800 billion. That is a massive chunk out of our economy that Obama plans to take from the private sector and turn it into public sector spending. That will do nothing to create wealth or grow the size of the pie for all Americans. It will merely result in greater shared misery.

The real high points for McCain on the economics issue came when he talked about a spending freeze and specific measures to cut wasteful spending, such as an end to ethanol subsidies. Obama would not name a single program that he would cut or freeze.

On foreign policy, McCain looked far more knowledgeable and confident than Obama. Obama committed no major gaffes, but the gravitas and experience gaps here were very visibly a canyon. McCain was speaking from experience, Obama was speaking from cue cards.

McCain was the aggressor and sounded much wiser on the answers to questions about Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan. He let Obama get away with the tired and false meme that our standing in the world has deteriorated over the past eight years because of Bush policies. McCain should have mentioned that, today, there are more pro-American leaders of foreign nations than there were eight years ago. The only people who do not like us today were the same people in Europe who did not like us 8 years ago or 18 years ago.

There were a few minor gaffes by Obama, only one of which McCain pounced on. Obama claimed his policy to meet without preconditions with the heads of enemy states was supported by Kissinger. McCain told him that was wrong and, subsequent to the debate, Kissinger called the media supporting McCain. The other was Obama’s bizzare assertion on Georgia that McCain was not given an opportunity to respond to:

. . . back in April, I warned the administration that you had Russian peacekeepers in Georgian territory. That made no sense whatsoever.

And what we needed to do was replace them with international peacekeepers and a special envoy to resolve the crisis before it boiled over.

Does Obama know that Russian peacekeepers were there – and had been there for years - per agreement between Russia and Georgia? He's acting like he just found out some secret information. And what makes Obama believe that “international peacekeepers” would have stopped the Russian invasion?

McCain’s response to the 9-11 question was, I thought, very good. I must admit I had forgotten that he was one of the legislators who had taken on the administration to get the 9-11 Commission set up.

My favorite line of the night – McCain comparing the stubbornness of Obama in refusing to acknowledge the success of the surge to the stubbornness of the Bush administration in refusing to acknowledge the need for it. Let's not have another four years of McBama.

Most memorable lines of the night both came from McCain –

“Reform, prosperity, and peace, these are major challenges to the United States of America. I don't think I need any on-the-job training. I'm ready to go at it right now”

and

“I guarantee you, as president of the United States, I know how to heal the wounds of war, I know how to deal with our adversaries, and I know how to deal with our friends.”

Most other blogs had a similar take:

Confederate Yankee

Hot Air

Jules Crittenden

Michelle Malkin

Tiger Hawk

Voldka Pundit

Jennifer Rubin at PJM

CNN had their debate report card.

Much more at Memorandum.

You can find the full transcript of the debate here.

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Congress At The Earmark Trough

Adding insult to injury - or in this case Congressionally mandated theft - the Democratically controlled Congress is passing $6.6 billion in earmarks - special interest spending that has never gone through the legislative process of debate and vote, spending that has never been subject to competitive bidding. Republicans were shoulder to shoulder with their Democratic partners at the trough.
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This from the USA Today:

A $630 billion spending bill nearing final approval in Congress includes $6.6 billion for thousands of lawmakers' pet projects, including $51.5 million requested by Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden when both presidential candidates have sworn off seeking any money.

Taxpayers for Common Sense analyzed the 2,321 special-interest items called "earmarks" in the spending bill. The legislation is a temporary measure that would fund the government through March, rather than October 2009, when the next fiscal year ends. It combines spending bills for the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security and Veterans Affairs, as well as nearly $30 billion in disaster relief for flood and hurricane victims and up to $25 billion in loans to automakers.

The House of Representatives approved the measure 370-58 on Wednesday, and the Senate is likely to follow before members leave Washington to head home for the November elections.

Both presidential candidates, Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama, have criticized earmarks. McCain, who doesn't request earmarks, has said that as president, he would veto any bill containing them. Since joining the Senate in 2005, Obama has requested $860.6 million in earmarks, according to the taxpayer group, but none this year, and he has pledged to reduce them if elected president. . . .

Read the entire article.

The list of top earmarkers:

Senate

Ted Stevens, R-Alaska $238.5 million

Thad Cochran, R-Miss. $226.6 million

Robert Byrd, D-W.Va. $224.9 million

Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii $222.2 million

House

John Murtha, D-Pa. $111.1 million

C.W. Bill Young, R-Fla. $99 million

Jerry Lewis, R-Calif. $78.2 million

Dave Obey, D-Wis. $51.5 million

This corrupting and corrupt process will not end until reform is forced down the throat of lawmakers of both parties. For Democrats, earmarks are the currency of their politics. For Republicans, they are poison pills that rip apart the party.

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Pork 'n Palindemonium . . . At The Wall St. Journal?

The WSJ is a conservative paper and a fair one - but today it tosses out the intellectual honesty for which it is famous and jumps on the bash Palin bandwagon. If she is deserving, that's one thing. But that is far from obvious in an incredibly poorly written piece by Laura Meckler and John Wilke. In their bill of particulars against Gov. Palin, the authors completely obfuscate the difference between a legitimate spending request and that corrupt bane of our modern Congress, the earmark that passes outside the normal legislative channels to become law without debate or vote.
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The WSJ has today what amounts to a hit piece on Gov. Palin. The authors claim that, because Gov. Palin has requested funding for specific projects, she is not a fiscal reformer and, indeed, is every bit the porker at the public trough that Obama is. You can read the article here.

There is a lot of confusion surrounding the term "earmark." Historically, the term has meant no more than simply designating funds to a specifc project. In recent years, the term "earmark" has also come to refer to a corrupt practice whereby funding requests are inserted in committee reports, never being debated or voted upon, yet treated as having the force of law.

I wrote about this the other day here when it was clear from the questions he was asking that Charlie Gibson, in his interview with Gov. Palin, was unable to tell the difference between an earmark and a legitimate spending request. And indeed, in justifying her claim to being a reformer, that is precisely what Gov. Palin explained to Charlie Gibson. You can watch it here.

If you want to see how the corrupt version of earmarking works, Democratic Sen. Carl Levin provides the example. He is about to get $5.9 billion dollars worth of earmarks sent out of his committee in the Defense Appropriations Bill. None will be debated. None will be voted upon. They represent a wholly broken and corrupt process.

