Category Archives: national news

national news, political news

What’s happened to the budget deficit?

BudgetDeficit

Remember the federal budget deficit?

Do you also remember how Republicans used to rail against it and how Democrats used to ignore it? Republicans said the deficit would keep growing and would bankrupt the nation. Democrats insisted that the government needed to “invest” public money on public projects.

Flash back to the 1980 presidential campaign.

  • GOP nominee Ronald Reagan’s campaign ran TV ads that parodied House Speaker Tip O’Neill and the Democrats in Congress as wasteful spenders. President Carter oversaw a deficit that “ballooned” to about $40 billion.

Reagan won the election in a landslide.

What happened then? President Reagan fought for tax cuts and exploded defense spending. The result: the federal deficit effectively tripled.

Let’s move ahead to the 1992 election.

  • Democratic nominee Bill Clinton ran against President George H.W. Bush, proclaiming “It’s the economy, stupid.” The nation was struggling through a recession. Clinton won the election. Then the Republicans took control of Congress after the 1994 mid-term election.

What happened after that? The Democratic president, working with the Republican-led Congress, balanced the budget. Clinton left the White House in 2001 and the budget was running a hefty surplus.

  • Republican George W. Bush was elected in 2000. Then came the 9/11 terrorist attacks. President Bush pushed through more tax cuts, but then took the nation to war against terror groups overseas. The result of that effort? The deficit returned and exceeded $1 trillion annually.

But the argument evolved into something else. It didn’t matter that the deficit was exploding, the president and his allies contended, because it constituted a minuscule portion of the Gross Domestic Product. Didn’t the vice president at the time say, “Deficits don’t matter”?

Well, I guess they did.

  • OK, now we come to the 2008 election. The economy has tanked. Financial institutions are going under. The housing market has crashed. So has the auto industry. The deficit was exploding.

Democrat Barack Obama won the election. He got Congress to kick in billions of dollars to jump-start the economy and bail out some of the leading industries.

What happened then? The economy began to recover. The jobless rate, which zoomed to 10 percent, began inching its way back down. Today it stands at 5.1 percent.

Oh, the deficit? It’s been cut by two-thirds.

It’s still too great. It’s a long way from the surplus delivered by President Clinton and his friends in the GOP-controlled Congress.

However, the traditional argument delivered by Republicans that deficits are bad and that Democrats are to blame for spending us into oblivion no longer is relevant.

Just think: The presidential campaign that’s unfolding before us has been called one that defies all conventional wisdom.

I believe the history of the federal budget deficit suggests conventional wisdom got tossed aside long ago.

 

International news, national news, political news

Presumptive speaker, um, ‘speaks’ the truth

House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy of Calif., talks about the Domestic Energy and Jobs Act, part of the House GOP energy agenda, Wednesday, June 6,2012, during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

The man presumed to be the next speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives managed quickly to reveal what many of us have suspected all along.

It is that the Benghazi committee formed by Speaker John Boehner was intended to torpedo the presidential campaign chances of former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.

So said House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy the other day when he was talking about Clinton’s sagging poll standing. He “credited” her decline to the formation of the Benghazi panel and its continued investigation into the fire fight that resulted in 2012 in the deaths of four brave Americans, including the U.S. ambassador to Libya.

GOP critics hit back at McCarthy

Some congressional Republicans aren’t happy with what McCarthy said. They have called his assertions inappropriate and have demanded that he apologize to Clinton for implying a partisan motive in forming the panel in the first place.

The attack was a terrible tragedy. Clinton has acknowledged it. Some in Congress, though, keep insisting that there was some sort of cover-up, a conspiracy, a calculated lie in reporting what happened that night at the U.S. consulate in Benghazi.

Clinton has said there was no cover-up. That hasn’t suited the GOP investigators, who keep hammering at the issue.

Boehner is leaving the House at the end of the month. The House is expected to vote next week on a new speaker. It’s presumed that McCarthy will get the gavel.

Is this what we can expect from the new Man of the House, more partisan targeting?

 

national news

What harm do background checks bring?

3 Comments

gun-control

I am a law-abiding, taxpaying, loyal American patriot, who once wore my country’s uniform and went to war to protect it.

I also own a couple of rifles. They’re hidden away. I don’t take them out very often.

But as the nation today ponders the impact of the latest mass shooting by a maniac, this time at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Ore., I am compelled to ponder: What would happen if I went to a gun store to purchase a firearm and was forced to wait a few days while the government performed a background check?

President Obama has called yet again for more stringent laws that might help prevent future maniacs from getting their hands on a gun.

Gun-rights groups — chiefly the National Rifle Association — will argue against any such action, contending it would violate the Second Amendment guarantee that Americans have the right to “keep and bear arms.”

Suppose we had mandatory background checks.

I’d go into the gun store. I’d select my weapon of choice. I would pay for the firearm. But I couldn’t take it home. Why? The business owner would submit my name to, say, the FBI or the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms for that mandatory federal background check.

