Archive for July, 2010

It’s hard to work in Washington and not become increasingly cynical about America’s political system.  Every day, you watch politicians put concern for their careers above concern for the country and its well-being.

And don’t be fooled; nothing has changed since Barack Obama took office.  The nation’s capitol is full of more partisanship than ever, and this week, it was a Democrat who chose his party affiliation over problem-solving.

The culprit is Congressman John Adler (D-NJ).

Adler is one of four Democrats who make up the “Spending and Deficit Reduction Working Group.”  These Democrats are theoretically deficit hawks who “have been growing increasingly frustrated with the lack of action and talking about specifics” when it comes to the issue of balancing our budget.

The members of this group have put forward a number of budget-cutting proposals, one of which was Congressman Adler’s proposal to eliminate the Advanced Earned Income Tax Credit (AEITC).  The AEITC is a way for those who expect to receive a regular Tax Credit to get part of that credit paid to them in every paycheck they receive throughout the year.  However:

A government audit revealed that some 80 percent of recipients did not comply with at least one program requirement; 20 percent had invalid Social Security numbers and thus may not have been eligible for the credit…and of the 60 percent of recipients who did file a return, two-thirds misreported the amount received.

Furthermore, even the White House has acknowledged that the AEITC “has a high error rate and is not widely utilized by eligible taxpayers.”  Eliminating it would save taxpayers $1.1 billion over ten years.

Sounds like a good idea to me – especially coming from a Democrat.

Well, the idea was so popular that approximately a week after it was proposed, it won the House Republican’s latest ‘YouCut’ vote.  ‘YouCut’ is an innovative campaign sponsored by House Republicans to allow the American People to propose and vote on potential federal spending cuts.  Apparently ‘YouCut’ voters thought Rep. Adler’s idea was worthy of consideration.

So, in a true display of bipartisanship, the Republicans brought Adler’s proposal to the floor for a vote.

Congressman Adler voted ‘no.’

Yes, you read that correctly.  Democratic “deficit hawk” John Adler voted against his own proposal to trim the budget.

I’ll give the good Congressman the benefit of the doubt and assume that he didn’t have a complete 180 degree reversal of opinion within a week.

So what could explain this ever so fast flip-flop?

I think I smell some partisan politics in the air.

I’ll admit that I can’t confirm whether or not Speaker Pelosi or Majority Leader Hoyer pulled the good Congressman into one of their offices and told him to get in line or else.  But I find it hard to imagine what else, aside from party loyalty, could have prevented Rep. Adler from voting again his own proposal.

I know that partisanship is nothing new, that many a politician has, voluntarily or under pressure, put party unity above the national welfare.  But when our nation faces a looming fiscal crisis in the frighteningly near future, such political games like this are all the more reprehensible.

Shame on you Congressman.  Shame on you for lacking the courage to stand up for the American People.

By Avi Snyder

“If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.” It has been drilled into our heads by mothers, teachers, and grandmothers for our entire lives. Sadly, the world of Washington exists far away from the pre-school playgrounds where the rule was enforced with stunning efficiency. In DC, politics is the name of the game. Play dirty, skirt the rules, and above all – go negative.

Democrats have fully immersed themselves in this world, leaving behind any notions of playing nice, or even talking policy. In this game the rule is “if you can’t say anything vicious and vile, don’t say anything at all.”  And in the past 18 months, especially when it comes to groups like the Tea Party, he Democrats have done whatever they can brand conservative-minded Americans as extremist, racist, ignorant individuals who have no clue what they really stand for.

The kicker is that despite all the efforts the Democrats have put in to making Tea Partiers out to be radicals, there’s a new poll that undermines their mudslinging.  In the article, Pew notes—to the chagrin of Democrats—the following:

“More voters view the Democratic Party as very liberal than see the Republican Party as very conservative (26% vs. 18%). As a result, the average rating for the Democratic Party’s ideology among all voters is somewhat farther to the left than the Republican Party’s is to the right.”

Interesting.  As Democrats continue to see a decline in their popularity, especially as they head into midterm elections where the chances of them getting quite a beating are increasing by the days pass, their only hope is to try to radicalize the other party’s members. Rather than understand their opponents – fiscally conservative people worried about the direction of our economy and our government – they know it is much easier to win if they marginalize them. Generalize Republicans as a party of corporate loving, tax hating, sometimes racist, uneducated white men who don’t deserve to even exist as a legitimate political party.