But as mentioned above, not all specific spending requests that fall within the generic definition of "earmark" are of the corrupt kind. Quite often, specific spending requests are to fund spending required of the state by unfunded federal mandates. And there are host of other reasons that justify reasonable specific spending requests that every state requests. They are not pork and they are submitted through the normal legislative process. All of this is ignored in the horrendous article in today's WSJ. The authors of that article lump together every spending request made by Gov. Palin as the Governor of Alaska and label it all as earmarks. To call this sloppy and biased reporting is a grotesque understatement.

It is beyond dispute that Gov. Palin has drastically reduced the spending requests for federal dollars made by the government of Alaska. As Gov. Palin wrote in an op-ed in an Anchorage newspaper some months ago:

[M]y administration has recommended funding for specific projects and programs when there is an important federal purpose and strong citizen support.

This year, we have requested 31 earmarks, down from 54 in 2007. Of these, 27 involve continuing or previous appropriations and four are new requests. The total dollar amount of these requests has been reduced from approximately $550 million in the previous year to just less than $200 million. . . .

Patterico takes a look at many of the requests made by Alaska under Gov. Palin:

. . . if you look at the document that Smith links, you quickly get feel for the fact that many of the earmarks are requests for funding that are completely legitimate, and many relate to unfunded mandates imposed upon Alaska by federal legislation like the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act. Several examples are set forth after the jump.

Here is the link to the document setting forth the Alaska appropriation requests. Here are a few examples of the justification for the request:

“Meets the increased needs under the Magnuson-Stevens Act for developing regional fishery coordinated databases.”

“This is an ongoing effort to collect data on the recreational hailbut fishery that is conducted by federal agencies though relying on the state for data.”

“Provides state funding for management of federal fisheries, including Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands king crab and tanner crab, weathervane scallops and groundfish.” . . .

Read the entire post. As Patterico notes, taking even the most jaundiced eye towards the spending requests made by Gov. Palin, none come close to asking for a $1 million earmark for her spouse's employer which just happens to coincide with a tripling of her salary. And indeed, you can compare the requests made by Ms. Palin with the list of earmarks released by Obama during the Democratic primaries. Go ahead. Do a little research - and be a bit more discening than the WSJ has been today. More links to posts on this at Memorandum.

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Analysis Of The ABC Interview Of Gov. Palin Part II – Reform, Earmarks, Abortion, Guns,

Comments -

The second part of the ABC interview is an improvement over Part I. Gov. Palin is more at ease with questions and she comes across as conservative, reasonable and sincere. Again the questions were fair but, as in segment I, there were flaws. Charlie Gibson questioning could have been much clearer on his questions regarding earmarks.

Gibson's opening question was what sets Gov. Palin apart from the Bush regime in terms of "change" and "reform." Her list of what she would change are lower taxes, fiscal restraint, and improved oversight of federal and quasi-government agencies. Fiscal restrain is the big part. I wish she had talked about the need to reform entitlement programs as that is, as Gibson intimates, the major hurdle in restraining spending.

On the economy, the big question in this segment concerned earmarks and the Bridge to Nowhere. Gov. Palin is attempting to make more out her final killing of the Bridge to Nowhere than is justified – probably because it makes for a good sound byte. Yes, she did redirect the funding from the Bridge project. But she did not reject the funding or otherwise return it to the federal government. Pushing this too far will hurt her.

At the same time, Charlie Gibson was making far less out of Gov. Palin’s record for reducing earmark requests in her state. No, she has not killed all of them, but she has reduced request for them significantly and she is clearly on record as intending to reduce such requests for her state in the future. Further, Chalie Gibson’s question on earmarks shows a fundamental confusion on the issue. Gov. Palin’s answer indicates she fully understands it.

There are two different categories of earmarks, and though both are problematic, one is far more problematic than the other. The lesser of two evils is when individual legislators request spending for a specific project within their state or for a special interest that is then debated and voted upon by Congress. But there is another category of earmark abuse that is the preponderance of the problem. The vast majority of earmarks do not go through the process just described. They are never debated and voted upon by Congress. They do not see the light of day in effect. This from the Weekly Standard describes the problem:

President Bush seems to grasp the issue. A year ago he publicly complained that "over 90 percent of earmarks never make it to the floor of the House and Senate. They are dropped into committee reports that are not even part of the bill that arrives on my desk. You didn't vote them into law. I didn't sign them into law. Yet, they're treated as if they have the force of law."

To make the matter worse, these in the latter category are far too often vaguely worded, open ended funding requests. The latter category absolutely must be killed if we are ever to have a hope of getting control on spending and reducing corruption. The former category needs to severely restricted, though there needs to be a lot of thought given to how to do this without unduly restricting reasonable requests for funding. That is a systemic problem that needs to be debated and reformed at the highest level of government. That said, given the abuses of the system at this point, we need to ere for the foreseeable future on the restricting such requests to the minimum possible.

Over at the Next Right, they have a superb example of how the corrupt version of earmarking works. Their example is Dem. Senator Carl Levin who literally is refusing any debate in a matter that will allow $5.9 billion in earmarks pass into law in the Defense Appropriations Bill without every being debated or voted upon in Congress.

Gov. Palin gets this one. I hope the audience watching does also. The fact is Palin and McCain will, I fully expect, make a very good faith effort to impose fiscal restraint, reduce pork and clean up the earmark process. And while all three of those are related, they are also separate - something Gibson seems to muddle in his questioning.

On "social issues," I think Palin hit all the questions out of the ball park. She came across as conservative but reasonable and willing to be flexible. In that regard, she made an important point - she distinguished between her personal views and what she believed would be reasonable policy in light of those who disagree with her.

Gibson's first question concerned abortion. Palin's answer was music to my ears. As she said, she would like to see Roe v. Wade overturned and abortion made a state issue. She does not want abortion made illegal, but she wants to see a greater "culture of life."

Hers is hardly an extremist position on either count (though her personal opinion that abortion is wrong even in cases of rape and incest puts her is not centrist by any means.) Indeed, the position that she articulates on Roe was one shared by now Justice Ginsburgh, a staunch advocate of abortion rights, who also believed that Roe was wrongly decided. Abortion appears nowhere in the Constitution. It is a social issue that the federal government should have no role in authorizing or limiting. Given my own personal opinion that nothing has done more damage to our Supreme Court jurisprudence than Roe v. Wade, it is a position I believe fundamental to putting our nation back on track. Roe opened up the flood gates for judicial activism - and it is a floodgate that has not been stemmed for nearly half a century. You can find much more on the issue in a seperate post that I did - The Supreme Court, Originalism, Activism & America's Future.

