There is an increasingly nasty battle brewing in the Republican race for the nomination to run against Democrat incumbent Tim Bishop in the First Congressional District in New York.  With jobs and the economy the number one issue across the nation, the petty personal attacks may result in potential Republican voters staying home in disgust.

In an excellent article in the Wall Street Journal titled, “New York’s GOP Never Learns,” Kim Strassel concludes her article by saying, “The effect has been to enrage and divide a New York party that should have bigger things on its mind. Say, winning this fall.” 

Chris Cox is trying to play catch-up to the front runner Randy Altschuler who has been actively campaigning for more than a year.  The difficulty for Mr. Cox is that his positions are not that different than those of Mr. Altschuler.  So, while Mr. Altschuler has been taking on the Democratic incumbent Tim Bishop and Bishop’s lockstep voting with Nancy Pelosi, Mr. Cox has resorted to attacking Mr. Altschuler.  Not to leave his flank unprotected, Mr. Altschuler has been forced to respond and now the race, with two weeks to go before the primary on September 14^th, has degenerated into a mudslinging contest.  There is a third candidate, George Demos, who is lobbing attacks from the rear with little effect.

Each candidate is calling themselves the “true conservative,” and Mr. Cox has garnered the support of the Suffolk County 9-12 Project the self-proclaimed “Largest Tea Party organization in Suffolk County.”  Mr. Cox’s father, Ed Cox, is the head of the New York State GOP.  Ms. Strassel reports that the senior Mr. Cox, backed Steve Levy over Rick Lazio for governor to curry favor with the Suffolk County GOP chairman to back his son.  It is all the kind of backroom political dealing that have attracted a rush of newcomer candidates and put incumbents of both parties on the endangered species list.

The Tea Party Endorsement

What caught my eye was the endorsement of the Suffolk County 9-12 Project and the announcement by Bob Meyer, co-founder.  He gave as one of his primary reasons that, Randy Altschuler was one of those people, “getting rich off the backs of hardworking Americans by outsourcing their jobs.”  That sounds more like Jimmy Hoffa, Andy Stern, or Barack Obama’s class warfare than any Tea Partier I know.  A commenter on the 9-12 Project’s site, Judyann Joyner added, “Randy is credited with the creation of ‘white collar sweatshops in India.’”  Pretty strong stuff.  I don’t know if Ms. Joyner or Mr. Meyer visited the company that Mr. Altschuler co-founded in India, but Business Week magazine did.

“The lights burn day and night in the gleaming glass-and-chrome building that towers over a leafy street in the southern Indian city of Madras. Here at OfficeTiger, 1,500 young men and women peer into computers 24 hours a day, analyzing and processing U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission reports and other documents drawn up by lawyers and bankers on Wall Street. Walking the floor, sometimes even at 3 a.m., is 34-year-old co-founder and co-Chief Executive Joseph Sigelman.”

Just because the office operates 24 hours per day, don’t been conned into thinking the same people are at their desks 24 hours a day.  “Gleaming glass-and-chrome building that towers over a leafy street,” yup, sounds like a hellhole to me.  Business Week added, “Indeed, OfficeTiger is the only successful startup in India’s $5 billion outsourcing industry that is owned and managed by a U.S. entrepreneur.”  So we have an American company making money in India, in what seems to be a rather large and competitive field, and this is a bad thing?  Since when did conservatives turn into protectionists?  But what about the jobs they replaced?  Okay, let’s examine that. 

You have some Wall Street firms that are in a competitive business.  A young entrepreneur comes up with an idea to reduce operating expenses by having an external company handle routine clerical tasks that are not one of the firm’s key competencies, that is, people don’t buy that firm’s services because of their typing skills.  The company outsources and reduces costs.  By reducing costs, they prosper and grow; by growing they create more high skill jobs like lawyers, accountants, financial analysts, IT people, etc.  Perhaps even some of the former typists, because of their computer skills can move of the ladder to spreadsheets, and databases.  Do some people lose their jobs, yes, just as buggy whip makers lost their jobs when the automobile came on the scene.  Okay, let’s shift to India.

