Tag: failout

Yes We Cantor

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

A running theme of the early Obama Administration has been “process.”

When will the President make good on his promise to pull troops out of Iraq? How will the President handle the suspected terrorists at Guantanamo? When will the government pass an economic policy to make everything better? White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs has frequently referred to each situation as a process – giving the Administration a chance to delay and diffuse questions.

And as Mama Eltringham pointed out to me today, one Republican is turning that back on the Administration. Faced with a harmful economic stimulus bill, Republicans are looking to delay and diffuse too – delay (or destroy) a harmful bill and diffuse criticism that they are suffering from sour grape syndrome since November. So Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia used the same language:

“The House is set to vote on the legislation as soon as tomorrow… Cantor said the House vote on the legislation ‘is only the first step in the process.'”

Gibbs later credited Cantor with successfully pushing to publish the stimulus package online for public scrutiny – a tactic which not only delays the bill’s passage, but forces the Obama Administration to explain spending $800+ billion in tax dollars during a time when working folks are pinching every penny to get by.

But don’t accuse the Republicans of trying to sink the stimulus. They’re just letting the process play out.

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Power vacuum

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

The Washington Post painted a great picture of the evolution of Your Nation’s Capital in a piece that ran yesterday.

The Post‘s Joel Kotkin points out that DC is unique among national capitals in that it was not a significant city before it was chosen to house the federal government – and even afterward, its growth was slow because American federalism concentrated power elsewhere. But as power became more centralized in the 20th century – especially in the last 30-40 years – Washington has grown in size and cultural significance.

At the same time, Kotkin reminds us, other American cities have suffered crises of identity; Detroit’s auto makers, New York’s financial barons, and others have been “forced to kiss Washington’s ring.” Businesses are moving their corporate headquarters here to be closer to the machinations of government.

Like most federal initiatives, Washington is synthetic. Cities like New York, Philadelphia, and Boston sprang up on their own because of their access to ports and commerce; Washington was placed strategically; it has planned by a relatively small committee of officials; and its growth has been fueled by money taken from other parts of the country.

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Socialism is bad right?

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

AOL Political Machine Blogger Matt Lewis was on Fox News today squaring off with former Mondale campaign manager Bob Beckel. The quote that stuck with Lewis coming away from the segment was Beckel’s defense of socialism: “What is wrong with some form of socialism in certain areas?” Here’s the video:

Beckel poses a valid question. And with the Obama administration less than a week from taking the controls, it’s a question that needs to be answered by opponents of a government controlled economy. If people are struggling to make ends meet, a scheme to nationalize industries will sound more appealing – and without a viable answer, could become a reality.

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Oh yeah, baby, bail me out…

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

Yesterday’s fun news of the afternoon was the $5 billion adult entertainment industry bailout proposed by Joe Francis of Girls Gone Wild and Larry Flynt of Hustler.

With Congress was going wilder than any of the barely legal spring breakers has Francis caught on film, the Porn bailout is well timed. The case they lay out similar to the Detroit automakers’: Flynt and Francis (the F&F boys?) argue that thanks to the internet, people just aren’t buying smut in the form of magazines and DVDs anymore. Rather than adapt to the new technology, they argue that the government should fund an old business model – a model which, if not fatally flawed, will certainly never be as profitable as it once was.

Some actually took it seriously: as the story unfolded, the Huffington Post used the occasion to point out how the recession has affected porn. Which goes to show just how ridiculous the concept of corporate welfare is: eventually, the government has to pick and choose which industries to subsidize and which to turn away. As Francis and Flynt show, any industry can claim to “need it so bad,” but Congress has to draw a line somewhere.

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2009: Three Issues to Watch

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

The conventional wisdom is that the Republican Party will be more aggressive in 2009 and beyond. They will have to be, since they are looking at a filibuster-proof majority of Democrats in the Senate to go along with the Democrat majority in the House and a Democrat President. It will be important, therefore, for Republicans to seize the offensive initiative.

There are three issues which will likely come to a head in 2009 which Republicans can win – if they can get out in front of the story and start framing the debate before their counterparts:

Card Check/Forced Unionization. The Employee Free Choice Act is a proposed law that makes it easier for union “representatives” to intimidate workers into joining unions. (This can’t be repeated enough.) Aside from giving Democrats a healthy stream of campaign cash and workers, stripping workers of the right to vote against unionization on a private ballot would likely expand unionization – which, as anyone from the American auto industry can tell you, will serve to make American goods more expensive and less competitive in the marketplace. The right to a secret ballot is sacred for most Americans.

