January 28, 2013

NEWSMAX
DeMint: Obama Pouring Debt on ‘Our Children’
by Amy Woods
January 27, 2013 

Former Republican Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina on Sunday said it’s clear that President Obama “plans to keep spending and borrowing and putting more debt on our children.”

Appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” DeMint also praised former GOP vice presidential nominee and House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan for his comments on the same program regarding the president’s apparent failure to recognize that the U.S. has a fiscal crisis.

DeMint said. “We can show where President Obama’s ideas go. The tax-and-spend and big-government approach has always failed us. Our job as conservatives is to make sure Americans know that, and we need to show it with real people and real faces.”

He called Ryan’s ideas a “complete contrast” to Obama’s.

With respect to foreign policy, the incoming president of the Heritage Foundation said that the United States needs to better understand the root causes of its failures as well as its successes in order to develop coherency and avoid the perception of weakness.

“We don’t understand what North Korea really is doing right now,” DeMint said, referring to nuclear weapons. “It’s not just to provoke us, but it’s a product demonstration for Iran and other countries that want to see if these things work because we know North Korea wants to sell them. Our problem here is a failure to really understand what is motivating these countries.”

Read more: http://goo.gl/sNHo0

TOWNHALL
America Needs a New Birth of Freedom
by Star Parker
January 28, 2013

Journalist Bill Moyers, who worked as an assistant to President Lyndon Johnson, shared memories in a column last year about how his old boss thought about our entitlement programs.

It was under Johnson, who championed the "Great Society" in the 1960s, that a good portion of the runaway government spending we are trying to get under control today originated.

Johnson signed into law Medicare, Medicaid, the War on Poverty programs, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Moyers recounted that for Johnson, Social Security and Medicare "were about a lot more than economics."

He recalls a time when the Johnson administration was supporting retroactive increases in Social Security payments. Moyers said he argued for the increases as economic stimulus. But Johnson called him and said:

"My inclination would be ... that it ought be retroactive as far back as you can get it ... because none of them ever get enough. That they are entitled to it. That's an obligation of ours. It's just like your mother writing you and saying she wants $20, and I always sent mine $100 when she did. I always did it because I thought she was entitled to it. ... We do know that it affects the economy. But that's not the basis to go to the Hill, or the justification. We've got to say that by God you can't treat grandma this way. She's entitled to it and we promised it to her."

I don't think we could have a clearer picture of Johnson's muddled thinking about his job and the role of government, which contributed so much to the problems we have today.

Johnson's words sound so wonderfully compassionate. But let's get things in perspective.

He saw no difference in his relationship and responsibilities toward his own mother, and sending her his own money, and his responsibilities as president of the United States and the relationship of government to citizens.

There is a world of difference between the appropriate responsibility of parents toward their children and children toward their parents, and politicians deciding on how to spend someone else's money for someone else's children, parents or grandparents.

Johnson didn't seem to grasp, or care, about the fact that family and government are two entirely different social institutions that serve very different purposes.

So the Johnson administration years marked not just the beginning of many huge government programs that we can't pay for today, but they also marked a major cultural change where government began displacing family and personal responsibility.

It is no accident that as the American welfare state grew, the American family collapsed.


Read more: http://goo.gl/Dgmfa

BREITBART
Palin: 'We Haven't Yet Begun to Fight!'—Exclusive Interview with Breitbart News
by Stephen K. Bannon
January 26, 2103

In my research for the film I made on Governor Palin, The Undefeated, I was constantly amazed at the anti-establishment stands she took at every step in her rise to power. Moves that a conventional politician would run from, she embraced: in Wasilla, in Juneau, and in the rise of the Tea Party. Her ability to see “over the hill” to what is really important, what really matters, is what sets her apart.

Andrew Breitbart embraced the Governor as a fellow warrior in the long struggle against a detached and venal political/media complex. He lives on in spirit and through the work of those he inspired—including, but not limited to, those who report and contribute at his site.

The Governor has been at the forefront of the fight against the Permanent Political Class and, as such, inspired Peter Schweizer and myself in our work last night on Fox News with Sean Hannity’s special “Boomtown.” We consider ourselves honored at Breitbart News to have her share with us her thoughts on the road ahead in this exclusive Q & A.

1. What's next for you?

Short term: I encourage others to step out in faith, jump out of the comfort zone, and broaden our reach as believers in American exceptionalism. That means broadening our audience. I’m taking my own advice here as I free up opportunities to share more broadly the message of the beauty of freedom and the imperative of defending our republic and restoring this most exceptional nation. We can't just preach to the choir; the message of liberty and true hope must be understood by a larger audience.

Focus on the 2014 election is also imperative. It’s going to be like 2010, but this time around we need to shake up the GOP machine that tries to orchestrate away too much of the will of constitutional conservatives who don’t give a hoot how they do it in DC. DC is out of touch, obviously. Voices on the right like Mark Levin, Rush, and the writers here at Breitbart have come out strongly against the “go along to get along” politicians who wave the white flag before the battle even begins. We’re not going to be able to advance the cause of limited constitutional government unless we deal with these big government enablers on our side. And this all ties into the problem of crony capitalism and the permanent political class in the Beltway. We need to consistently take them on election after election – ever vigilant.

As far as long-term plans, the door is wide open. I know the country needs more truth-telling in the media, and I’m willing to do that. So, we shall see. And always in the center of it all I have an awesome, full, exciting, and large family living in a very unique part of America that keeps me hopping! I love it!

2. Where do you think the country stands at the beginning of the President's 2nd term?

Before the November election I wrote that we all know what Obama’s second term will look like because we’ve seen his first. I said: “We know what we will get from a second Obama term. We will get the same failed policies. We will get Obamacare locked into law. We will get a debt crisis. We will get more inflation and higher gas prices. We will get tax increases. We will get fewer jobs. We will get more small businesses collapsing under the weight of higher taxes and unfair regulation. We will get more corruption and crony capitalism favoring the Obama administration’s friends. We will get less domestic energy development and increased dependence on terrorist sponsoring foreign regimes for our energy needs. We will get a 'blame America first' foreign policy that bows to our enemies and snubs our friends like Israel and leaves America and the world less safe. We will get less opportunity and security for ourselves and for our children.”

Predicting the future has never been easier because here we are! Already we see higher taxes, a stagnant economy, the same inflationary monetary policies, Obamacare looming like a dark cloud over small businesses, yet another demand for “debt ceiling” increases, continued stonewalling about the tragic Benghazi attacks, a Secretary of Defense nominee who has a history of being antagonistic to our ally Israel, and the attack on our Second Amendment rights by an administration that has no respect for the Constitution or the separation of powers.

The problem is that some on the Right are now skittish because of the lost 2012 election. They shouldn’t be. Conservatism didn’t lose. A moderate Republican candidate lost after he was perceived to alienate working class Reagan Democrat and Independent voters who didn’t turn out for him as much as they did for the McCain/Palin ticket in 2008. Granted, those same voters also didn’t turn out for Obama as strongly either. We had an election defined by a biased media plus millions of voters who sat it out in disgust. As long as we allow the media and GOP establishment to tell us who our nominees must be, we can expect to lose. I’m not interested in losing. America’s next generation can’t afford another loss.

3. The MSM have declared both you and the Tea Party dead and buried. Reaction?

I was raised to never retreat and to pick battles wisely, and all in due season. When it comes to defending our republic, we haven’t begun to fight! But we delight in those who underestimate us.

Read more: http://goo.gl/juMNk

January 22, 2013

NEWSMAX

Gingrich: Parts of Obama’s Speech ‘Goofy Left-Wingism’

by Todd Beamon

January 21, 2013

Former GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich told Newsmax late on Monday that 20 percent of President Barack Obama’s second inauguration speech was “goofy left-wingism.”

“Eighty percent was a very good, American speech that Republicans can use to make their case to the American people: the Declaration of Independence, having a good work ethic,” Gingrich, the former House Speaker, told Newsmax in an exclusive interview. “The other 20 percent was just left-wingism.”

Gingrich, who attended the inauguration, was among many GOP legislators and conservatives who shared their opinions on Obama’s second address. Many attacked the speech for its lack of specificity and bipartisan outreach.

As for Gingrich, the former Georgia representative said President Obama’s lack of clarity gave Republicans much fodder as his new term begins.

“For instance, he talked about how children need to feel safe,” he told Newsmax. “One left-wing reporter asked me if it was a call for gun control. I said that it was a call for armed guards in schools. He wasn’t clear.”