In India white collar jobs are created; their standard of living improves; they buy consumer goods like iPods and iPhones and their offices need sophisticated IT equipment from companies like Cisco Systems which grow companies like Apple and Cisco creating jobs in the U.S. We live in a global economy and if we want prosperity and peace, the best way to get there is through free markets.  Even Mr. Cox in the policy section of his website blames government policies for companies outsourcing jobs overseas.  If it is the government’s policies that make these jobs uncompetitive here and Mr. Cox knows it, why is Mr. Altschuler wrong for reacting to it and helping American companies that use these services remain competitive?

After selling Office Tiger to RR Donnelly, Mr. Altschuler started another company in the U.S., CloudBlue, that recycles old IT equipment.  So we have an entrepreneur that has started a couple of companies that have created jobs around the world and that makes him a villain?  Perhaps Mr. Meyer should go back and read some of the quotes on his own website:

“You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom.” – Dr. Adrian Rogers

“I have a right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” – Thomas Jefferson

Mr. Meyer’s key criticism of Mr. Altschuler smacks of the government picking winners and losers.  This business is okay, but not that one.  If your business creates jobs overseas that is bad, but if it creates jobs here it is okay.  Well, Mr. Altschuler has done both and he has firsthand experience doing so, which is what we sorely lack in Washington.  If the strategy of Mr. Cox continues, including creating another party, the TaxPayer party, to run on and split the vote further, Mr. Cox might as well mail his strategy over to the Bishop campaign as I am sure they will find it very useful in the general election.  Not my cup of tea.

The focus should be on defeating the out of control spenders in Congress who got us into this mess, not fighting each other to the death and let the incumbent waltz back into office.  The time is now.  Mr. Cox should focus on what he would do as a Congressman that is better than Tim Bishop and Mr. Altschuler.  If he can’t articulate that, he should drop out.  He is not going to win a lot of support by throwing mud at his fellow Republicans.

Note: In the spirit of full disclosure I have done some volunteer work for the Altschuler campaign

The controversy surrounding the Ground Zero mosque remains at the top of the news.  The battle over who stood where on the issue is shaping up to be a key campaign issue for November.  In New York, one of the candidates, Randy Altschuler has been pounding the Democrat incumbent Tim Bishop to say where he stands.  After considerable foot dragging, Bishop finally came out as opposed to the mosque being built in the shadow of Ground Zero.  Why did it take so long?  Was he putting his finger in the air to determine which answer would score the most political points?

What about some of the other politicians?  Altschuler is strongly opposed as is indicated on the front page of his website.  Chris Cox, who is running against Altschuler and Bishop, it is not so clear.  It doesn’t appear on his website, at least not in any of the obvious places.  Newsday gives a rundown on those already in office.

• Those opposed: Peter King (R), Tim Bishop (D), Steve Isreal (D)
• It wouldn’t be fair to say the following politicians favor the project, they more judiciously say they are not opposed;
  • Kirsten Gillibrand (D), the unelected Senator appointed to fill Hillary Clinton’s seat is in a special election this fall
  • Carolyn McCarthy (D) takes no stand other than to say it is emotional.  Ms. McCarthy was propelled into office on the sympathy she garnered when tragedy struck her family at the hand of LIRR gunman Colin Ferguson. Afterwards she felt compelled to travel the country and fight for gun control, making it harder for her fellow law abiding citizens to protect their homes and families.  But when 3,000 of her neighbors are slaughtered in the name of Islam, she has no opinion about a mosque being built nearby other than to say it’s an emotional issue.
  • It has been said that the most dangerous place on earth is the ground between Chuck Schumer (D) and a television camera.  Chuck’s been in hiding on this issue, but through a spokesman he says he’s not opposed.
  • Gary Ackerman (D) is on vacation and apparently his office doesn’t know his position or how to contact him to ask.

