After three days of turbulent meetings, the Texas Board of Education on Friday approved a social studies curriculum that will put a conservative stamp on history and economics textbooks, stressing the superiority of American capitalism, questioning the Founding Fathers’ commitment to a purely secular government and presenting Republican political philosophies in a more positive light.
Saturday was a great day to be a conservative! Some 4000 of us showed up on a cold and dreary day to send a message to our elected officials in Washington DC. The message was simple: Kill the bill!
Congressman John Kline and Congresswoman Michele Bachmann were terrific. All 8 MN members of Congress were invited. Representative Erik Paulsen had a prior commitment and sent a letter that can be summed up with three words: kill the bill. Governor Tim Pawlenty sent a similar letter with a similar message: Kill the bill!
Considering the rally was held in Congressional District 4 it is strange indeed that Betty McCollum did not show up. Scared Betty?
When the NARN began the first-ever blogger radio show six years ago, Mitch Berg organized regular social events for bloggers in the Twin Cities, which we call the MOB — the Minnesota Organization of Bloggers. The events are open to bloggers of any stripe, or blog readers, without any restrictions on politics. It’s a social event where political talk is more or less discouraged in favor of fellowship, and it gives us a camaraderie in the local blogosphere that I believe is rather unique.
[Saturday] night, we held our first night out in 2010, and this time I brought the camera to Ol’ Mexico in Roseville, which turned out to be a great venue for the event. I’ve uploaded the images to a new Flickr account and have a few in this slideshow. Hope you enjoy!
Top White House adviser David Axelrod says that if Congress passes the Democrats' national health care bill, it will be politically impossible for Republicans to undo the changes brought by the massive legislation. "I say, Let's have that fight. Make my day," Axelrod said on "Meet the Press." "I'm ready to have that, and every member of Congress ought to be willing to have that debate was well."
Axelrod made the point as he put forward the now-common argument that House Democrats who have already voted for the health care bill once should do so again because they will be attacked by Republican opponents this fall whatever they do.
A couple days ago, I talked with a couple friends of my friends about the Democrats' health care legislation in the context of whether Democratic candidates would distance themselves from the subject. This article in The Hill Magazine not only tells me the answer is yes. It tells me that the answer is an emphatic yes:
Hardly any Democrat running for Congress seems to want to talk about healthcare.
Of the 26 leading Democratic House candidates contacted by The Hill, only one would commit to voting for the Senate healthcare bill if and when it comes to the House floor. Out of the more than two dozen Democratic challengers and open-seat House candidates, only 10 commented for this story. Eight outright declined to comment.
Eight more didn't respond to several days' worth of requests via phone and e-mail.
TRANSLATION: Democratic candidates are treating the subject like it's radioactive waste. They want nothing to do with it.
Yesterday I spoke at the Kill the Bill Rally staged by Minnesota Majority at the state capital. The event drew thousands of people, which makes them about 100 times more newsworthy than the “coffee party” gatherings that drew tens of people … three tens of people in St. Louis, for instance, which garnered CNN’s attention. I didn’t see CNN at our little get-together, but perhaps the cold weather and bitter wind deterred them from covering our grassroots event. It didn’t deter thousands of Minnesotans from joining our call to kill the ObamaCare bill and start over from scratch on reforming the cost structure of American health care.
Sue Jeffers gives me a kind introduction; although we appear on competing stations in the Twin Cities, her station and AM 1280 The Patriot were happy to collaborate on this important issue. The intro lasts about two minutes, and the rest of the video is my speech. My friend David Strom used my Flip HD camera to shoot the video. Later, I’ll have videos of John Kline and Michele Bachman:
Rep. John Kline, the Republican Congressman who represents my district, gave the opening speech at the Kill the Bill Rally yesterday on the state capital mall. Kline, a former colonel in the Marine Corps, doesn’t mince words or waste a lot of time in this address. Each speaker got seven minutes (with the exception of Rep. Michele Bachmann’s keynote speech), but no one would have begrudged Kline the opportunity to speak at length. Instead, Kline gave a disciplined and relatively brief speech, outlining the outrages contained in the ObamaCare bill.
The United States has condemned Israel for announcing the approval of housing construction for Jews in Jerusalem while Vice President Biden was visiting. That's strong language and a striking development.
