Category Archives: Tax to Spend

How did this happen?

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NJ Governor Chris Christie

I usually don’t think much of Chris Christie. He isn’t a conservative and isn’t much of a ‘Pub, either. But today, he uttered a statement that I can agree upon. Finally!

“Some colleges are drunk on cash and embarking on crazy spending binges, just because they know they can get huge revenues from tuition.” — WSJ

In this case, Christie is right. College tuition is caught in a feed back loop. Colleges charge thousands of dollars for tuition, far beyond the means of most families. The students then file for student loans and get them. The student loans pays for the tuition. The colleges and universities, realizing they have a cash cow available in the form of government sponsored student loans, feel no restraint on raising tuition again each year.

In the mid-’60s when my wife and I went to college, we both had a teaching scholarship. Southern Illinois University, at that time, was on the quarter system, Fall, Winter, Spring and Summer quarters. My tuition costs—which included text book rental, $112 for an in-state resident. The scholarship paid for all of that except for a $12 Student Activity fee. I paid more for room and board, $298 per quarter, than I did for tuition. I also worked 40 hours/week, part-time for the university for the grand sum of $0.95 per hour. I went to school full-time and then worked 40 hours for those expenses not covered by tuition nor dorm.

Tuition for today’s colleges and universities should be investigated for RICO violations because today’s tuition is a racket.

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You’ve heard, no doubt, that St. Louis and Kansas City want to raise the minimum wage. Regardless of all the nonsense about a ‘living wage’ that such entry level jobs were never meant to fulfill, there are other reason why these metro areas want the pay increase—more money in the city coffers.

Higher minimum wage would increase city’s tax revenues, too

Letter-to-the-Editor, June 12, 2015

Mayor Francis Slay of St. Louis is asking the Board of Aldermen to pass legislation mandating a near doubling of the current minimum wage from $7.65 to $15 an hour for certain businesses operating in the city by 2020 (“Slay seeks to increase minimum wage in city,” June 3). Naturally, this will undoubtedly appeal to all those who buy into this demagogic charade of equality and “fairness” by politicians and their followers of the Left.

But aside from undeniable economic facts, that prices will go up and seniors on fixed income will be hurt, there is something else that will result that I have not heard being talked about.

Consider, when you virtually double the current minimum wage, can you guess what benefits the city of St. Louis will receive? If you said that with higher wages comes higher tax revenue from the city earnings tax along with increased payroll tax revenue that will go to the state of Missouri, then go to the head of the class. If you add that increase wages mean higher sales taxes, you are clearly a summa cum laude candidate.

What Sleight-of-Hand Slay is attempting to do without saying so is to generate additional revenue while seeking to avoid being accused of raising taxes. Wonder if anyone else has caught on to this?

In the case of Kansas City there is an additional tax, the 1% (or is it higher now?) city income tax. If the minimum wage is increased, the city will get more revenue from its income tax.

When you get to the bottom line, it’s always about collecting more taxes. Involuntary taxation is nothing more than theft by other means.

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Back to the grindstone

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A week ago I was on my way to Nashville. J and I are now back. The initial flurry on our return, checking the mail, doing errands postponed from last week, recovering from a bit of physical overexertion, are over.

Like any long anticipated event, there’s a let down when it’s over. The excitement, built by anticipation over the last weeks and months, is gone.

Sole Mio Banquet Room, Nashville, TN

Sole Mio Banquet Room, Nashville, TN

Last Saturday, J and I were invited by a number of blogger friends to dinner at a small Italian place, Sole Mio, a couple of blocks from the Music City Center. I had met about half of group from the St. Louis NRAAM in 2012. Some have become good friends despite the fact we’ve only met, face-to-face, once or twice before.

As bloggers, we all have our separate interests. Some write solely about guns and gun issues. Others, like my friend, Kelly, AKA, Ambulance Driver, writes about EMS topics. Some write about their military experiences and Jim, a new writer, presented me with signed copies of his books. All of us, however, have one common topic that we all write about at one time or another: Shooting.

It was a fun night. We agreed to meet again in a year at the next NRAAM in Louisville. Mrs Crucis and I have already marked our calendars for May 20-22, 2016. They’re still counting the attendance. The Annual Meeting continued through Sunday. The attendance by Saturday night was over 78,000. When Sunday’s attendance is added, I expect that number to exceed 80,000. The question is by how much. IMO, the Music City Center was too small. I hope Louisville is larger.

Next year we hope to take a couple of local friends with us.

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I may have escaped the political escapades in Missouri for a few days. That didn’t mean it stopped. In the Missouri Senate, the Tax ‘n Spend crowd wants to raise Missouri’s gas tax by 10¢. IIRC, it sits today at 19¢. This crowd says it must go up to 29¢ or we’ll lose some federal money.