The more interesting thing is an article in the Daily Caller that reports about moderate Muslims who are opposed to the mosque on the same grounds as most Americans.  They feel it is insensitive and inappropriate.  There may be a majority of Muslims here and around the world who are appalled by the actions of the radical extremists, but they are not very outspoken.  They were not outspoken on 9/11 nor are they very outspoken regarding the mosque.  Their voices are muted at best, when they should be screaming from the rooftops that these miscreants are hijacking their religion.  It could be for fear of reprisal from the radicals, who will kill anyone at the merest provocation.  However, if they don’t speak up, their silence will speak for them.  The radicals will become more strident and non-Muslims will take the moderate’s silence as acquiescence.  If the moderates truly believe what this article says, the mosque would not be built and healing the rift between Muslims and non-Muslims could begin in earnest. They need to be more vocal and take the lead in the War on Terrorism, to root out this evil from Islam.

I received an e-mail from Congressman Tim Bishop to tell those on his mailing list that we are better off this tax day.  Having stood with thousands of fellow Tea Party protesters, a very polite crowd I might add, I don’t share his mirth.  So I penned him the following reply:

Dear Congressman Bishop,

 I received your e-mail today with the subject line, “Better Off This Tax Day”.  That is a statement I find both bold and curious.  It is a statement that you seem to share with President Obama who was surprised that the Tea Party gatherings were not organized to blow him a kiss and say “thank you.”  I would like to address some of the points in your e-mail.

You begin by saying, “There is bipartisan agreement that tax cuts help spur economic growth…”  Well, yes and no.  I agree as do many conservatives that less taxes are good for both our liberty and our economy.  But to be truly effective, the tax cuts have to give the individual the greatest freedom to use their money as they see fit, after all it is their money being given to the government and not the other way around.  Tax cuts are least effective when used to encourage people to engage in some specific activity the government wants them to do.  In other words, the tax cuts should go toward growing the economy, not getting politicians re-elected.

As you know, the unemployment rate stands at 9.7%.  A year ago President Obama told us, in the strongest of terms, that it was imperative that we pass a $787 billion stimulus package.  If we did not pass that package the unemployment rate would rise to 9%, whereas if it was passed the unemployment rate would peak at 8%.  That’s $787 billion to restrain the unemployment rate by 1%.  Conservatives disagreed that this would work.  It didn’t work.  Not only was the unemployment rate not capped at 8%, it went above the “do nothing” case of 9%.  Now we have $787 billion dollars that we have to pay back and it got us exactly nothing, other than the new Obama administration “metric” of “jobs saved” which no one outside of the administration or Democratic party knows how to measure.

Let me take a moment to address some of the specific tax breaks you are touting.

• Making Work Pay tax credit – this works out to about $8 per week for a taxpayer.  Where I live in the district, this won’t buy a pizza.  If I team up with my wife, it may.  So pardon me if I don’t get too jazzed up about this.
• The rest of the tax breaks are all great if you have income to take them against.  The problem is 9.7% unemployment and you and this administration seem to be working on anything but putting people back to work.

Tax cuts that actually spur the economy and create growth and jobs are tax cuts at the margins.  Cut the marginal tax rates for everyone, even the evil rich people who pay 70% of the total taxes.  Congressman as much as you hate to read this, when people in the upper income brackets get a tax cut, they do not put the money under their mattress.  They spend it or they invest it, both of which lead to job creation.  When jobs are created, people have income and they start spending and then maybe some of the tax cuts you are boasting about will be meaningful, but until then they are just brochureware that is something that looks nice in your campaign literature, but is otherwise meaningless.

Instead of doing what worked in the 1980s and 1990s, this administration insists on doing what didn’t work in the 1930s.  It’s time for this administration to propose something that might actually work and then you may see bipartisanship in support of that proposal instead of bipartisan opposition.

After receiving one too many e-mails, post cards and other marketing pitches to extoll the virtues of ObamaCare, I felt compelled to send the following letter to Congressman Tim Bishop.

Dear Congressman Bishop,

 Judging by the e-mails and mail pieces the marketing program now begins.  To tell the 50%-60% of Americans who adamantly opposed ObamaCare, now that it has been signed into law, what good medicine it really is.  Before I point out the areas on which we disagree, I would first like to call for a sense of honesty in the debate on healthcare.  I applaud you for such honesty where you say on your glossy postcard that it was prepared, published and mailed at taxpayer expense. I challenge you, however, on your opening sentence.

