President-elect Barack Obama cannot possibly keep his health care campaign promises, explains Heritage expert Robert Moffit.

On the campaign trail, Moffit says, the candidate "promised--repeatedly--that Americans who already had health insurance would not face any changes in their coverage and that their costs would go down, saving the typical family $2,500 annually in premiums."

But under the president-elect's proposed health care reforms, "millions of Americans will indeed lose their existing coverage, and the promised premium savings are unlikely to materialize."

What's more, the programs amount to "a Trojan horse for government control and the progressive destruction of Americans' private health insurance coverage."

The incoming administration has suggested a number of radical health care changes:

• Establishing a new federally-run national health plan financed by the taxpayers;

• Imposing a mandate on employers to offer health insurance to their employees; and

• Creating national health insurance exchange in which the public health plan would compete -- unfairly -- with private health insurance.

Because the government's health care plan would likely be less costly up front to consumers, "the result would be a massive crowd-out of private health insurance coverage, especially employer-based coverage."

When Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) first came to power she promised, “the most honest, most open, and most ethical Congress in history.” She has since [1] flagrantly and [2] repeatedly broken this promise. It is part of the reason [3] Congress has record low approval ratings. Now President-elect Barack Obama is also making grand promises to create a [4] more open and transparent government. We hope that, unlike Pelosi, Obama chooses to keep his promise to the American people. But so far the signs are not encouraging.

Starting in mid-December [5] Obama’s advisers have huddled with congressional Democrats crafting an economic stimulus plan that is likely to [6] cost the American taxpayers at least $1 trillion. Obama has [7] previously demanded that the stimulus bill be ready to sign by his January 20th Inauguration Day. To meet this deadline Pelosi is considering passing the trillion dollar spending measure without going through the committee process. Her spokesmen Drew Hammill even claims that the House already completed all the necessary due diligence on their trillion dollar gambit last year: “[8] The House has already laid the groundwork for this package with numerous hearings and the bipartisan package passed in September.”

Since Pelosi long ago broke her promise to the American people to govern in an open and transparent manner, the House will probably pass the trillion dollar spending spree by January 12th without holding a single hearing. The story is different in the Senate where Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) still has the 40 senators necessary to keep Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) somewhat honest. Yesterday McConnell laid the groundwork for an actual Senate debate on the matter: “[9] Surely the Democrat leadership in Congress doesn’t plan to spend a trillion dollars of taxpayer money — nearly $10,000 in new debt for everyone who pays federal income tax, charged to the credit card for our children to pay — without safeguards, without appropriate hearings to scrutinize how tax dollars are being spent.”

Considering that there are scattered reports leaking around the country that the Democrats’ trillion dollar spending spree will include taxpayer money for [10] polar bear exhibits, casino pedestrian bridges, mob museums, and snow-making machines, surely the American people deserve a full inventory of where this trillion dollars will go. We have previously stated [11] our principled opposition to federal spending as a means to stimulate the economy, but at the absolute minimum the Obama administration should take Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) up on his request that [12] the entire text of the stimulus bill be available online for a full week before any votes are cast. Otherwise, the very first bill Obama signs will also mark his first broken promise to the American people.

Article printed from The Foundry: http://blog.heritage.org

URL to article: http://blog.heritage.org/2008/12/30/morning-bell-will-obama-ditch-transparency-for-stimulus/

There are still plenty of terrible economic stimulus ideas coming out of President-elect Barack Obama’s transition team, but there were some encouraging admissions from Obama senior adviser David Axelrod this Sunday on [1] Meet the Press. Asked by NBC’s David Gregory if Obama would break his promise to the American people to lower taxes, Axelrod said:

Look, we feel it’s important that, that middle-class people get some relief now. He’s promised a middle-class tax cut. This package will include a, a portion of that tax cut that will become part of the permanent tax cut he’ll have in his, his upcoming budget. It’s, it’s, it’s vital people are, are–need money in their pockets to, to spend. That’ll help get our economy going again.

We hope that this statement by Axelrod signals the acceptance by the Obama administration of a long held conservative belief, namely: [2] that temporary tax cuts are ineffective at stimulating the economy while permanent tax cuts are the best way to encourage both short and long term economic growth. As former Treasury undersecretary John Taylor [3] recently explained:

According to the permanent-income theory of Milton Friedman, or the life-cycle theory of Franco Modigliani, temporary increases in income will not lead to significant increases in consumption. However, if increases are longer-term, as in the case of permanent tax cut, then consumption is increased, and by a significant amount.

The Washington Post reports that the incoming Obama administration has not yet determined what form these permanent tax cuts will take, but to maximize effectiveness [4] the cuts should be as broad as possible and not limited to narrow tax loopholes restricted to only those families who engage in activities that Washington decides are worthy.

As encouraging as Axelrod’s commitment to permanent middle-class tax cuts was, his blind devotion to tax increases on the most productive Americans was equally discouraging. Asked by Gregory if Obama still planned to raise taxes Axelrod said:

Well, look, the question is on the Bush tax cuts for the very wealthiest Americans, and it’s something that we plainly can’t afford moving forward. And whether it, it, it expires or whether we repeal it a little bit early we’ll determine later, but it’s going to go. It has to go.