This fuzziness marks the foundation of a new, effective GOP strategy, Gingrich said.

“To conservatives, we have a choice,” he added. “Because he talked about having a good work ethic, I’d say: ‘Let’s reform unemployment compensation, with a requirement that you educate yourself so you can get a new job — because we should not be paying people to do nothing’ — and we can cite it as being a part of Barack Obama’s agenda.”

Gingrich likened the 80 percent of the president’s speech to words that might have been spoken by former GOP President Ronald Reagan.

“I’d say, ‘Let’s look at this speech and underline everything you agree with,’” he said. “If Ronald Reagan had given this speech, and you read it — and, not knowing who gave it — you could see that it was almost identical to something he would have said.

“But 20 percent is goofy left-wingism — and we’d cheerfully fight him on that. The whole section about climate change is nonsense. The great energy revolution we’re living through is called ‘oil and gas.’”

“There are portions of his speech that we can totally support,” Gingrich added — and embracing those sections, in particular, “would totally confuse Obama and the Democrats. That’s not quite what the Left expects.”

Meanwhile, Arizona Sen. John McCain expressed displeasure with Obama’s failure to discuss bipartisanship.

“I would have liked to have seen some outreach,” the 2008 GOP presidential candidate told the Los Angeles Times. “This is the eighth [inauguration] that I’ve been to — and always there’s been a portion of the speech where [the president says] ‘I reach out my hand because we need to work together.’ That wasn’t in this speech.”

Read more: http://goo.gl/FO8ki

TOWNHALL
Once a Critic of Deficits, Obama Now Goes for Broke
by Byron York
January 21, 2013

"You don't have to be a deficit hawk to be disturbed by the growing gap between revenues and expenses," said Sen. Barack Obama during a Nov. 3, 2005, debate on the Senate floor. At the time, Obama had been a senator for less than a year and the federal budget deficit was in fact shrinking, from $248 billion in fiscal 2006 to $160 billion in fiscal 2007. Still, Obama seemed deeply concerned about the deficit, and he appeared to believe it when he said the only way to close the shortfalls was to force Congress to pay for what it spends.

A few months later, on March 16, 2006, Obama returned to the same theme -- "You don't have to be a deficit hawk ..." -- in a sobering floor speech as the Senate considered whether to raise the nation's debt ceiling from $8.184 trillion to $8.965 trillion. "The fact that we are here today to debate raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure," Obama said. "It is a sign that the U.S. government can't pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our government's reckless fiscal policies."

The deficit, Obama argued, handcuffed government in many ways. The money paid in interest on the debt was money that could not be spent on education, transportation, disaster relief or many other worthy causes. And borrowing so much from foreign countries meant America's economy would be "tied to the whims of foreign leaders" who might not wish the best for the United States.

"Increasing America's debt weakens us domestically and internationally," Obama concluded. "I therefore intend to oppose the effort to increase America's debt limit."

Obama made good on his promise. Joined by then-Sen. Joe Biden, Senate Democratic leaders Harry Reid, Richard Durbin, Charles Schumer and indeed every other Democrat, Obama voted against raising the debt ceiling. Republicans, who controlled the Senate with a Republican in the White House, voted for the increase, which became law.

Later, as president, Obama admitted his '06 debt ceiling vote was a political maneuver. "That was just an example of a new senator making what is a political vote as opposed to doing what was important for the country," Obama told ABC in April 2011. "As president, you start realizing, 'You know what? We can't play around with this stuff.'"

Read more: http://goo.gl/9wQZ4

BREITBART

Thrill is Gone for Crowds at Obama Inauguration 

by Matthew Boyle

January 21, 2013

NATIONAL MALL, Washington DC—Crowds shuffled in throughout Monday morning and took their places around the National Mall for Barack Obama’s second inauguration as president of the United States. Color-coded tickets separated those who paid to be here from those who wanted to get in for free.

Lines were short. Getting into the ticketed areas was easy for those with the right stubs. Blue, green, gold, yellow, and orange ticket-holders had no problems slipping right up front for the show. But many of those in attendance trudged over to what event organizers called the “Non-Ticketed Mall” area–signifying they didn’t have to pay to be here.

Police and security units blocked off streets around Capitol Hill, forcing swaths of people wishing to see Obama take the oath of office again to walk or use the Washington, D.C., subway system–known as the “Metro.”

The air was frosty, a freezing cold that Washington, D.C. doesn’t normally endure. A biting wind exacerbated the chill. Cloudy skies prevented sun from shining through. But the weather wasn’t the only gloom in town.

“I could have just stayed home and watched this all on TV,” one woman complained into her cell phone near Breitbart News’ Kerry Picket, amid negative comments about the freezing air and lack of nearby places to eat.

Every so often along the lengthy path around the event area, a hustler peddling “Official Obama 2013 Inauguration programs” would pressure groups of people to purchase their booklets. Not many fell for it.

Obama buttons, tee shirts, and other political paraphernalia were for sale too, as were artistic photos and drawings of the first family. One vendor on C Street Southeast sold candy apples. “Get your Obama caramel apples here!” the man shouted as people walked past him from the Capitol South Metro stop right across the street from the Republican National Committee’s headquarters.

Closer to the mall, savvier peddlers pitched tents and stood up tables to push to their products. Cops told some of the tent-pitchers they needed to remove their setups because they weren’t supposed to be there without a permit. “You’ll be arrested if you don’t move this within half an hour,” a police officer told one merchandise cart owner on Seventh Street Southwest.

On a corner opposite that cart, two men laid out posters of Barack and Michelle Obama. “Can I have this dance?” read one caption on a sheet showing the president and first lady kissing with a heart design around them. Stacks of photos laid on the grass there, unsold. When this reporter moved to snap a photo of their posters on the ground, one of the men turned around and said with a bit of a desperate tone: “Are you interested in any of these? No pictures, you have to buy it.”

Compared to Obama’s 2009 inauguration, something was missing. The crowds carried an air of obligation. Those who made the trek to Washington for the day appeared to have done so because they were supposed to, not because they wanted to.

“It’s the re-inauguration of the first black president,” one man said into his cell phone while trekking around the mall, appearing to defend his decision to show up for whoever was speaking in his ear.

Excitement was lacking. Energy was non-existent. The magic that only Obama could bring to a country, like he did in 2008, was gone. Unemployment remains as high as when Obama first took office, and gas prices are even higher. The president’s approval ratings are still low.

Read more: http://goo.gl/m0Rjs

January 3, 2013

 

NEWSMAX
Bowles, Simpson: 'Washington Missed Magic Moment’ on Budget
by Newsmax Wires
January 2, 2013

Budget-deficit-reduction devotees Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson rue Congress’ inability to come up with a more comprehensive fiscal-cliff solution than the one it just passed.

While the deal represents a “small step forward” for deficit reduction, “it’s truly a missed opportunity to do something big to reduce our long-term fiscal problems,” the duo say in a statement issued by Fix the Debt, a group they founded.

Bowles was chief of staff for President Bill Clinton, and Simpson is a retired Wyoming Republican senator. They headed a panel on deficit reduction appointed by President Barack Obama in 2010. But their recommendations essentially went nowhere.

As for fiscal cliff negotiations, “Washington missed this magic moment to do something big to reduce the deficit, reform our tax code and fix our entitlement programs,” the two say. “Even after taking the country to the brink of economic disaster, Washington still could not forge a common-sense bipartisan consensus on a plan that stabilizes the debt.”

Government leaders now must summon up the courage for real tax and entitlement reform to begin curbing the $16 trillion public debt, Bowles and Simpson say.

They aren’t totally discouraged. “We take some encouragement from the statements by the president and leaders in Congress that they recognize more work needs to be done,” the two say.

But “to reach an agreement, it will be absolutely necessary for both sides to move beyond their comfort zone.”

Read more: http://goo.gl/b6ZOU

WASHINGTON POST
Our decadent democracy
by George Will
January 2, 2012

Connoisseurs of democratic decadence can savor a variety of contemporary dystopias. Because familiarity breeds banality, Greece has become a boring horror. Japan, however, in its second generation of stagnation is fascinating. Once, Japan bestrode the world, jauntily buying Rockefeller Center and Pebble Beach. Now Japanese buy more adult diapers than those for infants.

