Washington – Congressman Kevin McCarthy warned of balooning federal deficits at the Conservative Bloggers’ Briefing today at the Heritage Foundation. “How do you tell future generations that we are going to be able to compete with India and China? How do you tell future generations that they will be better off than we are, if you strangle-hold this debt upon them?” he said, predicting that the debates on President Obama’s extraordinarybudget proposal will focus on this issue. The budget being proposed by the administration lays seeks unprecedented post WWII spending increases. Democrats and …
“If you don’t return it on your own, we will do it for you.” So warned Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) referring to the $165 million in bonuses paid to employees of the 80% taxpayer owned insurance company AIG. And how did Schumer plan to force those employees to give their compensation back? With a specially targeted 91% tax. Rep. John Dingell (D-MI) later upped the bidding to 95% but Rep. Steve Israel (D-NY) refused to be out demagogued and proposed a full 100% tax. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) then demanded …
Hitting the Federal ATM, Again Apparently, It Does Grow on Trees: After an $800 billion stimulus bill, the President’s budget increases spending by $1 trillion over 10 years, includes an additional $250 billion placeholder for another bailout, and calls for a pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) law while astonishingly violating that rule by $3.4 trillion. More Deficits and More Debt: The President’s budget leaves permanent deficits averaging $600 billion even after the economy recovers and doubles the publicly held national debt to over $15 trillion ($12.5 trillion after inflation). To Pay for Historic …
As President Obama and Congress are starting to learn, it isn’t easy running American businesses from Washington. This week AIG threw bonuses in the faces of their new CEO’s on Capitol Hill, after Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT) specifically legislated that they could do just that. Senator Dodd is apparently wishing he hadn’t made that decision now. Now we learn that the auto companies that American taxpayers are bailing out an alarming rate are being forced into more bad decisions by lawmakers. Their new “bosses” on Capitol Hill are forcing them …
As more details emerge as to bonuses paid by bail-out insurance giant AIG, the nation’s outrage is growing. According to figures released by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, no less than 73 employees received bonuses of $1 million or more. Seven received more than $4 million. One employee received more than $6.4 million. To be fair, little is known about the circumstances of each case – we don’t know the names of the recipients, never mind the unique value of each. Many are no doubt engaged in unwinding AIG’s …
Are the Russians going to establish a bomber presence in Venezuela or Cuba? This past weekend a Russian air force commander spoke of potential basing opportunities in Venezuela while leftist President Hugo Chavez seemed to indicate a readiness to accept Russian aircraft. But then Chavez “walked the cat back” as the press officials like to say. Or didn’t he? Both the Pentagon and State Department press folks were quick to downplay the issue, not wishing to make waves when the White House has so much on its plate. One exchange …
Unemployment and social and economic instability sparked by the ongoing crisis have caused a socio-political fallout in Russia. The share of guest workers is traditionally high in Moscow’s employment patterns, and nowadays many of them have been laid off. The rates of street crime with their participation have spiked, according to the Moscow police data. In retaliation, there is a growing tide of violence on the part of Muscovites against non-residents, largely the natives of the Caucasus and Central Asia. Muscovites committed over 90 crimes against non-Slavic citizens in 2008. …
Former director of the Missile Defense Agency General Trey Obering (ret.) took a USA Today article to task at a recent screening of 33 Minutes in Washington D.C. Listening to Obering, the “reasons” not to build missile defenses sound a lot more like just bad excuses. Technology: Obering said the interceptors they have tested have been able to repeatedly hit within inches of where they aim. What the USA Today article doesn’t say, and Obering pointed out, is that the land based missile system was 3 for 3 in its …
Last week, with the signing of his pen on the Omnibus Spending Bill, President Barack Obama ended a pilot program designed to allow Mexican trucking companies to ship goods deep inside the United States. While controversial with some quarters of the American public, the program was necessary to ensure U.S. compliance with the North American Free Trade Agreement, commonly known as NAFTA. With the program no longer funded, the United States would be willingly violating that trade treaty. As a result, the government of Mexico announced plans to retaliate against …
Heritage Foundation Senior Policy Analyst Brian Riedl details how President Barack Obama’s budget raises taxes on Americans by $1.4 trillion: In his recent address to Congress, President Obama promised that “if your family earns less than $250,000 a year, you will not see your taxes increased a single dime. I repeat: not one single dime.” Yet even before the budget was released, he signed into law a 62-cent tobacco tax increase that does not exempt lower-income smokers. His budget proposes a $646 billion cap-and-trade tax that energy companies would immediately …