On homosexuality, her answer ought to give the gay rights community a warm fuzzy feeling. She simply said that she will not judge people's lifestyle. Although she did not mention it, I recall that she also supported gay friendly legislation in Alaska. Gibson did not ask her about her stance on gay marriage.

On guns, Gibson prefaced his question by stating that 70% of Americans support a ban on assault rifles. I would love to know where he got that number - that sounds like pure bull. Nonetheless, Palin's answer here was I thought very strong. They cut some of her answer to this line of questioning that I have seen in another video where she makes the very valid point that gun laws take guns out of the hands of the law abiding, not the criminals.

And the PUMA's ought to appreciate Gibson raising the fact that Palin spoke so highly of Hillary long before she was on the radar for the VP slot. That certainly makes her praise of Hillary on the campaign trail seem genuine and not cynical. And you have to love her dig at Obama - that he should have chosen Hillary as his VP pick.

Overall, I would grade Gov. Palin’s performance a solid B in the economic segment, an A in the social segment. I wish she would have expounded more upon the Obama tax plan and I wish Charlie Gibson’s questioning on ear marks and pork had been much clearer.

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This Is Going To Leave A Mark

I was wondering when Gov. Palin would start addressing the Bridge to Nowhere and the criticism of earmarks coming from Obama. Its the last 45 seconds or so of the video.



(H/T Hot Air)

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Dining At The Trough - Obama & Palin Compared

Senator Jim DeMint, McCain's ideological next of kin, has written an article in today's WSJ drawing the stark contrasts between the records of Obama and Palin on the issue of earmarks. The bottom line, for Obama to criticize Palin's credentials on earmarks is the height of hypocrisy.

This from Sen. DeMint in the WSJ:

. . . My Senate colleague Barack Obama is now attacking Gov. Sarah Palin over earmarks. Having worked with both John McCain and Mr. Obama on earmarks, and as a recovering earmarker myself, I can tell you that Mrs. Palin's leadership and record of reform stands well above that of Mr. Obama.

Let's compare.

Mrs. Palin used her veto pen to slash more local projects than any other governor in the state's history. She cut nearly 10% of Alaska's budget this year, saving state residents $268 million. This included vetoing a $30,000 van for Campfire USA and $200,000 for a tennis court irrigation system. She succinctly justified these cuts by saying they were "not a state responsibility."

Meanwhile in Washington, Mr. Obama voted for numerous wasteful earmarks last year, including: $12 million for bicycle paths, $450,000 for the International Peace Museum, $500,000 for a baseball stadium and $392,000 for a visitor's center in Louisiana.

Mrs. Palin cut Alaska's federal earmark requests in half last year, one of the strongest moves against earmarks by any governor. It took real leadership to buck Alaska's decades-long earmark addiction.

Mr. Obama delivered over $100 million in earmarks to Illinois last year and has requested nearly a billion dollars in pet projects since 2005. His running mate, Joe Biden, is still indulging in earmarks, securing over $90 million worth this year.

Mrs. Palin also killed the infamous Bridge to Nowhere in her own state. Yes, she once supported the project: But after witnessing the problems created by earmarks for her state and for the nation's budget, she did what others like me have done: She changed her position and saved taxpayers millions. Even the Alaska Democratic Party credits her with killing the bridge.

When the Senate had its chance to stop the Bridge to Nowhere and transfer the money to Katrina rebuilding, Messrs. Obama and Biden voted for the $223 million earmark, siding with the old boys' club in the Senate. And to date, they still have not publicly renounced their support for the infamous earmark.

Mrs. Palin has proven courageous by taking on big spenders in her own party. In March of this year, the Anchorage Daily News reported that, "Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens is aggravated about what he sees as Gov. Sarah Palin's antagonism toward the earmarks he uses to steer federal money to the state."

Mr. Obama had a chance to take on his party when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid offered a sham ethics bill, which was widely criticized by watchdog groups such as Citizens Against Government Waste for shielding earmarks from pubic scrutiny. But instead of standing with taxpayers, Mr. Obama voted for the bill. Today, he claims he helped write the bill that failed to clean up Washington.

Mr. Obama has shown little restraint on earmarks until this year, when he decided to co-sponsor an earmark moratorium authored by Mr. McCain and myself. Mr. Obama is vulnerable on this issue, and he knows it. That is why he is lashing out at Mrs. Palin and trying to hide his own record.

Mrs. Palin is one of the strongest antiearmark governors in America. If more governors around the country would do what she has done, we would be much closer to fixing our nation's fiscal problems than we are. . . .

Read the entire article.

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Palin On Earmarks & A Discordant Note

Q&O has posted an op-ed written by Gov. Palin in the local Anchorage, Alaska newspaper explaining her earmark policy. In light of the Obama camp's attempt to distort Gov. Palin's record on earmarks, this provides a good explanation. The Politico has an e-mail from a Wasilla resident who dislikes Palin. The e-mail has gone viral.

This from Gov. Palin, quoted in Q&O:

I am not among those who have said "earmarks are nothing more than pork projects being shoveled home by an overeager congressional delegation." I recognize that Congress, which exercises the power of the purse, has the constitutional responsibility to put its mark on the federal budget, including adding funds that the president has not proposed.

Accordingly, my administration has recommended funding for specific projects and programs when there is an important federal purpose and strong citizen support.

This year, we have requested 31 earmarks, down from 54 in 2007. Of these, 27 involve continuing or previous appropriations and four are new requests. The total dollar amount of these requests has been reduced from approximately $550 million in the previous year to just less than $200 million.

I believe this represents a responsible approach to the changing situation in Congress. Some misinterpret this as criticism of our congressional delegation.

In fact, it responds to messages from the Congressional delegation and the Bush administration. They have told us that the number of earmarks in the federal budget will be reduced and that there must be a strong federal purpose underlying each request.

We have also heard that, wherever possible, earmark requests must be accompanied by a state or local match. So, there are state budget consequences that must be considered as well when we ask for federal help.

There is no inconsistency or hypocrisy between my previous statements concerning earmarks and the recommendations my administration made to the delegation on Feb. 15. Specifically, I said earlier that the state would submit no more than 12 new requests, excluding earmarks for ongoing projects and the Alaska National Guard. Our recommendations are consistent with my previous comments and recognize the new budgetary realities in D.C.

Further, I applaud the delegation's decision to post all earmark requests. Posting, along with other reforms, will help insure the open and transparent public process that good government demands.