Spend! Spend! Spend! And when the money is spent, it’s never spent on what we really need. Missouri has allocated well over a billion dollars in the last decade to fix the state’s roads and bridges. Most of that money, once it was appropriated, was re-directed to more politically sensitive projects. MODOT is a joke. Nixon won’t release funds already allocated while claiming to need more. Now the idiots want more!? No! The Missouri Senate has blocked this tax and no-spend bill. At least for the moment.

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The ‘Pubs have three announced candidates so far, Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and Marco Rubio. They all made their announcements in public, in person, and made the media rounds afterward.

On the democrat side, Hillary announced her candidacy…via social media—not in public, not in person, and no interviews with the media. Instead, she rented a Darth Vader van, went to Iowa, found a restaurant, ran out everyone who was there, filled it with hired supporters and created a media event. And, like she did in 2008, departed without leaving a tip—verified by the on-site security cameras.

What a comparison: Cruz, Paul, Rubio, real people meeting real people vs. Hillary, a fraud and a phony, a manufactured candidate. It is a pocket-sized truism of left vs. right.

Hillary believes if she can manipulate the public, she’ll win. Not even the rabid democrats believe her anymore.

From PJ Media…

86% Say No to Hillary in MSNBC Poll

by Debra Heine, April 15, 2015 – 11:02 am

According to a new Rasmussen poll, nearly six in 10 voters believe that Hillary Rodham Clinton will be the next president. But perception is not reality, as an MSNBC poll seems to indicate.

The poll, which appeared on the MSNBC website on Tuesday morning, shows that 86% of MSNBC readers who responded would not vote for Hillary Clinton in the upcoming presidential election. Only 13% responded in the affirmative and a mere 2% said “maybe.”

The poll, while not scientific, strongly suggests that progressives do not prefer to have a baggage-laden career politician as their party’s standard bearer in 2016.

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“Missouri is no longer a presidential bellwether state. The state’s voters haven’t sided with the national victor since 2004,” so says the St. Louis Public Radio. What they really mean is that Missouri hasn’t been an Obama rubber-stamp much to the chagrin and disappointment of the St Louis liberals.  In fact, Missouri is so out-of-step, according to them, that the state’s political consultants are being chosen to lead the campaigns of Cruz, Bush, and perhaps Scott Walker.

Missouri’s position — and importance — in 2016 presidential contest up in the air

By

First, one thing needs to be made clear: Missouri is no longer a presidential bellwether state. The state’s voters haven’t sided with the national victor since 2004.

As a result, as more candidates announce their 2016 presidential bids, many activists in both major parties predict Missouri won’t be a battleground state this time, either.

This means, as in 2012, Missouri voters won’t see many presidential TV ads and likely won’t see much of the candidates.

Under that scenario, Democrats believe it will be too costly, too risky and unnecessary to try to carry the state. And Republicans are confident they don’t need to spend money to keep Missouri in their presidential column.

But that doesn’t mean Missouri has no role to play in the presidential contest. “We will not see presidential candidates coming here for votes, but they will be coming here for some of the talent in our state and probably more importantly, to raise funds,” said Republican consultant James Harris.

In fact, such quests already are underway. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush stopped by a couple months ago for a private money-raising event held at Hunter Engineering, the firm owned by former Ambassador Stephen Brauer and headquartered near Lambert Field.

…

And several major Republican players in the state already have lined up behind GOP contenders:

  • Kansas City-based consultant Jeff Roe has been assisting GOP hopeful Ted Cruz for months and recently was named his campaign manager;
  • Gregg Keller, a St. Louis-based consultant, is a senior adviser for Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker. Former U.S. Sen. Jim Talent, R-Mo., also is on board with Walker, providing policy advice. Keller and Talent previously had been active in Mitt Romney’s presidential bids.
  • Prominent St. Louis lawyer Jack Oliver, former vice chairman of the Republican National Committee, has been volunteering in the state and nationally on behalf of Jeb Bush. Oliver earlier had been the campaign finance chairman for former President George W. Bush.
  • Harris, based in Jefferson City, isn’t officially aligned with any of the 2016 candidates, although he personally backs Jeb Bush. He served as a contribution “bundler’’ for Republican nominees John McCain in 2008 and Romney in 2012.

Oliver, by the way, disagrees with those pundits who write off Missouri as a 2016 battleground state.  “Missouri is a very important state, and will be in the primary and in the general election,” he said.

Some fellow Republicans who privately agree with him point to the state’s top Missouri Democratic consultant, who long has been a national player:  veteran consultant/money-raiser Joyce Aboussie.

Based in St. Louis, Aboussie was the national political director for U.S. Rep. Dick Gephardt, D- St. Louis, for more than a decade. She has supported and assisted Hillary Rodham Clinton for years.

The column continues on the website, you can read all if it here. Missouri’s liberals may think Missouri has nothing much to be noticed. Others, on the national political scene, believe otherwise.