Odd then that the majority of people believe Democrats, not Republicans, lean further along the ideological spectrum. In other words, their scheme to radicalize conservatives, is backfiring.

There are several reasons why this the tactics is failing.  For one, the American public views the Democrats as out of touch, not the Republicans.  After all, the Democratic Party is headed by the great Barack Obama, a man who campaigned for president (and won) largely because he painted himself as someone who was himself on the fringe of his group–the political scene.  He was fresh faced, didn’t have a long political record to tarnish his image, and he was charismatic to boot.  The reality of his presidency, however, has left a very bitter taste in the majority of Americans’ mouths, as evidenced by his 48.6% disapproval rating.

Obama has had countless opportunities, especially since his approval ratings slide, to show Americans that he’s capable of being in touch with the country’s needs.  He’s failed every test.  Health care, financial regulation, the oil spill—all examples of a hopelessly out of touch, oblivious president who has done little to show he is able to do what he’s supposed to do: listen to what the people want.

The Democrats’ agenda is not closely aligned to Americans’ viewpoints in general.  With issues ranging from abortion (when Americans now are more pro-life than pro-choice) to health care (where more Americans were against the reform bill in its passage than for it), much of the party’s platform takes a significant amount of manipulation and heavy persuasion for Americans to buy into the ideas.

Before Democrats begin to paint factions of the Republican Party as “radicals”, it’s important to realize why they’re labeling them as such.  In reality, the vast majority of those that are being painted that way is because the Democrats have nothing else to go off of; they do not have a legitimate plan for how to win—or even maintain—their seats in Congress this November.  Their agenda has fallen flat on it sface, despite claims of legislative “victories”, and the voter frustration and anger is palpable…and not dissipating anytime soon.

by Leah Dow

I am growing more convinced every day that Liberals and Democrats live in an entirely different universe than the rest of us.

Whenever I get into an argument with a Democrat friend (yes, I have some) about the national debt, they seem to display a shocking lack of concern about the issue.  They rant and rave about Republicans wanting to privatize Social Security and about the need to keep spending money on more government stimulus, but they don’t seem to have a worry in the world about the consequences of the national debt.

In their world, Republicans’ concern about America’s fiscal future is simply a sneaky strategy to scare Americans into letting us take away their health care and kick grandma to the curb.

But in the universe the rest of us live in, our ever-growing national debt is a real problem, which could create seriously negative consequences for our nation very soon.

Want proof that Republicans and Conservatives aren’t just making this stuff up?  Just read the newest report on the ‘Federal Debt and the Risk of Fiscal Crisis’ put out by the non-partisan federal agency, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO).

The report, released earlier this week, places our current debt in a historical context, describes its likely rate of growth, and, most importantly, details the consequences of having an endlessly growing national debt.

The CBO presented two alternative budget scenarios: the “extended-baseline scenario,” in which current government policy remains virtually unchanged and the more realistic “alternative fiscal scenario,” which takes into account likely changes in current policy (e.g. Congress won’t cut Doctor’s payments under Medicare).

Simply put, either scenario looks dire.  In the “extended-baseline scenario,” our national debt will climb to 80% of GDP within 25 years, which would be its highest since the years immediately after World War II.  In the “alternative fiscal scenario,” the debt will shoot well above its historic high of 110% of GDP, hitting 180% of GDP by 2035.

But what do all these big, scary number mean, you may ask?  Why is it a bad thing to have such a huge debt?  After all, don’t big-time Nobel Prize winners like Paul Krugman not care about a large debt?

Well, Paul Krugman aside, the CBO has outlined the terrible consequences of having such a massive and growing national debt.

First, private investment will be ‘crowded out.’  In laymen’s terms, that means that investors will be buying government debt instead of investing in the private market, resulting in, “a smaller capital stock and lower output and incomes in the long run than would otherwise be the case.”

Second, tax rates will either soar, which would “discourage work and saving, further reducing output and incomes,” or drastic cuts in government benefits will have to occur.

Third, our ability to respond to crises like our last recession will be greatly reduced.  As the report put it:

A large amount of debt…leaves less flexibility for government actions to address financial and economic crises, which, in many countries, have been very costly to the government…A large amount of debt could also harm national security by constraining military spending in times of crisis or limiting the ability to prepare for a crisis.

But none of these terrible consequences, not one, is as bad as the final one the report discusses: a fiscal crisis.