Regarding your comments concerning earmarks requested by local governments and other Alaska entities, I have never sought to impose my views on their activities. In fact, my D.C. office meets with dozens of local governments and others requesting earmarks and this interaction has always been cooperative and cordial.

Each entity must interpret the new realities in D.C. for itself. The final decisions about which earmark requests to pursue are made by the congressional delegation as our representatives in Congress.

My role at the federal level is simply to submit the most well-conceived earmark requests we can. Of course, since the congressional delegation has told us that they expect state or local matches, requests submitted by others may have implications for the Alaska Legislature as well.

As I have said previously, we can either respond to the changing circumstances in Congress or stick our heads in the sand. For better or worse, earmarks, which represent only about 1 percent of the federal budget, have become a symbol for budgetary discussions in general.

Unfortunately, Alaska has been featured prominently in the debate about reform. By recognizing the necessity for change, we can enhance the state's credibility in the appropriations process and in other areas of federal policy.

One of my goals as governor is making Alaska as self-sufficient as possible. Among other things, that means the ability to develop our natural resources in a responsible manner.

However, I am also mindful of the role that the federal government plays in our state. The federal budget, in its various manifestations, is incredibly important to us, and congressional earmarks are one aspect of this relationship.

You will find more at the Q&O post.

The Politico has an e-mail from Anne Kilkenny of Wasilla, a woman who opposed Palin in 1996 and who is described as a stay-at-home mom and frequent letter to the editor writer. It is pretty brutal and puts a negative spin on Gov. Palin's time as Mayor of Wasilla:

. . . ABOUT SARAH PALIN

I am a resident of Wasilla, Alaska. I have known Sarah since 1992. Everyone here knows Sarah, so it is nothing special to say we are on a first-name basis. Our children have attended the same schools. Her father was my child's favorite substitute teacher. I also am on a first name basis with her parents and mother-in-law. I attended more City Council meetings during her administration than about 99% of the residents of the city.

She is enormously popular; in every way she's like the most popular girl in middle school. Even men who think she is a poor choice and won't vote for her can't quit smiling when talking about her because she is a "babe".

It is astonishing and almost scary how well she can keep a secret. She kept her most recent pregnancy a secret from her children and parents for seven months.

She is "pro-life". She recently gave birth to a Down's syndrome baby. There is no cover-up involved, here; Trig is her baby.

She is energetic and hardworking. She regularly worked out at the gym.

She is savvy. She doesn't take positions; she just "puts things out there" and if they prove to be popular, then she takes credit.

Her husband works a union job on the North Slope for BP and is a champion snowmobile racer. Todd Palin's kind of job is highly sought-after because of the schedule and high pay. He arranges his work schedule so he can fish for salmon in Bristol Bay for a month or so in summer, but by no stretch of the imagination is fishing their major source of income. Nor has her life-style ever been anything like that of native Alaskans.

Sarah and her whole family are avid hunters.

She's smart.

Her experience is as mayor of a city with a population of about 5,000 (at the time), and less than 2 years as governor of a state with about 670,000 residents.

During her mayoral administration most of the actual work of running this small city was turned over to an administrator. She had been pushed to hire this administrator by party power-brokers after she had gotten herself into some trouble over precipitous firings which had given rise to a recall campaign.

Sarah campaigned in Wasilla as a "fiscal conservative". During her 6 years as Mayor, she increased general government expenditures by over 33%. During those same 6 years the amount of taxes collected by the City increased by 38%. This was during a period of low inflation (1996-2002). She reduced progressive property taxes and increased a regressive sales tax which taxed even food. The tax cuts that she promoted benefited large corporate property owners way more than they benefited residents.

The huge increases in tax revenues during her mayoral administration weren't enough to fund everything on her wish list though, borrowed money was needed, too. She inherited a city with zero debt, but left it with indebtedness of over $22 million. What did Mayor Palin encourage the voters to borrow money for? Was it the infrastructure that she said she supported? The sewage treatment plant that the city lacked? or a new library? No. $1m for a park. $15m-plus for construction of a multi-use sports complex which she rushed through to build on a piece of property that the City didn't even have clear title to, that was still in litigation 7 yrs later--to the delight of the lawyers involved! The sports complex itself is a nice addition to the community but a huge money pit, not the profit-generator she claimed it would be. She also supported bonds for $5.5m for road projects that could have been done in 5-7 yrs without any borrowing.

While Mayor, City Hall was extensively remodeled and her office redecorated more than once.

These are small numbers, but Wasilla is a very small city.

As an oil producer, the high price of oil has created a budget surplus in Alaska. Rather than invest this surplus in technology that will make us energy independent and increase efficiency, as Governor she proposed distribution of this surplus to every individual in the state.

In this time of record state revenues and budget surpluses, she recommended that the state borrow/bond for road projects, even while she proposed distribution of surplus state revenues: spend today's surplus, borrow for needs.

She's not very tolerant of divergent opinions or open to outside ideas or compromise. As Mayor, she fought ideas that weren't generated by her or her staff. Ideas weren't evaluated on their merits, but on the basis of who proposed them.

While Sarah was Mayor of Wasilla she tried to fire our highly respected City Librarian because the Librarian refused to consider removing from the library some books that Sarah wanted removed. City residents rallied to the defense of the City Librarian and against Palin's attempt at out-and-out censorship, so Palin backed down and withdrew her termination letter. People who fought her attempt to oust the Librarian are on her enemies list to this day.

Sarah complained about the "old boy's club" when she first ran for Mayor, so what did she bring Wasilla? A new set of "old boys". Palin fired most of the experienced staff she inherited. At the City and as Governor she hired or elevated new, inexperienced, obscure people, creating a staff totally dependent on her for their jobs and eternally grateful and fiercely loyal--loyal to the point of abusing their power to further her personal agenda, as she has acknowledged happened in the case of pressuring the State's top cop (see below).

As Mayor, Sarah fired Wasilla's Police Chief because he "intimidated" her, she told the press. As Governor, her recent firing of Alaska's top cop has the ring of familiarity about it. He served at her pleasure and she had every legal right to fire him, but it's pretty clear that an important factor in her decision to fire him was because he wouldn't fire her sister's ex-husband, a State Trooper. Under investigation for abuse of power, she has had to admit that more than 2 dozen contacts were made between her staff and family to the person that she later fired, pressuring him to fire her ex-brother-in-law. She tried to replace the man she fired with a man who she knew had been reprimanded for sexual harassment; when this caused a public furor, she withdrew her support.