The Obama administration has also publicly announced the lengthy scolding of Prime Minister Netanyahu by Secretary Clinton in the past day. President Obama is reportedly "livid" with Israel. Secretary Clinton wanted it known that she had dressed down Netanyahu, saying Israel had harmed "the bilateral relationship," according to her State Department spokesman. The Wall Street Journal characterized the conversation as "a blistering rebuke."
Has the Obama administration gotten around to condemning the destructive or threatening actions of an American enemy? Jack Kelly notes the Obama administration's distinction as an unreliable ally and an unfaithful friend.
Approximately 4000 people attended the Kill The Bill Rally at the Minnesota State Capitol today, braving temps in the 40s to demonstrate their opposition to ObamaCare. Check-out Ed Morrisey's post on the rally on Hot Air. Here is a slide show of photos from the rally.
Give the Star Tribune credit; they actually report that “thousands” attended a rally in freezing weather today to demand an end to the ObamaCare effort. Minnesota Majority staged the rally on the state capital mall to hear Reps. John Kline and Michele Bachmann speak to the gathered opponents of the overhaul of the health-care system, as well as several other speakers — including me. The Strib did better than the Associated Press, which went with “at least hundreds” instead:
The message that echoed across the State Capitol grounds Saturday couldn’t have been simpler: “Kill the bill!”
A day after congressional Democratic leaders announced their final legislative push to enact a bill to overhaul the nation’s health care system, opponents rallied to send a noisy contrary message. Rally organizers said 4,000 people attended, but Capitol police estimated the crowd at 2,000 or less.
Representatives Michele Bachmann and John Kline were the keynote speakers at a rally held today at the Minnesota State Capitol protesting Democrats’ plan to force the health ‘reform’ bill through Congress in a matter of days using the so-called ‘nuclear option.’ The trick, technically called budget reconciliation, would enable the Senate to pass a House-amended version of its own already-approved health care bill, bypassing debate and thus staving off any filibuster.
Senator Byrd has said, “Using reconciliation to ram through complicated, far-reaching legislation is an abuse of the budget process. The writers of the Budget Act, and I am one, never intended for its reconciliation’s expedited procedures to be used this way. These procedures were narrowly tailored for deficit reduction. They were never intended to be used to pass tax cuts, or to create new Federal regimes.”
President Obama and Speaker Pelosi got some sober advice from two old pro Democratic pollsters in Friday morning's Washington Post. Here's the advice the White House and House Democrats should pay most of their attention to:
First, the battle for public opinion has been lost. Comprehensive health care has been lost. If it fails, as appears possible, Democrats will face the brunt of the electorate's reaction. If it passes, however, Democrats will face a far greater calamitous reaction at the polls. Wishing, praying or pretending will not change these outcomes.
Nothing has been more disconcerting than to watch Democratic politicians and their media supporters deceive themselves into believing that the public favors the Democrats' current health-care plan. Yes, most Americans believe, as we do, that real health-care reform is needed. And yes, certain proposals in the plan are supported by the public.
Last week, the county board voted 4-3 to lay over (and possibly kill) a request by the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office for federal funding of a “Kingfish” cell phone tracking device. It was the second time the board has postponed a vote on this request, likely making it difficult for the Sheriff’s Office to meet the deadlines for our local congressional representatives.
The Kingfish, as I understand it, is not capable of listening to cell phone conversations, but can track the location of a cell phone that is on but not being used. This device has been used by other law enforcement agencies around the country to track missing or abducted children who are carrying a cell phone or who are with someone who is carrying a cell phone. I am told that a court order is required before the Kingfish can be used to track a cell phone in any particular case.
I have long argued that the people of Minnesota are the most easily duped voters in the nation. Any minor celebrity can get elected to the highest office. Saturday Night Live's minor contributor Al Franken is currently Senator. NFL Hall of Famer Alan Page sits on the state's Supreme Court. Pro wrestler Jesse Ventura was Governor.
If there is one state that rivals Minnesota in bad selection it is New York. The people of New York have a habit of letting carpetbaggers with Presidential aspirations walz into their state and use their Senate seat as a launching pad for their national campaign. Hillary Clinton and Robert Kennedy are examples.
Now New Yorkers can now be embarrassed that they elected Eric Massa to Congress. Suddenly Democratic leadership has determined his behavior isn't fit for someone in congress. No one cared about his behavior until he dared cross his party leadership on health care reform, but once he did, we found out about his sexual advances to young male staffers:
The problem with gun control – one of the reasons that it’s finally stiffing with the American people – is that it burdens the law-abiding citizen for the crimes of society’s low-lifes. It’s one of the reasons America is rejecting gun control; Real Americans can’t abiding punishing those who’ve done no wrong.
