Tag: politics

Thomas Jefferson: Porkbuster

Stephen Moore, Political Diary:

During last week’s debate about the federal earmarking process — which is used to distribute pork to congressional districts — House Appropriators struck back. The appropriators, of both parties, complain that fiscal conservatives in the House are trying to ruin a time-honored congressional tradition of passing out bacon by demanding full transparency for pork spending. In a letter to his colleagues, Idaho Republican Rep. Mike Simpson went so far as to argue that the Framers wouldn’t have approved of this effort to curb Congress’s power of the purse and even claimed “earmarking is virtually required by article 1 section 9 clause 7 of the Constitution.”

So we did some checking on the writings of the founders to shed some light on their view of the domestic pork process. The first budget ever passed by Congress approved roughly $100 million of funds in today’s dollars. There were no Lawrence Welk Museums or Cowboy Hall of Fame earmarks in the bill — which was only a few pages long. The founders believed that if a government function wasn’t listed in the Constitution under the enumerated powers clause (Article I, Section 8), the right to spend money didn’t exist. Pork was hardly an issue.

The biggest opponent to federal spending on parochial projects was Thomas Jefferson. Here is what Jefferson wrote in a letter to James Madison: “I view [road building] as a source of boundless patronage to the executive, jobbing to members of Congress & their friends, and a bottomless abyss of public money. You will begin by only appropriating the surplus of the post roads revenues, but the other revenues will soon be called into their aid, and it will be a scene of eternal scramble among the members, who can get the most money wasted in their State; and they will always get most who are meanest.”

To be sure, there were defenders of congressional funding of local projects, most notably Alexander Hamilton. But back then the stakes and dollar amounts were much smaller. Given what’s happening today in Congress with highway bills larded up with thousands of special projects, we’d say that Jefferson’s warning was amazingly prescient. We’d also say that the founders would be mighty disgusted with the way Republicans and Democrats have been serving as guardians of the public purse.

The dangers of multiculturalism

I haven’t started reading Robert Ferrigno’s Prayers for the Assassin yet, though I need to soon. I have started reading his blog the past few days, and like this post from last month:

[I]t seems to me that the issue of the cartoons points out the dangers of multi-culturalism, which has been embraced by Western societies post WW2. If all cultures are equal, and each culture reserves the right to be offended and to act on that offense in a matter it deems appropriate, whether burning cartoons or cartoonists, than we’re in for a rocky ride. When do the Hindus in the West start torching McDonalds for promoting the sinful eating of cows? When do the Amish run amok in shopping malls outraged by the rampant consumerism and excess vanity? When do the Scientologists go after South Park, one of my three favorite TV shows?
Eerie how some things come to pass. Not that Scientologists are going after South Park (yet), but it was odd reading Robert’s post from February 5th, in light of the recent Isaac Hayes-South Park flap.
I don’t think we’ll see the Amish run amok any time soon, either, since they tend toward pacifism, but I must say I won’t be surprised to learn of any Hindu violence, should it erupt in this country. Like many Muslims in other countries, the Hindu within India can be exceedingly violent against Christians, Buddhists, and other persons of faith.

Wither the financial services windfall profits tax?

So both Goldman and Lehman are reporting huge earnings. Obviously they did so on the backs of working-class Americans and Congressional hearings should begin post-haste to determine if a “windfall” profit tax will be levied, right?
[For the sarcasm-impaired, the above was typed very much tongue-in-cheek.]

This “Striderweb”, I like it

Stephan Rider:

Please note: You’re not allowed to call yourselves followers of a “religion of peace” if you riot and make death threats over a political cartoon.

[…]

A lot of people decry such statements, saying that this is the actions of some muslims, but not most of them. I’m still waiting for the major leaders of Islam to rise up and denounce such violence. Until that starts happening on a regular basis, I have a hard time believing those arguments.
[Via Jeff.]

Are you registered to vote?

The Free Market Foundation reminds Texans the deadline for voter registration in time for the March primaries is this Monday, February 6th. If you need to register:
1. Click here to download a PDF of the voter registration form you can print out.
2. Fill it out and mail it to your county voter registration
office. Click here for a list of registrars by county.
As with every election, the Free Market Foundation is providing non-partisan Voters’ Guides free of charge. Send them an e-mail with your mailing address and desired quantity. I’ve taken advantage of these guides in the past, and they are great at distilling voting issues in to clear language, offering pros and cons for ballot propositions, as well as candidate information.