She has bitten the hand of every person who extended theirs to her in help. The City Council person who personally escorted her around town introducing her to voters when she first ran for Wasilla City Council became one of her first targets when she was later elected Mayor. She abruptly fired her loyal City Administrator; even people who didn't like the guy were stunned by this ruthlessness.

Fear of retribution has kept all of these people from saying anything publicly about her.

When then-Governor Murkowski was handing out political plums, Sarah got the best, Chair of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission: one of the few jobs not in Juneau and one of the best paid. She had no background in oil & gas issues. Within months of scoring this great job which paid $122,400/yr, she was complaining in the press about the high salary. I was told that she hated that job: the commute, the structured hours, the work. Sarah became aware that a member of this Commission (who was also the State Chair of the Republican Party) engaged in unethical behavior on the job. In a gutsy move which some undoubtedly cautioned her could be political suicide, Sarah solved all her problems in one fell swoop: got out of the job she hated and garnered gobs of media attention as the patron saint of ethics and as a gutsy fighter against the "old boys' club" when she dramatically quit, exposing this man's ethics violations (for which he was fined).

As Mayor, she had her hand stuck out as far as anyone for pork from Senator Ted Stevens. Lately, she has castigated his pork-barrel politics and publicly humiliated him. She only opposed the "bridge to nowhere" after it became clear that it would be unwise not to.

As Governor, she gave the Legislature no direction and budget guidelines, then made a big grandstand display of line-item vetoing projects, calling them pork. Public outcry and further legislative action restored most of these projects--which had been vetoed simply because she was not aware of their importance--but with the unobservant she had gained a reputation as "anti-pork".

She is solidly Republican: no political maverick. The State party leaders hate her because she has bit them in the back and humiliated them. Other members of the party object to her self-description as a fiscal conservative.

Around Wasilla there are people who went to high school with Sarah. They call her "Sarah Barracuda" because of her unbridled ambition and predatory ruthlessness. Before she became so powerful, very ugly stories circulated around town about shenanigans she pulled to be made point guard on the high school basketball team. When Sarah's mother-in-law, a highly respected member of the community and experienced manager, ran for Mayor, Sarah refused to endorse her.

As Governor, she stepped outside of the box and put together of package of legislation known as "AGIA" that forced the oil companies to march to the beat of her drum.

Like most Alaskans, she favors drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. She has questioned if the loss of sea ice is linked to global warming. She campaigned "as a private citizen" against a state initiaitive that would have either a) protected salmon streams from pollution from mines, or b) tied up in the courts all mining in the state (depending on who you listen to). She has pushed the State's lawsuit against the Dept. of the Interior's decision to list polar bears as threatened species.

McCain is the oldest person to ever run for President; Sarah will be a heartbeat away from being President.

There has to be literally millions of Americans who are more knowledgeable and experienced than she.

However, there's a lot of people who have underestimated her and are regretting it.

CLAIM VS FACT
*"Hockey mom": true for a few years.

*"PTA mom": true years ago when her first-born was in elementary school, not since.

*"NRA supporter": absolutely true

*social conservative: mixed. Opposes gay marriage, BUT vetoed a bill that would have denied benefits to employees in same-sex relationships (said she did this because it was unconsitutional).

*pro-creationism: mixed. Supports it, BUT did nothing as Governor to promote it.

*"Pro-life": mixed. Knowingly gave birth to a Down's syndrome baby BUT declined to call a special legislative session on some pro-life legislation

*"Experienced": Some high schools have more students than Wasilla has residents. Many cities have more residents than the state of Alaska. No legislative experience other than City Council. Little hands-on supervisory or managerial experience; needed help of a city administrator to run town of about 5,000.

*political maverick: not at all

*gutsy: absolutely!

*open & transparent: ??? Good at keeping secrets. Not good at explaining actions.

*has a developed philosophy of public policy: no

*"a Greenie": no. Turned Wasilla into a wasteland of big box stores and disconnected parking lots. Is pro-drilling off-shore and in ANWR.

*fiscal conservative: not by my definition!

*pro-infrastructure: No. Promoted a sports complex and park in a city without a sewage treatment plant or storm drainage system. Built streets to early 20th century standards.

*pro-tax relief: Lowered taxes for businesses, increased tax burden on residents

*pro-small government: No. Oversaw greatest expansion of city government in Wasilla's history.

*pro-labor/pro-union. No. Just because her husband works union doesn't make her pro-labor. I have seen nothing to support any claim that she is pro-labor/pro-union.

WHY AM I WRITING THIS?

First, I have long believed in the importance of being an informed voter. I am a voter registrar. For 10 years I put on student voting programs in the schools. If you google my name (Anne Kilkenny + Alaska), you will find references to my participation in local government, education, and PTA/parent organizations.

Secondly, I've always operated in the belief that "Bad things happen when good people stay silent". Few people know as much as I do because few have gone to as many City Council meetings.

Third, I am just a housewife. I don't have a job she can bump me out of. I don't belong to any organization that she can hurt. But, I am no fool; she is immensely popular here, and it is likely that this will cost me somehow in the future: that's life.

Fourth, she has hated me since back in 1996, when I was one of the 100 or so people who rallied to support the City Librarian against Sarah's attempt at censorship.

Fifth, I looked around and realized that everybody else was afraid to say anything because they were somehow vulnerable.

CAVEATS
I am not a statistician. I developed the numbers for the increase in spending & taxation 2 years ago (when Palin was running for Governor) from information supplied to me by the Finance Director of the City of Wasilla, and I can't recall exactly what I adjusted for: did I adjust for inflation? for population increases? Right now, it is impossible for a private person to get any info out of City Hall--they are swamped. So I can't verify my numbers.

You may have noticed that there are various numbers circulating for the population of Wasilla, ranging from my "about 5,000", up to 9,000. The day Palin's selection was announced a city official told me that the current population is about 7,000. The official 2000 census count was 5,460. I have used about 5,000 because Palin was Mayor from 1996 to 2002, and the city was growing rapidly in the mid-90's.

Anne Kilkenny
August 31, 2008

Read the entire e-mail here.

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Palin, Obama & The Bridge To Nowhere

The Bridge to Nowhere was, in 2006, proof positive that the Republican Party had come undone and was adrift from its conservative moorings. The Bridge to Nowhere probably did more to harm the Republican Party and more to explain the victory of Democrats in 2006 than any other single thing or event.

Some fiscally responsible Senators moved to remove this boondogle from the appropriations bill and redirect funding. They failed. As reported in the Hill:

Obama and 81 other senators opposed an amendment in 2005 to strike the infamous $231 million “Bridge to Nowhere” earmark for Alaska and redirect that funding to help with rebuilding New Orleans.