A fiscal crisis occurs when:

[I]nvestors become unwilling to finance all of a government’s borrowing needs unless they are compensated with very high interest rates; as a result, the interest rates on government debt rise suddenly and sharply relative to rates of return on other assets.

In other words, the government loses its ability to finance itself.

Such crises have already occurred in Argentina, Ireland, and, most recently, Greece.  Should the United States face such a crisis, we will have to restructure our debt or inflate our currency.  But both of those options could still lead to a skyrocketing in interest rates and be unsuccessful in staving off a crisis.

Ultimately, we will likely have to enact severe austerity measures like the ones being passed across Europe.  Such measures come with a heavy cost: high taxes, benefit cuts, and harmful economic effects.

What and when could we face such a crisis?

Unfortunately, there is no way to predict with any confidence whether and when such a crisis might occur in the United States; in particular, there is no identifiable tipping point of debt relative to GDP indicating that a crisis is likely or imminent.  But all else being equal, the higher the debt, the greater the risk of such a crisis.

As dire as all these predictions are, the CBO’s report doesn’t leave us without hope.

[T]he sooner that policymakers agree on credible long-term changes to government spending and revenues, and the sooner that those changes are carried out without impeding the economic recovery, the smaller will be the damage to the economy from growing federal debt.

If our government acts quickly, with courage and boldness, we can avert the worst consequences of our national debt.  Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) has already crafted legislation which, according to the very same CBO, pay down our national debt by 2080.

However, if our government doesn’t embrace proposals like Rep. Ryan’s, then we will, as the CBO reports, face a very bleak future.

So if you are ever arguing with a Democrat, and they don’t seem to care about the debt or are accusing you of using it as a political tool, just tell them to check out this latest CBO report.

Perhaps reading about their policies’ disastrous consequences will bring them back to this universe.

By Avi Snyder

Democrats are doing their best to sell something resembling a jobs bill, but rightfully skeptical Americans aren’t buying.

Democrats are readying the House floor for their manufacturing agenda entitled Making it In America. M.I.A. for short. What perfect irony. A party that has been Missing in Action on addressing our jobs crisis, now has a jobs plan that is MIA.

Unfortunately, even under their MIA plan, jobs are likely to remain MIA. As Fortune magazine reports,

“It appears the measures will fall into one of two categories: bills that won’t pass the Senate, and bills that wouldn’t much matter if they did.”

I would like to say that their hearts are in the right place. Since the recession began the nation has lost 2 million manufacturing jobs the sort of blue-collar jobs that many in this nation have relied on. The loss may also have serious long term consequences. Too often we are willing to let manufacturing jobs go overseas so long as the research and value-added work remains on our shores. But as Andy Grove, former CEO of Intel, asks in a recent Businessweek column,

“[W]hat kind of a society are we going to have if it consists of highly paid people doing high-value-added work—and masses of unemployed?

As Grove explains, the problem is that technology accumulates over generations, “experience builds on experience,” so that when we stop doing the hands-on manufacturing we lose out on the ability to do the value-added work on later iterations of the product.

Blue collar America deserves saving, but are the Democrats really trying? Some don’t think so. As Fortune reports,

“The whole point for Democrats is to hand easy wins to the most endangered in their ranks — many of whom hail from Rust Belt districts hit particularly hard by the recession. “This gives our guys a boost heading into August,” said another Democratic leadership aide, referencing the upcoming congressional recess that was dominated last year by scenes of angry town hall protests over health-care reform. “It’s a sharper message on jobs that plays well in their districts. It’s branded. People understand it.”

Democrats certainly need something to avert what is shaping up to be a brutal mid-term election. With voter anxiety riding high on a wave of unemployment, Democrats need some kind of feather in their cap to show wary voters. The party is hoping that M.I.A. will do just that. Unfortunately, a closer look at the legislation reveals a series of political softballs – great sounding names that everyone will love but do absolutely nothing to help bring manufacturing jobs to America. Take a look:

• American Jobs Matter Act: In federal bids contractors are allowed to state how many jobs will be created
• All-American Flag Act: Requires the government to purchase flags that are made in America
• National Manufacturing Strategy Act: Creates a “Manufacturing Strategy Task Force” and a “President’s Manufacturing Strategy Board” to figure out how to improve manufacturing sector
• End the Trade Deficit Act – Established a “Emergency Commission to End the Trade Deficit” to figure out better trade policies

Gimme a break. The only jobs this creates is more bureaucrats. The only jobs it is intended to save are Democrats who haven’t done a thing to create jobs. It seems in this political environment, saving incumbents jobs in Washington is of higher priority than saving blue-collar jobs across the nation.

