In his recent telephone town hall meeting, Tim Bishop expressed his support for the continued payroll tax holiday but making it clear that it would have no impact on the Social Security Trust Fund. Money for Social Security would continue to go into the trust fund from other sources. What other sources you might ask? I may have an answer for you.

In an article in HousingWire magazine, the author points out that:

The Federal Housing Finance Agency will increase guarantee fees on single-family mortgage-backed securities charged by the government-sponsored enterprises by 10 basis points effective April 1, 2012, in response to the new funding mechanism for the payroll tax cut extension passed by Congress.

So it seems that the Social Security Trust fund will get its money from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, or more accurately, from new home buyers. So for a two month extension of the payroll tax holiday that will prevent taxpayers from paying an additional $130 into the Social Security Trust Fund, that everyone expects to get back anyway, new home buyers will have to pay thousands in new fees.

The g-fee increase will remain in effect through Oct. 1, 2021. The Congressional Budget Office estimated the g-fees would offset about $35.7 billion in the costs of the tax cut. Mortgage Bankers Association CEO David Stevens said the increase could mean an extra $4,000 in fees on a $200,000 mortgage.

One of the problems facing Long Island is affordable housing. Our young people are leaving Long Island for areas were there is a larger rental stock that they can start out in, rather than living in mom and dad’s basement, and where they can afford to buy a house after saving a down payment for a couple of years. Apparently for the benefit of a political talking point Tim Bishop votes to slam an already weak housing marking with additional fees. After all who can really call a two month anything sound fiscal policy? Notice there is no spending cut mentioned here, it is an increase in taxes and fees. This is what Tim Bishop was telling his constituents not to worry about in his town hall meeting? What will become of his district, if nobody lives here but retirees? Is that his plan to solve the unemployment problem? Drive enough young people away until the number of jobs fits the remaining population?

The problem is spending. It was only last week that Joe Biden was attacking Mitt Romney’s policies by saying:

“His proposal would actually double down on the policies that caused the greatest economic calamity since the Great Depression and accelerated a decades-long assault on the middle class,” Biden added.

Decades long assault on the middle class? I guess he means you too, Bill Clinton. The greatest economic calamity since the Great Depression has been the Obama administration and if he were to get reelected it would finish America off. We have had the worst consistent unemployment since the Great Depression for the entire Obama administration. We have had the worst record of job creation, loss actually, since Herbert Hoover. The National Bureau of Economic Research says the recession ended in June of 2009. Does it feel like it to you? Most recoveries from economic downturns are mirror images of the slump. A gradual recession is followed by a gradual recovery; a sharp downturn is followed by a sharp upswing. Not this time. Just look at the job creation record of Team Obama.

This chart goes all the way back to Harry Truman and Obama’s performance stands alone.  Let’s put to rest the “eight years of failed Bush policy, yada, yada, yada” and face the fact that Obama and his spending, heavy-handed regulations, and insatiable appetite to fix everything by taxing more has put us into an economic winter. Tim Bishop has happily ignored the needs of his constituents to buy favor from the Democratic leadership and their special interest pals. They have done an awful job and we need to turn them out, before they turn us into Greece.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Long Island’s own Peter King (R) plans to introduce legislation that would make it illegal for someone to knowingly carry a gun within 1,000 feet of certain high-ranking federal officials, including members of Congress.  Before I take on the nuttiness of the law itself, I have to ask, “What makes them so special?” 

Have we reached an epidemic of attacks on Congressmen that warrants special protection?  In the history of the United States Congress only five incidents where members have been severely hurt or killed, which is five too many, but it hardly calls for setting all members apart as a specially protected class of citizens.  The five were:

1. Representative Jonathan Cilley of Maine was killed in a duel with Representative William Graves of Kentucky after accusing Graves of bribery on the House floor (1838).
2. Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts was beaten with a walking stick by Representatives Preston Brooks and Laurence Keitt, both of South Carolina (1856).
3. Puerto Rican Nationalists stormed the capital on March 1, 1954 and fired from the gallery to the floor of the House, five Congressmen were wounded, Alvin Bentley o f Michigan, Ben Jensen of Iowa, Clifford Davis of Tennessee, George Fallon of Maryland, and Kenneth Roberts of Alabama.
4. Representative Leo Ryan of California traveled to Guyana to investigate the goings on in Jonestown, where cult leader Jim Jones set up shop.  They were ambushed and killed by Jones’ followers and the entire community soon committed mass suicide (1978).
5. Gabrielle Giffords, who we pray will have a speedy recovery (2011).

Looking at this history, being a member of Congress looks to be a lot safer than a number of other occupations.  Try to relax, people.  And if you can’t, remember the words of Harry Truman, “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.”

