The National Republican Trust PAC is up with a hard-hitting new ad. It’s a $100,000 buy targeting the ballooning debt and out-of-control spending perpetuated by the Obama Administration.
Archive for category Obama
White House economic adviser Christina Romer said yesterday that the first stimulus package has been a success.
“In other words, after we administered the medicine, an economy that was in free fall has stabilized substantially, and now looks as though it could begin to recover in the second half of the year,” Romer told The Economic Club.
But if the economy doesn’t continue to improve, Romer thinks we should pass a second stimulus that will put the country further in debt.
“That said, if we come to the end of the year, if we’re not seeing the kinds of results that we anticipate … we’d start thinking about other things that need to be done.”
And apparently Romer did not learn from the mistakes of Geithner and Summers last Sunday. She would not say the Administration won’t raise taxes on the middle class.
“You know the president has made it very clear through the campaign that middle-class families have really gotten a bum deal, not just in this recession but probably for at least the last 10 years, and that’s why he does not want to do anything that burdens middle-class families,” Romer said. “And obviously no one is talking about raising taxes.”
Who Controls Obama?
Aug 6
Unions.
According to the United Transportation Union, its influence with the White House led to administration appointments for its general counsel and another former official. With all the money UTU’s PAC has given Democrats, the union says it expects more appointments in the future.
A major transportation union this week publicly boasted of the political influence it wields with the White House, but subsequently apologized to a congressional panel for the remark on Wednesday night.
The brash claim attracted bipartisan criticism as senators called on the union to retract the statement.
After President Obama nominated United Transportation Union (UTU) General Counsel Daniel Elliot to become a member of the three-person Surface Transportation Board, UTU International President Mike Futhey said in a statement: “The selection by President Obama of Dan Elliot and [former UTU official] Joe Szabo to head major transportation regulatory agencies is tribute to the political influence of the UTU, which flows from the UTU [political action committee (PAC)]. We have good reason to expect President Obama to reach into the UTU ranks for other appointments in the near future.”
In June, President Obama told the American Medical Association that the public option in his healthcare reform plan would not create a single-payer system. But looking back at his presidential campaign, Obama indicated his health plan would creep towards an entirely government-run program over time. This video, posted on Drudge today, highlights Obama’s statements, along with those of Rep. Barney Frank and Jan Schakowsky.
It appears President Obama may be preparing to break his central campaign promise to not raise taxes on middle class Americans. This morning, on ABC News’ This Week, George Stephanopoulos asked Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner whether Obama would back out of his tax pledge.
To get the economy back on track, will President Barack Obama have to break his pledge not to raise taxes on 95 percent of Americans? In a “This Week” exclusive, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner told me, “We’re going to have to do what’s necessary.”
Geithner was clear that he believes a key component of economic recovery is deficit reduction. When I gave him several opportunities to rule out a middle class tax hike, he wouldn’t do it.
“We have to bring these deficits down very dramatically,” Geithner told me. “And that’s going to require some very hard choices.”
There are two polls out today from NYT/CBS and WSJ/NBC offering similar perspectives on healthcare reform and President Obama’s agenda.
**As a brief side note—it would be useful if the New York Times would not throw so much useless information into their articles. One has to read 15 paragraphs to get to any actual data. This is a poll, not an interview with an Iowa Democrat.
To start, Obama’s approval has fallen as he continues his push for health reform. The polls show wide disparities in approval (SURPRISE—NYT is a bit high), but both indicate 8-10 point drops since April.
Mr. Obama’s job approval rating has dropped 10 points, to 58 percent, from a high point in April. (NYT)
Overall, Mr. Obama’s ratings fell on a series of measures. His job approval now stands at 53%, down from a high of 61% in April. (WSJ)
Without a doubt, the honeymoon is over. Voters no longer have a starry-eyed view of “The One.”
The proportion of people who said it was very or fairly likely that Mr. Obama would bring “real change” dropped to 51% from 61% in February. The share of those who said he could be trusted to keep his word fell to 48% this month from 58% in April. (WSJ)
Some of this drop in approval may be a result of Obama’s unpopular stimulus package.
Falling support for the economic stimulus plan, with 34% in favor, down from 44% in February; 43% now say it is a bad idea. (WSJ)
In addressing healthcare reform, it’s clear respondents want change and are displeased with the current system.