Business Bailouts. Speaking of Detroit, industries are already lining up with their hands out hoping to snag a share of the federal budget. Commercial real estate, retail stores, and even newspapers are rightfully asking why they shouldn’t get the same help as other industries. Handing out money hand-over-fist will earn votes in certain states and communities, but it won’t help the economy. And, in general, bailouts are unpopular among voters. Taking a stand against corporate entitlements would be a good way to demonstrate a broad support for entitlement reform.

Health Care. This may be the biggest challenge for the Republican minority, and it’s the issue they are already the most behind on. Given the state of the economy, a federal health care entitlement figures to be a popular program – especially if common misconceptions continue to be spread without answer. The Obama Pre-Administration has already solicited “public input” for its health care plan by having supporter organize “community discussions” during a time when many groups that would oppose his plan were taking a Christmas vacation. Of course, there’s plenty wrong with allowing the same people who run government institutions like the school systems, the IRS, the DMV, etc. to run medical care, but that case has to be made clearly, aggressively, and repeatedly.

These issues may not be the top three on President Obama’s docket, but Republicans can’t allow their agenda to be dictated by Democrats as they have for the past four years. These issues, while challenging, will help Republicans regain some control of the nation’s policy agenda.

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Mint’s Failout

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

With all the bailout buzz in the air, Mint.com – a free personal finance management website – has its own plan for an economic bailout package (pictured).

I counted five different times where the Mint plan taxes wealth – not income or consumption, but actual saved money (which has probably already been taxed as income). Mint proposes taxing investments and any money made off those investments and advocates seizing corporate bonuses and money that has already been paid out.

Once again: Mint purports to be a financial managment tool. But apparently they don’t believe in people saving money.

Even worse is Mint’s concept of a “Main Street Bailout” – which doesn’t send dollar one to Main Street at all. Their “renewable fuels” funding is nothing more than a subsidy for energy companies’ research and development labs. Their $50 billion mortgage rescue package will be administered by some government entity and doesn’t appear to include a plan for making those endangered mortages affordable to the borrowers who got in over their heads in the first place. And the $20 billion in state funding won’t go any farther than state capitals.

Mint clearly doesn’t care about creating a strong, smart, financial culture. But they do feel the need to advocate policies which sound like they help people solve problems – even if they make the problems worse.

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Senator to Banks: Keep on Keepin’ On

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

I was amused by Senator Chris Dodd’s admonition to banks receiving help a piece of that $700 billion pie that Congress so generously doled out earlier this fall. The Connecticut Senator urged these banks to lend more money.

Seriously. In the wake of a financial crisis created, in large part, by irresponsible lending to irresponsible borrowers, and resulting in almost $1 trillion in corporate welfare, Dodd feels like the sollution is creating more debt.

Maybe the plan is to ride it out until we find a new bubble to invest in.

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Senator to Banks: Keep on Keepin’ On

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

I was amused by Senator Chris Dodd’s admonition to banks receiving help a piece of that $700 billion pie that Congress so generously doled out earlier this fall. The Connecticut Senator urged these banks to lend more money.

Seriously. In the wake of a financial crisis created, in large part, by irresponsible lending to irresponsible borrowers, and resulting in almost $1 trillion in corporate welfare, Dodd feels like the sollution is creating more debt.

Maybe the plan is to ride it out until we find a new bubble to invest in.

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Don’t call us, we’ll call you

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

It looks like the Senate will vote to approve the Wall Street bailout that failed the House earlier this week – despite intense constituent disapproval.

Public disapproval of the proposed bailout was so high, in fact, that the House website crashed under the weight of the public response: those who tried to email their Congressman got an error message about high volume. Their solution was to limit the number of emails constituents could send in.

That’s not a typo – Congress really told America, “Hey! Pipe down!”

It’s easy to blame Capitol Hill’s 1970s-era staffing structure for making Congressional offices amazingly ill-equipped to handle high volumes of electronic constituent communication. But as the internet becomes the easiest and most convenient way for most people to get in touch with their elected representatives, this may just be a scam to drum up business for the post office.

Failout

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

It looks like you, me, and all our fellow taxpayers will not be chipping in more than $5,000 apiece to bail out Wall Street. (They will not be sending it back to us, so don’t get too excited.)

The Wall Street Failout makes me proud to be an American. Across the country, voters’ personal BS meters went off, as constiutuent pressure had a big hand in killing this bill. (Of course, Nancy Pelosi’s campaign speech didn’t help.)

Our elected representatives are now trying to come up with some kind of solution, but this is a good time to trust the wisdom of the people. Much of our current mess was created by government intervention in the first place, as the well-researched video below chronicles (and even though it’s 11 minutes long, it’s worth it). It seems unlikely that the cure for a government-created problem is more government.