Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to All!

And keep this thought. While the kids are unwrapping presents and you are visiting the family, the legislators in Trenton and Washington DC are not doing anything. And for that I will give thanks!

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Tell your representatives to vote NO on the 1.8 Trillion Dollar Healthcare Bill

If you live in any of these congressional districts, it is time to contact your Representative and tell them to vote for YOU, not Nancy Pelosi. Or else.

Representative Name Phone Fax

Robert E. Andrews (D - 01) 202-225-6501 202-225-6583 http://www.house.gov/andrews/contact_form_za.shtml

Frank A. LoBiondo (R - 02) 202-225-6572 202-225-3318 http://www.house.gov/lobiondo/IMA/issue.htm

John Adler (D - 03) 202-225-4765 202-225-0778 http://forms.house.gov/adler/webforms/issue_subscribe.htm

Chris H. Smith (R - 04) 202-225-3765 202-225-7768 http://chrissmith.house.gov/zipauth.html

Scott Garrett (R - 05) 202-225-4465 202-225-9048
http://garrett.house.gov/Contact/

Frank Pallone, Jr. (D - 06) 202-225-4671 202-225-9665 http://www.house.gov/pallone/contact.shtml

Leonard Lance (R - 07) 202-225-5361 202-225-9460
http://lance.house.gov/?sectionid=48§iontree=348

Bill Pascrell, Jr. (D - 08) 202-225-5751 202-225-5782
http://pascrell.house.gov/contact/

Steve Rothman (D - 09) 202-225-5061 202-225-5851 https://forms.house.gov/rothman/webforms/issue_subscribe.htm

Donald M. Payne (D - 10) 202-225-3436 202-225-4160 http://www.house.gov/payne/IMA/email.shtml

Rodney Frelinghuysen (R - 11) 202-225-5034 202-225-3186 http://frelinghuysen.house.gov/contactus/form.cfm

Rush Holt (D - 12) 202-225-5801 202-225-6025
http://holt.house.gov/contact.shtml

Albio Sires (D - 13) 202-225-7919 202-226-0792 https://forms.house.gov/sires/webforms/issue_subscribe.htm

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Unemployment at 10% and where is congress? Why spending of course.

From the AP:

The Labor Department said Friday that jobless rate rose to 10.2 percent, the highest since April 1983, from 9.8 percent in September. The economy shed a net total of 190,000 jobs in October, less than the downwardly revised 219,000 lost in September, but more than economists expected.

The jump in the jobless rate reflects a sharp increase in the tally of unemployed Americans, which rose to 15.7 million from 15.1 million. The net loss of jobs occurred across most industries, from manufacturing and construction to retail and financial. That tally is based on a separate survey of businesses.

Economists say the unemployment rate could climb as high as 10.5 percent next year because employers remain reluctant to hire.

And what is the President and Congress doing about it? They are trying to ram down our throats a 1.8 trillion dollar healthcare bill that won't reduce costs, won't improve your care and still won't insure everyone. And it won't get you a job. But one thing it will do...raise your taxes.

And if you want to understand who is driving this bus, all you need to do it look at the White House Visitor's log to see who spends the most time there - Andy Stern of the SIEU(from workerfreedom.org via Americans for Tax Reform).

The White House released an incomplete list of visitors who met with President Obama and top White House officials. Predictably, Andy Stern, President of the Service Employees International Union, stopped by the White House more than any other visitor. The Wall Street Journal Reports:

“Andrew Stern visited the White House 22 times between Inauguration Day and July 31, meeting with President Barack Obama seven times and leading all visitors recorded during that period.”

You don't know who the SIEU is? They are the union that show up in purple shirts (IE the Liberal Astroturf) at every protest to outshout the regular people.

Are you getting it yet?

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House Democrats want higher taxes for healthcare. Big shocker.

The word is that House Democrats will be proposing higher taxes on "high" wage earners to pay for their healthcare proposals. From Bloomberg:

Two people familiar with closed-door talks by committee Democrats said a House bill probably will include a surtax on incomes exceeding $250,000, as Congress seeks ways to pay for changes to a health-care system that accounts for almost 18 percent of the U.S. economy. By targeting wealthier Americans, a surtax may hold more appeal for House Democrats than a Senate proposal to tax some employer-provided health benefits.