Lawmakers working to craft a new comprehensive immigration bill have settled on a way to prevent employers from hiring illegal immigrants: a national biometric identification card all American workers would eventually be required to obtain.
Lawmakers working to craft a new comprehensive immigration bill are proposing a new national biometric ID card that would be required of all U.S. workers. WSJ’s Laura Meckler explains the proposal and the objections from privacy advocates.Under the potentially controversial plan still taking shape in the Senate, all legal U.S. workers, including citizens and immigrants, would be issued an ID card with embedded information, such as fingerprints, to tie the card to the worker.
If you’re interested in comparing the voting records of the two front runners for the GOP endorsement for Governor, Tom Emmer, and Marty Seifert, you owe it to yourself to do much more than just look at the Tax Payer League scorecards. While the Tax Payer League is a notable lobbying group, it’s positions on issues may or may not represent your positions, no matter how fiscally conservative you might be. It’s perfectly reasonable to differ from the Tax Payer League on a vote here or there and still claim the mantle of fiscal conservative. Neither Marty Seifert nor Tom Emmer have scored 100% over their career. If you’re really interested in voting records, rather than just reading claims of higher scores, it would serve you well to look deeper at the issues and circumstances of each vote.
In case you're inclined to relax in expressing your opposition to the nationalization of health care, pay heed to the words of Bart Stupak, via Robert Costa's report:
Sitting in an airport, on his way home to Michigan, Rep. Bart Stupak, a pro-life Democrat, is chagrined. "They're ignoring me," he says, in a phone interview with National Review Online. "That's their strategy now. The House Democratic leaders think they have the votes to pass the Senate's health-care bill without us. At this point, there is no doubt that they've been able to peel off one or two of my twelve. And even if they don't have the votes, it's been made clear to us that they won't insert our language on the abortion issue."
Blah, blah, blah. Stop talking about health care for 15 seconds. You have until at least March 18th to analyze Speaker Nancy Pelosi and streakerciser Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel bludgeon Congress to vote for Obamacare.
Let’s talk about the stories of legal manipulation and scandal that this administration is happy you aren’t paying attention to while you’re focused on jobs and health care.
Given the centrality of abortion to the ObamaCare debate, the latest news from Gallup should have Democrats concerned about the future of their party. They spent the last few months attempting to push through Congress a mechanism that would provide federal funding of abortions, which has stalled the bill in the House and threatens to kill ObamaCare. As Democrats attempt this, the youth vote that they so assiduously courted in 2008 has grown more anti-abortion:
“It is wholly possible to create law and qualify law before the law is on the books,” [link]
They can't even give it an up or down your throats vote. They do actually consider citizens the enemy of their radical agenda.
The Chicago mobsters are starting to blush a little with the ways the Democrats have to pass this. Anyone who votes for this is voting against the very foundation of this country.
There is a Rally tomorrow at the Minnesota Capital in opposition to ObamaCare. If you can, show up and let the Democrats and media know just how wrong this entire administration and Congress is.
The local media has a history of portraying each and every Democrat in office as mainstream. Sure, some are probably fairly open minded on the issues, but most have been stridently liberal. One of the biggest travesties in Minnesota reporting would have to be the silence of Al Franken's radical views. He somehow managed to slip through the election as a moderate.
You can take the foaming at the mouth liberal screamer out of the radio booth, but you can't take the liberal out of the screamer.
I think I've seen, heard, and read enough to where I now have a preference for the GOP endorsement for Governor. It's a slight preference in that I won't be at all disappointed with either front-runner. But my preference is for Tom Emmer.
Mostly, I think it's that Emmer dreams bigger dreams than does his very worthy rival Marty Seifert. And I think Emmer will be more determined to pursue those dreams, like taking on Minnesota's bloated array of over-reaching and often duplicated services. Seifert could expertly manage to drop our national tax burden ranking a few positions, but it will likely be a complicated solution that will unwind without annual attention. Emmer seems ready to make simpler, more structural changes, the kind that last.