You begin your piece by stating, “On March 21^st, we stood up to big insurance companies and passed health care reform.”  Really?  How is using the full coercive power of the federal government to unconstitutionally force millions of Americans to buy the products of these big insurance companies, whether they want to or not, standing up to them?  I’ll bet Wal-Mart wishes you would get tough with them and require all Americans to shop there on Thursdays.  Are you next going to get tough with GM and Chrysler by passing legislation forcing us to buy a Malibu or a Ram pickup truck?  Of course you will probably smack them around and make them comply with tougher CAFE standards, but hey, that’s what big government is for, no?

I am still waiting to find out how spending $1-$2 trillion dollars results in reducing the deficit by $143 billion in the first decade.  This may be presumptuous but I have a suggestion on how to lower the deficit by $1-$2 trillion.  Repeal ObamaCare and start over.

Nothing in this legislation actually goes to the root cause of reducing the cost of delivering health care.  It’s all giant shell game about hiding whose pocket the money is coming from to really pay for the same old broken system.  Here are some of the “benefits” you point out in your mail piece:

•  Free Preventive Care Under Medicare – this eliminates co-pays and deductibles under Medicare. This doesn’t reduce what it costs medical professionals to deliver preventive medicine, it just lowers the price to consumers.  Economics 101 says when you decreases the price the demand goes up.  By eliminating co-pays and deductibles, someone has to make up this modest difference.  It is either the medical professional who has to eat the cost, driving up rather than reducing the cost of preventive care, or it will be subsidized by the rest of us through taxes.  You are betting that if every senior gets preventive care, more expensive treatments will be avoided later.  The real question is: how many seniors are not getting preventive care because they don’t have a $20 co-pay and of that group, how many turn out to have a serious disease that could have been prevented?  This is a much smaller group than all seniors.  You cannot make seniors go to the doctor for preventive care if they don’t want to, whether it is free or not. 
• Free Preventive Care Under New Private Plans– When I had my own small business, I provided our employees with healthcare.  I chose a plan that provided free preventive health care.  When I left that business and went out on my own, I tried to buy the same plan privately.  It had a high deductible, HSA account, and free preventive care.  Such plans are available, but not in New York unless you have poverty level income.  The marketplace has these plans available.  Government regulations prevent me from buying them.  Why do we need to spend $1-$2 trillion to give me a plan that the marketplace already provides if government will just get out of the way?
• Ensuring Value for Premium Payments – This is where you require plans to spend a certain percentage of premium dollars on medical services.  How does this control costs?  If the underlying costs increase 100%, does it make us feel warm inside that the 100% increase in premiums that will follow will go 80% toward medical expenses?  It’s still an increase in premiums of 100%.

 Let me stop analyzing your mail piece here.  Doctors are threatening to leave the medical practice because of this legislation which will lead to rationing. This plan does not address the underlying problem.

There is a simple way to reform health care by controlling the underlying cost of delivering medical care, rather than mandating more and more coverage and expense paid for by someone else.  We all pay in the end.  Here is a simpler way that does not cost $1-$2 trillion dollars but may take some of that courage you boasted about in your opening sentence. 