I would wait a number of days. Let’s say it’s a week.

The check comes back. I’m clean. I can then pick up my firearm, take it home … and perhaps store it along with the two rifles I already own.

Have my Second Amendment rights been “infringed”? Have I been denied the right to “keep and bear arms”? Is the government going to disarm me?

No to all three things.

Why on God’s Earth can’t we enact a law that might prevent someone else from committing the kind of dastardly act that took place today in Roseburg?

 

national news

Here we go again … more gun violence

Guns-In-America

The list of cities and towns that have become synonymous with gun violence keeps growing.

Littleton, Austin, Blacksburg, Tucson, Newtown, Charleston, Aurora, Killeen. I know I’ve missed a few.

Let’s add Roseburg to that infamous list. A gunman today opened fire at Umpqua Community College in southern Oregon. Ten people were killed.

The gunman died in a fire fight with police.

Gun violence erupts again

This one hurts. It happened in my home state.

I’ll tell you just a bit about Roseburg. It’s a conservative community. Douglas County derives much of its income from logging. It’s a pretty part of the state, rather peaceful … really! Many residents there like to hunt deer and elk.

But here’s the latest version of the same question many of us keep asking when these spasms of violence erupt: Isn’t there a way to impose reasonable regulations that can keep guns out of the hands of maniacs while protecting the rights of law-abiding citizens?

I know what the Second Amendment says. It ends with the phrase ” … the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”

I endorse that principle. Honestly.

However, I keep coming back to the idea that stricter regulations — such as background checks on every person who purchases a firearm — can protect citizens’ right to “keep and bear arms” while denying permission to others who might pose a threat to society.

Gun-rights group and their powerful allies in Washington believe we have enough regulations on the books already. Bad guys will get guns no matter what, they contend.

If that’s the case, that no additional regulation is going to stop forever the kind of senseless carnage that erupted today in Roseburg, then are we going to just continue with the status quo and do nothing to tighten the rules that could prevent someone in the future from doing what that maniac did today?

The status quo is not working.

 

national news, State news

Fly ‘that flag’ proudly … on your own property

battle flag

An interesting question came to me the other day on my first day back at work after taking a two-week trek through Texas.

“Did you see many Confederate flags on your travels through the state?” my friend asked.

Well, not “many,” but certainly more than a tiny smattering.

Which brings me to the point. I do not object to the sight of the Confederate flag on people’s personal property: their motor vehicles or on their RVs when they’re parked.

It’s the public-property display of the flag that irks me — and no doubt others.

We pulled our fifth wheel through North Texas, down through the Piney Woods of East Texas (which is about as “Dixie” as it can get in Texas), along the Gulf Coast, back to the Hill Country … and then finally home.

We stayed at state parks and at private RV campsites along the way. And while we were on the move along the highways and back roads, we saw our share of battle flags flapping from the back of pickups and even a few of ’em flying in the breeze at RV sites where we were staying.

Do I assume that anyone who flies the flag is a flaming racist intent on restoring slave ownership, which was one of the reasons the South went to war with the United States of America from 1861 to 1865? Not for one moment.

The whole Confederate kerfuffle was based on displaying the flag on public, taxpayer-supported property … such as at the South Carolina statehouse grounds in Columbia. The South Carolina Legislature voted earlier this year to take the flag down after a gunman killed nine African-Americans at the Charleston church; a young suspect in the shooting then was revealed to be a staunch supporter of the Confederacy and the issues for which it stood.

Flying the Confederate battle flag on the back of a truck? Or in someone’s front yard? Or from their RV? Not a problem, or at least not enough of a problem to raise a ruckus.

I was gratified, though, that we didn’t see too many of them on our journey through Texas.

 

 

national news, political news

Conspiracy comes back

conspiracy

Conspiracies never die. They’re immortal. They have more lives than thousands of cats.

Who killed JFK? What did FDR know about Pearl Harbor? Was 9/11 an inside job?

These things make me crazy.

Now comes the “vast right-wing conspiracy” put forwarded by Bill and Hillary Clinton. It’s back.

Bill Clinton to join the fight

The former president says all this talk about e-mails and whether his wife, the former secretary of state and current Democratic presidential candidate, is part of the “right-wing conspiracy” cooked up by his foes as he was considering a run for the presidency way back in 1991.

I wish he and his wife, Hillary Clinton, would leave that argument alone.

President Clinton told CNN about a menacing phone call he got from the White House as he was preparing to challenge President George H.W. Bush. The caller allegedly told the then-Arkansas governor he’d better not run, or else his foes would dig up tons of dirt on him.

Media officials — such as Washington Post assistant managing editor Bob Woodward, no slouch as a journalist — said the call never occurred. Others have said the same thing.

Hillary Clinton coined the term “vast right-wing conspiracy” early in her husband’s presidency. She said conservatives conspired to cook up lies about the president in an effort to destroy him.

There’s little doubt that some of the allegations of wrongdoing were bogus. Was it all part of a concerted conspiracy? No one has yet come close to proving that to be the case.