America has its lowest birth rate since at least 1920 — family formation and workforce participation (which hit a 30-year low last year) have declined in tandem. But it has an energy surplus, the government-produced overhang of housing inventory is shrinking and the average age of Americans’ cars is an astonishing 10.8 years. Such promising economic indicators, however, mask the country’s democratic decadence, as explained by the Hudson Institute’s Christopher DeMuth in the Dec. 24 Weekly Standard:

Deficit spending once was largely for investments — building infrastructure, winning wars — which benefited future generations, so government borrowing appropriately shared the burden with those generations. Now, however, continuous borrowing burdens future generations in order to finance current consumption. Today’s policy, says DeMuth, erases “the distinction between investing for the future and borrowing from the future.”

It is now as clear as it is unsurprising that most Americans will be spared the educational experience of “fiscal cliff”-related tax increases and spending cuts, which would have been a small but instructive taste of the real costs of the entitlement state.

Still, December’s maneuverings taught three lessons.

First, there will be no significant spending restraint. Democrats — you know: the people respectful of evidence and science — even rejected a more accurate measurement of the cost of living that would slightly slow increases in myriad government benefits. Accuracy will be sacrificed to liberalism’s agenda of government growth.

Second, Barack Obama has (as Winston Churchill said of an adversary) “the gift of compressing the largest amount of words into the smallest amount of thought.” His incessant talking swaddles one wee idea — raising taxes on “millionaires and billionaires,” including people earning less than half a million. He has nothing pertinent to say about the steadily worsening fiscal imbalance that will make sluggish growth — less than 3 percent — normal.

Third, one December winner was George W. Bush because a large majority of Democrats favored making permanent a large majority of his tax cuts. December’s rancor disguised bipartisan agreement: Both parties flinch from cliff-related tax increases and spending decreases. But neither the increases nor decreases would have tamed the current $1 trillion-plus budget deficit nor made a discernible dent in the 87-times-larger unfunded liabilities of the entitlement state.

This state cannot be funded by taxing “the rich.” Or even by higher income taxes on the middle class. Income taxes cannot fund the government liberals want, and they dare not seek the consumption and energy taxes their entitlement architecture requires. Hence, although Republicans are complicit, Democrats are ardent in embracing decadent democracy. This consists not just of infantilism — refusing to will the means for the ends one has willed — but also of willing an immoral means: conscripting the wealth of future generations.

As economists Glenn Hubbard and Tim Kane explain in National Affairs quarterly, the U.S. political system “cannot govern the entitlement state” that “exists largely to provide material benefits to individuals.” Piling up unsustainable entitlement promises — particularly, enactment of Medicare in 1965 and the enrichment of Social Security benefits in 1972 — has been improvident for the nation but rational for the political class. The promised expenditures, far in excess of revenue, would come due “beyond the horizon of political consequences.”

“Our politicians,” say Hubbard and Kane, “are acting rationally” but “politically rational behavior is now fiscally perverse.” Both parties are responding to powerful electoral incentives to neither raise taxes nor cut spending. Hence, “the clash over raising the debt limit that gripped Washington during the summer of 2011 was just the beginning, not the end, of our fiscal woes.”

But the perils of the entitlement state are no longer (in Hubbard’s and Kane’s words) “safely beyond the politicians’ career horizons.” Furthermore, a critical mass of Republicans reject the careerists’ understanding of “politically rational” behavior. These Republicans have a different rationale for being in politics.

The media, which often are the last to know things because their wishes father their thoughts, say the tea party impulse is exhausted. Scores of House Republicans and seven first-term Republican senators (Rand Paul, Mike Lee, Pat Toomey, Ted Cruz, Ron Johnson, Marco Rubio and Tim Scott) will soon — hello, debt ceiling — prove otherwise.

Read more: http://goo.gl/LsuW5

BREITBART
Can Boehner Hang onto His Job?
by Matthew Boyle
January 3, 2013

The Speaker of the House will be elected today and some conservatives believe they have the votes necessary to oust John Boehner. In an appearance on CNBC, American Majority Action spokesman Ron Meyer said there are more than 20 House Republicans willing to vote for someone other than Boehner on Thursday when the 113th Congress convenes to elect a Speaker. Another source from a different organization has similarly confirmed that more than 20 have planned to oppose Boehner.

Meyer and AMA correctly predicted Republican opposition to Boehner’s fiscal cliff “Plan B" and the overwhelming House Republican opposition to Vice President Joe Biden’s and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s fiscal cliff deal that passed the House on Tuesday evening.

Outgoing Louisiana Republican Rep. Jeff Landry made a similar prediction earlier in the evening, telling Breitbart News that between the required minimum 17 members and 20 were on board at that point.

Despite rumors that he might do so, Boehner did not resign at a Republican conference meeting Wednesday night.

The reason why some, including Landry, thought Boehner would resign Wednesday is because that group of members supposedly approached Boehner and offered him a way to avoid the public fight that will likely take place on Thursday. An emergency Republican conference meeting was called on Wednesday evening and Boehner’s decision not to resign sent a message to those who want to unseat him that he believes he will survive tomorrow's vote.

Freshman Rep. Steve Stockman of Texas is on the record publicly stating he’ll oppose Boehner on Thursday, but the members also need a leader to rally around. Though there has been speculation that House Majority Leader Eric Cantor may emerge, his spokesperson would not respond to Breitbart News’ inquiries about whether he would. House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy also would not go on the record as supportive of Boehner.

But, as Breitbart News reported weeks ago, the document containing the conservative plan to unseat Boehner notes that those members involved expect a new leader to emerge if Boehner were to lose a first election for Speaker (there are potentially multiple votes).

Meyer said in a statement Wednesday evening that his sources are "very Conservative members” and that they "remain optimistic that Speaker Boehner will lose his job tomorrow.” He also noted that sources behind the rumor that Boehner would resign Wednesday night were "different sources than the ones that helped AMA correctly predict the exact vote counts for Plan B and the Biden-McConnell bill.”

Boehner has made concessions to the conservatives seeking his ouster – a sign he's worried about his job. He caved on the Hurricane Sandy package after originally killing Cantor’s efforts to bring the bill to a vote after the “fiscal cliff” package Tuesday evening. After outrage from Reps. Peter King and Michael Grimm from New York, Boehner now will allow a vote on a Sandy package on Friday.

Boehner also, through a spokesman, renewed an old promise he made – but broke. Boehner said he won’t negotiate with the president on his own anymore, and will let the House follow the regular order. "He is recommitting himself and the House to what we've done, which is working through regular order and letting the House work its will,” a Boehner aide told The Hill.

Boehner made a similar promise during an interview with National Journal’s Major Garrett in October 2010, before the Tea Party wave swept Republicans into the House majority – and Boehner into the Speaker’s office. Boehner promised to follow the three-day rule – meaning legislation wouldn’t come to the floor until it was available for three days for members and the public to read – a promise he broke yet again with the “fiscal cliff” deal.

The Budget Control Act of 2011 – the legislation that carved the so-called “fiscal cliff” into law – was negotiated behind-closed-doors between the president and the Speaker. Boehner has also conducted negotiations on each Continuing Resolution (CR) – the legislation that funds the government in absence of a budget – directly with the White House.

We were each elected to uphold the Constitution and represent 600,000-odd people in our districts. We need to open this place up, let some air in. We have nothing to fear from letting the House work its will–nothing to fear from the battle of ideas. That starts with the committees. The result will be more scrutiny and better legislation.”

But now that he’s in trouble, he’s making the same promises again.

Stockman, for one, is not opposing Boehner because he doesn't like the Speaker as a person, but because he believe he’s failed the conservative cause. “We cannot tolerate betrayal of conservative principle and economic reality,” the Texas Congressman wrote in blog post according to the Dallas Morning News, adding that Boehner is a “decent man” who didn’t get the job done.

Landry made a similar argument in an op-ed for Breitbart News on Wednesday. “Thanks to the leadership of Speaker John Boehner, the House passed a bill which raises taxes by $620 billion while cutting spending by a mere $15 billion over 10 years,” Landry wrote. “Usually, a compromise is an even trade (one-for-one). In this trade, House and Senate Republicans traded $41 dollars in tax hikes for every $1 dollar in spending cuts—not exactly a balanced approach.”