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Taxes…and more taxes.

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One way or another, Spring is tax time. This year could be like no other in our country’s history. More taxes will become effective—more taxes to be paid, than at any other time since George Washington was inaugurated.

You won’t hear about it from the MSM, nor from any mainstream news outlet. You won’t know the extent of these taxes until it comes time for them to be paid. And, pay you will.

The first item is, unsurprisingly, Obamacare. This is the first time you will pay your Obamacare tax. If you don’t have health care, you will have to pay a penalty. If you do have health care, your employer will have to pay a tax to support Obamacare. If you’re self-employed, your tax will be the increased cost of individual healthcare. Regardless of your circumstances, you will pay more.

Obamacare penalty may come as shock at tax time

By Tom Howell Jr. – The Washington Times – Sunday, January 18, 2015

http://media.washtimes.com/media/image/2015/01/19/obama_s877x585.jpg?321c9d70daf99fc888c0b24f70eed91a13ac78bc

In a scene reminiscent of Pontius Pilate washing his hands after sentencing Jesus, President Barack Obama wipes his face with a cloth handed to him by White House Butler Von Everett in the Blue Room of the White House following an event with business leaders in the East Room, Jan. 28, 2009. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

Those Americans who didn’t get health insurance last year could be in for a rude awakening when the IRS asks them to fork over their Obamacare penalty — and it could be a lot more than the $95 many of them may be expecting.

The Affordable Care Act requires those who didn’t have insurance last year and didn’t qualify for one of the exemptions to pay a tax penalty, which was widely cited as $95 the first year. But the $95 is actually a minimum, and middle- and upper-income families will actually end up paying 1 percent of their household income as their penalty.

TurboTax, an online tax service, estimated that the average penalty for lacking health insurance in 2014 will be $301.

“People would hear the $95, quit listening, and make an assumption that that was what their penalty was going to be,” said Chuck Lovelace, vice president of affordable care for Liberty Tax Service. “I think that a lot of people will be surprised when they get in there and find out that their penalty is [based] on their household income.”

The penalty is designed to prod Americans to buy insurance and the penalty for not having it is scheduled to rise considerably: to a $325 minimum or 2 percent of income in 2015, and to a $695 minimum or 2.5 percent of income in 2016. (The column continues on to a 2nd page at the Washington Times website.)

It may not have been in the forefront of everyone’s mind about Obamacare taxes (note: that’s plural,) we did know they were coming. Other taxes, or tax proposals are more recent.

With the dropping price of gasoline at the pump, a by-product of the Oil War between the US and OPEC, the Congress is considering raising the gas tax for the first time since 1993. The belief in Washington is that people will have more disposable income due to the lowering cost of gas at the pump so they can afford to pay a higher tax.

Corker calls for federal gas tax hike

Mary Troyan, Tennessean Washington Bureau 4:04 p.m. CST January 11, 2015

WASHINGTON – Low gas prices have rekindled talk on Capitol Hill about raising the federal gas tax to eliminate huge annual deficits in the federal Highway Trust Fund that pays for road and bridge work around the country.

While some top Republicans remain adamant a tax hike is not the answer, there are signs that the idea, including one from Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee, is at least getting a fresh look.

Corker and Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., have proposed raising the federal gas tax by 12 cents over two years and indexing it to inflation. To make the concept more palatable to fiscal conservatives, the measure would lower other taxes.

The 18.4-cent-per-gallon gas tax hasn’t been raised since 1993. As vehicles have become more efficient, the revenue generated by the tax has dropped. Current stopgap funding for the Highway Trust Fund expires in May, and transportation officials in Tennessee and other states are holding back projects until uncertainty about the federal money is addressed.

Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., chairman of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, said this week a gas tax increase could not be ruled out. Republican Sen. Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma, chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, agreed. (Read more at the website.)

The feds aren’t the only ones eying consumers’ wallets, a number of states are covetously thinking the same as the feds. As usual, the excuse is the crumbling transportation infrastructure and dwindling Highway Trust Fund. The root cause isn’t insufficient taxes, the root cause is that, like the Social Security Trust Fund, the Feds have been robbing the Highway Trust fund to pay for more welfare.

The highway crumbling infrastructure isn’t due to a lack of taxes, it’s due to redirecting the money to other non-transportation projects. Cut those other projects, stop robbing the trust funds, and there would be plenty of funding to rebuild the highways and bridges.

The same reasoning applies to the states.

States look at hiking gas tax as fuel prices plunge

Aamer Madhani, USA TODAY 12:09 p.m. EST January 17, 2015

With gas prices dipping to their lowest level in years, lawmakers in state capitals throughout the USA are increasingly open to the idea of raising fuel taxes to help rebuild crumbling roadways and bridges.

The movement at the state level comes as House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said last week that he’s doubtful that there will be enough backing for a bi-partisan push to raise the federal gas tax, which has stood at 18.4 cents per gallon since 1993.

