Good for Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., and former Kansas Sen. Bob Dole for speaking today in support of Gov. Kathleen Sebelius for secretary of Health and Human Services. As Dole told a Senate committee, “‘Bipartisanship’ is a good word. We ought to develop it, nurture it and let it grow.” Dole also spoke about the pressing need to reform health care, saying that “not acting is not an option anymore.” Sebelius agreed. “We face a health system that burdens families, businesses and government budgets with skyrocketing costs,” she said. “Action is not a choice. It’s a necessity. . . . Should I be confirmed, health reform will be my mission.”
Glenn Beck has had a surge of popularity since becoming a host on Fox News Channel. He is now a leading voice for conservative populist anger, the New York Times reported. Beck says he believes every word he says on his TV and radio shows, though he knows he is also an entertainer. “I’m a rodeo clown,” he said.
Conservative writer David Frum said Beck’s success “is a product of the collapse of conservatism as an organized political force, and the rise of conservatism as an alienated cultural sensibility.”
“It’s a show for people who feel they belong to an embattled minority that is disenfranchised and cut off,” he said.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates (in photo) sounded a grim note on “Fox News Sunday” in predicting that North Korea “probably will” test-fire a missile soon and that “we’re not prepared to do anything about it” — unless “it was headed for Hawaii or something like that.” Gates also seemed pessimistic about the idea of diplomacy countering the nuclear threats posed by North Korea and Iran. “The opportunity for success is probably more in economic sanctions in both places than it is in diplomacy,” Gates said.
A comment in Friday’s Opinion Line accurately noted that “George Bush spent 1,020 days, more than one-third of his presidency, on vacation” — though a president is never really “on vacation.” CBS News White House correspondent Mark Knoller, who famously tracks such things, broke down the numbers this way: 490 days at Bush’s Texas ranch, 487 days at Camp David and 43 days in Kennebunkport, Maine. Other interesting tallies of the Bush 43 era: He attended 338 political fundraisers and 12 baseball games, delivered 23 commencement speeches, played 24 rounds of golf (giving it up six months into the Iraq war out of respect to families of fallen troops), hosted six state dinners, cast 12 vetoes, visited 75 foreign countries and flew 1.4 million miles on Air Force One. One thing Bush never did as president? Visit Vermont.
President Obama is correct to place new conditions and expectations on the auto industry before providing more bailout funds. But his announcement today was contradictory and worrisome at times. Obama said that his administration has “no intention” of running General Motors, yet it forced out GM CEO Rick Wagoner and likely will replace most of the company’s board during the next few months. He complained about decades of complacency and problems with the auto industry, yet he expressed confidence in its ability to remake itself.
Will the regime change at the White House lead to more states approving the use of medicinal marijuana? Doing so seemed foolhardy as long as the Bush administration was raiding and prosecuting dispensaries in California and other states, which is why former Kansas Attorney General Robert Stephan’s advocacy of a medicinal marijuana law went nowhere in Topeka in 2007. But Attorney General Eric Holder has said the Justice Department plans to leave those operations alone as long as they comply with state laws. During his online town hall, President Obama drew the line at legalizing marijuana to fight the recession, though, saying he didn’t think that was good economic policy.
It would be premature (and naive) to anticipate that the two major political parties will reform the presidential primary process in a way that gives more states a meaningful say in choosing the nominees. But at least there are signs of a willingness to try. The new Democratic Change Commission, which includes Kansas Democratic Party chairman Larry Gates, will seek to revamp the calendar so that favored states such as Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada hold their events in February 2012, followed by other states starting in March. It also wants to reduce the number of superdelegates, whose convention votes became such a contentious issue last year. Meanwhile, a new GOP committee is reviewing the timing of Republican nominating events. As it is, “I think we’re headed for essentially a national primary that happens on one or two days, and that’s not good,” David Norcross, a Republican National Committee member from New Jersey, told the Hill newspaper.
“We just decided it was time to quit dodging.” — Rep. John Grange (in photo), R-El Dorado, on why both legislative chambers finally voted to raise the state’s lowest-in-the-land $2.65-an-hour minimum wage
“This is crazy and it’s mean.” — Rep. Marti Crow, D-Leavenworth, arguing against a House-passed bill to require welfare recipients to be subject to random drug tests
“You want Grandma and Grandpa to come down to a state office building and pee in a cup so that they can take care of their grandchildren?” — House Minority Leader Paul Davis, D-Lawrence, arguing against requiring random drug tests for participants in the grandparents-as-caregivers program
Seeking to convince the world that the United States finally is serious about slashing Earth-threatening carbon emissions, President Barack Obama is urging Congress to fast-track his plan for a carbon cap-and-trade system. Obama’s ambitious goal would require all Americans to abandon wanton consumption and adopt a green way of life that would reduce our nation’s carbon emissions 15 percent from 2005 levels by 2012 and 80 percent by 2050. Opponents of cap-and-trade legislation dubiously argue that such a system will destroy the U.S. economy — a mind-boggling assertion when you consider the huge number of jobs it will create. The new administration is duty-bound to bring the United States into line with the rest of the world in embracing Kyoto and preparing for Copenhagen. — Wayne Madsen, Online Journal
Key congressional committees are expected to begin debating legislation that would impose mandatory limits on greenhouse-gas emissions. The proposed legislation would create a European-style market-based system that caps the maximum allowable amounts of carbon dioxide from power plants, manufacturers and vehicles. If companies emit more than their cap allows, they must buy “carbon permits” on the market from companies that have extra ones. This “cap-and-trade” system is designed to give companies an incentive to reduce emissions, but unknowing consumers would be “taxed” through higher home energy bills and the rising costs of fuel, food and consumer products. It’s time we developed a fair system by first recognizing that greenhouse gas controls must be implemented globally: No one nation can do much on its own to reduce climate change. — Mark J. Perry, finance professor at the University of Michigan at Flint
Another bailout-related outrage: The political action committees of five large beneficiaries of Troubled Asset Relief Program funds gave $85,300 in campaign contributions to members of Congress in January and February, including some lawmakers who serve on panels that oversee the program. Bank of America’s $24,500 of largesse included $1,500 for House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md. House Minority Whip Eric Cantor, R-Va., received $2,500 from Citigroup and $10,000 from UBS (one of AIG’s counterparty recipients). The four congressional campaign committees are taking such contributions, too. If TARP recipients’ PACs insist on continuing their campaign contributions, all members of Congress should do as Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., and Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., have and decline to accept them.