King’s Law

A few years ago, I worked for a small consulting firm advising small businesses.  I am going to present one of my days at that firm with the hypothetical assumption that I was licensed to carry a concealed weapon and was so armed on this day.  Everything else in my hypothetical story actually happened.

After a busy morning I felt the urge for a coffee break.  I was working at the firm’s main office and there was a Starbucks about two blocks away, down a hill.  It was a nice day so I took a stroll down.  Upon arriving at the Starbucks I got on line to order a venti black coffee.  I thought it odd to see a dog in the store so my eyes followed the leash to see who’s dog it was.  Standing about six feet to my left, perusing the CD rack in the store was none other than William Jefferson Clinton, 42^nd President of the United States with, I assume, Buddy the dog.  Did I just walk myself into a felony, as I was certainly within 1,000 feet of a certain high ranking official, and within about fifteen feet of at least one Secret Service agent at the door of the store.  Okay, I didn’t know he was in there so, technically, I didn’t knowingly get within 1,000 feet of him while armed, but I certainly knew he was there and I was six feet away and armed.  Do I make a fast break for the exit to sprint until I am at least 1,000 feet away?  Would that alarm the Secret Service agent?  Would someone get shot or go to jail for no good reason?

Is the law reciprocal?  Can we demand that no politician can knowingly approach within 1,000 feet of anyone who is armed?  That might have been one way to stop ObamaCare.  Ring the Capital building with law abiding armed citizens no more than 1,000 from each other and presto!  Congress can’t cross the line and go into session.

Seriously, folks, the best thing that Congress can do is pass a law that they will not pass any laws related to what happened in Tucson, for at least 90 days.  By then we might actually have more facts of what happened and what broke down, before trying to fix something.  By the way, what are the odds that Loughner would obey a 1,000 foot limit, or whatever gun restrictions Congress can dream up?  This was a very disturbed individual who had his behavior on full display for about six years and nothing what done to either help him or institutionalize him.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours.  Please comment below.

Do you remember the scene in the movie “Saving Private Ryan” where after storming a machine gun nest and losing their medic, the Americans have to deal with how to handle a prisoner they captured?  Some say shoot him on the spot others disagree.  They know they can’t take him with them as he will slow them down.  After much vigorous debate Captain Miller (Tom Hanks) decides to untie him, point him toward the American line and tell him to keep walking, with the hope that he will be captured by the advancing American forces. 

Later in the movie as Miller’s unit is in a pitched battle to the last man, the released German prisoner is among those killing Miller’s men.  After reinforcements arrive to turn the battle in the Americans favor and the remaining Germans surrender, the former prisoner smiles and nods to the soldier in Miller’s unit that acted as translator and argued for sparing him as if to say, “Hey, how’s it goin’ pal?”  The soldier lowers his rifle and kills the German.

I am reminded of this by the current situation with Yemen.  Started under President Bush was the insane idea of releasing enemy combatants where they can find their way back to the battlefield.  This stupid policy was, until recently, going to be accelerated under President Obama.  Either we are at war or we are not.  You can’t fight a war with half measures.  Either you fight it to win or let the enemy have their way.  If we are in a war and we capture the enemy they stay captured until the war is over.  We don’t need a bunch of lawyers standing on the sidelines tapping their foot and their watches and saying, “how much longer are you going to hold these people without charging them?”  Answer: until the war ends or hell freezes over, whichever comes first.

 Is It a War Yet Mr. President?

 Backed into a corner, on his fifth (?) try to explain what his administration is doing on the War on Terror (am I allowed to call it that?), he actually called it a war, at least against Al Qaida.  He has spent the better part of his first year in office giving the back of his hand to the Bush administration.  But after seven years of Bush keeping us safe and two terrorist attacks on our soil this year with Obama at the helm and his poll numbers sinking, he has come to the realization that he owns this now.

The tough Harry Truman talk is nice (“The Buck Stops Here”), but it is just words until you actually do something with the buck that just stopped on your desk.  Why is the spectacularly incompetent Janet Napolitano still drawing a salary?  In Obama’s world it seems to be that what he means when he says the buck stops here is that he is the only one subject to firing and since we can’t fire him, everyone under him keeps on keeping on.  But who appointed these people?  It was Obama.  So he should recognize that he blundered and if the underlings don’t have enough sense to fall on their swords and resign, he should flat out fire them.

 Vacations are Important.  Anti-terrorism, Not So Much

 After the terror attack at Fort Hood, you would think that perhaps President Obama would be a little more responsive to another attempted attack, but hey, he was on an Hawaiian vacation.  Nobel Prize?  Chicago trying to win a bid for the Olympics?  President Obama will travel across the sea for that.  But an attempted attack on America?  Chill, baby, chill.  How about his director of National Counterterrorism, Michael Leiter, taking a ski vacation?  Just because stopping such an attack might be considered counterterrorism and just because that organization just failed miserably at stopping such an attack, and just because we didn’t know why it failed or if another attack might be on the way, why interrupt time with the family over that?  Family time is important, so said his boss. Don’t worry, Mike, we’ll wait.