The Obama administration has also declined to endorse raising the federal gas tax to finance road funding, but says it will take a look at anything Congress comes up with.

State legislators and governors, however, aren’t waiting for Washington.

Republican leaders who typically find talk of raising taxes a non-starter are making the issue a priority in 2015, even though polling consistently has shown broad opposition among Americans to fuel tax hikes.

“The states have shown that they are more likely to act on the gas tax than the federal government is,” said Carl Davis, a senior policy analyst at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a research group in Washington. “The states have to balance their budgets. If they see, their roads are in bad shape or their bridges are literally falling down—in some cases—they need to come up with a way to pay to improve that. And there’s a limited number of things you can do at the state level.” (Read more here.)

The column notes that a number of states have raised gas taxes in recent years. I also note that most of those states are in the liberal north-east, the area commonly known as the rust belt for good reason—tax flight by businesses.

The final example of taxes for this post comes from Missouri. At least one bill has been filed to convert the state to the ‘Fair Tax.’ I’m of two minds on this. I don’t like consumption taxes, sales taxes. Sales taxes have many unintended consequences, the least of which is to drive consumers to buy large ticket items out-of-state where taxes may be lower. On the other hand, I wouldn’t mind seeing Missouri’s Department of Revenue taken down a very large peg.

A bill has been filed for the 2015 Missouri session that would reduce Missouri’s income tax by 25% per year until it is eliminated. It also proposes an increase of the current 4% sales tax to 7% sales tax on “retail sales of new tangible personal property and taxable services.” It idea is that the sales tax would be gradually increased as the income tax is decreased to make the scheme, “revenue neutral.” Frankly, I’ve never seen a bill work as it was envisioned. Something always goes wrong. It is the unintended consequences that make our lives harder and they are never fully corrected.

Be that as it may, we must be eternally vigilant on taxes. I’ve yet to meet a tax I liked. Every tax I’ve ever seen failed to meet its original purpose.

 

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Words for Wednesday

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Somedays it is hard to write a post. The difficulty is caused by a number of reasons, repetitive news cycles, ignorance of the MSM and in many areas the ignorance and apathy of the public. At other times, a lack of motivation or time conflicts conspire to push me to not post.

Today is one such day.

Be that as it may, today’s lead item is about stupidity. John Boehner’s bartender—a man who has been Boehner’s bartender for over five years, is accused of plotting to poison the Representative from Ohio.

The bartender must be an astoundingly poor planner. He had opportunities to shuffle off Boehner’s mortal coil for five years…but he just couldn’t get his act together.

When I read the article, it triggered my disbelief tripwire. After a facing mutiny in the GOP ranks, Boehner and the FBI reveal this incompetent. It just seems to be a misdirection ploy to get some positive media for Boehner. I wonder how many American have trouble with this news item?

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Guns and Taxes

From WMSA.NET…

From the PoliticMO Newsletter for January 14, 2015.

GUNS — ‘Gun groups vow to fight Missouri lawmaker’s bill taxing guns to pay for police body cameras,’ Raw Story: “A Missouri state legislator has drawn criticism from gun enthusiasts for introducing bills that would pay for body cameras for police officers through a tax increase on firearm and ammunition sales… House Bills 75 and 76, which were introduced by state Rep. Brandon Ellington (D), would implement a 1 percent tax raise on gun sales, with the money going to the “Peace Officer Handgun and Ammunition Sales Tax Fund,” to be used to buy the cameras. Officers would then be required to wear the cameras during any interaction with the public, and keep the footage in their records for at least 30 days. Undercover officers and detectives would be exempt from wearing the cameras. …

“The National Rifle Association (NRA) has already come out against Ellington’s proposal. ‘Forcing law-abiding Missourians to pay an additional tax on firearm and ammunition purchases is unmerited. Gun owners and purchasers should not be responsible for funding these projects,’ the group said in a release. ‘The NRA will continue to fight against such misguided encroachments on those who exercise their Second Amendment rights.’” — PoliticMO Newsletter, Jan 14, 2015

We continually hit with taxes and more taxes. A new tax to one thing or another, another hand in our pocket stealing our money under the guise of law. Every tax has some benefit, we’re told. I just don’t believe it. We don’t need a new tax to fund body cameras now, especially one that taxes guns and ammunition.

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The rank and file of our military do not like Obama. Who’da thunk it?

AMERICA’S MILITARY: A conservative institution’s uneasy cultural evolution

The force is changing — often reluctantly — alongside the civilian society it serves

In his first term, President Obama oversaw repeal of the controversial “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.

Then he broke with one of the military’s most deeply rooted traditions and vowed to lift the ban on women serving in combat.

And the commander in chief has aggressively sought to change military culture by cracking down on sexual assault and sexual harassment, problems that for years were underreported or overlooked.

