The latest jobs numbers are due out on Friday and apparently the news must not be very good– and in fact the news is probably worse than the White House had expected– because Barack Obama’s economic adviser, Larry Summers, is already making excuses for the numbers and claiming that we need to “look past” the latest numbers.
Larry Summers is actually claiming that the jobs numbers are “distorted” because of all of the storms that we have had over the last month.
The blizzards that affected much of the country during the last month are likely to distort the statistics. So it’s going to be very important … to look past whatever the next figures are to gauge the underlying trends
There you have it, Larry Summers is actually blaming the fact that we have had Winter storms in the Winter for the fact that there were not as many jobs created as the administration has hoped.
The theory goes like this; construction had to be put on hold because of the storms, so construction jobs were not created. (Apparently the fact that there is no new construction happening in the first place is secondary to the fact that if there were actually construction jobs the storms would have prevented the hiring of construction workers.)
The theory continues with the claim that because restaurants and stores had to close for a few days that they were forced to either delay hiring employees or temporarily lay off employees until the storms blew over.
This has got to be one of the most asinine and transparent arguments that I have heard in a long time. This is a blatant attempt to defer the blame for this administration’s failed economic policies, and because the administration can no longer talk about the problems that it “inherited” it has to look elsewhere. But there is nowhere to turn because this administration– with the passage of the stimulus bill– now owns this economy, so the administration is lamely trying to blame nature for the failings of Barack Obama.
Nobody really believes this line of bullshit, do they? Sooner or later Barack Obama is going to have to look in the mirror, man up, and admit that he and his policies bear the responsibility for the state of the American economy. The first step in recovery is admitting that you have a problem.
Charlie Rangel may step down tonight
Embattled and disgraced chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Charlie Rangel, may step down as early as tonight. With the Republicans preparing a resolution demanding his removal and with “frontline” Democrats fearing their chances for re-election, the tide appears to be turning away from the corrupt chairman of the committee that writes the tax laws.
Democrats are now urging Charlie Rangel to step down so that they can avoid having to take a vote on his removal. Democrats are caught in a tough place on this issue if the Republicans manage to send their resolution to the floor for a vote; they will have to chose between their loyalty to the 38 year veteran of the house and aligning themselves with the very corruption that they promised to end if they were given power, or abandoning Charlie Rangel in his time of need for political reasons.
No Democrat in a re-election campaign can survive siding with Rangel and his corruption in this political climate; they will be forced to vote him out, so privately they are asking Charlie Rangel to help them avoid this embarrassment to themselves and to Rangel.
It now seems inevitable that one way or the other, Charlie Rangel will not be chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee for much longer, it is just a matter of whether he will go quietly for the good of the party, or whether he will force his own party to vote for his dismissal. Personally, I don’t care whether he steps down or whether he is voted out as long as he is no longer in charge of writing the tax laws that we must follow but that he ignores.
Did the White House offer Joe Sestak a high ranking job to bribe him not to run against Arlen Specter?
Somehow I missed Pennsylvania Representative Joe Sestak’s claim that someone in the White House offered him a high ranking job in exchange for his promise not to run against Arlen Specter in a primary bid for Specter’s re-election. But that is what Joe Sestak has claimed on more than one occasion.
The administration is denying that this bribe took place and Joe Gibbs is claiming ignorance when he is asked about the claim, but the question is, why would Joe Sestak lie about this offer? What could he possibly stand to gain by making something like this up? I can’t find an answer to those questions that would lead me to believe that Joe Sestak is lying about the job proposal. I have to believe it is the truth.
The next question that needs to be asked is, was it inappropriate for the White House to make this offer in order to help a senator that the administration wants to see returned to the senate? Technically, there was probably nothing wrong with this offer; I am sure that this type of thing happens all the time. But I just can’t help but think that the White House should stay out of the affairs of the states. Let the people decide who should represent them. That would be the most appropriate way to settle who becomes the next senator from Pennsylvania. The White House shouldn’t be in the business of deciding which candidates should be allowed to represent the people, that is the people’s business. If the people of Pennsylvania approve of Arlen Specter they will return him to the senate no matter who is running against him, if they do not, they won’t. It really is that simple.