“The surtax is obviously more attractive to Democrats in the House because it’s more progressive, which they find attractive in and of itself,” said Paul Van de Water, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a research group focused on policies affecting low- and moderate-income families.

The real joke here is that Democrats and President Obama keep proposing taxes on the "rich guy". And for every one of these proposals, the "righ guy" keeps changing. I am willing to guarantee that this will eventually translate into a tax across the board for all productive members of society.

But the bigger problem is that Democrats said they were going to pay for the stimulus by taxing "rich people". Then they were going to pay for their irresponsible budget by taxing "rich people". Then they were targeting "rich people" for the carbon tax. It seems to me that they have used this tactic to "pay for" every spending increase they have proposed.

Time to wake up America. We cannot afford another House spending proposal.

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Minnesota's Bachmann takes on Acorn

On my way home from the airport tonight I was listening to Mark Levin's radio show and heard Minnesota's Michele Bachmann speaking about her proposed legislation to organizations under indictment to receive Federal tax dollars.

“This is about how Congress spends the people’s money and about setting the bar high. Accessing federal funding is a privilege, not a right, and it must be earned,” said Bachmann. “Congress should not allow groups, such as ACORN which has been repeatedly investigated and indicted for voter registration fraud, to receive taxpayer dollars. You can’t violate the public trust with one hand and take the taxpayers’ money with the other.”

Check out her website. It is more than we are getting from our representatives right now.

Go here.

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Read the bill!

I usually don't forward messages I get from the various public interest groups but since I already wrote on the problem of our congress passing a bill that they didn't bother to read first. Repreentatives that don't read legislation are not representatives at all-they are party shills. The Sunlight foundation has started a web site called www.readthebill.org. If you think that at the minimum, all legislation should have 72 hours in plain view before it is voted on, you should watch this video and go to the site and sign the petition.

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Bailout is not the only option!

There was buzz the other day about a large number of economists that sent a letter to the congress suggesting that there was a better way to handle the mortgage crisis. Now today, Jeffrey Miron a Senior Lecturer of Economics at Harvard explains what the content of that communication included (from CNN):

The current mess would never have occurred in the absence of ill-conceived federal policies. The federal government chartered Fannie Mae in 1938 and Freddie Mac in 1970; these two mortgage lending institutions are at the center of the crisis. The government implicitly promised these institutions that it would make good on their debts, so Fannie and Freddie took on huge amounts of excessive risk.

Worse, beginning in 1977 and even more in the 1990s and the early part of this century, Congress pushed mortgage lenders and Fannie/Freddie to expand subprime lending. The industry was happy to oblige, given the implicit promise of federal backing, and subprime lending soared.

This represents well understood fact except for Democrats in the House and Senate (and much of the media as well). This statement really brings the issue home:

The fact that government bears such a huge responsibility for the current mess means any response should eliminate the conditions that created this situation in the first place, not attempt to fix bad government with more government.

So what to do?

The obvious alternative to a bailout is letting troubled financial institutions declare bankruptcy. Bankruptcy means that shareholders typically get wiped out and the creditors own the company.

Bankruptcy does not mean the company disappears; it is just owned by someone new (as has occurred with several airlines). Bankruptcy punishes those who took excessive risks while preserving those aspects of a businesses that remain profitable.

In contrast, a bailout transfers enormous wealth from taxpayers to those who knowingly engaged in risky subprime lending. Thus, the bailout encourages companies to take large, imprudent risks and count on getting bailed out by government. This "moral hazard" generates enormous distortions in an economy's allocation of its financial resources.

A massive transfer of wealth from taxpayers to Wall Street isn't the only answer. And congress should do their job and investigate every potential option with an eye toward the bill paying taxpayer first and Wall Street executives second.

Read the entire article here.

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Nancy Pelosi can shut off the lights/cameras of congress on drilling but can't pass a bailout bill without Republican help?

A very interesting question. Why is it that the Republicans cannot even get an amendment to a bill to the floor when Czar Nancy wields the gavel are now awash with so much power in the House that a bailout bill can't go through? Doesn't anyone remember Nancy Pelosi shutting off the cameras and lights while the Republicans kept debating energy policy when the Democrats went on vacation?