At a time when the Obama team is proposing $775 billion in new spending, calling tax cuts “something that we plainly can’t afford” is laughable. We hope that before Obama pursues this course he consults with his Council of Economic Advisers chairman Christina Romer, who has published economic studies concluding that: 1) [5] tax increases harm economic growth; 2)[6] tax cuts lead to greater economic activity; and 3) [7] government spending has at best a small effect on stimulating economic activity.

Furthermore, we hope that the President-elect’s team isn’t falling back into their dangerous idea of “major” redistribution of wealth.  Axelrod went on to say:

In other words, when you add up the tax cuts and the change–the expiration or the repeal of, of the tax cut for the wealthy, it’ll amount to a net tax cut for the American people.  It’ll just restore some balance, David, which we badly need.

“Balance” can only mean redistribution, which will inevitably lead to lower levels of entrepreneurial activity, reduced investment and lower wages for all workers, especially those in lower-skilled jobs.  We hope that President-elect Obama recognizes the needs for permanent tax cuts across the board, for all Americans.

Article printed from The Foundry: http://blog.heritage.org

URL to article: http://blog.heritage.org/2008/12/29/morning-bell-permanent-tax-cuts-only-please/

Media redeploying over the event horizon from Iraq

America: Love it, or in love with it?

Joel Stein tries to plumb the differences in patriotism between the Right and the Left in his somewhat satirical column on loving one’s country.  He admits that he doesn’t love America in a blind manner, but his assumption that conservatives do sets him on the wrong track:

I don’t love America. That’s what conservatives are always telling liberals like me. Their love, they insist, is truer, deeper and more complete. Then liberals, like all people who are accused of not loving something, stammer, get defensive and try to have sex with America even though America will then accuse us of wanting it for its body and not its soul. When America gets like that, there’s no winning.

But I’ve come to believe conservatives are right. They do love America more. Sure, we liberals claim that our love is deeper because we seek to improve the United States by pointing out its flaws. But calling your wife fat isn’t love. True love is the blind belief that your child is the smartest, cutest, most charming person in the world, one you would gladly die for. I’m more in “like” with my country.

Fox News’ Sean Hannity loves this country so much, he did an entire episode of “Hannity’s America” titled “The Greatest Nation on Earth.” In that one hour he said, several times, “the U.S. is the greatest, best country God has ever given man on the face of the Earth.” One of the surest signs of love is it makes you talk stupid.

Perhaps Stein doesn’t watch enough of Hannity to understand the program.  Hannity does not fill his program with nothing but hosannas to America.  In fact, as all conservative (and liberal) pundits do, Hannity spends almost all of his time pointing out what ails America and offers his solutions to the problems.  Those solutions run to conservative policies, especially on laissez-faire capitalism and strong national defense, and usually as correctives to what Hannity sees as failed liberal policies of the past and present.

Honestly, the second paragraph is about as patronizing and stupid a point as I’ve ever seen in a featured newspaper column.  Does Stein even bother to read conservatives or listen to them even for an hour?  Fifteen minutes?  I’ve never heard one yet that argues for America’s perfection or the need to freeze us in the current political and policy status quo.  It’s absurd on its face and should be embarrassing to the LA Times’ editors.

I don’t doubt the patriotism or love of country of liberals or conservatives.  I assume that their engagement in the political process is an expression of their love of country, just as I assume that veterans of all political stripes serve from that same love of America.  The difference between the two comes to whether they believe that America has served as a force of good for the world over the arc of its 232-year existence or whether our sins outweigh the good we have done.  Actually, that difference exists primarily with a subset of liberals on the hard Left, and not liberals as a whole.

That difference, which we commonly call American exceptionalism, defines the difference in patriotism and leads Stein to the ultimate conclusion of his column, which is that belief in that exceptionalism amounts to little more than tribalism.  I’d buy that if it wasn’t for the fact that more people leave their homes to come to America than any other country to find freedom, liberty, and a chance at prosperity.  We literally can’t keep people out of the United States, and it’s one of our more intractable political problems.  Vast numbers of Americans aren’t fleeing to Europe or Africa or Asia or even South America.  People from those lands flock to the US.  There’s a reason for that, and that migration pattern tells why American exceptionalism is real and not just some tribalistic, Neanderthal reaction to one’s birth place.

What comprises that exceptionalism?  Lady Logician has some thoughts:

Joel - the reasons most conservatives love America more are not “tribalistic” as you claim and no conservatives don’t hold the patent on loving America. The fact that you have bought into this absurd notion shows that you still don’t get it. The reason that conservatives like myself (as well as Jazz, his progressive wife Georg and my liberal co-workers) love America is because it is a place where we can all agree on the problem, disagree on the solution and still stand shoulder to shoulder to defend a country that may be flawed. It is still a place that we can stand tall and say that there is no place that we would rather be - in this time - than in this place….the United States of America.