It seems to me that Barack Obama should have more important things on his plate to worry about rather than who is running against whom in state elections. He appears to be sidetracked when he wades into state politics, no wonder why he can’t get anything done.
Barack Obama appears ready to propose changes to the healthcare reform bill that he unveiled just days before last week’s “healthcare summit,” and will announce those changes on Wednesday. Nancy Pelosi is on record as saying that the newest healthcare reform proposal from Barack Obama will be “much smaller” than the one he proposed last week, and the one the House already passed:
“In a matter of days, we will have a proposal, it will be a much smaller proposal than we had in the House bill, because that’s where we can gain consensus. But it will be big enough to put us on a path of affordable, quality healthcare for all Americans that holds insurance companies accountable.
Is this finally an admission that the Democrats realize there is no way they can pass this enormous healthcare bill that they have been working on for about one year? It certainly seems as if that is the case. Barack Obama made one last push to pass his healthcare reform bill that culminated in the “healthcare summit” last week, even threatening to use reconciliation in order to frighten some Republicans to vote for the bill. But it is becoming evident that the president and the Democrats are not really willing to use reconciliation to pass this bill– and they probably will lose a reconciliation vote in the House even if they ram it through the Senate– it was a last ditch effort to try to pass the bill and it looks like it may have failed.
So now the president is looking at yet another healthcare reform proposal and the rumor is that this one will be much smaller– that certainly is good news. But we do not know what will be in this bill and what will be left out of this bill, so it bears watching what will happen next.
Both the president and the Democrats have invested too much time on this issue to let it go without passing something– anything– so it will be interesting to see what this anything turns out to be. We don’t know what is in the president’s latest proposal but we will know in two short days.
The mayor of Las Vegas said that Barack Obama was a slow learner and he was right, but maybe, just maybe, Barack Obama has finally learned his lesson on this healthcare reform bill.
Much has been made about whether the Democrats will use reconciliation to pass the healthcare reform bill– and I have been just as guilty as anyone else on this topic– but as I have thought about this issue more and more, I am beginning to wonder if it is an issue at all.
What do I mean by this? Surely if the Democrats use reconciliation to pass a bill that the American people in large numbers do not want than it should be an issue that we should be concerned about, but I am beginning to think that it is a non-issue. Why? Because we are focused on the Senate using reconciliation to pass this bill with a simple 51 vote majority instead of the 60 vote super majority but we are forgetting one thing; we are forgetting that this bill still has to be passed by the House as well.
While reconciliation will probably allow the Senate to pass this bill with 51 votes, it is uncertain– and probably unlikely– that the House will be able to pass this bill as it now stands.
That is where the future of this bill lies– in the House, and right now Nancy Pelosi is struggling to get the votes needed to pass it. Due to circumstances beyond her control, the House has lost three of its “yes” votes to either retirement or death. The House passed this bill by a 5 vote margin, 220-215, but only after language was added to ensure that federal funding for abortion was not included in the bill.
With these three “yes” votes now gone, and with the abortion language stripped from the bill, it would seem that passage in the House is highly unlikely. There is a coalition of at least 20 pro-life, Blue Dog Democrats who have pledged not to vote for this bill unless the Stupak amendment is reinserted. This seems to be highly unlikely, and even if it is the House will then lose the more liberal members.
This bill could be in real trouble, even if reconciliation is used, which is why I now believe that the threat of reconciliation may be just that– a threat and nothing more, an attempt to intimidate Republicans into voting for this bill because while reconciliation may help it pass the Senate, Republicans will need to be onboard if there is any chance for it to pass the House.
Democrats are trying to “persuade” Republicans to vote for this bill by claiming that they will pass it either with or without them, but in truth they cannot pass it without them– at least in the House. The truth is that they need some of the Republicans to vote for this bill in order to offset the votes of the Blue Dog Democrats, and I don’t see that happening.