Obama is an unpopular president in the eyes of the men and women in uniform. Yet his two-term administration is etching a deep imprint on the culture inside the armed forces. As commander in chief, he will leave behind a legacy that will shape the Pentagon’s personnel policies and the social customs of rank-and-file troops for decades to come.

Go visit the Military Times and read the complete article. It confirms the opinions of many now serving and some fears as well.

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Strike! While the price is low.

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The price of crude dropped to $45 a barrel yesterday. A gas station in Texas posted a pump price of $1.499 a gallon. We all rejoice at the lowering prices. Long-haulers see their costs dropping, and the economy begins to pick up. ‘Course, Washington takes credit of all of it while doing nothing but talk.

Oh, they are talking. Talking about raising gasoline prices by at least another 12¢ as gallon. Why? Because consumers can afford to pay more since they aren’t paying as much per gallon!

Incredible! But, not completely unexpected from the crazed spending lusts of those in Congress and in the administration. I expect our local congresscritter, Vicky Hartzler, who supports massive welfare spending in her voting for the yearly Ag bill (SNAP/Foodstamps), will get in line with her rubberstamp.

It’s not as if the taxes collected has decreased. No, in fact the gas tax revenues has increased. With the lower gas prices, people and businesses are driving more, buying more gas. The federal gas tax is 18.4¢ and 24.4¢ for diesel fuel. It is a fixed tax per gallon. If the tax was a percentage of the cost of a gallon, then a lowering price would reduce the tax revenue—but it is not.

The Daily Signal, a news website and newsletter of the Heritage Foundation posted an article today that delves deeper in the push for more taxes. Surprise, Surprise! It’s not just democrats pushing for a higher tax.

Why Washington Politicians Want to Hike the Gas Tax

Stephen Moore / /

Suddenly everyone in Washington wants a gas tax hike—apparently so consumers don’t save too much money at the pump. As prices keep falling, the politicians and the moochers in Washington want a piece of the action.

Rather than raise the federal gas tax, a better policy would be to repeal the federal tax and let states pay for their own road projects.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Minority Whip Richard Durbin, D-Ill., and even Republicans such as Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee have linked arms with the entire road-building industry and green groups that want the cost of fuel to go up.

Pelosi won’t even hide her cynical motivation: With gas prices low, maybe motorists won’t notice that we’re gouging them.

“If there’s ever going to be an opportunity to raise the gas tax, the time when gas prices are so low—oil prices are so low—is the time to do it,” she explained.

That’s rich coming from Pelosi, who has done everything she can to stop the shale oil and gas revolution that made prices fall in the first place.

Apparently if OPEC can’t keep prices high, the feds will. And these are the folks who say they want to help the middle class.

Every penny increase in the gas tax will take about $1 billion out of the wallets of consumers. So a 10-cent or 20-cent gas tax will take about $10 billion to $20 billion from consumers.

The politicians like to point to studies by road builders and civil engineers that insist America’s infrastructure is crumbling and we must spend hundreds of billions of dollars to fix our roads, highways, bridges and airports. Now there’s an impartial jury. Who do you think is going to get all this money?

Corker adds that we are “just stealing from future generations out of the general funds to pay for infrastructure because Congress is going to fund infrastructure but not in the appropriate way.”

Corker is right that America needs more roads and needs to fix the ones we have to reduce congestion and potholes. But this isn’t because the 18.4-cents-a-gallon gas tax raises too little money—$34 billion a year should be plenty and infrastructure spending is near an all-time high.

The “stealing” that is going on is from the trust fund. Congress siphons tax dollars away from roads to worthless mass transit systems with tiny ridership.

Why should motorists see their gas tax dollars go to transit projects they don’t use?

If Washington would simply devote all gas tax dollars to roads, we wouldn’t need a tax hike.

Don’t be surprised if gas tax hike dollars help fund California’s $68 billion high-speed rail white elephant. The program has been so riddled with cost overruns, it may go down in history as one of the most absurd transportation projects in U.S. history.

There’s no bigger hypocrite when it comes to infrastructure than President Obama. He wants $300 billion for a federal infrastructure fund even as he announces he will veto a bill to create needed pipeline infrastructure and some 42,000 jobs at virtually no cost to taxpayers. Pelosi and Durbin are against Keystone, too.

Rather than raise the federal gas tax, a better policy would be to repeal the federal tax and let states pay for their own road projects.

The interstate highway system was completed 30 years ago, and there is no more need for a national tax at 18.4 cents a gallon to fund bridges and high-speed rail projects to nowhere. Devolving transportation projects back to the states will ensure that gas tax money is used for the highest value-added projects.

The column continues at the website. You can read it in it’s entirety here.

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“Don’t Get Stuck on Stupid!”

