Radio America Online News Bureau

Republicans

Bolton Replaces McMaster, GOP’s Ugly Omnibus, Millennials Love Doing Taxes

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Teddy Kupfer of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America cheer President Trump’s selection of John Bolton as National Security Adviser and look forward to his tough stance on North Korean nukes and the Iran nuclear deal while liberals fear that Bolton will start bombing everyone.  They also unload on the bloated $1.3 trillion omnibus that the majority of Republican representatives and senators approved, much to the delight of Democrats and the fury of fiscal conservatives.  Teddy and Greg understand the desire of Republicans to rebuild the military but find the reckless spending in other areas unacceptable.  They scratch their heads trying to figure out why more than half of millennials actually enjoy doing their taxes.  And they offer a champagne toast to the late Democratic Georgia Gov. and Sen. Zell Miller and reflect upon his memorable keynote address at the Republican convention in 2004.

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Austin Bomber Dead, Fiscal Conservatism is Dead, Congratulate-Gate

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America briefly grouse about D.C.area drivers in inclement weather before sipping their martinis.  Then, they welcome the end of the Austin mail bombing horrors as the suspect apparently blows himself up as police close in on him.  They also fume as the GOP-led Congress pursues yet another omnibus spending bill with virtually no fiscal restraint in sight, leading Jim to declare that “fiscal conservatism is dead.”  And they sigh as President Trump defies his staff to congratulate Vladimir Putin on “winning” his election and because a disgruntled Trump staffer then leaked classified information to the media.

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Public Sours on Anti-Gun Businesses, GOP Dodges Scandal, No Tax = No Obamacare?

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America discuss new polling showing public perception dropping for businesses that are publicly breaking ties with the NRA, due entirely to a massive plunge in favorability among Republicans.  They also breathe a sigh of relief as Republicans in Arizona’s eighth congressional district reject the frontrunner in the primary after the married minister was caught exchanging inappropriate texts with a female staffer.  And they wish the best of luck to 20 state attorneys general who argue that all of Obamacare should be declared unconstitutional now that the tax provision that saved it at the Supreme Court in 2012 has been scrapped in the new tax law.

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Virginia Republicans Help Pass Medicaid Expansion

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After four years of resisting Medicaid expansion in Virginia, 20 Republican lawmakers in the House of Delegates relented and helped to push a limited, bipartisan expansion across the finish line, a vote one conservative member believes the GOP will live to regret.

“I think this is going to prove to have been a very, very bad decision,” said Republican Del. Nick Freitas, who is also a candidate for U.S. Senate this year.

Former Democratic Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe pressed for full Medicaid expansion for four years.  He failed each year, given the GOP’s roughly 2-1 majority in the House of Delegates.  However, in November, Democrats picked up 15 seats, leaving the Republicans with a slim 51-49 majority.

Earlier this week, Virginia House Speaker William Howell announced a bipartisan agreement to expand Medicaid in Virginia, but with certain conditions, including work requirements and the ability to reverse the expansion if the federal government fails to deliver the funding it has promised.

On Thursday, the plan cleared the House of Delegates, 69-31, with all Democrats and 20 Republicans voting for it.  There is still an uncertain future, however, since the Virginia Senate did not include Medicaid expansion in it’s budget, meaning the issue will be resolved in a House-Senate conference.

Freitas says Howell and other Republicans have reasons for what they did but he says it was still a big mistake.

“It’s frustrating.  I certainly understand where the speaker and other members are coming from with respect to being concerned that a full expansion is in the works.  So their attitude is that we’ve got to do something first in order to make sure that we get certain provisions in there that Republicans have asked for in other states,” said Freitas.

“We just voted on it on the House floor today and unfortunately it did pass with 31 Republicans voting against it.  So it was actually a minority of Republicans in the House of Delegates that voted for the Medicaid expansion within the budget,” said Freitas.

Freitas says this is a terrible idea both fiscally and in terms of health policy.

“This is bad not only from a fiscal standpoint, which we tend to focus on a great deal but I think it’s bad also when you look at the underlying problems with respect to Medicaid.

“This is a program that is failing people not only from a fiscal standpoint, but it’s actually failing people with respect to the quality of health care that it’s supposed to be able to provide.  I don’t think any of us should be shocked by that.  That’s what happens when a government tries to micromanage a program,” said Freitas.

But were Republicans wise to head off a much worse program that could have passed instead of this one or should the GOP have avoided this path altogether?

“You can make a reasoned argument that something worse could come.  The question is how complicit do you want to be in the end product.  I don’t think there’s a good way to expand Medicaid, period,” said Freitas.