America is not just a birthplace and isn’t really a nationality, at least not primarily.  It’s an idea and an ideal, and even when we fell far short of that ideal, we worked to correct ourselves.  We disagree on the ways to improve, which a free people can do, but most of us, liberals and conservatives alike, work hard on those solutions not because we don’t care enough but because we love America so much — the place, yes, but the idea and the ideal most of all.  We have freed more people in more ways than any other nation in history, and we have provided the highest overall standard of living in history as well.  And we can do even better — and we will.

If Stein still hasn’t figured that out, then he should stop writing for a while and start to learn about his country and what it really means, and what it has meant.

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The bailout-seeking domestic auto industry has been criticized as being unproductive and inefficient. It hasn't been helped by mandated fuel economy standards that have done little to reduce our dependence on foreign energy or help the environment. Now the fuel we have been mandated to put in our cars, equally unproductive and inefficient, is also seeking a bailout.

Ethanol never made much sense economically or environmentally. It never would have made it to market without congressional mandates and huge subsidies. Having the first presidential contest in the corm state of Iowa didn't hurt either. With oil prices plummeting, it is even less competitive — if it ever was.

I’ve reported for years on how city and state governments have forked over hundreds of millions in public subsidies to private mall developers and retailers.

Redefining hard intelligence

Disgrace: Ahmadinejad to deliver “alternative” Christmas message on British TV

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Last week's deal was supposed to hold both the managers' and unions' feet to the fire. In handing out the taxpayer money, the White House insisted the auto union cut worker pay roughly to the levels of their successful competitors, Toyota, Honda and Nissan.

For $17 billion in emergency bailout cash and possibly much more later, it was a reasonable request. As President Bush said, "The time to make the hard decisions to become viable is now — or the only option will be bankruptcy." He added that a deadline of March 31 for the industry to prove its "viability" and other limits "send a clear signal to everyone involved."

Well, if so, the United Auto Workers didn't get it.

Just days before Christmas, the UAW let it be known it'll fight any concessions on wages and benefits. "An undue tax on the workers" is how union boss Ron Gettelfinger described it as the UAW reneged on the deal almost before the ink was dry.

This will go down as one of the most cynical acts of political manipulation ever. The UAW agreed to one thing with President Bush, knowing full well President-elect Barack Obama and congressional Democrats were big recipients of union largesse and would let them slide. They read the situation correctly.

Democratic Rep. Barney Frank this week called union concessions an "unfair assault on working men and women" — a not-accidental echo of Gettelfinger's comments.

But the only real assault on "working men and women" here is the enormous cost this bailout will entail — a cost that all working taxpayers will have to bear and which some analysts think will ultimately total $75 billion to $125 billion.

And the UAW hopes you'll pony it up and give them a free ride.

Simply put, unless the UAW makes concessions, a bailout can't work. It will be a financial impossibility. The U.S. automakers' high labor costs, coupled with the 2,000-plus pages of work rules and union requirements under the most recent labor deal, will keep them from achieving the productivity they need to compete.

The U.S. automakers are bleeding $6 billion a month. Better to pull the plug now and force them into bankruptcy, where radical restructuring — including cuts in union pay and benefits — wouldn't be optional but mandatory. That's the industry's only hope.

Cheney the worst VP? Hardly!

No, what this poll suggests is that almost a quarter of Americans have no grasp of our own history.  The question itself is rather silly; it’s almost as trenchant as asking who makes the worst fast-food taco.  Vice Presidents have little real impact on policy, unless they become President through succession or election.  They do nothing without the endorsement and forebearance of their presidents, which makes the idea of best and worst in class almost entirely meaningless.

However, let’s offer three examples that should have rendered the question entirely moot:

• Aaron Burr - The only VP to kill a man in office.  He shot the Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, in a duel after Hamilton (reportedly) deliberately shot wide.  (Cheney shot a man by accident, who survived, but there’s a thin parallel for Cheney haters.)  Burr had to flee to South Carolina while VP to avoid prosecution for murder in New Jersey  Later, he formed his own army and by several accounts intended to rebel against the US and form his own nation in the Ohio valley.
• John Calhoun - One of the men who inspired the Civil War and an outspoken proponent of slavery.  He served as VP to both John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson, resigning under the latter to take a seat in the Senate.  He championed “nullification”, the supposed right of states to supercede federal law when they disagreed with it, and the right of secession.  More than most, he amplified the bitter divisions between the South and abolitionists and set the stage for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans as well as the extension of slavery for decades.
• Spiro Agnew - The only VP to resign because of criminal charges, this really shows how illiterate the CNN respondents had to be.  After all, Agnew resigned just 35 years ago, and he worked for Richard Nixon, one of the most reviled presidents in history.  Agnew pled guilty to a failure to report income in order to avoid charges of bribery during his tenure as VP and as governor of Maryland.

No matter what one thinks of Dick Cheney, he hasn’t done anything to eclipse these embarrassments in the American historical record.  I myself think Cheney’s done a good job, but I would allow that history may prove differently.  The burden of history will really fall, as it should, on George Bush.