Yesterday, The Daily Caller highlighted a continuing issue I have with the Obama Administration and that is using words that attempt to hide or do not describe what the government is talking about. For example, the President constantly uses the word “revenue” instead of taxes and “investment” instead of more government spending. But that is not the […]
Back in Black
Senator Coburn (R-OK) and his staff have been leaders in fighting a bloated federal government, rife with waste, fraud, and abuse. His office has produced several reports on where spending could be cut in the federal government and would certainly help return its role back to what it was envisioned to be – small with […]
Put On the Daddy Pants
Politico Pro, a Washington D.C.-based policy magazine, recently wrote a piece entitled, “The Sequester’s Slow Burn,” by Darren Samuelsohn. He starts off by saying, “So the era of sequestration has meant furloughs for more than 800,000 workers and entire agencies are shuttered for days – and those were the easy cuts. There are nine more years […]
Got jobs?
For all the hand-wringing since March 1 about the sequester and the Obama administration threatening to furlough thousands of federal employees and contractors, thus marking the end of civilization as we know it, you would be happy to know the federal government is still hiring people.
Light at the End of the Pipeline
At a time when the national debt exceeds $16.5 trillion, the unemployment rate is 7.9 percent, and the United States is searching for ways to reduce dependence on oil from the Middle East, it sure would be nice to have a project that assuages all three concerns at the same time. Such a project exists – it is called the Keystone Pipeline. Yet despite the overwhelming evidence of the positive impact that the pipeline would have on the American economy, as of March 7, 2013, the Obama Administration and the State Department had delayed making a decision to approve or reject the project for 1,630 days.
The Shovel-Ready Jobs Swindle
The money would be spent on a variety of infrastructure projects, such as improved highways, railways, and transit systems. The national infrastructure bank, according to Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), would end up functioning as a “public private partnership like Fannie Mae.” Such a comparison should give taxpayers heartburn.
The Consumer Police and Sin Taxes
There have always been and will always be some people who believe they know what is best for everyone, so they try to force their will on the rest of society. This attitude is very much at odds withthe philosophy that liberty should be maximized and that people should be allowed to live their lives as they would like as long as they are not infringing on the rights of others.In recent years, the “we know best” crowd has expanded the number of activities that they believe need policing far beyond the traditional sins that have been targeted for decades and even centuries.
Federal Bailout No More! State and Local Governments Must Deal With TheirOwn Pension Predicaments
In December 2008, state governments had nearly $1.94 trillion set aside in pension funds for approximately 20 million active state and local government employees and seven million retirees and dependents who currently receive benefits.
Using market-based discount rates that reflect the risk profile of pension liabilities, finance professors Robert Novy-Marx of the University of Chicago and Joshua Rauhof Northwestern University calculated that states have pension liabilities of $5.17 trillion, which means that state pension plans are unfunded by $3.23 trillion. Local government pension plans are unfunded by $574 billion.
Port Earmark Divides South Carolina Senators
Citing the need to modernize the Port of Charleston, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) submitted a $400,000 earmark to the Senate version of the fiscal year 2011 Energy and Water Appropriations Act to study the port’s potential deepening. However, the Senate Appropriations Committee rejected the project.
Privacy Problems
Privacy may mean different things to different people, but at a certain level everybody wants their privacy protected. The advent and growth of the Internet has greatly amplified privacy issues.
As with every other subject that comes to the forefront of the American psyche, Congress is gearing up to offer legislation to “protect privacy.” As usual, this means Congress could do more harm than good.