He also says the provision to reverse the expansion in certain circumstances may sound reassuring but believes that would never happen.

“If we don’t have the will to prevent a bad program from expanding, I don’t see how we’re suddenly going to have the will to kick off hundreds of thousands of people that we’ve made dependent upon that program once it’s gone into play,” said Freitas.

The argument that the bipartisan bill had to be pursued to avoid a more liberal version begs the question, since Republicans still control both parts of the legislature.  Were some Republicans prepared to vote for full expansion without the GOP conditions?

“I think that’s a fair assessment.  I do believe that there were some Republicans that were willing to vote for a full expansion,” he said.

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Good Family Leave Plan, GOP’s Reconciliation Surrender, GOP Mad Paul Tells Truth

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Alexandra DeSanctis of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America cheer the family leave plan pushed by Sen. Marco Rubio and Ivanka Trump to allow parents to tap their future Social Security checks to cover the weeks surrounding the birth of a new baby in exchange for waiting extra weeks when they reach retirement.  In addition, Alexandra rebuts the liberal insistence that family leave must be a whole new entitlement.  They also slam Republicans for effectively surrendering the option to use budget reconciliation for the next two years as part of the horrific budget deal with Democrats.  And they fire back at Republican lawmakers who spent Thursday trashing Sen. Rand Paul’s filibuster as a waste of time, when those GOP members are really just mad that Sen. Paul called them out for their blatant hypocrisy on deficit spending and not wanting to take a vote on restoring budget caps.

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Space X Success, Big Spending Republicans, Pelosi on Race & Immigration

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David French of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America pause to cheer the Falcon Heavy rocket launch by Space X this week and David hopes it sparks more aspirational innovation that our nation so sorely needs.  They also grimace as Republican majorities are preparing to jack up spending significantly over the next couple of years, even though some positive elements are included in the budget bill.  And they sigh as Nancy Pelosi uses part of her marathon floor speech on immigration policy to say her young grandson blew out his birthday candles and wished he could look like his friend from Guatemala.

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Why is the U.S. Still Spending at Obama Levels?

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As Congress approaches yet another government funding deadline, the U.S. government is still spending taxpayer dollars at Obama-era levels since lawmakers continue to kick the fiscal can down the road in perpetuity, and one leading economist says that inaction is triggering the return of trillion-dollar deficits that future generations will have to pay.

Vance Ginn is senior economist at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, where he also directs the foundation’s Center for American Prosperity.  Ginn also shared his insights on recent stock market volatility and what it means for the nation’s overall economic health.

On Feb. 8, the short-term continuing resolution approved last month will expire, triggering another partial government shutdown unless another funding bill is approved.  Right now, Democrats and President Trump are drawing competing lines in the sand over immigration policy.

As a result, no one is advocating actual changes in spending for the various department and obligations of the government.  In essence, the U.S. is still operating at Obama-era spending levels more than a year into the Trump administration.

Congress and Trump have repeatedly avoided dealing with the issue by passing and signing continuing resolutions in April, September, December, and January.  And there is no indication the next bill will be any different.

“What it seems like they’re doing is trying the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.  That’s the definition of insanity and that’s what we continue to have in D.C,” said Ginn.

“Congress hasn’t taken the opportunity here – and the multiple congresses before this – to restrain the growth of spending over time,” said Ginn, and he says political considerations are behind the failure to rein in spending.

And while Democrats are doing their best to gum up Republican efforts to trim the federal budget, Ginn says the bottom line is Republicans know cutting spending comes with political consequences, so they’re reluctant to do it.

“When you’re looking at the next election cycle, you want to get re-elected.  So it makes it very difficult to make those tough choices to cut spending for interest groups that are there often with their hands out,” said Ginn.

Recently, Treasury Department officials announced deficits for Fiscal Year 2018 could approach $1 trillion.  Most reaction has been quick to blame the recently approved tax cuts.  Ginn says that is one factor but not the primary factor.

“The driver of deficits and debt is spending.  We don’t have a revenue problem.  We have a spending problem.  We’ve got to get the spending under control as quickly as possible.  This would be a great opportunity to do that,” said Ginn.

And he says deficits will continue to bury us until the big ticket items are dealt with.

“The president has put out some good ideas like rolling back some of the funds going to the EPA and some other areas, but we really have to have congressional action.  This isn’t just going to take cuts to spending.  At some point, it’s going to have to be reforms to entitlement programs to really bend the cost curve so we don’t have massive deficits and debt year after year after year,” said Ginn.

Ginn says every year that lawmakers dither on spending adds another pile to the bill facing our children and grandchildren.