1. Eliminate 3^rdparty payer.  If you invite me to dinner and you tell me that you’re picking up the tab and I am handed a menu with no prices on it, look out!  It’s gonna hurt.  Americans are smart consumers.  They will spend hours researching a car or flat screen TV before buying, because it’s coming directly out of their pocket.  They play a role in how much they pay.  That’s how markets work.  We do not have a free market in health care.  The way to do this is with high deductable insurance plans and Health Savings Accounts (HSA).  If you take the lower cost of the premium for the insurance piece and add the amount to fund the HSA, the costs are about the same as the premium alone on a traditional plan.  I went from a $10,000 annual premium for a traditional plan to a $5,000 premium cost for a high deductible with a $5,000 contribution to the HSA account.  If you want to help people with deal with the high deductable, help them fund the HSA accounts, but keep the buying decision in their hands.  Trust me, they will ask questions, they will shop around, because it’s their money and the less they spend, the more they keep.  Many HSA accounts have a provision to roll money over into an IRA if the account grows large.  This will take guts to implement because the public will have to be educated that they will come out ahead when they have the liberty to make their own choices.  You seem tough enough to ignore the will of the people to implement what you feel is good for them, why not implement something that will actually work?
2. Implement tort reform.  Not an experiment here or there.  If you want to show how tough you really are, stand up to the trial lawyers who fill Democratic coffers.  Implement the system they have in Britain.  No contingency fees and loser pays.  Maybe I’ll stop seeing commercials on my TV that promote a new drug, followed by a come on from a law firm to call them if you actually took the drug because, “you may be entitled to compensation.”  I have no problem with a person getting compensated when they have been harmed through the fault or negligence of a company.  Human life is not perfection.  We are all different.  Some of us can eat three eggs a day and never have a heart problem, others may look at a pat of butter and feel pains in their chest.  Lawyers shouldn’t get rich because humans are not perfect and companies can be bluffed into paying these extortionists rather than defending the case on the merits.  Lawyers  should get paid for the time they put into a case.  OB/GYN doctors are leaving the practice in droves because they cannot afford the malpractice insurance premiums.  Doctors are practicing defensive medicine ordering every possible test for fear they will be asked later, if a patient gets worse, why they didn’t order that other test.  When you add the cost of malpractice insurance on top of the cost of additional tests and procedures, it doesn’t get cheaper to deliver health care and you are not necessarily delivering better health care.  Let the doctors practice medicine, tell the lawyers to stop running a lottery.
3. Buy insurance across state lines.  As indicated previously, the plan I want to buy is available, but not in New York.  The market sees a need for such a product, I want to buy such a product, the government says no.  You want me to believe that now if we spend $1-$2 trillion the government will solve my problems.  Get the government out of my way, thank you very much.
4. Have more tailored insurance policies.  Why, as I approach the golden years, do I have to buy a health insurance policy that covers pre-natal care? In vitro fertilization? Sex change operations?  When I buy automobile insurance, I have about a dozen choices in every category about the kind of coverage I want.  How much deductible?  Do I want rental car reimbursement?  Roadside assistance?  Yet when choosing a health care policy, if I have a choice at all, it is a total package, take it or leave it.  Who decides what has to be included?  Is it me or the government regulators?  If I want to have free preventive care, fine let me choose that and adjust the premium accordingly.  If I want to pay the co-pay for free preventive care, give me that choice.  If we had more choices, as in a free market, costs will go down.  If the government says, everyone must take this, there is no competition and costs climb.
5. Control illegal immigration – If emergency room costs are driving up health care costs for all, and illegal immigrants use the emergency room as their primary care provider then it would follow if you controlled illegal immigration you would drive down health care costs.  Milton Friedman, the great economist, believed in open borders.  However, he also said you can’t have open borders and a welfare state.  It doesn’t work.
6. We need to have Medicare reform.  When Medicare passed the government projected that hospital coverage would grow to $9 billion by the early 1990s.  It actually grew to $66 billion a 700% error in their projection.  We hear again that we are going to crack down on Medicare and Medicaid fraud and this time we really, really mean it.  Estimated at nearly $100 billion per year in waste and fraud, why can’t this be done without spending $1-$2 trillion?

 What you and this Congress passed is a disaster.  If the projections on this monstrosity “miss” by 700% like they did on Medicare, where do we go for a bail out?  Who is going to bankroll that one?  Your children?  Your grandchildren?  The six items I laid out cost next to nothing, why not try them first?  You can always go back later and say we need to do more.  But with ObamaCare, it could be a runaway train that no one can stop.  It is a giant shell game.  It doesn’t address the underlying cost of providing medical care, it only hides whose pocket is getting picked to pay the bill.

