Odds and ends no. 19

It’s been a couple months since I went through my “blog ideas” folder and checked out what’s in the grab bag of interesting stuff so tonight seems like a good occasion to look there once again. So let me open up my mailboxes and see what pops out at me…

I haven’t touched on the issue of energy in awhile, in part because our gas prices haven’t gone quite as sky-high as they did this time last year – even with recent price increases we’re only paying about half as much at the pump as we were at this point in 2008. But that doesn’t mean the issue has gone away and I keep in touch with my source in the energy industry. She sent me a primer on rhetoric vs. reality and I may gather more information later this week as I’ve been invited to another blogger conference call on the subject.

Now, let’s look at those who would deign to create law on the subject of energy as well as a thousand and one other aspects of life. How this escaped a full post I don’t know – perhaps it was because our current legislator wasn’t included as part of the survey. Regardless, the National Taxpayers Union last month released its list of big spenders in Congress, and out of the Maryland and Delaware contingent only Roscoe Bartlett had a decent grade (his 72% was a B) while Mike Castle was fortunate to “earn” a D. While there’s certainly room for argument about fiscal friendliness and the weight the NTU assigns to particular votes, in 2008 the trend was not one toward smaller government and I can but imagine what the 2009 report will show.

But even if Congress held the line, what happens if they’re not the ones who hold the purse strings anymore? It’s an argument postulated in a recent op-ed by the Center for Individual Freedom, which asks the question:

(W)hat if the GOP is proven right … the voting public once again demands change … and America discovers that a Congress full of resurgent Republicans is powerless to stop the bleeding?

That scenario is all too plausible given the breathtaking rate at which the legislative branch is losing its power to determine the nation’s economic future to unelected bureaucrats.

This trend began late last year, when the Bush Administration used fears of a nationwide financial meltdown to smooth passage of its Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP), promoted as a panacea for the nation’s financial ills.

TARP, unfortunately, did not unfold as advertised.  Even its name proved to be a lie. Rather than buying up the “troubled assets” that were supposedly prolonging the credit crunch, TARP morphed into a plan for injecting liquidity into the nation’s banking system (a move, it should be noted, that has done little to increase lending rates).   Because Congress had practically given the money away at gunpoint, the mandarins at the Treasury Department were free to change the program’s aims at will – despite the fact that they had claimed only weeks before that the original plan was the only thing standing between the nation and economic oblivion. (Emphasis mine.)

Multiply that by the dozens of bureaucratic fiefdoms entrenched in Washington and it’s clear we need a sea change in attitude among Americans, too.

Let’s start with our Congressman. This was the response I received a few weeks ago regarding my concerns with the stimulus package:

Thank you for contacting my office to share your thoughts on the economic stimulus legislation. As your Representative, I am guided by the perspectives of my constituents and our common goals of restoring fiscal responsibility to our nation’s federal government, revitalizing our economy, protecting the Chesapeake Bay and preserving the agricultural heritage of our communities.

Our economy is in crisis and the American people are hurting. Since the current recession began in December 2007 over 3.6 million Americans have lost their jobs. Employment fell in every month of 2008, and over 600,000 jobs were lost in January 2009 alone. In Maryland unemployment has reached a 15 year high. There is a consensus among economists that drastic action is needed to rejuvenate the economy.

In an attempt to address the nation’s worsening financial situation, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, H.R. 1, was introduced in the House of Representatives on January 26, 2009.  This legislation contained $819 billion in infrastructure spending, revenue sharing with the states, middle class tax cuts, business tax cuts, unemployment benefits, and food stamps.

While this initial package contained well-intentioned efforts to strengthen our economy, the bill also contained billions in spending that I was not convinced would go directly to stimulating the economy. Considering the fact that our nation is already over $10 trillion in debt, we cannot afford a fiscally reckless stimulus bill.  Consequently, I voted against the proposal and expressed my belief that Congress could and must do better. As the bill moved to the Senate and then the Conference Committee between the chambers, I worked with like-minded colleagues on both sides of the aisle, particularly members of the Blue Dog Coalition, to remove billions of dollars of spending that was not timely or targeted, including eliminating $200 million for the National Mall, $75 million for smoking cessation activities, and $16 billion in permanent changes to Medicaid. In the end we succeeded in cutting over $60 billion in misguided spending from the legislation while adding significant tax relief for Maryland families. Ultimately, the package included $288 billion of tax cuts for working families, including $70 billion to protect middle-class families from the Alternative Minimum Tax.