The New Surgeon General’s Warning

Courtesy of Jeff Harrell.

Reckless with the truth and national security

A Patriot Post reader:

In their eagerness to inflict as much damage as possible to the Bush administration record, the Democrats once again are being reckless with the truth and with national security. Some say that the president is spying on American citizens. The president has made clear from the start that the wiretaps were limited to targeting communications from outside the country to individuals in the U.S. with known links to terrorist groups. It’s not an “unreasonable search” to look for the bad guys when fighting international terrorism. The Democrats don’t have a leg to stand on in this issue…and they know it.

How can the Democrats in all honesty criticize the president for intelligence failures and then attack him for being too aggressive in doing surveillance? How do you explain dismantling protections in the midst of a terror war? The Democrats by their duplicity are playing a very dangerous game that could derail the president’s strategy to defeat a
deadly enemy. The Fourth Amendment to the constitution protects its citizens from “unreasonable searches and seizures” but who will protect us from “unreasonable” self-serving, seditious and self-destructive politicians?” –Fredericktown, Ohio

Shocked–shocked!–we tell you

Paul Greenberg:

Dana Priest of The Washington Post sounds shocked – shocked! – to discover that George W. Bush ordered a complete remobilization and reinvigoration of the CIA immediately after September 11th:

The effort President Bush authorized shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, to fight al-Qaida has grown into the largest CIA covert-action program since the height of the Cold War, expanding in size and ambition despite a growing outcry at home and abroad over clandestine tactics…

This is news? Isn’t this just what W. told the country he would do in the aftermath of September 11th?

[…]

Apparently W. meant it. According to the Post’s Ms. Priest, the president signed an order six days after September 11th empowering American intelligence agencies in a way not seen since the Second World War.

Gosh, just as if we had suffered a surprise attack and thousands of our people had been killed in a second Pearl Harbor.

Do you think maybe the president decided to fight this like a world war because, far ahead of his critics, he realized we were in one?

On truth being stranger than fiction

Best of the Web:

What do the senior senator from Massachusetts and quadruple murderer Stanley “Tookie” Williams have in common? The Associated Press provides one answer:

Meet the latest children’s author, Sen. Ted Kennedy, and his Portuguese Water Dog, Splash, his co-protagonist in “My Senator and Me: A Dogs-Eye View of Washington, D.C.”

Scholastic Inc. will release the book in May.

So Ted Kennedy has a dog named Splash? How witty.

Mary Jo Kopechne’s children could not be reached for comment.

Cleaning house

Today’s featured article on OpinionJournal, while highlighting the Abramoff ugliness, shows why many conservatives, this one included, are relatively unhappy with the Republicans in Congress:

The party that swept to power on term limits, spending restraint and reform has become the party of incumbency, 6,371 highway-bill “earmarks,” and K Street. And it’s no defense to say that Democrats would do the same. Of course Democrats would, but then they’ve always claimed to be the party of government. If that’s what voters want, they’ll choose the real thing.

[…]

Republicans won’t escape voter anger by writing new rules but only by returning to their self-professed principles. Gradually since 1994 they’ve decided they want to reform and limit government less than they want to use government to entrench their own power, and in the case of the Abramoffs to get rich doing so. If Speaker Dennis Hastert, interim Majority Leader Roy Blunt and other GOP leaders are too insulated to realize this, then Republicans need new leaders, and right away.
What’s the adage, “Lead or get out of the way”? That’s what the Republican congressional leadership needs to do. Show some backbone and lead, or let a willing someone step up and take over. There should be no more talk of DeLay returning to the Majority Leader position. Even if Mr. DeLay is found to be completely innocent (and in the case of the Texas charges, I believe he is), he has been tainted by allowing himself to be put in that position in the first place. Mr. Blunt or another Republican congressman needs to be named the new Majority Leader, so the floundering of the party can be put to a stop.
The Republican Party, lead by Reagan, and then briefly from ’94-98 by Gingrich, was the party of smaller government. This message resonated with the American people, and this put and kept the Republicans in power so long as they abided by that message. If Republicans are so interested in remaining in power, as the OpinionJournal piece opines, perhaps they should look to their recent past.