When the funds arrived in Alaska, Gov. Palin killed the bridge project. Instead, she "directed state transportation officials to find the most "fiscally responsible" alternative . . ." Wow. With this ticket, and on these facts, we can actually kick the bridge across the aisle - and perhaps bring about . . . dare I say it . . . change to politics as usual.

Dr. Sanity has the whole story.

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Pork In The Night

It is not the title of the latest pornographic flick, merely the latest senatorial obscenity.


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Senators John McCain and Jim DeMint sponsored a bill that would have placed a moratorium on earmarks for a year. The odious Harry Reid, the man who recently attempted to defend the earmark process as part of constitutional system at its inception, scheduled a vote on the bill late in the eve when reporting on it would be at a minimum. This from the WSJ:

For Congressional Appropriators, Thursday night's vote cashiering the earmark moratorium was an embarrassment of riches, with some 71 Senators endorsing Capitol Hill's spending culture. For everyone else, it was merely embarrassing.

The amendment, sponsored by Jim DeMint (R., S.C.), would have imposed a one-year earmark freeze, and it seemed to be gaining momentum earlier in the week, even cheered on by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. But the Appropriations empire struck back, twisting every arm to preserve its spending privileges. The measure was voted down after being ruled "non-germane" to the budget. That's as good a measure as any of the Congressional mentality: Apparently earmarks, which totaled $18.3 billion for 2008, aren't relevant to overall spending.

Just three Republican Appropriators voted for the amendment, including surprise support from longtime skeptic Mitch McConnell. No such shockers from the Democrats, with all Appropriators going against and only six Senators bucking the party line, especially Missouri's Claire McCaskill, one of the more courageous antipork champions.

Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton no doubt backed the moratorium to insulate themselves against one of John McCain's signature themes. But they're also bending to the broader political winds. In an election year, voters understand the waste and corruption that pork enables, leading even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to say, "I'm losing patience with earmarks."

That Mr. McCain's Republican colleagues fail, or refuse, to recognize the political potency is not a good sign. More GOP Senators voted against the moratorium than voted for it, proving that they are just as complacent about pork as most Democrats. And this vote comes on the heels of offenses like appointing ranking GOP Appropriator Thad Cochran ($837 million in pork last year) to the earmark-reform "working committee." The Republicans appear to be settling in comfortably with their minority status.

Read the entire article. And there is more on the vote at Hot Air, including a list of the Senators who voted against the bill. I suspect the votes of Clinton, Obama and McConnell were little more than an attempt to innoculate themselves from criticism. All three are committed porkers.

Q&O, in defining the problems with pork, had this to say:

1. Earmarks are not a significant fiscal problem - certainly not when compared to entitlements or other programs.

2. However, earmarks are the primary fulcrum for outside interests to corrupt the legislative process. Earmarks are the source of much of the undue power of individual Congressmen.

3. Earmarks aren't just corruption bait, though. They are also an Incumbent Slush Fund, allowing politicians to spread the pelf around their State/District to secure votes and favor. Perhaps we should start counting them as de facto campaign contributions. That's exactly how they are used.

I would add a fourth paragraph to that, and that is that the earmark process itself is corrupt. This from an article on earmarks in the Daily Standard.

President Bush seems to grasp the issue. A year ago he publicly complained that "over 90 percent of earmarks never make it to the floor of the House and Senate. They are dropped into committee reports that are not even part of the bill that arrives on my desk. You didn't vote them into law. I didn't sign them into law. Yet, they're treated as if they have the force of law."

Earmarks are corrupting and, unfortunately, a wholly bipartisan addiction. In an era where our long term fiscal health is very much at issue and out of control spending threatens the long-term viability of our nation, earmarks are not simply a minor problem, but an obscene emblam of corruption and an existential jettisoning of fiscal discipline. For conservatives, watching our Republican legislators dine at the trough is the equivalent of watching Nero fiddle while Rome burns.

George Will, in a column a month ago, gave the sordid blow by blow description of how earmarks, if not outright corruption, certainly dance on the knife's edge of corruption. Certainly the worst excesses of this corrupt system are also often a complete waste of taxpayer funds.

Most recently, we learn from the Obama camp that he secured a million dollar earmark for the University of Chicago Hospitals, where his wife is employed as VP of Community Affairs. Once Obama was elected Senator, the University nearly tripled her salary to $316,962. Is this corruption? I am sure it is not in the criminal sense, but it certainly has the stench of corruption and quid pro quo about it.

The first step to getting a handle on out of control government spending will be an end to the modern practice of earmarks. And the only chance of that happening is if McCain is elected and crams it down the throats of our corrupt Republican Senators.

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Interesting Posts From Around The Web - 13 March 2008

Interesting posts from around the web, all below the fold:

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Art: Sisyphus, Vecellio Tiziano, 1549

A Rose By Any Other Name: A fallen hero.

Dinah Lord: Kidnapped Iraqi Archbishop found dead.

The Transatlantic Conservative: John McCain and the Pledge of Allegiance. Its quite a moving story.

Classical Values: "Wright is raw. Obama is smooth. Different sales pitch. Same product." Watch the video.

Ironic Surrealism: Much more on Obama’s racist Reverend Wright.

Q&O: Hillary gets fact checked with predictable results.

The New Editor: Per Instapundit, Hillary plays the Dork Card.

Winds of Change: Evaluating Geraldine Ferarro’s comments on Obama.

Redstate: Quid pro crook - Obama, earmarks, and his wife’s salary.

This Ain’t Hell: Code Pink suffers mission failure . . . and yes, that dress makes you look fat.

Red Alerts: The good and bad news about the economy from an interview with legendary economist Anna Schwartz, who co-authored the revolutionary "Monetary History of the United States" with Milton Friedman.

A Western Heart: Our economic woes are wholly self-inflicted. This is not the normal business cycle.

Vast Rightwing Conspiracy: Obama pulls a Kerry on the issue of mail in voting.

The Irish Elk: "Ho No," it’s a good Spitzer round-up.

An Englishman’s Castle: The UK has granted an asylum to a rouge’s gallery of people who have no business in the West whatsoever. Now, in the case of a young gay man from Iran who faces execution for his homosexuality, where there should be no question that asylum is appropriate, the UK is inexplicably dragging its feet.

Fulham Reactionary: Indeed, as to illegal immigrants, it seems but for the odd Iranian homosexual, the police aren’t even really trying anymore.