“That means future generations are going to have to pay more in taxes.  Currently the national debt is around $21 trillion.  (This years projected deficit) would push it up to $22 trillion or $23 trillion.  If you add in unfunded liabilities for Social Security and Medicare, we’re over $100 trillion in debt,” said Ginn.

Ginn says some states are modeling fiscal responsibility and that Congress could take a lesson from his state of Texas.

“When you look at the Texas model of low taxes, relatively less government spending and sensible regulation, what we’ve been able to do in Texas is pass conservative budgets that don’t increase by more than population growth plus inflation.  Actually it’s been less than that.

“It would be great to see the day where Congress can do that.  And that would help it to live within taxpayers’ means over time,” said Ginn.

Meanwhile, the past several days on Wall Street have investors reaching for the antacid.  Before Tuesday’s gains, the markets saw the biggest losing streak in about two years.  Ginn says the negative numbers approached the range of a typical correction, but figuring out why takes some work.

“Eighty percent of businesses have come in above expectations for earnings in the fourth quarter, so you would expect greater increases in the stock market as well.  But there’s also anticipation of faster economic growth and higher inflation, and some of those things are starting to contribute to an increase in interest rates, which slows economic growth and reduces the money supply in circulation,” said Ginn.

But with the Federal Reserve edging interest rates up recently, why is inflation becoming a problem?  Ginn sees two reasons.

“Part of that is from the economic growth potential from the tax cuts that were passed and people are already starting to see an increase in their pay.  As they see an increase in pay, they like to spend more and that increases demand.  Without the increase in supply – which I think we will see from increased production from businesses – that would increase inflation,” said Ginn.

But there’s another, very different reason inflation concerns are mounting.

“The Federal Reserve has increased the money supply quite dramatically over the last decade, from quantitative easing  and everything else.  So you’re seeing inflationary pressures from that monetary factor as well,” said Ginn.

The bottom line though, says Ginn, is that Americans should have confidence in the economy going forward.

“The fundamentals are strong.  The last three quarters of last year averaged three percent growth.  That’s the long-term growth rate of our economy over the last 100 years,” said Ginn, noting the number is significantly better than during the Obama years.

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GOP Governors Look Strong, Big Deficits Coming Back, Memo Mania

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America see decent prospects for Republicans governors in the 2018 midterms, as they are glad to see the ten most popular governors in the U.S. are all Republicans and that many of the GOP’s least popular governors are not running for re-election.  They also groan as Treasury Department officials project nearly trillion dollar deficits returning this fiscal year.  And they get dizzy trying to follow all the accusations and counter-attacks related to the House Intelligence Committee FISA memo, concluding that the more information that gets released the better – from all sides – so long as sources and methods are not compromised.

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Brat Discusses End of Shutdown, DACA Fight, FISA Memo

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Senate Democrats abandoned their hopes of attaching an immigration bill to legislation to fund the federal government , but Rep. Dave Brat, R-Va., warns a fierce fight over immigration policy is still coming that conservatives must win.

Brat also expounded upon why he and dozens of other House Republicans want to make public a FISA memo on FBI and Justice Department conduct in recent years.

However, the big story on Capitol Hill Monday was Senate Democrats agreeing to a GOP plan to fund the federal government through February 8 in exchange for a promise to start a debate on legislation to grant legal status and possibly a path to citizenship for people brought to the United States illegally when they were children.

Until Monday, Democrats has insisted upon immigration being tied to the funding, but Brat says reality smacked the minority party in the face since the government partially shuttered operations at midnight Saturday morning.

“I think they heard plenty of feedback coming back that said, ‘What are you guys doing?'” said Brat, noting the position of Democrats was tantamount to withholding pay for our military and funding for the Children’s Health Insurance Program all for the sake of helping people in the U.S. illegally.

Brat says the untenable position of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, and other Democrats even overwhelmed efforts in the media to paint Republicans as responsible for the shutdown since they control the White House and both chamber in Congress.

“It’s amazing that you have to have a debate on who shut the government down.  You’ve got 95 percent in the House and the Senate on the Democrat side voting to shut it down.  If you forego rationality and language in the public square, that’s a hint where your society is,” lamented Brat.

In addition to wanting legislation to provide legal status for 800,000 people enrolled in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA, Brat says Democrats wanted the provision with no conditions.

“They got out way over their skis.  They’re saying they want a DACA debate.  We’re going to have a DACA debate.  What they really mean is they want a clean, Democrat DACA bill and no border security,” said Brat.

It’s not just Democrats pushing for a generous DACA bill.  The so-called Gang of Six includes Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., and Cory Gardner, R-Colo.