But now, all of a sudden, she can't get a bill through without a small band of conservative legislators in the House? Oh I get it. It is because there were only about 4 votes from Republicans and the bill would have gone through as a piece of partisan Democrat legislation. Apparently, the Democrats do have some level of shame.

For you see, this bill has been crafted by Chris Dodd and Barney Frank. Remember these two. Chris Dodd got more money than anyone from Fannie and Freddie to look the other way while they continued to write bad loans. Chris Dodd also got a sweetheart deal from Countrywide as a "friend of Angelo". In most states, Chris Dodd would be in jail. But not in the senate. Oh, and don't forget Barney Frank. These are the people who are leading the bailout:



And even Nancy Pelosi knows that the media will not protect her if Nancy along with her Democrat colleagues were major contributors to the problem, failed in their oversight responsibility and enacted a flawed bailout with no opposition support. Even Nancy isn't that stupid apparently. Harry Reid on the other hand...

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Pelosi as usual takes no responsibility!

Despite mounds of evidence that the Democrats created the environment that created the mortgage crisis, actively fed and watered it with their corrupt friends and then personally benefitted from their lack of oversight a wink and a nod and some campaign contributions, their leaders refuse to take any responsibility.

From TheHIll:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, when asked Tuesday whether Democrats bear some of the responsibility regarding the current crisis on Wall Street, had a one-word answer: “No.”

Pelosi (D-Calif.) ripped President Bush’s “mismanagement” of the economy and a lack of regulation that led to the current situation.

“I think the American people have had it with this situation where the middle-income people in our country are not protected from the ramifications of the risk-taking and the greed of these financial institutions,” Pelosi told MSNBC.

You are right Nancy. We are tired of your blaming the mortgage companies alone for a situation that you bought and paid for. You know the greed I recognized from this situation? Franklin Raines (Clinton White House Budget director and Obama consultant) received 100 million dollars in greed money before he got caught. How about Democratic operative Jamie Gorelick who received 25 million FOR HER LACK OF OVERSIGHT!

Nancy Pelosi is a partisan hack who is in way over her head. She has presided over the most unpopular congress in the history of the United States. She has accomplished nothing and blames everyone else for her failures. She is nothing more or less than an empty suit and our country is worse for it.

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Federal Workers can make tax laws but won't pay!

From foxnews.com:

The Internal Revenue Service is trying to collect billions of dollars in late taxes from nearly half a million federal employees.

Documents obtained by WTOP radio through the Freedom of Information Act show the federal employees and retirees did not pay more than $3.5 billion in taxes owed last year.

Just like with Charlie Rangel and his lack of tax responsibility while reaching into others pockets, this is outrageous. But the article isn't finished:

The Executive Office of the President, which includes the White House, has 58 employees who did not pay more than $319,000. More than 1,000 Capitol Hill workers are on the list.

So 58 people in the White House don't bother to pay taxes. That's bad enough. But 1,000 people who work on the Hill? Are you kidding me? I wonder how many normal citizens are afforded the same courtesy. Frankly, the IRS should release exactly who these people work for and their role in the setting and execution of tax policy decisions.

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Charlie Rangel and Fairness

From this morning's New York Post:

Rep. Charles Rangel, the powerful head of the congressional committee that writes the country's tax laws, blamed his ignorance - and not being able to understand Spanish - for failing to report $75,000 in rental income from his Caribbean holiday home.

So let me get this straight, the man in charge of the committee that sets tax policy in the House wants us to believe that he shouldn't be in trouble because he didn't know the rules. Funny. He wrote them.

But he also believes that he shouldn't be held accountable:

"I really don't believe that making mistakes means you have to give up your career."

That is funny. Isn't this the same man who wanted Trent Lott drawn and quartered for a comment praising a colleague at a party. Isn't he also the one who wanted his corrupt colleague in Louisiana to step down from his committee assignment for wrongdoing (maybe Charlie just wanted his seat).

Charie Rangel has been outspoken about taxing all of us from every angle while posing as a man of the people. However, he accepted 4 rent controlled apartments which should have gone to working families. He also didn't pay his taxes on his place in the Dominican Republic. Why? Because he thought he would get away with it.

One more question. If Charlie Rangel was a Republican, would he still be the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee today? I think we all know the answer to that.

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