Seraphic Secret: Israel releases its annual intel report and Iran puts a bounty on Irsraeli leaders.

Shrinkwrapped: Has Israel lost the will to live?

The Shield of Achilles: I thought this was answered several millenia ago. Should incestuous marriages be declared illegal?

Liberty Corner: Taking on the arguments against teaching intelligent design.

Sigmund, Carl & Alfred: PC Manspeak. Heh.

The Dhiveistan Report: "[T]he penis of the Elected never softens, the erection is eternal. The sensation that you feel each time you make love is utterly delicious . . ." Surprisingly, this is not out of Eliot Spitzer’s journal. It is more insidious than that.

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Krauthammer on Lobbying, McCain & The Left's Demagoguery

Charles Krauthammer responds to the NYT hit piece on John McCain, providing a civics lesson and highlighting the demagoguery of the left in the process.













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Charles Krauthammer takes a more benign view of lobbying than do most in this day and age, though he is completely correct that the "lobbying" is constitutionally protected speech that is often both reasonable and necessary. Krauthammer then notes, as I did here, that there was nothing untoward whatsoever in John McCain trying to get a recalcitrant FCC to do their job and make a decision on a matter effecting Paxson Communications. That, indeed, falls well within the ambit of what we expect our elected representatives to be doing. This from Krauthammer:

Everyone knows the First Amendment protects freedom of religion, speech, press and assembly. How many remember that, in addition, the First Amendment protects a fifth freedom -- to lobby?

Of course it doesn't use the word lobby. It calls it the right "to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." Lobbyists are people hired to do that for you, so that you can actually stay home with the kids and remain gainfully employed rather than spend your life in the corridors of Washington.

To hear the candidates in this presidential campaign, you'd think lobbying is just one notch below waterboarding, a black art practiced by the great malefactors of wealth to keep the middle class in a vise and loose upon the nation every manner of scourge: oil dependency, greenhouse gases, unpayable mortgages and those tiny entrees you get at French restaurants.

Lobbying is constitutionally protected, but that doesn't mean we have to like it all. Let's agree to frown upon bad lobbying, such as getting a tax break for a particular industry. Let's agree to welcome good lobbying -- the actual redress of a legitimate grievance -- such as protecting your home from being turned to dust to make way for some urban development project.

. . . What would be an example of petitioning the government for a redress of a legitimate grievance? Let's say you're a media company wishing to acquire a television station in Pittsburgh. Because of the huge federal regulatory structure, you require the approval of a government agency. In this case it's called the Federal Communications Commission.

Now, one of the roles of Congress is to make sure that said bureaucrats are interpreting and enforcing Congress's laws with fairness and dispatch. All members of Congress, no matter how populist, no matter how much they rail against "special interests," zealously protect this right of oversight. Therefore, one of the jobs of the chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee is to ensure that the bureaucrats of the FCC are doing their job.

What would constitute not doing their job? A textbook example would be the FCC sitting two full years on a pending application to acquire a Pittsburgh TV station. There could hardly be a better case of a legitimate "petition for a redress" than that of the aforementioned private entity asking the chairman of the appropriate oversight committee to ask the tardy bureaucrats for a ruling. So the chairman does that, writing to the FCC demanding a ruling -- any ruling -- while explicitly stating that he is asking for no particular outcome.

This, of course, is precisely what John McCain did on behalf of Paxson Communications in writing two letters to the FCC in which he asked for a vote on the pending television-station acquisition. These two letters are the only remotely hard pieces of evidence in a 3,000-word front-page New York Times article casting doubt on John McCain's ethics.

Which is why what was intended to be an expose turned into a farce, compounded by the fact that the other breathless revelation turned out to be thrice-removed rumors of an alleged affair nine years ago.

It must be said of McCain that he has invited such astonishingly thin charges against him because he has made a career of ostentatiously questioning the motives and ethics of those who have resisted his campaign finance reform and other measures that he imagines will render Congress influence-free.

Ostentatious self-righteousness may be a sin, but it is not a scandal. Nor is it a crime or a form of corruption. The Times's story is a classic example of sloppy gotcha journalism. . . .

Read the entire article.

The problem with lobbying is that it has become associated with pandering to special interests at best and, at worst, a tool of corruption when combined with earmarks - as Duke Cunningham, William Jefferson and John Murtha exemplify. In that light, McCain stands firmly on the right side of this issue, being a champion against the corrupting practice of earmarks and an opponent of the corrupting influence of money in politics. Indeed, his much maligned McCain-Feingold bill was aimed at precisely the latter. Regardless, lobbying will always be an element of our Democratic system, and to pretend otherwise, as does Obama - who happens to embrace earmarks - is pure demagoguery.

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What A Steaming Pile of Bull-Pelosi

Consider the title to be a Freudian slip. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Sunday defended earmarks, then declared the surge in Iraq a failure and listed the justifications as to why we need to surrender immediately.




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Wolf Blitzer interviewed Speaker Pelosi on CNN today. You can find the complete transcript here. Blitzer first asked her about earmarks. Here is the exchange:

PELOSI: . . . Congress has a right, the power of the purse. And I'm not a big fan of earmarks, but they do have value, if done with transparency. It may be news to the president, but when the Democrats took control of the Congress, we had -- we instituted transparency. We've cut the earmarks in half and went back to the transparency. Every person who has an earmark has to identify himself with it, affirm that he has not -- doesn't have a financial benefit to him personally, or her personally.

Not a big fan of earmarks? She is number 4 on the list of House members who have put earmark requests into 2008 budget bills. Number 1 on the list is her right hand man, Jack Murtha. Between them, they lead the earmark pack, having submitted earmarks for nearly a quarter of a billion dollars of taxpayer money. She's not just a fan of earmarks, she is the Queen of earmarks.

As to the claim to have cut earmarks in half, she is using some math with which I am not familiar. The numbers for 2008 show a four fold increase in earmarks over 2007.

The rules she is claiming she has put in place are the barest of reforms and, ultimately, only amount to partial transparency. They have done nothing to stem the corruption or the waste of the earmark process. Nor have those rules addressed the worst excesses. And indeed, Pelosi is balking at any bi-partisan substantive reform.

PELOSI: But this president is making that statement, in the State of the Union, a president who's signed more legislation, with more earmarks, than any president in the history of our country, didn't say "boo" until his last...

I concur. That is why the Republicans are known today as the minority party.

BLITZER: Why not just eliminate them all?