Read more: http://goo.gl/7zDul

December 29, 2012

NEWSMAX
McConnell and Reid Called in to Come up With Fiscal Cliff Deal
by Thomson/Reuters
December 28, 2012

Senate leaders are working to craft legislation by Sunday that averts the year-end "fiscal cliff" of tax hikes and spending cuts, but many details needed to be worked out after a crucial meeting with President Barack Obama on Friday.
Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid and his Republican counterpart Mitch McConnell, termed the meeting "constructive" and "positive" and said they would keep working on trying to find a solution over the weekend.

However shortly afterwards Reid said he would be sending a bill to the Senate calling for an end to the Bush-era tax cuts for households earning more than $250,000, a figure that Republicans have repeatedly said they will not accept.

"At President Obama's request, I am readying a bill for a vote by Monday that will prevent a tax hike on middle-class families making up to $250,000, and that will include the additional, critical provisions outlined by President Obama," Reid said in a statement.

"In the next 24 hours, I look forward to hearing any good-faith proposals Senator McConnell has for altering this bill."

After adjourning on Friday, Reid he would probably not call the Senate back into session until about 1 p.m. on Sunday to give leaders time to hash out a deal.

On the Senate floor, McConnell said, "We are engaged in discussions, the majority leader and myself and the White House, in the hopes that we can come forward as early as Sunday and have a recommendation that I can make to my conference and the majority leader can make to his conference."

"So we'll be working hard to try to see if we can get there in the next 24 hours. So I'm hopeful and optimistic," he added.

An aide to House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner said it was agreed at the White House meeting that the Senate should act first.

"The speaker told the president that if the Senate amends the House-passed legislation and sends back a plan, the House will consider it — either by accepting or amending," the aide said.

However, Reid said it would be difficult to craft a solution that can win passage in both the House and Senate, adding that it involves "big numbers."

"Whatever we come up with is going to be imperfect," Reid said. "Some people aren't going to like it. Some people will like it less. But that's where we are and I feel confident that we have an obligation to do the best we can."

Read more: http://goo.gl/lKKlm

TOWNHALL
Senate Approves $60.4 Billion Sandy Aid Bill
by AP News
December 29, 2012

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate on Friday approved a $60.4 billion emergency spending aid package for victims of Hurricane Sandy that had been backed by Senate Democrats.

Democrats had to turn back Republican efforts to cut programs such as $150 million in fisheries aid that Republican lawmakers said was unrelated to the storm that hammered the East Coast late in October. The measure cleared the Senate on a 62-32 vote, with 12 Republicans supporting the bill. Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., was the only Democrat to vote against the bill, but he later switched his vote to support the measure.

The bill faces uncertain prospects in the House, where GOP leaders appear reluctant to move quickly on a big spending bill in the final days of a lame duck session. Congress' attention is focused on talks over the so-called fiscal cliff of tax hikes and automatic spending cuts.

Sandy was blamed for at least 120 deaths and battered coastline areas from North Carolina to Maine. New York, New Jersey and Connecticut were the hardest hit states and suffered high winds, flooding and storm surges. Sandy damaged or destroyed more than 72,000 homes and businesses in New Jersey. In New York, 305,000 housing units were damaged or destroyed and more than 265,000 businesses were affected.

Senate Republicans failed on an amendment for a smaller package of about $24 billion in aid for Sandy, which was the most costly natural disaster since Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and one of the worst storms ever in the Northeast.

House GOP leaders have not said how they plan to proceed. But House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers of Kentucky has said Congress should probably begin with a smaller aid package for immediate recovery needs and wait until more data can be collected about storm damage before approving additional money next year.

Rep. Paul Ryan, the 2012 GOP vice presidential nominee and a leading House fiscal conservative, has criticized the Democratic bill as "packed with funding for unrelated items, such as commercial fisheries in American Samoa and roof repair of museums in Washington, D.C."

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., urged House leaders to "put this bill on the floor quickly and allow a vote." If the House balks, Schumer said, the Senate bill provides "very good groundwork" for seeking Sandy aid next year.

The measure includes $11.5 billion for the Federal Emergency Management Agency's chief disaster relief fund and $17 billion for community development block grants, much of which would help homeowners repair or replace their homes. Another $11.7 billion would help repair New York City's subways and other mass transit damage and protect them from future storms. Some $9.7 billion would go toward the government's flood insurance program. The Army Corps of Engineers would receive $5.3 billion to mitigate flood future risks and rebuild damaged projects.

Senate Republicans said much of the spending in the Democratic bill was for projects unrelated to Sandy, such as $150 million for fisheries disasters that could go to Alaska as well as Gulf Coast and New England states. Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., sought to strip the fisheries funding, but his amendment failed.

To court votes, Democrats last week broadened some of their bill's provisions to cover damage from Hurricane Isaac, which struck the Gulf Coast earlier this year. A provision was added to the $2.9 billion allotted to Army Corps of Engineers projects to reduce future flooding risks; the coverage area for that program will now include areas hit by Isaac in addition to Sandy. Democrats also shifted $400 million into a community development program for regions suffering disasters, beyond areas struck by Sandy.

A Coburn amendment to reduce the federal share of costs for the Army Corps of Engineer projects to reduce future flooding risks also failed.

Read more: http://goo.gl/dQevo

WASHINGTON TIMES
Washington spenders flunk basic math - Raising taxes won’t avoid ‘fiscal cliff’
by Rep. Darrell E. Issa
December 28, 2012

Politicians in Washington have spent the better part of the past two months advancing a myth that is undermining one of the most important public policy debates in recent memory. It’s a myth that is coming at the expense of solutions based on common sense that could return us to balance and fiscal stability.

Twenty-six years ago, President Reagan implemented significant tax reforms that lowered the individual income tax rate, limited deductions and brought equality to tax rates across all levels. Before that reform, there had been 15 different marginal tax rates reaching levels as high as 50 percent for top brackets. By the time Reagan left office, the number of brackets had been reduced to two: 15 percent and 28 percent.

In 1993, President Clinton raised the top two income rates to 36 percent and 39.6 percent while also raising the corporate tax rate, increasing the taxable portion of Social Security benefits and increasing income taxable for Medicare. This is what has become known as the “Clinton tax rates.”

In 2001, President George W. Bush changed the rate from 39.6 percent to 35 percent, lowered the capital gains and dividend income rates, and expanded credits and deductions such as the Child Tax Credit and the Earned Income Tax Credit.

So much time and energy is being spent advancing the myth that raising taxes is the best way to avoid falling off the so-called “fiscal cliff.”

If you raised taxes on the top income bracket, you would generate around $1 trillion over 10 years. The past four years under President Obama have resulted in trillion-dollar deficits each year. At this rate, in 10 years we’re looking at $10 trillion in new debt. At best, the “tax-the-rich” proposal is just a 10 percent solution.

Let’s take this tax-more, spend-more approach to the extreme. If you return everyone to the Clinton-era tax rates, you’re still left with a 10-year, $2.3 trillion deficit, and that’s assuming everything stays as it is right now, and Washington breaks its trend of spending more every year. (Even if we go over the fiscal cliff and return to Clinton-era tax rates, we’re still left with at least a $2.3 trillion deficit over the next 10 years.) The bottom line is this: Under no proposed scenario does raising taxes eliminate the deficit and return us to a balanced budget. The problem is government spending.

This fixation with tax increases is doing a huge disservice to the American people because it ignores the real crisis: government spending. By now, you know all too well that government spends more than it takes in. The federal government is spending more per household than ever before. Since 1965, spending per household has grown by 152 percent.

Conveniently omitted from the current fiscal-cliff discussions is the reality that for individuals earning more than $200,000 a year, their taxes already are going up in 2013, courtesy of Obamacare, which includes a new 1 percent tax on persons making more than $200,000 a year as well as an additional 3.8 percent tax on capital gains, investment income and certain home sales. These two new taxes will generate $317.7 billion over a 10-year period, or $31 billion a year — covering just a fraction of the current $1.1 trillion deficit for fiscal 2012 alone.

Do you know what some in Washington will say 10 years from now, when the problem hasn’t gone away? They’ll say, “We need to tax more.” Why isn’t the solution ever about spending less?

Some in Washington aren’t interested in the truth. They aren’t interested in facts. They aren’t interested in solving the problem. For them, that’s bad for business. It’s much easier for them to keep kicking the can down the road and using our fiscal decline to essentially “cry wolf” and raise your taxes. When will it ever stop?

I can guarantee you this: It won’t stop here, it won’t stop with just the “1 percent” or the “2 percent.” There will never be enough to satisfy this insatiable appetite to spend more.

That’s what’s really at stake right now.