Let me be clear, the final version of the stimulus bill was not perfect.  However, given the depths of the financial crisis, we could not afford to let the perfect be the enemy of the necessary. The bipartisan compromise contained critical job-creating infrastructure investments in areas like transportation and broadband development. It included needed aid to states and localities to stave off layoffs and cuts to essential services. Meanwhile, the $288 billion worth of tax relief will help grow our economy by providing over 95% of working families with a tax cut. And, most importantly, it is projected that the package will create or save approximately 8,200 jobs in the 1st District and over 66,000 across the state of Maryland.

The stimulus bill enjoyed the strong support of a diverse range of coalitions, including conservative pro-business organizations like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, the Association of General Contractors and the National Restaurant Association. The package is projected to create or save over 3.5 million jobs, and even conservative economists like Mark Zandi, an economic advisor for John McCain’s presidential campaign, noted “that the jobless rate will be more than 2 percentage points lower by the end of 2010 than without any fiscal stimulus.”  Although I am under no illusion that the stimulus bill alone can bring us out of the current recession, I believe that it is an essential first step.

Like you, I am concerned about our nation’s fiscal policies.  Consequently, I voted against the release of an additional $350 billion to bailout Wall Street and the $410 billion FY09 Appropriations Omnibus, two costly measures that I did not believe were the most responsible expenditures of taxpayer dollars. My first official act as a Member of Congress was to sign on as an original co-sponsor of legislation to stop the automatic 2010 Member pay raise and I was pleased to later join my colleagues in successfully rejecting the pay increase when it came to a vote before the full House of Representatives.

Please know that I will work to ensure rigorous oversight over the stimulus and I encourage you to do so as well by visiting the www.recovery.gov website, where you can track the bill’s impact.

Please do not hesitate to contact me again in the future regarding issues that concern you.  I believe that continuous communication with the residents of the First District is essential to helping me be an effective advocate for you in Congress. To stay informed, please visit my website at www.house.gov/kratovil.

Thank you again for contacting me and I look forward to hearing from you.

While the jury is still out, Frank’s not as bad as I feared thus far but certainly we can do better in Congress.

Continuing on the subject of legislative business, there are some who feel we Republicans can do better as a party here in Maryland. While the subject didn’t openly come up in our recent convention, there’s a few in the General Assembly who don’t care for party leadership, as evidenced by this letter (h/t Blue Ridge Forum).

They’re the same folks who complain that the party is missing a fundraising opportunity by pricing its VIP gathering with Newt Gingrich too low, at least if you believe this Alan Brody piece in the Gazette newspaper. (Again, h/t to Blue Ridge Forum).

Yeah guys, just keep alienating your grassroots. While it’s true that Gingrich should be a good draw, I don’t think many GOP activists in Maryland have $250 in pocket change lying around to get a chance to meet with Newt Gingrich, let alone twice that much. Honestly, the party brass should be pleased with getting the onetime Speaker to be a speaker as opposed to the little-known person the event featured last year.

Just bring on an establishment candidate next year or try a coup at the Fall Convention and watch the Eastern Shore and Western Maryland contingents walk out – then see how successful 2010 is without us.

Finally, you may recall that the group Our Country Deserves Better did a bus tour last fall to promote the McCain/Palin ticket (well, mostly Sarah Palin). They’re going to do it again, this time as part of the Tea Party movement.

From August 28 to September 12, a host of folks will cross the nation with daily rallies. The Tea Party Express will wrap up in Washington D.C. for a gathering to show support for fiscal conservatism in our nation’s capital. Methinks the tour needs to make a slight detour southward! Delaware and Maryland have liberal big-spenders in Congress too.

So that’s a cleaning of my mailbox. Hope you enjoyed it!

Author: Michael

It's me from my laptop computer. View all posts by Michael