Sincerely yours,

The marketing juggernaut is just getting warmed up, but instead of standing fascinated while your Congressman plays 3-card Monty, ask him or her the tough questions.  Ask them calmly, respectfully, and don’t let them dance.  If they dodge your question, ask it again.  If they don’t… fire them in November.

Congressman Tim Bishop referred to it in his town hall meeting.  If you ask a statist where does the Constitution authorize them to get involved in every detail of our lives, the only place they can point to is Article I, Section 8:

The Congress shall have the Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts, and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States; {my emphasis}

So what does the general Welfare mean?  Statists who claim the Constitution is a living breathing document believe that this clause gives them the right to do whatever they please, and whatever gets them reelected.  As conservatives we believe in original intent and therefore we have to go back to what the founders meant when they penned those words.  Why is that an important distinction?  Because the meaning of words change.

Are You Gay?

If you were asked that question in the eighteenth century, the questioner would have been asking you if you were merry; keenly alive and exuberant; having or inducing high spirits.  If asked that question today, the questioner wants to know if you are a homosexual.  So if the founders wanted to emphasize that the Constitution was a serious document and wrote, “nothing contained herein should be construed to be gay,” no one at the time would have raised an eyebrow, other than the dopiness of the clause.  If read in today’s context, it would create an uproar.

Are You Bad?

The band Huey Lewis and the News have a song called “Bad is Bad” in which the band plays on how the word “bad” now means ”good” in contemporary vernacular, but sometimes it actually means bad, really bad.  It shows how words change can change with time.  Back when the Founders wrote the Constitution and you said someone was bad, you might find yourself choosing dueling pistols.  Today, the response to the statement, “You’re bad,” would probably be, “Thanks, man.”

So if you don’t seek out the original meaning of the Constitution and our laws based on when they were written, everything can become meaningless over time.

What Did the Founders Mean by Provide for the General Welfare?

Alexander Hamilton was a proponent of a broad interpretation of the General Welfare and he supported that position during the Constitutional Convention.  However proposals along those lines, such as spending for internal improvements were rejected by the Convention.

“{James} Madison repeatedly argued that the powers to tax and spend did not confer upon Congress the right to do whatever it thought to be in the best interest of the nation, but only to further the ends specifically enumerated elsewhere in the Constitution, a position supported by Jefferson.” — The Heritage Guide to the Constitution, p.93

There was another interpretation that fit in the middle that even Hamilton recognized.  That was that the term “general” meant “national” welfare and not for purely local or regional benefit. President James Monroe demonstrated this

“in his 1822 message vetoing a bill to preserve and repair the Cumberland Road.  Monroe contended that Congress’s power to spend is restricted ‘to purposes of common defense, and of general,  national, not local, or state, benefit.” — The Heritage Guide to the Constitution, p. 93.

Later President James K. Polk vetoed a bill that looked a lot like today’s runaway earmarks.

“It provided $6,000 for projects in the Wisconsin territory — constitutionally permissible because of Congress’s broader power over federal territories — but it included $500,000 for a myriad of projects in the existing states.  Polk contended that to interpret the Spending Clause to permit such appropriations would allow ‘combinations of individual and local interests [that would be] strong enough to control legislation, absorb the revenues of the country, and plunge the government into hopeless indebtedness.’” – ibid, p. 95

If you changed some of the numbers you could have written that today rather than in 1847.  Where this came off the rails, along with so many other government disasters we are paying for today, was during FDR’s tenure beginning in 1936.  Subsequent Supreme Court decisions left the definition of “General Welfare” up to Congress.  How ridiculous is that?  Justice Sandra Day O’Connor summed it up pretty well in her dissent in South Dakota v. Dole

“If the spending power is to be limited only by Congress’ notion of the general welfare, the reality….is that the Spending Clause gives ‘power to the Congress….to become a parliament of the whole people, subject to no restrictions save such as are self-imposed.’  This….was not the Framer’s plan and it is not the meaning of the Spending Clause.”