The other side tries to boil this down into a seven-second sound bite about taxing the rich and people paying their fair share. In 2009, the top 10 percent of earners in the United States already paid more than 70 percent of federal income taxes.

This isn’t about fairness and unfairness. It’s about taxing and spending, and the federal government has spent enough.

Read more: http://goo.gl/Zi0b6

December 20, 2012

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
America's Dangerous Powerball Economy
by Arthur Brooks
December 19, 2012

What can the state lottery teach us about how to deal with the fiscal cliff? Quite a bit, actually.

Last month, two families in Missouri and Arizona had their dreams come true when they shared the largest Powerball lottery jackpot in history: $587 million. "We are truly blessed," one of the winners told the press.

Perhaps. People always imagine all the nice things that would happen to them if they won the lottery: They would travel more, buy a beautiful home, start a foundation or quit a tiresome job. Rarely do people say, "If I won the lottery, I'd marry somebody who doesn't love me, buy a bunch of things I don't really want, and then start an ugly alcoholic spiral."

But hitting the jackpot generally leads to unhappiness. A famous 1978 study of major lottery winners in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology showed that while the winners experienced an immediate happiness boost right after winning, it didn't last. Within a few months, their happiness levels receded to where they had been before winning. As time passed, they found they were actually less happy than they had been before winning.

Does this suggest that money makes us unhappy? Not at all. There is a huge amount of research showing that money, when earned, has a generally positive association with happiness. The problem is when it is unearned, when raw purchasing power is untethered from hard work and merit. Above basic subsistence, happiness comes not from money per se, but from the value creation it is rewarding.

The University of Chicago's General Social Survey reveals that people are twice as likely to feel "very happy" about their lives if they feel "very successful" or "completely successful" at work, rather than "somewhat successful." The differences persist whether they earn more or less income.

Entrepreneurs of all types rate their well-being higher than do members of all other professional groups in America, according to years of polling by the Gallup organization. And it's not because of the money. The employment website CareerBuilder.com reported in 2011 that small business owners made 19% less per year than government managers.

While earned success facilitates the pursuit of happiness, unearned transfers generally impede it. According to the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, going on the welfare rolls increases by 16% the likelihood of a person saying he or she has felt inconsolably sad over the past month (even after controlling for poverty and unemployment). A study by economist John Ifcher at Santa Clara University shows that single mothers who were required by the 1990s welfare reform to work for their benefits—and therefore lost leisure time, had to find child care and the like—were still significantly happier about their lives after the reforms than before.

All this data relates to our policy debates because every year, fewer and fewer people earn their way in America without a government subsidy. As my colleague Nicholas Eberstadt has written, entitlements have doubled as a percentage of the ballooning federal budget since 1960. Today, more than half of American households receive government transfer benefits.

And this isn't just a case of senior citizens taking the Social Security they have paid for. Unearned transfers are exploding. Consider that the number of Americans receiving disability benefits has increased almost 20-fold since 1960, to 8.6 million today from 455,000. The Tax Foundation notes that nearly 70% of Americans now take more out of the tax system than they pay into it.

It is a simple fact that the United States is becoming an entitlement state. The problem with this is not just that it is bankrupting the country. It is that the entitlement state is impoverishing the lives of the growing millions dependent on unearned resources. The good news is that we have a golden opportunity to rein in entitlements, for the first time in many years.

But there is bad news, too. President Obama argues that the real problem is undertaxing the public, not overspending on entitlements. He is currently asking Congress for $1.3 trillion in tax increases over a decade but less than $1 trillion in spending cuts—largely deferred, meaning much of that may not even take place. A study by Ernst & Young shows that Mr. Obama's proposed tax hikes would force small businesses to eliminate about 710,000 jobs.

Mr. Obama's proposal suggests he is entirely comfortable with an entitlement state. His telling entrepreneurs that they weren't responsible for their success on the specious grounds that government was responsible for the country's infrastructure—"You didn't build that"—wasn't just an inartful turn of phrase. It implied he is blind to the moral difference between what is earned and what is unearned.

Before us today is a chance to improve the true welfare of our nation while changing our overspending ways. By reforming entitlements and the tax system instead of extracting more money with higher tax rates, the economy could be reoriented away from unearned transfers to earned wages. This would make the economy fairer and sounder. And in the process it could build a happier country for ourselves and our children.

Read more: http://goo.gl/nYVqT

AMERICAN THINKER
A Crack in Obama's Armor?
by Matt C. Abbott
December 20, 2012
Just when you're about to give up entirely on the federal courts, a small sign of hope emerges.

From The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty:

Today [Dec. 18], a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. handed Wheaton College and Belmont Abbey College a major victory in their challenges to the HHS mandate. Last summer, two lower courts had dismissed the Colleges' cases as premature. Today, the appellate court reinstated those cases, and ordered the Obama Administration to report back every 60 days-starting in mid-February-until the Administration makes good on its promise to issue a new rule that protects the Colleges' religious freedom. The new rule must be issued by March 31, 2013.... 

'This is a win not just for Belmont Abbey and Wheaton, but for all religious non-profits challenging the mandate,' said [Kyle Duncan, general counsel of The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty]. 'The government has now been forced to promise that it will never enforce the current mandate against religious employers like Wheaton and Belmont Abbey and a federal appellate court will hold the government to its word.'

A win? Perhaps. Still, I think it's a bit premature to declare victory. One can hope that these legal challenges to the HHS mandate are making the Obama administration sweat a little, so to speak. Or maybe the president will actually have a pang of conscience. After all, the least he can do is allow for authentic religious freedom here in the United States of America.

As Pope Benedict XVI recently stated, religious freedom is a fundamental human right. (Granted, I'm not holding my breath that the president will embrace the pope's wisdom.) In his message for the 46th World Day of Peace on Dec. 14, the pope said:

'One of the fundamental human rights, also with reference to international peace, is the right of individuals and communities to religious freedom. 

'At this stage in history, it is becoming increasingly important to promote this right not only from the negative point of view, as freedom from-for example, obligations or limitations involving the freedom to choose one's religion-but also from the positive point of view, in its various expressions, as freedom for-for example, bearing witness to one's religion, making its teachings known, engaging in activities in the educational, benevolent and charitable fields which permit the practice of religious precepts, and existing and acting as social bodies structured in accordance with the proper doctrinal principles and institutional ends of each. 

'Sadly, even in countries of long-standing Christian tradition, instances of religious intolerance are becoming more numerous, especially in relation to Christianity and those who simply wear identifying signs of their religion.'

Read more: http://goo.gl/8DGSs

NATIONAL REVIEW
The New Racial-Derangement Syndrome
by Victor Davis Hanson 
December 20, 2012

There is a different sort of racialist derangement spreading in the country — and it is getting ugly.

Here is actor Jamie Foxx joking recently about his new movie role: “I kill all the white people in the movie. How great is that?” Reverse white and black in the relevant ways and even a comedian would hear national outrage. Instead, his hip Saturday Night Live audience even gave Foxx applause.

Race-obsessed comedian Chris Rock tweeted on the Fourth of July, “Happy white peoples [sic] independence day . . . ”

Actor Samuel L. Jackson, in a recent interview, sounded about as unapologetically reactionary as you can get: “I voted for Barack because he was black. . . . I hope Obama gets scary in the next four years.”
No one in Hollywood used to be more admired than Morgan Freeman, who once lectured interviewers on the need to transcend race. Not now, in the new age of racial regression. Freeman has accused Obama critics and the Tea Party of being racists. He went on to editorialize on Obama’s racial bloodlines: “Barack had a mama, and she was white . . . very white, American, Kansas, middle of America . . . America’s first black president hasn’t arisen yet.”

Freeman’s racial-purity obsessions were echoed on the CNN website, where an ad for the network’s recent special report on race included a crude quote from three teen poets: “Black enough to be a n. White enough to be a good one.”

In the 21st century, are we returning to the racial labyrinth of the 19th-century Old Confederacy, when we measured our supposed racial DNA to the nth degree? Apparently, yes. ESPN sports commentator Rob Parker blasted Washington Redskins quarterback Robert Griffin III last week for admirably stating that he did not wish to be defined by his race rather than by his character: “He’s black, he does his thing, but he’s not really down with the cause.” Parker added: “He’s not one of us. He’s kind of black, but he’s not really like the kind of guy you really want to hang out with.” (ESPN suspended Parker for his remarks.)