That was a quote from Lt. General Russell Honeré from the Katrina cleanup when the military had to come in to help state and federal officials in New Orleans. While the circumstances and reasons for the quote has been forgotten, the quote itself has not.

The dems in Washington have not taken that advice. No, they, after their massive losses last November, continue with their failed agenda. Only now, they are pushing that failed agenda harder.

Dems double down on liberal populism, push bolder wealth redistribution

By S.A. Miller and David Sherfinski – The Washington Times – Monday, January 12, 2015

House Democrats, fresh off massive election losses, say the problem is they didn’t make a bold enough case for tax increases and wealth transfer to the poor. They rectified that Monday with a speech by Rep. Chris Van Hollen proposing tax increases on the wealthy with the money going straight to tax cuts for the poor and middle class.

The plan uses tax laws to encourage employee wage increases, reduce tax breaks for Wall Street and slap another fee on financial transactions. The government would dole out $1,000 tax credits for most workers and increase a slew of other tax credits for poor and middle-class families.

“This is a plan to grow the paychecks of all, not just the wealth of a few. This proposal attacks the chronic problem of stagnant middle-class incomes from both directions. It promotes bigger paychecks and lets workers keep more of what they earn,” Mr. Van Hollen, the ranking member on the House Budget Committee, said in a speech announcing the plan at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank in Washington.

The Maryland Democrat said the proposal would restore balance to a tax code that “is now skewed in favor of people who make money off of money and against those who make money off of work.”

The plan built upon the liberal populism that dominates the Democratic agenda for confronting a Republican-controlled Congress, such as the push to raise the minimum wage and reducing student loan debt. But it went further by offering workers a direct cash payment. (The column continues at the website.)

The scheme will probably be DOA in Congress. At least it should be. With the current push by the establishment GOP for accommodation with liberals, who knows, really, if this is dead, or, like Frankenstein’s monster, will suddenly gain life again.

It’s time for a resurgence of those, currently out of favor by the establishment, to gather again under the name of, “Taxed Enough Already!”

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Friday Follies for November 14, 2014

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I haven’t used the ‘Follies’ headline for awhile. I do so when there are a number of items appearing on the ‘net but none worthy for a longer post nor discussion.

We won the mid-term ten days ago. We should be celebrating but we’re not. Why? Because we are watching the Washington GOP leadership selling us down the river0—again. The day after the election, McConnell tells a reporter he will not use Congress’ more potent weapon, the power of the purse. “We won’t shut down the government!” he declares meaning he will continue with the stream of CRs and upholding Harry Reid’s plan for funding everything we’re against—Obamacare, Dodd-Frank, open border, and governmental tyranny across the nation.

“Throw the bum out!”  Too late, McConnell has been re-elected as Majority leader. Boehner was re-elected Speaker of the House with only three dissenting votes.

McConnell chosen as next Senate majority leader, Boehner re-elected as House speaker

WASHINGTON –  Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell joined House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio on Thursday at the pinnacle of the congressional and Republican power structures in Washington — two establishment deal-cutters, each on occasion frustrated by the other’s inability to rein in their party’s most zealous ideologues.

The pair, formally selected Thursday to lead their party’s new majority control of Congress, will be charged with guiding Republicans on Capitol Hill for the final two years of President Obama’s presidency. Their success or failure could determine whether the GOP can take back the White House in 2016.

McConnell, 72, is taciturn and rarely cracks a smile. “Why don’t you get a life?” he joked to photographers trying to snap photos of him after he was unanimously chosen by his Senate GOP colleagues Thursday to serve as the new majority leader starting in January.

The article blathers on here, if you’ve the stomach to read it.

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For some good news, Sullivan has been declared the winner in the Alaska Senate race. Begich continues to wallow in his fantasy and has not, as far as I know, conceded the race. No class. A common fault of democrats.

Sullivan brings up the number of GOP Senators to 53. The last race still to be determined is Cassidy vs. Landrieu in Louisiana. Landrieu is pushing the Keystone Pipeline bill in an attempt to gain votes but it doesn’t appears to have helped.

‘Her campaign is running on fumes’: Final Senate race looks to be a Louisiana laugher as internal polls show GOP’s Bill Cassidy opening up 16-point lead over Sen. Mary Landrieu

  • Poll commissioned by GOP candidate’s campaign shows massive advantage leading up to Dec. 6 runoff 
  • Win by GOP Rep. Bill Cassidy would bring total Republican pickup to a whopping 10 seats
  • Landrieu is hoping a long-awaited vote on the Keystone XL pipeline will improve her fortunes
  • Poll was leaked in Washington to send a message to energy lobbyists who think she can prevail
  • Survey is an ‘automated’ phone poll that Landrieu’s campaign considers less credible than traditional surveys conducted by voice
  • ‘Her campaign is running on fumes,’ the pollster told MailOnline 

Democratic Senator Mary Landrieu is trailing her Republican challenger by a giant 16-point margin in a runoff for one of Louisiana’s two U.S. Senate seats, according to poll results obtained by MailOnline.