What is even more disconcerting is that it looks like it will lead to even more deficit spending. As reported by The Hill,

“At the same time, many of the agenda items will cost money and will require not just offsets — if they aren’t determined to be “emergency” measures — but a further balancing of the stimulus-versus-deficit equation.”

This is unacceptable. Blue collar jobs must be saved but increasing the federal deficit will only serve to choke off growth. Businesses have made clear that what they really need is a period of relative calm in which the government returns to the background. More legislation, bureaucracy and debt will only compound the problem that has driven many businesses to stop hiring or move overseas – uncertainty.

Sadly, Making It in America is just some recycled proposals, repackaged with great-sounding names and little to no substance. We need real answers. We need for Washington to quit being missing in action.

by Brandon Greife

“Things could be worse.”

That is the best this beaten-down President can say. It reminds me of the scene from that holiday classic National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. Family patriarch Clark Griswold simply wanted to have the hap-hap-happiest family Christmas possible. Unfortunately, he blew it. Dozens of tragic events later, including an incinerated Christmas tree, an imploding turkey, and thousands of Italian twinkle lights that aren’t twinkling, Clark loses it.

His wife, doing her best to defuse the situation encourages everyone to remain calm “before things get worse.” To which Clark gives the classic reply: “Worse? How could they get any worse? Take a look around, we’re at the threshold of hell!”

That is the sense of frustration that many Americans are feeling. We’re taking a look around, surveying the damage from a President who promised us that things would change and all we’ve got is an incinerated job market, an imploding financial situation, and hundreds of Democrats who aren’t doing very much to fix it. The only thing saving us from a complete Clark Griswold-like meltdown is the dying hope that the government will get out of the way and let businesses create some jobs.

But don’t worry. Our President has answers! After all, this is a guy who wrote a book titled “The Audacity of Hope.” Hope! He was gonna bring “change you can believe in.” So at best he’ll have answers. At worst he’ll talk us down from the ledge.

Wrong. The man with all the answers, or at least quasi-answers couched in platitudes, is apparently all out. So we get “things could be worse.” So I’m led to ask…how?

In June the unemployment rate continued to hover around 10 percent with the private sector gaining a measly 83,000 jobs and total employment falling by 125,000. Not apocalyptic, but not all that great either. Consider, that we need to create around 10.7 million jobs to reach full employment. Over the course of five years we would need to create 300,000 a month to get back to where we were five years ago. If you need any more proof that things couldn’t really be worse, just ask the 6.8 million people who represent the long-term unemployed (jobless for 27+ weeks).

Moreover GDP growth has been extremely slow – around 2.8 percent. As Paul Krugman explained the figure: “even if the economy continued to grow at that rate, we wouldn’t see anything like full employment until late in Sarah Palin’s second term.” For those of you who don’t understand Krugman-speak that means never.

The depressingly low GDP is made even more so by the depressingly high debt-to-GDP ratio. A new report by the Office of Management and Budget shows that the budget deficit will reach a record $1.47 trillion this year. Far from getting better, 2011 is predicted to have a $1.42 trillion deficit, $150 billion more than expected. If the CBOs estimates hold true spiraling interest payments would push the debt to 109% of GDP by 2025 and would reach 185% of GDP by 2035. For a dose of context consider that America’s debt-to-GDP ratio peaked at 109 percent at the end of World War II.  Not to mention the sad fact that Greece’s debt was at 115% before their economy fell into the abyss earlier this year.

With things so historically bad, the country’s finances utterly wrecked, and an entire generation of young adults drowning in the government’s red ink, we don’t get solutions, we get “things could be worse.”

Then again, perhaps my expectations are just too high. Perhaps I should have just trusted Reagan when he told me, “government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.” But part of me wanted to have a little hope. A smidgen of belief that the geniuses in Washington would at worst step out of the way and let businesses do their thing. Unfortunately, that is just not how things work in this White House.

Take Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner for instance. This past weekend while speaking about the impending tax increases (because that should really get businesses going) he said, “the country can withstand that. I think it’s good policy”

“Withstand?” That is the measure by which Washington judges good policy? That’s like saying, I’ll just shoot him a couple times in the leg, he’ll survive! Yea, but I can’t walk.