PELOSI: Well, I'm not averse to that, myself, personally. But when a president says to the Congress, I will decide every penny of spending, that's just not right. That's just not right.

So the reason she refuses to eliminate earmarks is because the President has written an Executive Order refusing to honor the most corrupt earmarking practice of Congress? In what universe can that be classified as either logic or an answer to Blitzer's question. Well, actually it was an answer. As shown in the links above, she is neck deep in earmarks herself and has no intention whatsoever of substanitvely addressing the earmark issue.

BLITZER: So let's talk about Iraq, which is another issue high on the agenda of the American public.

PELOSI: Right.

BLITZER: The president says, quote, "The surge is working. I know some don't want to admit that and I understand, but the terrorists understand the surge is working."

Is the surge working?

PELOSI: The president is wrong in several respects. First of all, the military aspect of the surge is working. And God bless our troops. They've performed excellently. And any time they engage in battle, we want them to succeed. The president knows that. He shouldn't say we don't want admit that that military aspect of the surge is working.

PELOSI: But the purpose of the surge was to create a secure time for the government of Iraq to make the political change to bring reconciliation to Iraq. They have not done that.

BLITZER: But they've taken some steps...

BLITZER: ... on the Baathists being allowed to come back...

PELOSI: ... baby steps, very late -- . . .

On the floor of the House in February, 2007, Pelosi stated she was against the surge because, she predicted, it would only escalate the violence in Iraq. She and Harry Reid were adamant that we shouldn't be fighting in the midst of a civil war. Once it became clear that our soldiers have been largely successful in bringing peace to Iraq, the words "civil war" were dropped from the Pelosi-Reid vocabulary. On December 20, 2007, Pelosi told reporters: "I think you are going to see a good deal of focus be on why it is that even when you have some military success to establish a secure time when the government can act politically, they still do not act in a way to bring reconciliation in Iraq." Now that the Iraqi government has acted to bring about reconciliation, Pelosi moves the goal posts again.

Evidently, she had the Iraqi government on a double secret time limitation, whereby any reconciliation occurring after December 20, 2007 doesn't count. Pelosi does not bother to explain how the reconciliation is "too little." The Sunni's in the Iraqi government were quite happy with it.

The bottom line, of course, is the goal posts will continue to move as more success is achieved in Iraq. But under no circumstances can the surge or our efforts in Iraq be characterized as "winning" or "succeeding." This is, after all, about partisan political gain for the Democrats to, one, achieve power, and two, discredit conservatives. What is our national security mmatched up against that?

BLITZER: I spoke with General David Petraeus, the U.S. military commander in Iraq. And he pointed to all the statistics showing that casualties are down; stability is coming to the Al Anbar province, elsewhere.

And the increased troops that they sent over for the surge -- they'll be back out by July or so. But he then said this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEN. DAVID PETRAEUS, COMMANDER, MULTINATIONAL FORCES, IRAQ: We will, though, need to have some time to let things settle a bit, if you will, after we complete the withdrawal. We think it would be prudent to do some period of assessment, then, to make decisions.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: He's basically suggesting there should be a pause, this summer, to assess where it stands, so that all of the gains will not have been lost, squandered. Are you open to that?

PELOSI: We will be entering the sixth year of this war in about another month, March 19. It will be five years that we've been in this war, over a year and a half longer than we were in World War II. . . .

In other words, "no" - we need to surrender and time is of the essence. What World War II has to do with this, I do not know. Hostilities in the one other insurgency we fought, the Philipines War, did not end for 14 years. There is a difference between war - fought with incredible violence by standing armies over a short period - and an insurgency where the opposing force tries to hide in the civilian population. That is a nuance Pelosi does not wish to ponder.

PELOSI: . . . Certainly, we have to leave a few people there to protect our embassy, for force protection, to fight the terrorists and that.

This is utter insanity. The Iraqi Defense Minister recently estimated it would take until 2012 until Iraq can achieve complete responsibility for internal security and 2018 until it could control its borders from foreign threat. The only stability that would come to Iraq if we were to leave now would be that imposed by al Qaeda in Sunni regions, by Iran in Baghdad and the Shia south, and by Turkey in the Kurdish north. It would come at the cost of countless lives and have nearly unimaginable ramifications for our foreign policy. We have nearly 150,000 soldiers in Iraq now "fighting terrorists." If she thinks that we can leave a small force in Iraq under the circumstances that would likely ensue, she's nuts. She would be inviting the massacre of our soldiers.

BLITZER: Are you not worried, though, that all the gains that have been achieved over the past year might be lost?

PELOSI: There haven't been gains, Wolf. The gains have not produced the desired effect, which is the reconciliation of Iraq. This is a failure. This is a failure.

This is simply and utter and complete determination to lose in Iraq. I wish Blitzer had asked her to define "reconciliation" if she refuses to acknowledge the security gains, the number of people returning to Iraq, the real Pax Americana descending on Baghdad, the recent de-Baathification law, nor the recent law passed to allow Sunnis to collect pensions as evidence of reconciliation. So what would she accept?

PELOSI: . . . But [U.S. soldiers] deserve better than a policy of a war without end, a war that could be 20 years or longer. And Secretary Gates just testified, in the last 24 hours, to Congress, that this next year in Iraq and Afghanistan is going to cost $170 billion. . . .

There is no such thing as war without end. Wars end in one of three ways. You win (WWII). You convince the other side to stop fighting (WWI, Korea). You lose and leave, and to the victors go the spoils, sooner or later (Vietnam). Guess which option Pelosi is opting for.

And as to the costs to stay, they are high. But what will be the long term costs that we will pay for leaving Iraq to become an Qaeda stronghold in the Sunni area and a sattelite of Iran in the Shia south. What costs will we pay to fight what would be an explosion of terrorism? Which Middle East country or radical religious movement will be deterred by the threat of U.S. force in the future - and what costs will we pay to fend off their conventional - or nuclear - adventursim? Which country will ally themselves with the U.S. against any foe? Nobody has asked yet about the costs of surrender and withdrawal from Iraq will be, yet they quite forseeably outweigh any cost we might pay to succeed there.

In summary, Pelosi has embraced the "culture of corruption" represented by earmarks that she had promised to reform. She didn't drain the swamp; rather, she personally has jumped in for a swim with Jack Murtha. As to the Iraq War, would it be possible for Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and the anti-war crowd to be any more transparent. The games Pelosi and Reid are playing on these critical issues with the American people are a travesty, perhaps approached in scale only by MSM whose complicity is necessary for Pelosi and Reid to pursue this travesty.

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