Unfortunately, the new racialist derangement is not confined to sports and entertainment. The Reverend Joseph Lowery — who gave the benediction at President Obama’s first inauguration — sounded as venomous as the Reverend Jeremiah Wright in a speech that Lowery delivered to a black congregation shortly before this year’s election: “I don’t know what kind of a n***** wouldn’t vote with a black man running.” Lowery reportedly preceded that rant by stating that when he was younger, he believed that all whites were going to hell, but now he merely believes that most of them are. And in his 2009 inauguration prayer, Lowery ended with his hopes for a future day when “white will embrace what is right.”

Wasn’t Obama’s election supposed to mark a new post-racial era? What happened?

Read more: http://goo.gl/IGO7b

December 19, 2012

NEWSMAX

Mark Foley: Boehner’s ‘Surrender’ Inevitable in Fiscal-Cliff Talks

by By Todd Beamon and Kathleen Walter

December 18, 2012

Former U.S. Rep. Mark Foley tells Newsmax TV that House Speaker John Boehner is “going to have to wave the white flag of surrender” and accept tax increases to reach a deal with President Barack Obama to avert the fiscal cliff expected to occur at the end of the year.

“We have a spending problem more than we have a revenue problem, but there’s got to be a decision to be made to get a little bit of both,” Foley, the popular Florida Republican who resigned his seat in 2006 after five terms, tells Newsmax in an exclusive interview. “We’ve got a divided Congress. We’ve got a Democratic presidency, we’ve got a Democratic Senate and we’ve got a Republican-led House.

“We can bay at the moon as long as we want. We’re going to hit the fiscal cliff. So, Boehner has to concede,” he added. “Boehner’s going to have to wave the white flag of surrender, that we’re going to allow some additional revenue — but I would suggest the Democrats better, including the president, figure out what we’re doing with entitlements, work on reducing some defense spending — waste, fraud, and abuse — and find a way to not just simply say we’re going to keep spending, spending, spending.”


Boehner is not wrong to consider revenue increases in his talks with Obama, Foley said.

“Most people don’t use a million-dollar homestead exemption to deduct interest from their income. If you adjusted that to $500,000 to properly reflect what the average homeowner needs in a mortgage deduction, you could reduce that exemption and bring in a lot of cash revenue,” Foley said. “Technically, yes, that’s a tax increase on those who have more than $500,000 in mortgage loans, but shouldn’t we design a program that benefits the majority rather than a select few?

“Let’s design a tax code that satisfies the broad middle class. The rich, if they lose a little deduction, aren’t going to notice it. The poor aren’t taking advantage of it. It’s the middle class that we protect by doing so. When you allow that to happen, you raise revenue so then we have a chance to fill in the deficit.

“But if the Democrats are allowed to spend that enhanced revenue, then you’ve really at zero as far as an accomplishment,” Foley added. “That’s why both sides have to work together. Bring a little bit of revenue through some mechanism of the tax code but, really, dramatically reduce spending — and, there, we see a brighter future for America.

“If it’s simply force Republicans to raise taxes and we don’t want to do anything with spending, then this disaster will continue.”

And, any increase in the nation’s debt ceiling should be tied to a Congressional vote, he said.

“It causes people to reflect on the urgency when there’s that debt-ceiling limit, because it makes people remind themselves. If you just put it on autopilot, people lose sight of the fact that we’re in a financial free-fall and we are in a dangerous place.

“That’s the reason for credit limits on individual borrowers: to prevent them from going broke. Our nation has to have the same trigger,” Foley said. “So I disagree completely when the president says let me have ultimate power and let me raise the debt ceiling as I need it. Unfortunately, this man would borrow us into the grave.”

Rank-and-file Republicans should give Boehner some slack during these demanding negotiations, Foley said.

“He’s always in jeopardy. You’ve got a majority leader who probably wants his job. You’ve got a majority whip who wants his job. But when that speaker has to make decisions that reflect the best interest of the nation, there are those who are in extraordinarily safe districts who squawk.

“But this man has to control a body of 435, so I hope they give him the flexibility to properly negotiate,” Foley said. “Hopefully, he won’t give up too much — and we will resolve this problem.”

That includes keeping up the pressure for Democrats to make cuts and changes to Social Security and Medicare.

“Social Security is not supposed to be the end all, be all of your retirement,” Foley said. “People say what if they raise the retirement age? I can’t retire until I’m 67. No, you don’t get paid until you’re 67. You can retire when you’re 35. That’s the free will of the environment. You can do anything.

“Yes, there are those that work hard at average jobs — and 67 may be a burden, but we’re living longer, we’re living healthier, and even people now in our generation who turn 65, they don’t want to retire. They want to stay in the workforce until 72. But if it’s going to be around for your child, Timmy, when he needs Social Security, it better be a system that has longevity.

“The same with Medicare,” he added. “You can’t provide every ounce of healthcare to a growing, age-eligible population without some requirement to suggest the wealthier pay a higher premium or take less out. So I don’t begrudge them. That’s one of the most urgent issues.

“Democrats better get to the table and stop the squawking about you’re hurting the elderly because nobody has proposed, including Paul Ryan, to hurt the elderly.”

Read more: http://goo.gl/bHqF6

TOWNHALL
It's the Spending, Stupid
by John Stossel
December 19, 2012

Listening to progressive media pundits, I'd think the most evil man in the universe is Grover Norquist, head of Americans for Tax Reform. His crime? He heads a movement that asks political candidates to pledge not to raise taxes.
I think Grover accomplished a lot. But I wish he'd convinced politicians to pledge not to increase spending.

President Obama says raising taxes to cut the deficit is a "balanced" approach.

Balanced ...

But what's "balanced" about raising taxes after vast increases in spending? Trillions for war, Medicare, "stimulus" and solar panels. Tax receipts rose -- after tax-rate cuts -- from $1.9 billion in 2003 to $2.3 billion in 2008, the year the recession started. That increase couldn't keep up with the spending. The deficit doubled -- actually, more than doubled -- as politicians increased spending to nearly $4 trillion! Our debt, at more than $16 trillion, now exceeds our gross domestic product.

Ludicrous, irresponsible spending is why we're in trouble. As columnist Ron Hart points out, Bill Clinton's balanced budget spent $1.7 trillion. "Adjusted for inflation," he writes, "our federal government would (have) a $200 billion surplus. But instead of increasing government spending in line with normal inflation, under Bush and Obama we are spending $3.8 trillion today. Democrats, who believe we have a 'revenue' problem instead of a 'spending' problem, must also think they have a bartender problem, not a drinking problem."

The media obsess about tax rates, but spending is more important. As Milton Friedman taught us, spending is a far more accurate gauge of the government burden. If government spends a dollar, that dollar is taxed away from someone. If it's borrowed, it's removed from productive use, setting the stage for higher taxes later. If the government prints more dollars to fund spending, our purchasing power falls. Transferring purchasing power from the people to the government via inflation is a form of taxation.

If Republicans and Democrats reach a deal, the tax increases will be real -- but spending "cuts" probably illusions. If they actually happen, they will only be reductions in already planned increases. The Wall Street Journal notes that when the two parties talk about cutting spending by $4 trillion over a decade, "those numbers have no real meaning because they are conjured in the wilderness of mirrors that is the federal budget process. Since 1974, Capitol Hill's 'baseline' has automatically increased spending every year according to Congressional Budget Office projections ... . Tax and spending changes are then measured off that inflated baseline."

Read more: http://goo.gl/WBSJN

THE WASHINGTON POST

Review of Benghazi attack faults ‘grossly’ inadequate security, leadership failures

by Anne Gearan

December 18, 2012

An independent investigation of the fatal attack on a U.S. diplomatic post in Libya on Sept. 11 found that “grossly” inadequate security and reliance on local militias left U.S. diplomats and other personnel vulnerable, the State Department told Congress on Tuesday.

The review of the assault on the mission in Benghazi, Libya, that killed Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans faulted systemic failures of leadership and management deficiencies at senior levels within two bureaus of the State Department, according to an unclassified version posted on the department’s Web site Tuesday night. 

The review by the Accountability Review Board said the temporary, lightly defended compound where Stevens died lacked disciplined oversight of its security operations. The diplomatic post’s ad hoc nature, with inexperienced staff members working there for short periods, “resulted in diminished institutional knowledge, continuity, and mission capacity,” the report said.