We need decision-makers who don’t judge policy based on what America can stand, but instead judge it based on what America can’t stand without. Hopefully we’ll get them come November when voters will have a chance to vote out the Democratic mad scientists intent on stacking debt upon deficits waiting to see when the nation will crumble. Until then, I’ll attempt to be comforted by the fact that apparently, somehow, things could be worse.

by Brandon Greife, Political Director

I am rarely as proud of the Senate Republican Conference as I am today.  That’s because this week, every single Senate Republican, all 41 of them, stood up for free speech and the Constitution by blocking a vote on the Democrats’ shameful DISCLOSE Act.

The DISCLOSE Act is a naked attempt to chill political speech in the run-up to an election that is shaping up to be very bad for Democrats.  Its disturbing and unconstitutional provisions abound.

The Act would have mandated that, “A corporate chief, union head, or nonprofit leader…say they approved a campaign message” during the ad.  “Donors supporting the speech would also be disclosed.”

On the surface, such a requirement may not seem so bad.  Perhaps it would have some tangential effect on reducing the influence of special interests in elections.

But it would serve to further erode the protections of the First Amendment – a harm that is in no way outweighed by its perceived benefit. The DISCLOSE Act, a shameless acronym for “Democracy is Strengthened by Casting Light on Spending in Elections,” was Democrats’ response to the Supreme Court decision in Citizens United. The court found that Congress may not prohibit funding of political speech by corporations and nonprofit groups. Since Congress could not regulate the speech, Democrats tried something different – forced disclosure. Of course, the goal is the same – restrict businesses or groups free speech rights – but it is accomplished by a different means.

As John Samples of the Cato Institute explains,

Sen. Charles Schumer and Rep. Chris Van Hollen hope that forcing disclosure will lead to a backlash by customers or shareholders against the relevant businesses or groups. If so, the leaders of the businesses or groups in question may decide to the costs of speaking out are too high and remain silent. In other words, Schumer and Van Hollen hope to chill the speech of their political opponents

Any group funding an ad must already disclose its donations via an FEC report, DISCLOSE would require those donors to personally appear and endorse the ad. It is a pure partisan ploy. Bending the First Amendment in an attempt to steer the business community, who has been utterly unimpressed with this Administration’s job legislation, out of elections. It’s a case where if you know you’re going to lose, change the rules of the game. But the Constitution is not just any set of rules; it is the bedrock upon which this “nation of laws” is built.

And the Act’s disclosure requirements aren’t even its most disturbing feature.  It also prohibits government contractors from making any “independent expenditures and payments for electioneering communications” and bars any recipient of TARP fund from “making any independent expenditure or disbursing any funds for an electioneering communication.”

Both of these provisions are blatantly unconstitutional restrictions on political speech.  These aren’t bans on donations to particular campaigns or politicians; these are bans on certain entities from spending money on political advocacy.  It prohibits core First Amendment speech and effectively bars these entities from engaging in this country’s political discourse.  As the editors of National Review summarized these restrictions:

By redefining thousands of businesses and non-profits as “government contractors,” it bans them from so much as mentioning an incumbent or candidate from three months before the primaries all the way through the general election — four months before the primaries in the case of presidential elections. That’s a six-month media blackout for congressional elections and more than a year in presidential races.

This “blackout” would have insured that virtually all election discourse is concentrated in the hands of the media, and insure that all election information be “vetted in editorial offices in Washington and New York.”

One has to wonder whether these Congressional Democrats, who claimed to be outraged over George Bush’s alleged trampling of the Constitution, have ever read the document they took oaths to uphold.

This bill was not about the fairness or corruption in campaigns; it certainly wasn’t about the Constitution; it was, in the words of Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, “about protecting incumbent Democrats from criticism ahead of this November’s election.”

Senate Republicans should be proud of their opposition to this shameless attack on our Constitutional rights by the Democrats.  But they must remember that the fight is not yet over.  The Dems could very well revive this bill after their recess, or worse, during the post-election lame-duck session.

Senate Republicans must stay principled, and be ready to form another united front when this bill resurfaces for debate.  I’m waiting for them to make me proud again.

By Avi Snyder

The latest roundup of news, commentary and analysis from around the web.