The survey, commissioned by GOP Rep. Bill Cassidy’s campaign, was leaked to media in order to fire a shot over the senator’s bow and send a signal to energy lobbyists that her ship is taking on water.

It suggests that Democrats’ worst fears have been realized even though Landrieu edged Cassidy by 1 percentage point on Election Day.

…

A second Republican candidate, Rob Maness, won 14 per cent of the vote on Nov. 4, enough to deny them both the 50-percent showing required to avoid a December 6 runoff. 

Now Maness has endorsed Cassidy, helping him erase his 1-point deficit with Landrieu and adding far more.

Cassidy is ‘trying to shut K Street down for Mary’ by selectively releasing the polling data, a source close to his campaign in Louisiana told MailOnline.

‘The energy folks, the lobbyists, keep trying to say she has a chance to win. That’s why it was leaked.’

Landrieu has lined up for what Republican Capitol Hill aides are calling the ‘Hail Mary XL,’ a legislative strategy to save her Senate seat by winning a vote to approve the Keystone XL pipeline, which would bring 700,000 barrels of oil daily from the Canadian province of Alberta to the Gulf coast.

From the information I’ve been able to gather, Landrieu is toast. Cassidy will bring the total number of GOP Senators to 54. It would be nice if McConnell would use that number as leverage dealing with Obama and the democrats but my expectation for that is…nil.

One question I have…why do we see these breaking news stories in the UK Daily Mail instead of a US news outlet? Our country is in sad shape when we have to use foreign sources for news here in the US.

***

I wrote yesterday about the push to expand Missouri’s medicaid using the three-year funding promised as part of Obamacare. What the advocates for that expansion don’t bother to tell you is that the state would be responsible for the added ocsts after that third year. Why is Jackson County and Truman Medical Centers in such dire straits? Increased cost of medical care compounded by the cost of complying with federal regulations.

Those increased cost are having another negative medical impact—rural hospitals.

Rural hospitals in critical condition

Rural hospitals serve many of society’s most vulnerable.

Jayne O’Donnell and Laura Ungar, USA TODAY

RICHLAND, Ga. — Stewart-Webster Hospital had only 25 beds when it still treated patients. The rural hospital served this small town of 1,400 residents and those in the surrounding farms and crossroads for more than six decades.

But since the hospital closed in the spring of last year, many of those in need have to travel up to 40 miles to other hospitals. That’s roughly the same distance it takes to get from Times Square to Greenwich, Conn., or from the White House to Baltimore, or from downtown San Francisco to San Jose.

Those trips would be unthinkable for city residents, but it’s becoming a common way of life for many rural residents in this state, and across the nation.

Since the beginning of 2010, 43 rural hospitals — with a total of more than 1,500 beds — have closed, according to data from the North Carolina Rural Health Research Program. The pace of closures has quickened: from 3 in 2010 to 13 in 2013, and 12 already this year. Georgia alone has lost five rural hospitals since 2012, and at least six more are teetering on the brink of collapse. Each of the state’s closed hospitals served about 10,000 people — a lot for remaining area hospitals to absorb.

The Affordable Care Act was designed to improve access to health care for all Americans and will give them another chance at getting health insurance during open enrollment starting this Saturday. But critics say the ACA is also accelerating the demise of rural outposts that cater to many of society’s most vulnerable. These hospitals treat some of the sickest and poorest patients — those least aware of how to stay healthy. Hospital officials contend that the law’s penalties for having to re-admit patients soon after they’re released are impossible to avoid and create a crushing burden.

“The stand-alone, community hospital is going the way of the dinosaur,” says Angela Mattie, chairwoman of the health care management and organizational leadership department at Connecticut’s Quinnipiac University, known for its public opinion surveys on issues including public health.

The closings threaten to decimate a network of rural hospitals the federal government first established beginning in the late 1940s to ensure that no one would be without health care. It was a theme that resonated during the push for the new health law. But rural hospital officials and others say that federal regulators — along with state governments — are now starving the hospitals they created with policies and reimbursement rates that make it nearly impossible for them to stay afloat.

Low Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements hurt these hospitals more than others because it’s how most of their patients are insured, if they are at all. Here in Stewart County, it’s a problem that expanding Medicaid to all of the poorest patients -– which the ACA intended but 23 states including Georgia have not done, according to the federal government — would help, but wouldn’t solve.

“They set the whole rural system up for failure,” says Jimmy Lewis, CEO of Hometown Health, an association representing rural hospitals in Georgia and Alabama, believed to be the next state facing mass closures. “Through entitlements and a mandate to provide service without regard to condition, they got us to (the highest reimbursements), and now they’re pulling the rug out from under us.”