For all of the talk about reconciliation, it appears to be nothing more than a political game that Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid cannot win.
Climategate: Al Gore defends the IPCC
Still have no power, it is supposed to be on tonight but I am not holding my breath. Here is a mobile post.
Since all of the scandals surrounding the IPCC have been brought to light Al Gore has been silently absent. Now that has changed with this editorial that appeared in the New York Times. Al Gore is back and it is unsurprising that he is defending the IPCC and their flawed data.
He makes the claim that as much as he wishes it were true that these “flaws” in the IPCC’s research prove that we are not facing an “unimaginable calamity” that it is simply untrue and the United States “would still need to deal with the national security risks of our growing dependence on a global oil market dominated by dwindling reserves in the most unstable region of the world, and the economic risks of sending hundreds of billions of dollars a year overseas in return for that oil.”
He may have a point when he makes the statement about the United States’ dependency on foreign oil– hell, I want to stop sending money to the Middle East for oil when we have it here– but he is purposely trying to confuse and intertwine these two separate issues. The issue of global warming and the issue of our dependency on foreign oil are two different issues, but Al Gore is trying to tie them together to save his enterprise which will fall apart if Americans realize that the IPCC has been scamming us all these years.
He goes on to defend the IPCC and claims that these mistakes don’t take away from the fact that global warming is real and that it is man-made. If this is true than Al Gore should have no problem with an investigation into the IPCC, their data, and their motives because if what Al Gore says is true he– and the IPCC– will be exonerated. If he has a problem with an investigation it will be due to the fact that he is, and always has been, full of shit.
But Al Gore probably won’t support an investigation that could possibly prove his claims and that is because he stands to lose millions of dollars if the IPCC is shown to have manipulated the data– possibly even more money than the IPCC itself.
With Al Gore’s money train under attack, is it any wonder that he has come to its defense?
Democrats begin to ask Charlie Rangel to resign
Still without power, here is a mobile post. Hopefully my links will work, if they do not I apologize.
Earlier this week the House ethics committee found Charlie Rangel guilty of ethics violations for accepting a gift trip to the Caribbean. It has been my belief that, with all of the tax scandals surrounding the man who chairs the House Ways and Means Committee, Charlie Rangel should at least step down from this committee while he was being investigated. After all, the House Ways and Means Committee writes the tax laws that Charlie Rangel was violating.
But not only did that not happen, Democrats– who promised to run the most ethical and honest congress ever– came to this tax cheat’s defense. Now that he is a known tax cheat that could be changing.
Democrat House members are now calling for him to resign his chairmanship. Paul Hodes, Gene Taylor, and Bobby Bright are the first Democrats to call for Charlie Rangel to resign as chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. Here is what New Hampshire congressman Paul Hodes had to say:
“I honor and respect Charlie Rangel’s lifetime of service as a soldier serving our country in Korea and as a public servant. But Washington must be held to the highest ethical standards. Regrettably, with the finding of ethics violations, Charlie Rangel should step down from his leadership position.”
Being from New Hampshire, this might be the first time that Paul Hodes has said something that I agree with, unfortunately he is not my congressman and Carol Shea Porter remains mum on this issue.
And the other Democrats mentioned above had similar statements, yet Nancy Pelosi still appears to be ready and willing to defend this tax cheat. I can understand Democrats coming to the defense of Charlie Rangel until after the investigation is over, but there is no excuse for it now. The investigation is over and he was found to have violated ethics rules– and there are still more investigations pending– so it is time for him to resign, at least his chairmanship and I won’t be happy until he resigns from the House period!
Some Democrats– probably those who are involved in tight re-election campaigns– are beginning to see the inevitable, but the leaders appear to be either oblivious or uncaring to the corruption that is happening right under their noses. Perhaps if more Democrats come out strongly against Charlie Rangel the leadership will be forced to take action, but until then nothing will change.