Assembled by Avi Snyder

With the Bush-era tax cuts set to expire next January, the news is abuzz with talk of whether or not Democrats will let them expire and raise taxes while the economy is still ailing.  National Review’s Rich Lowry ways in on the subject, detailing the myriad arguments against tax hikes on any Americans no matter their income, and reminding us that here is plenty of spending to trim to offset any potential costs.  His arguments transcend party lines, and even the most devoted Keynesian can see the folly of a massive tax hike before our economy recovers.

Also, watch Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) take MSNBC’s Chris Mathews to school on issues relating to taxes, spending and the deficit.  It looks like Mathews didn’t do very much research on Ryan before the interview.  If he had, he would have knows about Ryan’s concrete proposals to trim government spending and reform entitlements.  It’s always good to watch an informed Republican teach an ignorant Liberal some lessons about economics.

But tax hikes aren’t the only mischief the Dems are up to… They are still trying to push the DISCLOSE Act, which is a blatant attempt to undo the consequences of the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United.  Thankfully, Republicans filibustered this latest effort to violate our Constitutional right to free political speech.   Thanks to Senate Republicans for standing proudly united in fighting this bill.

Looks like Democrats are getting more and more worried about November by the day.  With Republicans poised to take over at least one house of Congress this November, Democrats like comedian-turned Senator Al Franken (D-MN) are warning of the dangers of Republican oversight in Congress.  Byron York of the Washington Examiner details the Democrats’ paranoia of some checks and balances in our government, and shows why some serious supervision of Democrats is good for the country.

But, truth be told, if I were a Democrat I would also be worried about Republican oversight, especially with the latest news that long-time Democrat Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY) is scrambling to cut a deal with the House Ethics Committee in an effort to avoid a sure to be embarrassing ethics trial.  So much for Pelosi’s promise to “clean-up Congress.”

Is it just me, or does the Congressional Budget Office come out with a new report every month talking about the dangers of our National Debt?  Well, they’ve come out with yet another one this week detailing the dire consequences of never-ending and quickly growing budget deficits.  When will the Democrats wake up to the reality that we can’t keep running up our debt?  How many more reports will it take?

Call me a cynic, but I don’t think the Dems will ever wake up to our fiscal crisis.  After all, as Social Security, our biggest federal entitlement quickly approaches insolvency, Democrats haven’t offered a single solution to protect America’s retirement security.  Michael tanner of the Cato Institute, calls out the Democrats for attacking Republican reform proposals, while offering no viable alternative.  Who’s the ‘Party of No’ now?

What does all this news add up to?  It adds up to a tremendous failure on the part of President Obama to live up to his campaign promises.  The man who campaigned as a post-partisan, post-racial, new-breed of candidate has turned out to be a far-left, divisive, politics-as-usual president.  Even Democrats can’t bite their tongues anymore.  Long-time Liberals Pat Caddell and Douglas Schoen have taken to the pages of the Wall Street Journal to call Obama out on his failure.  Maybe with his own party criticizing him, the President will shape up.  But I wouldn’t hold my breath.

In politics, you have to expect the unexpected. A friend one day can be a foe the next—depending on the shenanigans going on in the political arena. No one knows this better then Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY).

A former close friend to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), Rangel once chaired the powerful Ways and Means Committee.  Now, however, the tables have turned. The Democratic Queen is looking to banish Rangel from her kingdom.

Rangel resigned from his chairmanship in March after the ethics panel determined he had broken congressional gift rules by accepting trips to conferences in the Caribbean that were financed by corporate interests. Unfortunately for Rangel, it doesn’t look like there is a light at the end of the tunnel.

The House Ethics subcommittee just found that Rangel violated additional ethics rules in a separate instance, and will begin preparations for a trial as early as tomorrow.

Ever since it was reported in early 2008 that Rangel might have used his congressional status to benefit his personal financial interests, he has been under the Ethics’ committee’s microscope. The most serious inquiries concerned Rangel’s failure to declare $239,000 to $831,000 in assets on his disclosure forms, as well as his effort to raise money for a private center named after him at City College of New York using his congressional letterhead.

An Ethics trial in September, which is when the saga will unravel if Rangel doesn’t cut a deal, is the last thing House Democrats want with Election Day fast approaching.

While only one house Democrat, Rep. Betty Sutton of Ohio, has called for Rangel’s resignation, at least two other Democrats – Rep. Brad Ellsworth, the Senate nominee in Indiana and Rep. Kathy Dahlkemper, a Pennsylvania Democrat – have pledged to donate any campaign contributions received from Rangel directly to charity.