There are a lot of measures when looking at candidates, especially when we consider that in the gubernatorial race on the Republican side that we have 2 strong conservatives fighting for every possible delegate vote. Below are the endorsements listed to date for the candidates for the Republican governor’s race. I thought I’d apply the lifetime Taxpayers League ratings of these endorsers of each candidate and see how they stack up.
Thankfully, the Taxpayers League has been doing the hard work of their annual Legislative Scorecard for years rating all legislators each session based on the votes they consider the most important to you the taxpayer. Below is the simple math for the 2 candidates (including their scores) and their endorsers lifetime TLM 2009 ratings.
The Taxpayers League is looking for its next director of development! If you truly believe in limited government and have expertise in non-profit fundraising, this opportunity may be for you!
Necessary Qualifications:
* 3-5 years experience in major donor fundraising
* Background/knowledge of Minnesota state government
For the longest time economists have pushed for tax reform that has included broadening the tax base while reducing rates. Former CBO director Alice Rivlin -- surely no conservative -- suggested as much in 1982:
Lower tax rates increase the incentive to work, save, and invest, and they decrease the incentive to borrow. They therefore push in the right direction relative to the economy's need for greater productivity and capital formation, though the improvement that can be attained in these areas through the tax system alone should not be overestimated. At the same time, lower tax rates have numerous technical benefits. Distortions caused by the tax treatment of interest and debt during inflation, the double taxation of corporate-source income, the incentive to make use of tax shelter schemes, the marriage penalty, and the incentive to conceal income in the so-called "underground economy" would all be at least partly corrected if tax rates were lower and the rate schedule correspondingly flatter.
The first reaction I had after reading DFL State Party Chairman Brian Melendez's statement was "That's the best you could do"? My next reaction was that Chairman Melendez had just publicly accused Tom Emmer of being principled. Here's the text of Chairman Melendez's statement:
"Tom Emmer's dismissal of 'compromise' as a valuable political tool is just a recipe for more of the same self-serving gridlock that we have seen under Governor Pawlenty. The failure to compromise has produced a government shutdown, frequent stalemate in policy debate, and historically staggering deficits, and it has put the state's credit rating at risk. We can't afford another governor who refuses to compromise when so many Minnesotans are out of work and the state's deficit is spiraling out of control.
"Politics is the art of the possible, and compromise is what makes real solutions possible in a heated political environment. Minnesota needs a governor who will be a governor for the entire state, not just the political right or the political left or the special interests. Tom Emmer's recent comments show that he lacks those skills, or, if he has them, he thinks that they are a waste of time."
The Senate Parliamentarian has ruled that President Barack Obama must sign Congress' original health care reform bill before the Senate can act on a companion reconciliation package, senior GOP sources said Thursday.
The Senate Parliamentarian's Office was responding to questions posed by the Republican leadership. The answers were provided verbally, sources said.
House Democratic leaders have been searching for a way to ensure that any move they make to approve the Senate-passed $871 billion health care reform bill is followed by Senate action on a reconciliation package of adjustments to the original bill. One idea is to have the House and Senate act on reconciliation prior to House action on the Senate's original health care bill.
Wobbly House Democrats don't want to vote for the Senate bill without a guarantee of the Senate passing a bill that fixes what's broken in the Senate bill. House Democrats thought that they'd found a solution with the Slaughter Solution, in which the Senate bill would be deemed passed the minute the House passed a bill fixing the Senate bill. Under the Slaughter Solution rule, the House wouldn't even vote on the Senate bill.
With the Senate Parliamentarian's ruling, that solution disappeared.
Gallup has a new poll showing that the ground is eroding under the feet of anthropogenic global-warming advocated. Skepticism in the US has rapidly increased over the last four years, climbing from 30% in 2006 to almost half of all respondents in their latest survey:
Gallup’s annual update on Americans’ attitudes toward the environment shows a public that over the last two years has become less worried about the threat of global warming, less convinced that its effects are already happening, and more likely to believe that scientists themselves are uncertain about its occurrence. In response to one key question, 48% of Americans now believe that the seriousness of global warming is generally exaggerated, up from 41% in 2009 and 31% in 1997, when Gallup first asked the question.
I don't know what Steve Landsburg is drinking, but someone get me a case, and then get cases to Washington and St. Paul. Here are a few choice tidbits:
There is this notion abroad that an extra billion in government spending can be converted from "irresponsible" to "responsible" as long as it's accompanied by an extra billion in tax hikes. That's like saying a $500 haircut can be converted from "irresponsible" to "responsible" as long as you withdraw the $500 from your bank account.