49 percent said they supported fundamental changes, and 33 percent said the health care system needed to be completely rebuilt. (NYT)
But voters don’t want the high-tax, government-run options that Obama is pushing.
In mid-June, respondents were evenly divided when asked whether they thought Mr. Obama’s health plan was a good or bad idea. In the new poll, conducted July 24-27, 42% called it a bad idea while 36% said it was a good idea. (WSJ)
Primarily, this pushback is coming from Americans who are pleased with their health insurance. They are concerned they won’t be able to choose their own doctor and determine what coverage they need.
Among those with private insurance, the proportion calling the plan a bad idea rose to 47% from 37%. (WSJ)
Respondents believe that government-run health insurance will leave them with second-rate care. The polls show voters think quality will decline under Obama’s plan.
And despite his efforts — in speeches, news conferences, town-hall-style meetings and other forums — to address public misgivings, 69 percent of respondents in the poll said they were concerned that the quality of their own care would decline if the government created a program that covers everyone. (NYT)
In the Journal poll, only two in 10 people said the quality of their own care would improve under the Obama plan; just 15% of those with private insurance thought it would. Twice as many overall, and three times as many with private coverage, predicted their own care would get worse. (WSJ)
All the data above may seem like good news for the GOP, but WSJ shows the public backs Democratic plans on paying for reform.
On the question of how to pay for the measure, the poll found only one idea with majority support: a surtax on the rich, the approach taken in the bill moving through the House, but which isn’t expected in the Senate version.
Public support for fining businesses that don’t offer insurance dropped from last month, with half of those polled now in favor. Only four in 10 liked the idea of taxing insurance companies that offer particularly generous health plans, an idea that has gained currency in the Senate Finance Committee. (WSJ)
All told, Americans are confused about healthcare. Costs are the greatest concern for most voters, but respondents thought costs would rise regardless of what is done.
In one finding, 75 percent of respondents said they were concerned that the cost of their own health care would eventually go up if the government did not create a system of providing health care for all Americans. But in another finding, 77 percent said they were concerned that the cost of health care would go up if the government did create such a system. (NYT)
If Republicans want to succeed on this issue, they should try a little harder to offer ideas and find compromise.
By 55 percent to 26 percent, respondents said Mr. Obama had better ideas about how to change health care than Republicans in Congress did. (NYT)
There is overwhelming support for a bipartisan agreement on health care, and here again, Mr. Obama appears in the stronger position: 59 percent said that he was making an effort to work with Congressional Republicans, while just 33 percent said Republicans were trying to work with him on the issue. (NYT)
But at least the GOP has convinced voters Democrats are just as partisan as they are.
The poll also found a rising sense of partisanship. More than three in 10 surveyed said the current Congress has been more partisan and divided than in the past, compared with just 11% who said it has been less partisan.
In February, people were more likely to blame Republicans by a two-to-one margin. This month, they were divided over who to blame, with most saying both parties were at fault. (WSJ)
Jonathan Weisman has a must-read article in the Wall Street Journal that should make any rational, semi-educated reader feel dismayed by the incompetence and wastefulness of the federal government.
Highlights:
The Office of Thrift Supervision, a division of the Treasury, identified unused phone lines costing $320,000.
…
The Justice Department estimates it can save $573,000 through fiscal 2010 by setting up its printers and copiers to use both sides of the paper. By emailing some documents instead of printing them out, the Department of Homeland Security will save $318,000.
Both Homeland Security and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration have pledged to take the same step that has sent the newspaper industry into a tailspin: They will start getting their news online free, rather than renew their subscriptions. Homeland Security will save $47,160, or 0.0000026% of the deficit.
The Coast Guard realized that maintenance schedules for its 1,800 small boats assumed they were for recreational use such as water-skiing or bass-fishing. By adjusting maintenance schedules to reflect what the Coast Guard actually does, the agency discovered it can save $2 million a year.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency is going to save $3.8 million by refurbishing and reusing or selling its emergency trailers — like the ones provided to people displaced by hurricanes — instead of ditching them.