The conspiracy theory, though, is back.

Oh, brother.

 

national news, political news, State news

Sen. Cruz draws outrage … from the GOP!

cruz

Ted Cruz has had this problem almost from the day he joined the U.S. Senate in January 2013.

He thinks much too highly of himself and too little of his colleagues, many of whom have much more time in the senatorial saddle than the junior Republican from Texas.

The Senate leadership, led by Cruz’s fellow Republicans, has shot him down yet again.

And to think the leadership did so after Cruz called Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell a liar on the Senate floor earlier this year. Shocking, I tell ya! Shocking!

Cruz in trouble in Senate

He wants to shut down the government over Planned Parenthood funding. He’s griped about GOP senators being too willing to work those dreaded Democrats. He once accused former GOP Sen. Chuck Hagel of consorting with communist North Korea while Hagel was seeking to become defense secretary in the Obama administration. He once said John Kerry — a decorated Vietnam War veteran — lacked sufficient appreciation of the military; Cruz, by the way, never wore his country’s uniform.

Now the Cruz Missile is running for president of the United States and he’s running into trouble among his colleagues.

They keep pushing back on this young man’s efforts to obstruct whenever and wherever he gets the chance.

Cruz has his fans on the right and the far right. They’re with him in his efforts to shut down the government. They like his fiery rhetoric. They believe he’s capable of fixing whatever ails the nation.

A legislator, though, has to cooperate — even with those in the other party. If he fails to learn that fundamental truth about legislating — which is the making of laws — well, nothing’s going to get done.

Ted Cruz then will have nothing to show for his bombast.

 

business news, national news, political news

Is Trump … a socialist?

income tax

Let’s see how this goes.

Donald Trump wants to eliminate the tax burden for individuals who earn $25,000 or less annually, and for families that earn $50,000 a year. He would allow them to pay no federal income tax — none, zero.

He wants to reduce the corporate tax rate from 35 to 15 percent; wealthy Americans would get a reduction in their income tax from 39.6 percent to 25 percent.

But … he vows to eliminate hundreds of loopholes that he says in effect will generate more revenue for the government and grow the economy. Trump said his plan is going to “cost me a fortune.”

Is the leading Republican presidential candidate a socialist in the mold of, say, Barack H. Obama, who also has argued for reducing the tax burden low-income Americans?

My strong hunch is that the GOP faithful are going love this plan, as it’s coming from a Republican. When something like this comes from a Democrat, well, he’s just another wealth-distributing socialist who’s intent on “destroying the American dream.”

Uh, Mr. Trump? What about that national debt?

Trump tax plan

national news, political news

Boehner is burning key congressional bridge

john_boehner_ap_328

John Boehner is showing some spunk now that he’s a declared short-timer in the halls of Congress.

The speaker of the House of Representatives announced his planned resignation from Congress, effective Oct. 30. He’s weary of the constant fighting with TEA Party members of his GOP caucus.

Then there’s word he might become a lobbyist after waiting a year, per House rules for former lawmakers.

So, what does he do? He starts torching the “false prophets” who gave him so much hell as he tried to manage the House’s legislative agenda.

Those “false prophets” well could become potential sources for the clients he would represent lobbying for their interests in the halls of Congress.

What’s up, then, with the speaker burning that key bridge?

It might be that Boehner could spend the next year campaigning for more moderate and, dare I say, reasonable Republicans. Those individuals, then, could be his target audience as he starts lobbying them for legislation favorable to whomever he hopes to represent.

Speaker Boehner has liberated himself from the shackles of trying to please the multi-faceted elements within his own political party, let alone trying to find common ground with congressional Democrats, who are angry with him for kowtowing to the TEA Party in the first place.

You go, Mr. Speaker!

 

business news, national news, political news

Fiorina: business miracle worker or misfit?

carly

Carly Fiorina is giving me fits.

I happen to think several good things about the Republican presidential candidate.

I like her stage presence. She’s a commanding individual. She’s articulate and unafraid. She holds up well when asked tough questions. She claims to be friends with several world leaders.

I believe Fiorina has acquitted herself beautifully during those two joint appearances with the other GOP candidates.

Then I run into this little thing about her business experience, specifically her tenure as head of Hewlett-Packard.

Fiorina boasts about her leadership of the computer giant. I can’t understand why.

She was forced to quit by the H-P board. Why? Board members said the company stock value had declined precipitously; earnings were down; they disagreed with her about the company’s overall performance and, finally, they disliked her refusal to delegate more authority to division heads.

Fiorina sweeps all that away.

However, I keep coming back to the fundamental question: If Fiorina is such a brilliant business mogul, why did her bosses on the Hewlett-Packard board of directors feel the need to push her out of the way?

If the only Republican woman running for president intends to stay in the game, she’s going to have to answer for that — and explain in detail how her business history at H-P doesn’t disqualify her from taking command of the world’s greatest economy.

I’m all ears, Carly, er, Ms. Fiorina.