Archives for October 2011

For weeks, Vice President Joe Biden has claimed that budget cuts have forced cities to reduce the size of their police force.  He says the Obama jobs bill would put more officers on the streets and rape and murder would increase if the plan is defeated.  But what do the real statistics show?  Is there a connection between crime rates and the number of police on the job?  And should the federal government be in the business of hiring local cops?  We ask Jim Kouri, vice president of the National Association of Chiefs of Police.

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Greg Corombos of Radio America and Jim Geraghty of National Review are glad that James Carville thinks the lousy economy could spell defeat for Obama.  They also groan as Mitt Romney tries to play it too safe in Ohio.  And they’re scratching their heads over the latest Herman Cain web ad.

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Texas Rep. Louie Gohmert is frustrated by what he sees as unconstitutional actions by President Obama and Congressional Democrats.  Why does he say the Senate jobs bill would have been nothing but show even if it passed?  What does he think of Obama acting unilaterally on mortgage and student loan policies?  If this is unconstitutional, what if anything is Congress ready to do to put some checks on the president?  We discuss it all with Rep. Gohmert.

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On Tuesday, Texas Gov. Rick Perry unveiled his 20-20 plan.  It’s a flat tax rate of 20 percent on income and he would lower corporate tax rates to 20 percent as well.  Many other taxes would be eliminated.  What should we make of the Perry plan?  Is a flat tax the right way to go?  What about Herman Cain’s Fair Tax approach?  Is a national sales tax a good idea?  And how should America respond to President Obama’s continued push for his economic plan – including higher tax rates for the wealthy?  We ask Brian Wesbury, former chief economist for the Joint Economic Committee in Congress.  He is now chief economist at First Trust Advisers in Illinois.

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Greg Corombos of Radio America and Jim Geraghty of National Review cheer Rick Perry for finally putting forth a serious policy plan on taxes.  They also find good and bad in the assessment of Occupy Wall Street by liberal columnist Richard Cohen.  And they wonder why Florida is making itself a winner-take-all primary in the GOP presidential race.

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The Arab Spring started in Tunisia and most recently led to the death of a dictator in Libya.  For the most part, our media have described these movements as driven by those yearning for freedom –  not unlike the fall of the Iron Curtain.  But now Libya’s new rulers are imposing radical Sharia law, Egypt is already killing religious minorities and the incoming leaders of Tunisia are the equivalent of the Muslim Brotherhood.  Should we be OK with this trend if it’s what the people want or has the United States just facilitated the radicalizing of an already unstable region?  Will these new regimes be supporting terrorism?  And what should we expect in Syria – where the existing government seems to be increasingly vulnerable?  We discuss it all with Brigitte Gabriel, founder of Act for America and author of “They Must Be Stopped: Why We Must Defeat Radical Islam and How We Can Do It”.

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President Obama continues his campaign for piece-by-piece passage of his jobs bill, but Republicans are still not buying his arguments.  Obama has repeatedly highlighted a bridge between Ohio and Kentucky as evidence of infrastructure upgrades that are needed and would be done through his plan.  Ohio Rep. Steve Chabot represents the district containing the north end of the bridge and says Obama’s plan is about politics and not about creating good, long-term jobs.  He also discusses how long those infrastructure jobs would take to be created?  Chabot also explains why he’s sponsoring legislation to roll back a new Obama administration regulation that Chabot says would cripple the cement industry.

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Greg Corombos of Radio America and Jim Geraghty of National Review cheer the landslide re-election of Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal.  They also slam President Obama for dodging the Constitution in advancing his jobs plan and rip the liberal media for trying to conjure up a scandal about Marco Rubio.

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On Friday, President Obama announced that all U.S. forces would be withdrawn from Iraq by the end of the year.  Even limited forces left to train Iraqi troops are on their way home.  So is this a good decision?  What will happen in Iraq without a considerable U.S. force there?  What presence should we maintain in the region?  Why could this lead to greater Iranian influence in Iraq and the region?  And does President Obama have a coherent Middle East policy?  We ask retired U.S. Army General Paul Vallely.

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New York Rep. Ann Marie Buerkle is pleased to see the Obama administration admit the CLASS program from the new health care laws is financially unsustainable.  She says CLASS was supposed to make Obamacare cost effective for taxpayers so a new evaluation of the entire law will likely show a much more bleak fiscal picture.  Buerkle says her constituents are still fired up about the health care debate because business owners are making plans to stop offering health coverage to their workers.  Rep. Buerkle is also a member of the House Oversight & Government Reform Committee and offers an update on the panel’s Fast and Furious investigation.

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