If Harry Reid has his way, the lame duck session will continue until Christmas. He is trying to get all the left wing legislation that Democrats were afraid to pass before the election, passed now that they have lost the election. There is some question about the ethics of this but ethics do not rank high on Senator Reid’s priorities. Looking at the behavior of his family in Nevada is a hint of that state of mind. Nancy Pelosi does not require explanation.
The Tax bill- The “Bush Tax Cuts” were the rallying cry of leftists since 2002 and 2003. Even Senator McCain, to his discredit, campaigned against “tax cuts for the rich” in 2000 when he was running against Bush. Many forget just what the economy was like in 2000. The Clinton Boom, as even Republicans refer to it, was a combination of holding the line on taxes after his initial tax increase in 1993, and the internet bubble. Even Hillary took her final bonus from the Rose Law Firm on December 31 to avoid her husband’s tax increase that was to be retroactive to January 1. That tax increase and the health care project Bill Clinton entrusted his wife with, were the reasons for the Republican takeover of Congress in 1994. The result was pretty dramatic.
That is a pretty interesting chart. First, it shows that the Clinton bull market only began after the 1994 election. I had invested in gold stocks when Clinton was elected and they did quite well. Everybody anticipated a typical Democrat inflation. Unfortunately, I did not anticipate what George Bush and Alan Greenspan would do to the dollar to try to keep the Clinton crash in 2000 from continuing. Even Greenspan was heard talking about reflating the economy after 2000 with a housing bubble. Anyway, the Clinton boom was due to the Republican Congress. After 2000, they lost their way.
The chart also shows a comparison to the 1929 crash which was also a low interest rate consequence. Benjamin Strong, the president of the New York Fed, was trying to balance gold flows between the US, England and Europe, especially Germany and France. The US had a huge hoard of gold after World War I. To try to keep the gold from all flowing into the US, he kept interest rates low. He might have seen the danger in time but he died of tuberculosis in 1928.
Had the tax rates increased on January 1, there was considerable risk of a “double dip” recession. Now, I think that risk is lessened. Obama seems to be recognizing that his course was untenable. Not so the other Democrats in Congress, especially the House.
Harry Reid was shocked when he failed to get his monstrous budget resolution passed in the Senate. To grease the skids, he had included earmarks requested by Republican Senators earlier in the year. I have read that Daniel Inouye, Chair of the Appropriations Committee of the Senate, included those earmarks without any request from the Senators involved. The Senators wavered but responded to the entreaties of Mitch McConnell for unity. Now, the new Congress will be able to shape the new budget and start the reform.
The DREAM Act has been sold to the public as applying to college students and volunteers for the military but it is far wider than that. Actually, it applies to anyone under 35 and all they have to do is swear they have applied to college or to the military. There is no actual obligation to serve or to enroll and attend college classes. Wisely, it was blocked although it will keep coming back. Ultimately, a limited amnesty might be achieved once the border is really secured with a fence. There is no point in considering such legislation until we have border security. We also need better treatment of applicants of legal immigration.
The DADT bill was passed repealing the federal policy. There was a persistent misunderstanding that this was military policy. It was not and efforts were made to confuse the issue by those opposed to the military. Some of the elite colleges that had expelled ROTC in the 60s are making noises that they will allow ROTC programs once again now that the policy has been repealed. We will see. The gay issue was only the latest excuse for the anti-military views of left wing faculty and I expect to see more obstacles appear.
The economy would respond to real evidence that spending will be cut and taxes will remain stable at present levels. The anti-business tone of this administration will remain and we will see if Obama can restrain the temptation to intervene by executive order, like the EPA attempt to regulate carbon. I hope that will be slapped don by the new Congress.
I hope the START treaty is stopped as it is unnecessary and may be harmful to efforts at ballistic missile defense, which the left opposes on general principles. Hopefully that will end the lame duck session.
He is trying to get all the left wing legislation that Democrats were afraid to pass before the election, passed now that they have lost the election. There is some question about the ethics of this but ethics do not rank high on Senator Reid’s priorities.
It seems lately that a lot of our government’s business is done by non-traditional means: executive orders, czars, continuing resolutions, emergency spending, judicial fiat. This tells me that playing it straight up has become hide bound. Older countries, such as India and China, are famous for their bureaucratic log jams. America used to be good at practicality and “creative destruction”. I guess we are maturing.
Once Obama is gone, we might see some of this reversed. The “non-traditional” means of governing all seem concentrated on left wing ends.