Out of Control Spending

The outrage demonstrated at the town halls shows that the American people are fed up with Congress ignoring what they are saying and bankrupting the country.  The Supreme Court in the 1930s opened the door to profligate spending by Congress that was kept in check by the Constitution for 140 years prior.  To allow Congress to define general welfare as they want and then spend accordingly makes no sense logically or otherwise.  If the Supreme Court does not set this right, a Constitutional Amendment may be required, and I am no fan of amending the Constitution at every turn.  As an American I take pride our Constitution that we have only felt a need to amend 27 times in over 200 years.  But if we allow changes in the definitions of words to drag the Constitution along with them, then we need to take measures to put the Constitution back where it was as a beacon to guide us rather than a quaint artifact of our history.

In a previous post I described how I wrote to my Congressman on a particular topic.  He responded with a letter I thought was so flawed with logic that I felt compelled to respond, even as I believed it would have the equivalent effect of arguing with my dog.  He would politely listen,  cock his head, and then go about his business, but I wrote it anyway.  What I got in response surprised me.  I got the exact same letter as the first time around with only the date changed.

Fool Me Once…

With all the town halls and people finally beginning to find their voice, I tried to communicate with my Representative again.  This time I sent him a short e-mail with two very simple questions:

1. On the Stimulus, Cap and Trade, and Health Care, did you read these bills in their entirety before voting on them?
2. Can you help me by directing me to that part of the Constitution that authorizes the federal government to get involved with health care.

An honest response would be along the lines of:

1. Yes, Yes, No
2. Article I, Section…

But instead a got a long e-mail telling me that health care was complex, that he wrote a letter to Nancy Pelosi requesting a delay in voting, and basically all the statist talking points.  My two simple questions were simply ignored.

Town Hall Outrage

The outrage being demonstrated in the town halls is not the result of right-wing organizers.  It is the result of being treated by our elected Representatives as children who should be seen but not heard.  They schedule a town hall meeting, read an opening statement of their carefully crafted talking points, and then take questions that they answer by rephrasing the question so that a reply can be given from the talking points.  At the appointed time, they thank the crowd for their input, which they will ignore, wave to the crowd and hurry away from the unwashed masses to marble halls of Congress, their $169,000 salary, their staffs, etc.

The people will not stand for this anymore.  They see these power hungry, career politicians, not representing the people but lecturing them.  Americans have had enough, and they’re not going to take it anymore.

Here is Congressman Tim Bishop’s Town Hall experience, in two parts.

Tim Bishop\’s Town Hall Meeting – Part 1

Tim Bishop\’s Town Hall – Part 2

Baby's Not Happy About the Stimulus Bill She's Stuck With

The colorful brochure arrived in the mail today titled, “Fighting For Long Island.”  In it Congressman Tim Bishop extols the virtues of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, and how much bacon he brought home for the district.  Inside the folder is a map of the 1st Congressional District with callout balloons showing all the locations where stimulus money will land.  On first blush one is tempted to think, good job Congressman!  But then I reached for the calculator.

By the Numbers

If you take the $787 billion and divide it by the 535 members of Congress (425 Congressman and 100 Senators) the stimulus bill works out to $1.47 billion per member.  That’s a lot of dough.  I then took out my calculator and tallied up all the monies on the map that “CONGRESSMAN TIM BISHOP Delivers Economic Recovery Funds To Long Island.”  Just to be sure, I checked my numbers three times and the projects added up to $274 million. That’s not good.  That means that our Congressman brought home less than 19% of his share, which means that a lot more backslapping members of Congress got more than their share.  Throw into the mix that every Republican voted against the bill and probably were not considered too kindly on the receiving end, then we really got short changed.

Money In vs. Money Out

Although there are many people who like to believe that Uncle Sam is really some independently wealthy tycoon who showers his nieces and nephews with his largess, the sad reality is that the money all comes from us.  So I wondered how much do we send to the Treasury?

The federal government does a pretty good job of concealing how taxes are broken down by congressional district, which is understandable as accountability at election time can be problematic.  In 2004 the First Congressional District in New York ranked 60th in the nation in average income tax liability per tax return, at $8,310 per return.  What percentile is that?  Let’s see 60 out of 435 comes out to be about the 14th percentile, well above the midpoint.  How much stimulus did our esteemed representative bring home?  Somewhere around the 81st percentile well below the midpoint.  So the bottom line is that our Congressman voted to have his constituents pay a very large share of stimulus money that will go to every other part of the country, while we spend years working off the debt.  Brilliant!