Republicans seem to be strangely quiet on this issue as well, where are all the Republicans demanding for Charlie Rangel’s resignation? They should be front and center on this issue but they seem unwilling to take a stand. Why is that? What are they afraid of?
It is time for Charlie Rangel to step down.
No power
A wicked Winter nor’easter with heavy downpours and 60 MPH winds has left over 300,000 New Hampshire residents without power. That is about half of the state.
Needless to say, I am one of them so I won’t be posting much for a while. It is estimated that some people will be without power for a week, hopefully it won’t be that long but last year’s ice storm knocked out power for 11 days.
As usual, I can’t stay totally away from the blogosphere, so if anything that I feel blog-worthy comes up I will write a mobile post, so check back.
Democrats sour on the jobs bill
The jobs bill passed its cloture vote by a 70-28 margin making this the first piece of legislation that had any kind of bipartisan support but now it appears as though Democrats are beginning to sour on the bill.
Liberal Democrats are upset that Harry Reid threw out the original $150 billion bill in favor of the much slimmed down $15 billion version, but the problems do not stop there; Blue Dog Democrats are upset that the pay-go language has been stripped out of the bill.
As it stands right now, Democrats may not have the votes to pass this bill which just a few short days ago appeared headed to passage fairly easily. The infighting within the Democrat party could be this bill’s undoing. While the Democrats are trying to paint the Republicans as the party of no, the truth is that the differing Democrat factions cannot agree on a single piece of legislation. Democrats have stalled almost all of Barack Obama’s domestic agenda.
Up until last month the Democrats enjoyed a 60 vote super majority, there was nothing that the republicans could do to stop anything, yet the Democrats have not been able to come to a consensus on anything. We saw this in the healthcare reform debate; Democrats should have had healthcare reform passed long before the election of Scott Brown left the legislation on life support, but the intraparty bickering left the healthcare bill in limbo and now we may be seeing the same old divisions rising up to bite them on the ass again.
The Democrats and Barack Obama promised to unite the country but so far they have not even been able to unite their own party.
Tim Pawlenty endorses John McCain for re-election
Tim Pawlenty has been mentioned as a possible presidential candidate in 2012, but today he did something that is not going to help him if he truly does have presidential aspirations. Today Tim Pawlenty endorsed John McCain in his re-election bid.
I understand that Tim Pawlenty has known John McCain for 20 years and he considers him a friend, but there is no excuse for endorsing a man who supports amnesty for illegal immigrants while at the same time trying to call himself a conservative.
John McCain made a name for himself as the “Maverick” that bucked George Bush and the Republican party in general for the last eight years; he was “rewarded” for this by somehow winning the Republican nomination for president in 2008. With the political atmosphere being so anti-Bush, anti-Republican in 2008 John McCain was able to capture the nomination from a party that was trying to distance itself from itself. Naturally, that did not work as the voters chose a true liberal Democrat over a faux Democrat.
But now the climate has turned toxic for Democrats– and probably more accurately incumbents in general– and people like John McCain are in trouble, yet people like Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin, and now Tim Pawlenty are coming to this man’s defense and trying to help him win re-election. If John McCain loses his bid for re-election in the primary– and I think that he will– this will hopefully show these high profile Republicans that the American people do not want RINOs representing them. You would think that these politicians realize this already but evidently they do not.
Just when Republicans seem to be ready to make a political comeback, they start showing us that they still do not get it. The good ole boy network appears to be in full force. The American people are souring on Barack Obama’s liberal agenda, now is the time to show the people that Republicans offer a legitimate alternative to Barack Obama; certainly John McCain is trying to portray himself as more conservative than his actions over the last eight years suggest, but the people know who John McCain is and what he stands for because all we have to do is look at his record.
Republicans may be willing to overlook John McCain’s record but the voters of Arizona have the chance to show the nation that the people are not. Republicans who support John McCain and the other RINOs like him, do so at their own peril.
America's Watchtower 