I keep finding fresh evidence to suggest that the balance of power is changing, between the teachers unions and the Legislature, School Boards, and taxpayers they used to dominate. District 112, the Eastern Carver County Schools ("Chaska") is going toe to toe with Education Minnesota on a new contract. They have already forgone the $25 per student penalty for not having a signed contract by January. Among the sticking points is the district's proposal to eliminate "steps" - automatic pay increases for years of service.
In a similar way, Governor Pawlenty is challenging tenure - a form of seniority bestowed after some number of years. Federal programs like No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top are demanding some new thinking here. And the Minneapolis Public Schools, facing still more layoffs, says traditional seniority is too high a price for this struggling district trying to retain its bright, new teaching prospects by losing some veteran but "depressing, mediocre" teachers.
In a statement sent to reporters, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said that the only troubling thing was the 5-4 ruling by the court, which said that corporations could spend unlimited amounts of money advocating on behalf of candidates in elections. Roberts leads the court.
"What is troubling is that this decision opened the floodgates for corporations and special interests to pour money into elections, drowning out the voices of average Americans," Gibbs said. "The President has long been committed to reducing the undue influence of special interests and their lobbyists over government. That is why he spoke out to condemn the decision and is working with Congress on a legislative response."
That's downright insulting. President Obama repeatedly and consistently ignored what We The People said about Obamacare during last August's townhall meetings. President Obama totally ignored the hundreds of thousands of calls to Congress last January and February about his failed stimulus plan. He's ignored what We The People said in the elections in New Jersey and Virginia and the special election in Massachusetts.
Virginia Postrel’s life has put her in position to experience the issues of the American health-care system in a very personal manner. She donated a kidney to a friend, only to discover a year later that she had a particularly aggressive form of breast cancer. In a lengthy but worthwhile interview with Reason TV, Postrel discusses the use of the expensive but effective drug Herceptin in the US — and also in New Zealand, where politics blocked it from being covered by the single-payer system in that country. Postrel discusses the market-based reforms that work as well as the reasons they meet resistance with Ted Balaker:
Perhaps you've heard - there's a gubernatorial race going on.
Since the True North ruling junta has gotten a few emails on the subject, I want to make sure we're clear on a few things.
True North is not a GOP blog. We are a conservative blog that supports the first principles of conservatism, and the candidates, politicians and policies that in turn support them. It's entirely possible that True North could support a conservative DFLer over a liberal Republican. Not to worry - it's pretty much a theoretical exercise, so far. Most of True North's contributors are Republicans, and as a practical matter the GOP, imperfect as it is, is the conservative party - but we are not a party blog.
Hell may have frozen over. I am going to quote something from the Strib. On their Opinion Page of Tuesday, March 9, three Minneapolis citizens penned thoughts which tell me the castle walls of public education may be beginning to crumble, the veneer may be beginning to peel.
The three contributors, Don Samuels, city councilman, Chanda Baker, director of strategic partners for Pillsbury United Communities and Sondra Samuels, president of the PEACE Foundation, take strategic and targeted aim at Tom Dooher, president of Education Minnesota.
Opponents of a government takeover of health care have less than two weeks to stop “the crown jewel of socialism,” according to Representative Michele Bachmann, congresswoman for Minnesota’s sixth district. Bachmann spoke Monday on Hot Tea Radio, a production associated with Tea Party Patriots and this publication. Addressing questions from co-hosts C.L. Bryant and Rob Gaudet, along with several callers, Bachmann detailed an urgent legislative scenario.
“The president recognizes his time is short,” said Bachmann. “He has not been listening to the American people, and he won’t be, because he’s made it clear – his interest is not doing what the American people want done. His interest is doing what he wants done. He believes in socialized medicine… [it] is the crown jewel of socialism. He recognizes that if they pass socialized medicine, we will forever be a politically Left country… because people will get used to these entitlement benefits.”
Congresswoman Bachmann was doubtful the fight over abortion language among Democrats would ultimately preclude abortion coverage. Even if the Stupak amendment makes it into the bill, Bachmann pointed out there would still be “tens of thousands of pages of unwritten regulations that the new health care czar and the current Health and Human Services Secretary, Kathleen Sebelius, will write.”
Blah, blah, blah. Stop talking about health care for 15 seconds. You have until at least 