Historically, New York gets about $0.79 from the federal government for every $1 that New Yorkers pay in taxes.  So why do New Yorkers keep overwhelmingly electing Democrats to Congress who love to increase taxes that ultimately end up being sent to other states?  Who are they working for (perhaps themselves)?

The Stimulus Was Really About Jobs

So let’s not get bogged down in costs when it’s jobs we’re really talking about.  After all, passing the stimulus would keep the unemployment rate at 8% instead of 9% without it.  Oops, it’s already at 9.5% and climbing.

Of all the projects identified on the map of the district, one had an actual figure, in bold, stating that it would create 1,000 jobs.  That’s a nice figure, but let’s put it in perspective.  There are about 233,000 people employed in the district. At a 9.5% unemployment rate that would mean about 22,135 jobs have been lost in this recession.  So creating 1,000 jobs equates to about 0.4% employment.  The particular project that was identifed with creating these 1,000 jobs was getting $184.3 million in stimulus money or two-thirds of all the stimulus in the district.  That works out to us spending $187,300 per job created.  Call me a conservative, but somehow I think that if we cut taxes by $184.3 million we would create a lot more than 1,000 jobs.  But what we will have to do is raise taxes to cover the $184.3 million that we are spending to create these jobs which will probably turn right around and kill them or an equivalent number.

What Federalism Means to Me

Here is a “top ten” list of stimulus projects compiled by Senator Tom Coburn [R-OK]:

1. “Free” Stimulus Money Results in Higher Utility Costs for Residents of Perkins, Oklahoma
2. FutureGen: The Stimulus Earmark that Wasn’t, Becomes the Costliest Pork Project in History
3. Little-Used “Shovel-Ready” Bridges in Rural Wisconsin Given Priority Over Widely Used Structurally Deficient Bridges
4. $800,000 for little-used Johnstown, Pennsylvania airport to repave a back-up runway; the “Airport for Nobody” Has Already Received Tens of Millions in Taxpayer dollars
5. $3.4 Million for Wildlife “Eco-Passage” in Florida; Project Still May Take Years to Finish
6. Nevada Non-Profit Gets Weatherization Contract After Being Fired For Same Work
7. Non-Existent Oklahoma Lake in Line for Over $1 Million To Construct a New Guardrail
8. Taxpayers Taken for a Ride: Nearly $10 Million to be Spent to Renovate a Century Old Train Station that Hasn’t Been Used in 30 Years
9. Ten Thousand Dead People Get Stimulus Checks, Social Security Administration Blames a Tough Deadline
10. Town of Union, New York, Encouraged to Spend Money It Did Not Request For a Homelessness Problem It Does Not Have

Now if someone in Florida (No. 5) want to spend $3.4 million for a wildlife “eco-passage” (i.e., roadway tunnel for turtles)  project, fine.  The good people of Florida can pay for it.  If the people of John Murtha’s district  want to spend $800,000 (No. 4)  to repave a backup runway in Johnstown, fine.  Let those folks pay for it.

If it doesn’t cross a state line, or have a benefit for ALL Americans, it’s not the federal government’s business.  That is my litmus test for federalism.  There is nothing more idiotic than having me pay for your project while you pay for mine.  Because it comes down to a perpetual power grab where those who stay in the government the longest get everyone to pay for their projects (so their constituents will re-elect them) and everyone else gets the bill.  Just ask yourself how many federal functions have been moved to West Virginia (Robert Byrd 50+ years in the Senate).  How much pork goes in to John Murtha’s district (38 years in Congress).

Spinning it for All it’s Worth

So look for the brightly colored brochure from your Congressman crowing about how many stimulus dollars they brought home, but just remember, if your Congressman hasn’t been serving for 20 years, he or she probably got fleeced and you got screwed.  Enjoy holding the bag.