Behind the Curve

It seems that with each attempt the enemy is one step ahead of us.  So discussions heated up about these new body scanners that can find anything, so it is claimed.  Don’t get me wrong, I am a big advocate of technology, but I guess the real problem is best summed up by one pundit comparing our methods to the Israelis:

“The Israelis look for terrorists, we look for tweezers.”

Instead of reading body scanners, perhaps we should be training the TSA agents in reading body language.  That’s what the Israelis do.  If you are a Palestinian, sorry, but you go in a different line and you get more closely screened and questioned.  You may pass, but you are going to be thoroughly checked out. We should do the same.  Where is your passport from?  What visa stamps do you have in your passport indicating where you have been?  Why don’t you have any luggage Mr. Abdulmutallab?  Why did you buy a one way ticket?  Who are you staying with in Detroit?  I see you paid cash for your ticket, how much cash do you have left for your trip after you land in Detroit?  Do you have a credit card?  No?  Hmmm…maybe you should wait over there, while we check further.

 No technology is foolproof.  Having worked in technology for over thirty years I can say that with some degree of confidence.  It only takes one failure of the technology for a disaster to strike.  But if we spend less time trying to find that box cutter, shampoo bottle, tweezers, jar of honey, etc., and spend more time spotting someone who doesn’t look like they are on a nice business trip or a visit to relatives or who otherwise fit the profile of a terrorist, that’s right I said it: profile, we could probably become a lot safer without having to lock the bathrooms for the last hour of the flight.  If we had pulled the young Abdulmutallab aside and questioned him, he probably would have cracked like an egg.  Does anyone think for a minute that this kid would have given off no body language signals if questioned by a trained professional?  The right combination of skilled human observers and questioners along with technology, is what we need to be safer.   Rather than this:  We”re the TSA and You Can Count on Us!

Intelligence Sprawl

We also need to collapse the intelligence arms of our government back into one and shut the others down.  Roll back Homeland Security into the Department of Defense, put the myriad intelligence gathering arms back into the CIA, make people accountable and lessen the need for a coordinating center to gather intelligence from a dozen agencies correlate it and send it back out to the dozen agencies.  All that does is create more fiefdoms that don’t want to talk to the dummies in that other agency who aren’t as smart as we are.  As the old saying goes, “When everyone’s responsible, no one is responsible.”  Government is neither nimble nor overly cooperative.  The fewer handoffs between agencies necessary to connect the dots, the better off we will all be.

Reading one of the liberal pundit’s pan of Sarah Palin’s new book and how the reviewer harps on her inexperience, anyone with a room temperature IQ cannot help but ask, what about the guy who won?  You can say she had little executive experience, only two years as governor of Alaska and two terms as mayor of 7,000 resident Wasilla.  But while one may argue she had little executive experience, he had none.  For that matter, neither did McCain or Biden.  Legislative experience?  Sure.  Executive experience? No, and it shows.

Decisions, Decisions

What has he actually made a decision on?  The economy?  The porkulus package that is “saving” so many jobs, was put together by Pelosi.  It was as if she brought it to him and said, “Here, sign,” and he did.  Health care?  He talked a great deal about it, but five or more proposals sprouted from different committees and like a demolition derby, banged around until there was one left, dented, but still moving.

Guantanamo?  Iraq? Afghanistan?  A decision, no, no, no, we need to ponder and confer more. Despite putting the commander, McChrystal, in place, Obama can’t seem to agree or disagree with his recommendation.  And now, the granddaddy of them all, trying the 9/11 terrorists in New York.

Who’s the Boss?

This is what Barack Obama said:

“‘This is a prosecutorial decision as well as a national security decision.”

Er, no.  This is a decision for the Commander in Chief.  Don’t slough it off on some underling, no matter how lofty his title, so that at some future date you can put the blame on him.  As Harry Truman (D) said, “The buck stops here.”  It’s time, Mr. President, to step in, assert your constitutional authority and put a stop to this.  The military tribunals were set up and authorized by Congress for just this purpose.  It’s time to do the right thing.  You took an oath to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, not to bow to your left wing base. 

 After 9/11, President Bush kept us safe  for seven and half years.  Less than a year into your presidency, we have had the worst terrorist attack on our soil since then.  This was preventable.  But we are already starting down the slippery slope of liberal happy talk and putting all Americans in harm’s way.  Consider this, if the jihadists had their way and actually defeated us and took over, the first place they would go to slaughter the devils would be Hollywood.  If you don’t want to protect America because it’s what you took an oath to do, then do it to save your Hollywood friends from themselves.