Finally, the report said State Department officials in Washington ignored requests from the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli, the Libyan capital, for additional guards and better security for the Benghazi compound, which served as a temporary U.S. consulate for eastern Libya. It also said that there had been worrisome incidents in the weeks before the attack that should have led to increased security, but the report did not identify any specific threats to the compound on Sept. 11.

The report said State Department security personnel on the scene and CIA officers at a nearby annex used as an operations base had responded in a timely and appropriate manner, and it absolved the U.S. military of any blame, saying there was not enough time for a military response that would have made any difference.

Despite the broad security failures, the report did not single out any individual officials as violating procedures and did not recommend any disciplinary action.

The report also concluded that, contrary to initial reports by the Obama administration and by media outlets, there was no protest outside the outpost ahead of the attack and that the assault on the diplomatic compound and the CIA annex was carried out by terrorists.

Stevens and another diplomat, Sean Smith, were killed inside the compound. Two other Americans, CIA contractors Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty, died in the attack on the annex. Ten people were injured in the assault.

The panel’s report “provides a clear-eyed look at serious, systemic challenges,” Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton wrote in letters to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee. She said that the State Department had already begun to address the lapses and that she accepts “every one” of the recommendations for improvement.

Read more: http://goo.gl/JIi4i

December 9, 2012

REAL CLEAR POLITICS
Shock Therapy for Obama's Super-Sized Gov't
by Robert Robb
December 7, 2012

I’ve been having irresponsible thoughts. Or at least I’ve been thinking more favorably about something I have previously denounced as irresponsible: not increasing the federal debt limit.

There is no good end in sight for the non-negotiations to avoid the fiscal cliff. And the impasse goes far deeper than the question that preoccupies the public discussion about whether to increase the tax rates on the affluent.

The tax rate issue is a matter of firmly-held principle and important political symbology on both sides. But it’s not the heart of the impasse.

According to President Obama’s own budget staff, increasing the top two rates to 36 percent and 39.6 percent would only raise $442 billion over ten years, or only about a fifth of the $1.6 trillion in tax increases Obama is demanding.

Obama’s own budget actually proposes to raise significantly more -- $750 billion – through the approach proposed by Republicans in the non-negotiations: limiting the deductions of the affluent. In addition to reinstating the limits that existed prior to the Bush tax cuts, Obama’s budget proposed capping the value of all itemized deductions for the top-two tax rates at 28 percent.

So, as politically important as the rate issue is, resolving it would only reveal an even bigger – and probably irreconcilable – divide. What Obama is really trying to do is to force Republicans to finance – through higher taxes and increased borrowing – the size of the federal government Obama thinks appropriate.

And Obama likes his government supersized. Obama’s budget proposes locking in federal spending at 23 percent of Gross Domestic Product, an unprecedented level since the end of World War II. Obama has proposed no constraints that would bring spending below that level and consistently dismisses as non-starters any such proposals by others.

Obama likes to cite the Clinton economy in support of his positions. But federal spending as a percentage of GDP was just 18 percent at the end of Bill Clinton’s tenure. The difference between Obama-level spending and Clinton-level spending is more than $700 billion a year.

The Simpson-Bowles debt commission recommended that federal spending be brought down to 21 percent of GDP. The difference between Obama-level spending and Simpson-Bowles level spending is around $300 billion a year.

Republicans in the House undoubtedly won’t, and shouldn’t, agree to finance Obama-level spending. After all, they were elected in 2010 to put a brake on Obama’s spending and were returned to power this election.

But where and when to draw the line is substantively and politically dicey. Obama clearly intends to push Republicans to the edge of every cliff – the expiration of the Bush tax cuts and sequestration; maxing out the debt limit – counting on them to blink at the end.

At no point will Republicans have the upper hand politically. But blink each time, and they end up financing Obama-level spending.

So, perhaps it’s time to think about the unthinkable: not increasing the debt limit.

This does not have to mean default. Existing debt can be rolled over under the current limit. Servicing the debt only costs around $250 billion a year, which could be made a priority.

What it would mean is that on-going spending would have to be on a pay-as-you-go basis. Spending would have to be reduced from $3.6 trillion to around $2.8 trillion.

That’s a huge cut. But spending as a percentage of GDP would be close to the 18 percent it was under Clinton. In fact, if the Clinton spending discipline of limiting growth in outlays to around 3 percent a year had been maintained during the profligate presidencies of George W. Bush and Obama, that’s about what the size of the federal budget would be today.

Not increasing the debt ceiling would be shock therapy for the country, with uncertain economic and political ramifications. A more gradual decline in spending as a percentage of GDP, such as proposed in Paul Ryan’s budget or by the Simpson-Bowles commission, would be infinitely preferable and more responsible.

But if the only choices are financing Obama-level spending or shock therapy, then at least some thought has to be given to shock therapy.

Read more: http://goo.gl/Ab1QD

AMERICAN THINKER
Antinomianism: The Soft Heresy
by Daniel Ciofani
December 9, 2012

The election of 2012 fused principles of state and church demanding Americans follow one distinct path. The country chose to follow a path that is fiscally illogical, covetous of private property, dismissive to personal initiative, mythological towards freedom, repentant to a planet, subjugating of the religious to the secular, deadly to the unborn, disrespectful to the sick and aged, encouraging to the sexually deviant, and destructive to family.

So how could our nation, so strongly and freely steeped in Judeo-Christian principles, have chosen such a path willingly? First, let us quickly address the Judeo portion of our heritage. Quite simply, there used to be twelve tribes of Israel. Now there are but two; Judah and Benjamin (and a sprinkling of Dan). So when and why did the other tribes evaporate? This I will leave to the more learned, but I have a hunch that they weren't doing something right.

Let's focus in on our good Christian friends.There are many makes, models, colors, and flavors of Christianity to freely choose from in our society. After five hundred years of reforming, reshaping, and reshaking Christianity, the truth is that there is not much difference among each of the varieties. Oh sure, on paper or parchment there are fundamental differences, but they are difficult for the average laity to describe without stumbling. Rarer yet are clergy who attempt to describe their branch's differences, for fear of losing half their flock.

This can be interpreted as a good thing, however. After all, Christianity started out as one Faith and the spirit of ecumenism fosters all to become one family again. Perhaps the old passage, "There is one Lord, one Faith, and one Baptism" rings truer than ever. Amidst all the church rules and laws, maybe we can agree with Augustine, "Love, and do what you want!"

So how could a Christian faith so unified with other denominations all across the country vote so consistently to outlaw its own historical and religious values? How could Christianity vote for ideas that run counter to mathematical, logical, civil, moral, and Biblical laws? It's really quite simple. It's not that there aren't enough Christians in the country, for there are plenty. It's because Christians are saved! (Or think they are.) Their prayer, song, and presence in the Lord, made possible through the gift of Salvation, calls them to be exempt from earthly laws. In short, many Christians are practicing a style of Christianity known as Antinomianism. Here is the definition:

an•ti•no•mi•an•ism (noun) 

1. Theology; The doctrine or belief that the Gospel frees Christians from required obedience to any law, whether scriptural, civil, or moral. 

2. The belief that moral laws are relative in meaning and application as opposed to fixed or universal.

In case you are wondering, Antinomianism is a Christian heresy. This gentle and soft heresy is popular for many reasons. First, it's very old. The original Antinomians were Gnostics. They believed that Christianity was a secretive and privileged message that only the learned understood. They were the climate-changers of their day. The Gnostics held those who just didn't get it in contempt. With that secret knowledge, you could do whatever you wanted in this life, because the material world was ultimately unimportant. Antinomianism made a return during the Reformation, and Luther had to formally put the heresy in its place. Sure, the Just shall live by Faith. Sure, good works don't get the job done. However; Faith and bad works means all bets are off. Even the Council of Trent made a case for its specific heresy. All Christians get to clearly understand this one: antinomianism is an equal opportunity Salvation destroyer.

Today Antinomianism is alive and well in all churches. We have all met many Antinomians. They are the Christians comfortable with bankrupting the country and confiscating others' property. They are Christians who somehow believe that Salvation has a quota based on skin color. They are the pro-choice Catholics, and the Anglicans who encourage the homosexual clergy. They include the Lutherans who pray long and hard for their church to finally move from Sola Scriptura to Some-a-Scriptura. They are even the Evangelicals who actively await the destructive end, while not even voting to prevent it. They are Saved, so they do whatever they want, even if it's deadly. All of these Christians use their gift of Faith as an escape valve for their own irresponsible moral, religious, and Biblical decisions and public policy.