The legislation they crafted with Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill., not only grants permanent legal status to the roughly 800,000 DACA enrollees but to all people here illegally who are eligible for DACA but never signed up for it.  All of them would also be allowed to pursue a “pathway to citizenship.”

In addition, the parents of all of those people would also get legal status despite being responsible for the law-breaking to enter the U.S. in the first place.  All told, some 10 million people could gain legal status as a result of the Gang of Six bill.

The offsets in the legislation amount to very little.  The Gang of Six bill would tweak but not fundamentally change current chain migration and visa lottery policies and only allocate money to maintain existing border fencing.

Brat says that approach is reckless, and he is particularly frustrated about the lack of action on chain migration, which allows citizens to sponsor immediate and extended family members to come to the U.S. legally.

“You have all of the leading conspirators on the other side – Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi and Dick Durbin – all coming out against chain migration as early as five years ago.  They’ve totally switched sides,” said Brat.

Brat says the progression of legalizing DACA recipients and their extended families results in an economic nightmare.

“If you allow the DACA piece to go through that will have a lot of unintended consequences like chain migration and extended families.  That will lead to millions more, while we’re trying to get 20 million American citizens that have left the workforce back in the workforce,” said Brat.

“We’ve got to get all of our own citizens back in the labor force and then you see if you have a labor shortage.  The other key piece is we’re trying to move towards a rational skills and merit-based immigration system instead of the familial piece that has gotten us in this boat in the first place,” said Brat.

Brat also says following the Gang of Six prescription will result in another huge bill to pay for a nation already more than $20 trillion in debt.

“Who’s gonna pay the bill?  That’s where you get the issue: health care, if you’ve got two kids in public schools that’s $26,000 a year.  Every person in the country with a certain status is eligible for $40,000 of federal benefits a year.  That’s one of the reasons we’ve got a welfare crisis right now,” said Brat.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell agreed to begin a DACA debate before government funding runs out again on Feb. 8.  Given the easy passage of the Gang of Eight bill in the Senate in 2013, passage of the Gang of Six bill seems likely.

That would put immense pressure on the House and President Trump to go along, but Brat says 2013-2014 proves stopping a bad bill is not impossible.

Brat should know.  His upset primary win over the sitting House majority leader in June 2014 was a major factor in derailing the Gang of Eight plan.

“It did blow up in the House.  I think there was an election that had something to do with it in Virginia’s seventh district.  I’ve heard rumors,” cracked Brat.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., is sponsoring a far different immigration reform plan.  He would grant legal status to DACA recipents with no pathway to citizenship.  He would also limit chain migration to spouses and children and ditch the visa lottery altogether.  His bill would authorize border wall construction but fails to appropriate money for it.

Brat says commitment to Goodlatte’s approach and a President Trump veto as a backstop gives amnesty opponents plenty of firepower.

“We need to start off strong with the Goodlatte bill.  Then you could have a debate between the Goodlatte bill and the Senate.  Then the president is the ultimate veto threat, so a lot of it is going to depend on where President Trump comes down on this,” said Brat.

Brat is also one of several dozen House Republicans who have seen the FISA memo from the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence that GOP members describe as alarming “alarming” to “stunning” to sure to land people in prison.  While specifics are still under wraps, the four-page memo focuses on alleged FISA abuses by the FBI and Justice Department during the 2016 campaign.

The top Democrat on the intelligence panel, Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., says the memo should not be released because the American people will not be able to understand it without the supporting documentation.

Brat says the memo should be made public because the people have the right to make up their own minds about what’s in it and what the fallout should be.

“We’re a democratic republic.  The people are our boss.  We’re not the boss. Maybe he got his eighth grade civics upside down but I still believe in the good old school stuff where the people are my boss and I’m going to let them see the information, let them make up their mind, and then I’m going to represent them.  That’s my job,” said Brat.

Despite the strong adjectives used by other Republicans, Brat says he is not worried about the memo being over-hyped.

“There’s something just very, very wrong at the highest levels of our Justice Department,” said Brat.  “I’m not too worried about the over-hype on this.  You cannot over-hype any corruption at all in the highest levels of government.”

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DNC Still Adrift, Shutdown Theater Returns, CNN Says Socialism is Cool

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America enjoy learning that the Democratic National Committee is still mired in chaos and that the liberal establishment and the Bernie Sanders supporters are still feuding more than a year after the 2016 campaign and just months before the midterm elections.  They also groan as the threat of a government shutdown looms and some Republicans think they can win the public relations battle, even though the media always pin the blame on Republicans, regardless of the circumstances.  And they shred CNN for co-opting the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. to advance progressive environmental policies and for suggesting King was a socialist “before it was cool.”

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