Slowly but surely other key Democrats are coalescing in support of Rangel’s resignation. On Monday Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida, who is heavily involved in the House Democratic re-election efforts, but it in terms of big picture, what is best for Rangel’s legacy in saying:

“I think Mr. Rangel would be wise to evaluate what’s best not only for him, but also for the causes he has advanced for as many years as he has in his long career.”

For a party who vowed to “drain the swamp” and bring transparency to Congress, the Democrats are failing miserably on delivering such promises. Democrats are continuing to engage in series of backdoor meetings with the embattled representative, in an effort to encourage a less dramatic alternative to a public trail.

Charlie Rangel is making the party look bad in an election cycle. Once a liberal friend, he is now a party foe. So when Van Hollen justifies his meeting with Rangel as “I was presenting him with some of my observations,” and claims he was acting “as a friend”, its just another instance of Democrats playing “Keep your friends close and your enemies closer” in an election cycle.

By Sinead Casey (Hat tip to Samantha Cohen)

The White House has predicted a record-high deficit of $1.47 trillion. In order to better conceptualize this massive amount of debt, let’s take a look to see exactly what this means in more familiar terms (thanks to Ariana Eujung Cha for the stats).

Generated by Facebook Photo Fetcher

Europe has always been a bastion of progressivism. In the United States, liberals have trumpeted the success of their social programs, suggesting that we should follow down their righteous path. Conservatives, on the other hand, have pointed out the staggering budget problems European countries, especially those that are considered Western, have consistently wrestled with.

Let’s take a look at Britain. Aside from being a steadfast U.S. ally in military operations, its political makeup has always been slightly different from ours—and that’s what made the relationship “special” and unique. Now, however, we’ve got a President and certain members of Congress who are pushing for us to become more like them—especially when it comes to health care.

Here’s the deal: the U.K. has a debt topping $900 billion (and they’ve got their own version of their debt clock…although $900 billion doesn’t seem quite as scary as $1.3 trillion). Since they’re going through the same debt crisis we are, they’re finding ways to cut corners.

And what social program is first on the chopping block? The National Health Service. In the wake of a major budget crisis, one of the first programs to be scaled back is one that directly affects the well-being of British citizens.

The cuts in funding have been called “astonishingly brutal”, as even the most common and simple surgeries and procedures will now be rationed. A recent Telegraph article itemizes just how deep the budget cuts will go in to the nation’s publicly funded health care system:

* Restrictions on some of the most basic and common operations, including hip and knee replacements, cataract surgery and orthodontic procedures.

* Plans to cut hundreds of thousands of pounds from budgets for the terminally ill, with dying cancer patients to be told to manage their own symptoms if their condition worsens at evenings or weekends.

* The closure of nursing homes for the elderly.

* A reduction in acute hospital beds, including those for the mentally ill, with targets to discourage GPs from sending patients to hospitals and reduce the number of people using accident and emergency departments.

* Tighter rationing of NHS funding for IVF treatment, and for surgery for obesity.

* Thousands of job losses at NHS hospitals, including 500 staff to go at a trust where cancer patients recently suffered delays in diagnosis and treatment because of staff shortages.

* Cost-cutting programs in pediatric and maternity services, care of the elderly, and services that provide respite breaks to long-term careers.

This is bad news for the British. Yet what really baffles me is that the Democrats, all the while watching this implosion of the British health care system, are still trying to push ours in that very same direction. Harry Reid said just yesterday: “we’re going to have a public option, it’s just a question of when.” This statement reflects similar sentiments that the President and the lovely Speaker Pelosi expressed earlier this week.

What is it that our leadership isn’t getting? Usually, lessons are learned from experience and history. We have all been forewarned to let not history repeat itself. So, when we see Britain having to ration health care services because it’s bankrupting their nation, it would hardly seem irrational to expect our leaders to think the same about the policies they’re pushing.

But they’re not. Despite our debt, and the public outrage, and the public opinion polls, and midterm elections that are expected to annihilate the Democrats, and a living example of just how awful and inefficient centralized health care systems are, Reid and his friends just won’t give up when it comes to health care.

It’s a bad sign for the U.S. when we start emulating Europe just as they’re starting to wake up and back peddle to common sense policies, a place the United States used to call home. But it’s even worse when we have a triumvirate in power (Pelosi, Reid, and Obama) that continues to defy all logical reasoning simply for the sake of a misguided political agenda.

By Leah Dow (edited by Samantha Cohen)