Obama’s budget reductions have been ridiculed, and rightly so. Obama has cut $100 million from the federal budget. This works out to about .006% of this year’s projected deficit. Since the federal agency budget is $1 trillion, the reduction represents $1 for every $10,000 spent—not exactly a big savings.
To put it in perspective, the median household income in the United States is around $45,000. Obama’s cuts are equivalent to shaving $4.50 off the average household budget. That’s less than the cost of a meal at McDonald’s.
“Some of these cuts are so small they would be a rounding error of a rounding error in the federal budget,” said Brian Riedl, a federal budget expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation. They also show how “unbelievably outdated” the government is, he said.
“I mean, emailing around the daily press clips instead of printing them out and distributing them? That should not have been necessitated by a presidential order.”
Post-Partisan No More
Jul 23
A new Rasmussen poll finds that a majority of Americans believe President Obama is a partisan Democrat.
Fifty-three percent (53%) of U.S. voters say President Obama is now governing like a partisan Democrat, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.
Just 32% say the president is governing in a bipartisan fashion, while 15% are not sure.
Viewed as more partisan are Congressional Democrats. Oddly enough, Congressional Republicans…less partisan than Obama.
Congressional Democrats continue to be viewed as more partisan than their Republican counterparts. Fifty-nine percent (59%) say majority party members in both the House and Senate are acting like partisan Democrats. Twenty-one percent (21%) view their actions as bipartisan, and 20% are undecided.
As for the GOP legislators, 50% say they are acting like partisan Republicans, while 22% see their performance as bipartisan. Even more voters (28%) are unsure of what they’re doing, a reflection perhaps of their low visibility in a Democrat-dominated Congress.
At last night’s news conference, President Obama demonstrated a remarkable ability to talk for 60 minutes without showing emotion or saying anything new. The only change to his rhetoric was the shift from “healthcare reform” to “health insurance reform,” which is, at best, a weak attempt to create Luntz-ian language.
Obama needed a game-changer, but it seemed he was just going through the motions, resigned to the fact that Congress can’t finish by August. Recess will be the proving grounds for reform, and the legislation’s fate will be determined while lawmakers are home in their districts.
One odd moment last night came when Obama, possibly unwittingly, made a reference to a scene in the Matrix as a puzzling illustration of cost control:
“If there’s a blue pill and a red pill, and the blue pill is half the price of the red pill and works just as well, why not pay half price for the thing that’s going to make you well?”
In the film’s red pill/blue pill scene, Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) gives Neo (Keanu Reeves) a choice between two pills. If Neo takes the blue pill, he can return to the reality he believes. If he takes the red pill, he can “stay in Wonderland.”
That is, ironically, exactly what Obama peddled to the American people last night: a trip to Wonderland. The Associated Press offered a fact check on Obama’s healthcare rhetoric and found he continues stretching the truth.
OBAMA: “We already have rough agreement” on some aspects of what a health care overhaul should involve, and one is: “It will keep government out of health care decisions, giving you the option to keep your insurance if you’re happy with it.”
THE FACTS: In House legislation, a commission appointed by the government would determine what is and isn’t covered by insurance plans offered in a new purchasing pool, including a plan sponsored by the government. The bill also holds out the possibility that, over time, those standards could be imposed on all private insurance plans, not just the ones in the pool. … It’s true that people would not be forced to give up a private plan and go with a public one. The question is whether all of those private plans would still be in place if the government entered the marketplace in a bigger way.
OBAMA: “I have also pledged that health insurance reform will not add to our deficit over the next decade, and I mean it.”
THE FACTS: … White House Budget Director Peter Orszag told reporters this week that the promise does not apply to proposed spending of about $245 billion over the next decade to increase fees for doctors serving Medicare patients. … Beyond that, budget experts have warned about various accounting gimmicks that can mask true burdens on the deficit. The bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget lists a variety of them, including back-loading the heaviest costs at the end of the 10-year period and beyond.
OBAMA: “You haven’t seen me out there blaming the Republicans.”
THE FACTS: Obama did so in his opening statement.
As Morpheus would say, we probably all “feel a bit like Alice, tumbling down the rabbit hole.” Obama cannot back up his claims with any real facts, but he assumes voters will take him at his word. That is, after all, how he got elected in the first place. This “is the wool that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.”