And so the next time you attend church, ask your spiritual leader if he or she is an Antinomian. Most will say that they'll have to get back to you on this one, while they go and look it up. When they do respond, they'll contend, of course not! You'll then have to ask them to describe one religious law of the faithful, defended strongly by your church in secular society. If your spiritual leader has no response, then you have met another Antinomian. No matter how the conversation goes, it is common practice for all religious leaders to suggest, for the sake of the Church, that you pray on it. In the meantime, for the sake of the Church, the Devil too, will be preying on it.

Read more: http://goo.gl/AxZze

Luke 6:46 46 “Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?

November 27, 2012

NEWSMAX

Fiscal Cliff in U.S. Raises Risk of Global Recession, OECD Says

by Bloomberg News

November 27, 2012

Failure to prevent the so-called fiscal cliff in the U.S. would increase the risk of a global recession, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said, while adding that the “greatest threats” to the world economy lie in the euro area.

“If the fiscal cliff is not avoided, a large negative shock could bring the U.S. and the global economy into recession,” the Paris-based OECD said in its Economic Outlook report released today.

As the administration of President Barack Obama prepares to negotiate a budget agreement with Republicans in Congress, the OECD urged “smooth” implementation of tax increases, spending curbs and a higher debt ceiling in the medium term.

“Reducing the large federal budget deficit is necessary to restore fiscal sustainability, but this should be done gradually and in the context of a well-identified medium-term consolidation plan,” today’s report said.

The fiscal cliff refers to the $607 billion in federal spending cuts and tax increases scheduled to take effect early next year unless Congress acts. Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said Nov. 16 the deadlock can be resolved “within several weeks” while the uncertainty it has created “already is having an effect on consumer confidence and the economy.”

Absent the automatic spending cuts and most of the tax increases currently set to take effect next year, the U.S. federal deficit would come to $1.04 trillion in fiscal year 2013, the fifth consecutive year of budget gaps exceeding $1 trillion, according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office.

Europe Crisis

The OECD report also said it is “urgent” to solve Europe’s debt crisis.

“In the euro area, where the greatest threats to the world economy remain, progress in adjustment and in strengthening institutions has been significant over the recent past,” the OECD said. “However, challenging fiscal sustainability conditions in some countries risk sparking a chain of events that could considerably harm activity in the monetary union and push the global economy into recession.”

A “major financial event” in the euro zone “would spill over into the rest of the global economy, including the United States,” Pier Carlo Padoan, OECD chief economist, said during a conference call with reporters yesterday.

Federal Reserve

The Federal Reserve should stand ready to enlarge its third round of quantitative easing program if the U.S. economy deteriorates, the OECD said.

“If the economic situation were to turn out significantly worse than expected, the Federal Reserve should further expand the size of its purchases of government and mortgage-backed securities and start purchasing other types of assets if necessary to ease financial conditions,” according to today’s report.

Read more: http://goo.gl/5D57A

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

$16 Trillion Only Hints at the True U.S. Debt

Hiding the government's liabilities from the public makes it seem that we can tax our way out of mounting deficits. We can't.

by Chris Cox and Bill Archer

November 26, 2012

A decade and a half ago, both of us served on President Clinton's Bipartisan Commission on Entitlement and Tax Reform, the forerunner to President Obama's recent National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform. In 1994 we predicted that, unless something was done to control runaway entitlement spending, Medicare and Social Security would eventually go bankrupt or confront severe benefit cuts.

Eighteen years later, nothing has been done. Why? The usual reason is that entitlement reform is the third rail of American politics. That explanation presupposes voter demand for entitlements at any cost, even if it means bankrupting the nation.

A better explanation is that the full extent of the problem has remained hidden from policy makers and the public because of less than transparent government financial statements. How else could responsible officials claim that Medicare and Social Security have the resources they need to fulfill their commitments for years to come?

As Washington wrestles with the roughly $600 billion "fiscal cliff" and the 2013 budget, the far greater fiscal challenge of the U.S. government's unfunded pension and health-care liabilities remains offstage. The truly important figures would appear on the federal balance sheet—if the government prepared an accurate one.

But it hasn't. For years, the government has gotten by without having to produce the kind of financial statements that are required of most significant for-profit and nonprofit enterprises. The U.S. Treasury "balance sheet" does list liabilities such as Treasury debt issued to the public, federal employee pensions, and post-retirement health benefits. But it does not include the unfunded liabilities of Medicare, Social Security and other outsized and very real obligations.

As a result, fiscal policy discussions generally focus on current-year budget deficits, the accumulated national debt, and the relationships between these two items and gross domestic product. We most often hear about the alarming $15.96 trillion national debt (more than 100% of GDP), and the 2012 budget deficit of $1.1 trillion (6.97% of GDP). As dangerous as those numbers are, they do not begin to tell the story of the federal government's true liabilities.

The actual liabilities of the federal government—including Social Security, Medicare, and federal employees' future retirement benefits—already exceed $86.8 trillion, or 550% of GDP. For the year ending Dec. 31, 2011, the annual accrued expense of Medicare and Social Security was $7 trillion. Nothing like that figure is used in calculating the deficit. In reality, the reported budget deficit is less than one-fifth of the more accurate figure.

Why haven't Americans heard about the titanic $86.8 trillion liability from these programs? One reason: The actual figures do not appear in black and white on any balance sheet. But it is possible to discover them. Included in the annual Medicare Trustees' report are separate actuarial estimates of the unfunded liability for Medicare Part A (the hospital portion), Part B (medical insurance) and Part D (prescription drug coverage).

As of the most recent Trustees' report in April, the net present value of the unfunded liability of Medicare was $42.8 trillion. The comparable balance sheet liability for Social Security is $20.5 trillion.

Were American policy makers to have the benefit of transparent financial statements prepared the way public companies must report their pension liabilities, they would see clearly the magnitude of the future borrowing that these liabilities imply. Borrowing on this scale could eclipse the capacity of global capital markets—and bankrupt not only the programs themselves but the entire federal government.

These real-world impacts will be felt when currently unfunded liabilities need to be paid. In theory, the Medicare and Social Security trust funds have at least some money to pay a portion of the bills that are coming due. In actuality, the cupboard is bare: 100% of the payroll taxes for these programs were spent in the same year they were collected.

In exchange for the payroll taxes that aren't paid out in benefits to current retirees in any given year, the trust funds got nonmarketable Treasury debt. Now, as the baby boomers' promised benefits swamp the payroll-tax collections from today's workers, the government has to swap the trust funds' nonmarketable securities for marketable Treasury debt. The Treasury will then have to sell not only this debt, but far more, in order to pay the benefits as they come due.

When combined with funding the general cash deficits, these multitrillion-dollar Treasury operations will dominate the capital markets in the years ahead, particularly given China's de-emphasis of new investment in U.S. Treasurys in favor of increasing foreign direct investment, and Japan's and Europe's own sovereign-debt challenges.

When the accrued expenses of the government's entitlement programs are counted, it becomes clear that to collect enough tax revenue just to avoid going deeper into debt would require over $8 trillion in tax collections annually. That is the total of the average annual accrued liabilities of just the two largest entitlement programs, plus the annual cash deficit.

Nothing like that $8 trillion amount is available for the IRS to target. According to the most recent tax data, all individuals filing tax returns in America and earning more than $66,193 per year have a total adjusted gross income of $5.1 trillion. In 2006, when corporate taxable income peaked before the recession, all corporations in the U.S. had total income for tax purposes of $1.6 trillion. That comes to $6.7 trillion available to tax from these individuals and corporations under existing tax laws.

In short, if the government confiscated the entire adjusted gross income of these American taxpayers, plus all of the corporate taxable income in the year before the recession, it wouldn't be nearly enough to fund the over $8 trillion per year in the growth of U.S. liabilities. Some public officials and pundits claim we can dig our way out through tax increases on upper-income earners, or even all taxpayers. In reality, that would amount to bailing out the Pacific Ocean with a teaspoon. Only by addressing these unsustainable spending commitments can the nation's debt and deficit problems be solved.

Neither the public nor policy makers will be able to fully understand and deal with these issues unless the government publishes financial statements that present the government's largest financial liabilities in accordance with well-established norms in the private sector. When the new Congress convenes in January, making the numbers clear—and establishing policies that finally address them before it is too late—should be a top order of business.

Read more: http://goo.gl/thbZY