For many rural hospitals, partnering with big health systems is the only hope for survival. Some have resorted to begging large hospitals for mergers or at least money to help them pay their bills. But Douglas Leonard, president of the Indiana Hospital Association, said these days, “I’m not sure they can get anyone to answer the phone when they call.”

The article continues at the website. Obamacare does not just increase the cost of an individual’s medical care, it also reduces the reimbursement of those services to hospitals and physicians. In the end, we all suffer. The institutions with tighter cash flows are hit first and worse.

Illegal!

Posted on by

A federal appeals court dealt Obamacare another blow—Obama’s subsidies are illegal.

Fed appeals court panel says most Obamacare subsidies illegal

– CNBC

This is a breaking news story. Please check back to the link above for updates.

In a potentially crippling blow to Obamacare, a top federal appeals court Tuesday said that billions of dollars worth of government subsidies that helped 4.7 million people buy insurance on HealthCare.gov are not legal under the Affordable Care Act.

In its decision, a three-judge panel said that such subsidies can be granted only to people who bought insurance in an Obamacare exchange run by an individual state or the District of Columbia — not on the federally run exchange HealthCare.gov. Plaintiffs in the case known as Halbig v. Burwell argued that the ACA, as written, only allows that often-significant financial aid to be issued to people who bought insurance on a marketplace set up by a state.

The decision is certain to be challenged by the Obama Administration, and does not immediately have the effect of law. But if it is ultimately upheld, it would cause insurance rates for those people who lost the subsidies to dramatically rise.

HealthCare.gov serves residents of the 36 states that did not create their own health insurance marketplace. About 86 percent of its 5.45 million customers received a subsidy to offset the cost of their coverage this year because they had low or moderate incomes.

In a report issued Thursday, the consultancy Avalere Health said that if those subsidies were removed this year from the 4.7 million people who received them in HealthCare.gov states, their premiums would have been an average of 76 percent higher in price than what they are paying now.

…

Before the decision, a leading Obamacare expert who was firmly opposed to the plantiffs’ arguments said a ruling in their favor could have major consequences for the health-care reform law.

“If the courts were to decide that the Halbig plaintiffs were right, it would be a huge threat to the ACA,” said that expert,Timothy Jost, a professor at the Washington and Lee University School of Law.

…

On Monday, one of the intellectual godfathers of the argument that is the basis of the Halbig case, as well as three other similar pending court challenges, said that tens of millions of people would be freed from Obamacare mandates in the affected states if the challenges prevailed.

Michael Cannon, director of health policy studies at the libertarian Cato Institute, said more than 250,000 firms in those states—which have about 57 million workers—would not be subject to the employer mandate being phased in starting next year. That rule, which hinges on the availability of subsidies on Obamacare exchanges, will compel employers with 50 or more full-time workers to offer affordable health insurance or pay a fine.

The crucial point to this court decision is in the last paragraph above—no subsidies, no employer mandate. If the employer mandate is declared illegal, then why would anyone want to stay in the program…Obamacare…if their rates go up an estimated 76%?

The decision is bad news for Obama, his sycophants and Obamacare.

***

Dave Helling, writing in the Kansas City “Red” Star laments on the lack of discussion about issues in the upcoming Primary two weeks from today. Helling’s lament was echoed in the PoliticMO newsletter this morning.

AUGUST BALLOT — “After dragging for months, the primary is now just two weeks away,’ Dave Helling previews in the KC Star: “That deadline does not seem to have quickened the pace of local campaigns, however. They seem slightly listless, as if the voters’ verdict is still months in the future. Missouri’s three-fourths cent sales tax for transportation improvements has probably drawn the most interest. It would be the largest tax hike in state history. But where’s the campaign? Normally, two weeks out, you would see tax supporters holding news conferences at crumbling bridges. Ads would suck up TV time. Letters to the editor would extol (or denounce) the proposal. Have you seen much of this? I haven’t, either. …

“Sluggish campaigns lead to low turnout. …  In most years, “no” voters are more motivated and a small turnout would endanger the tax. But it’s also possible the quiet campaign has helped tamp down anti-tax fervor in Missouri. In either case, it’s probably too late for consultants to reconfigure their campaigns. It’s going to be hard to awaken voters in the next two weeks after putting many of them to sleep over the last six months.” — KC Star.

Perhaps Mr. Helling should look at his own editorial board for that lack of interest. If stories aren’t reported, the great unwashed, i.e., those who only get their news from that liberal Kansas City rag, are unaware of those issues. It makes me wonder if the average denizen of Kansas City is even aware an election is scheduled two weeks from today. Don’t blame any apparent lack of interest of the lack of substance in the issues, Mr. Helling. Blame those like the KC Star editorial board for down-playing those issues hoping that a low turnout will allow the tax increase in Amendment 7 to pass. The KC Star hasn’t yet seen a tax increase it didn’t like.

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