“Many economists and analysts are worrying that the United States might go the way of Japan, which suffered a ‘lost decade’ after its own real estate market fell apart in the early 1990s. But I’m more concerned that the United States is coming to resemble Argentina, Russia and other so-called emerging markets, both in what led us to the crisis, and in how we’re trying to fix it,” wrote Desmond Lachman of the American Enterprise Institute. He argued that the parallels between U.S. policymaking and what we see in emerging markets are clearest in how we’ve mishandled the banking crisis. “We delude ourselves that our banks face liquidity problems, rather than deeper solvency problems, and we try to fix it all on the cheap just like any run-of-the-mill emerging market economy would try to do,” he said.
Vice President Joe Biden did the comedy honors at the Gridiron Club dinner last weekend. Among the highlights:
– “I know these evenings run long, so I’m going to be brief. Talk about the audacity of hope. President Obama does send his greetings, though. He can’t be here tonight, because he’s busy getting ready for Easter. He thinks it’s about him.”
– “You know, I never realized just how much power Dick Cheney had until my first day on the job. I walked into my office, and you know how the outgoing president always leaves the incoming president a note in his desk? I opened my drawer and Dick Cheney had left me Barack Obama’s birth certificate.”
– “I understand these are dark days for the newspaper business, but I hate it when people say that newspapers are obsolete. That’s totally untrue. I know from firsthand experience. I recently got a puppy, and you can’t housebreak a puppy on the Internet.”
It wasn’t a surprise that a jury today found Wichita abortion doctor George Tiller not guilty of 19 misdemeanor charges. Based on news reporting on the trial, the prosecutors presented a weak case that Tiller violated a state law requiring an independent second opinion for the late-term abortions.
Nearly all the experts say that Pakistan/Afghanistan is the biggest foreign policy threat facing the United States. Today President Obama outlined his new strategy for this problem area. It includes sending 4,000 more troops to train Afghan security forces and increasing aid to Pakistan. He said that al-Qaida “is actively planning attacks on the U.S. homeland from its safe haven in Pakistan” and that “the situation is increasingly perilous.”
Wichitans are of two minds about how President Obama is doing, according to a new SurveyUSA poll for KWCH, Channel 12. In the Tuesday poll, 49 percent said the administration is heading in the right direction, while 41 percent said it’s on the wrong track. Only 26 percent said they expect the local economy to improve by the end of 2009, while 28 percent predict it will get worse and 43 percent anticipate no change. In a statewide poll co-sponsored by KWCH, Obama had a 55 percent approval rate, up a point from last month and down seven points from when he took office.
The GOP-controlled Legislature is on the verge of increasing the state minimum wage. Miracles never cease. The House and Senate have passed bills that would increase the state’s current $2.65-per-hour minimum wage to the federal minimum, which will soon be $7.25. For years, GOP lawmakers have blocked efforts to raise the state wage, which is the lowest in the nation. They and business lobbyists have considered the minimum wage to be a socialist threat to the free market, even though the law change would affect fewer than 20,000 Kansans, according to estimates. GOP lawmakers are now wisely deciding that this ideological fight isn’t worth the political black eyes.
Tracking a cell phone signal takes seconds on TV crime dramas. But in real life, after the 2007 kidnapping of 18-year-old Kelsey Smith of Overland Park, her parents “worked for four days to have her phone location traced,” said state Sen. Pat Apple, R-Louisburg. “The wireless company did not respond. Passage of the Kelsey Smith Act would ensure no other family would have to go through the pain of waiting that Kelsey’s family did.” Versions of the bill have cleared both chambers and must be reconciled. Such legislation should be a useful tool for law enforcement in situations when every second counts.
Obama “picked 14 of the Sweet 16 right. That’s pretty good. That’s better than he did with his Cabinet positions.” — Jay Leno
“President Obama also announced another faith-based program: his budget.” — Leno
“Very strange incident at JFK Airport in New York City today. An AIG executive going through security had to empty out all his pockets. You know what fell out? Senator Chris Dodd.” — Leno
“The only way Obama could get more TV time is if he had eight babies.” — Craig Ferguson
“Michelle Obama is planting a vegetable garden on the White House lawn. You know the economy’s bad when the Obamas are afraid of running out of food.” — Jimmy Fallon
“The debate on the budget is phony, the howling on deficits a charade,” wrote columnist E.J. Dionne. “Few politicians want to acknowledge that if you really are concerned about long-term deficits, you have to support tax increases.”
Meanwhile, “Frontline” had an interesting but depressing program this week on the national debt. It spread the blame, reporting on the estimates of how much Barack Obama’s budget will add to the debt but also noting how the Bush administration cut taxes while it was waging two wars and approving a huge entitlement expansion (Medicare prescription drugs). Experts on the program agreed that curbing Medicare and Medicaid spending is the biggest challenge.
Someone decided it would be entertaining to write a blog as Barack Obama’s teleprompter, offering “reflections from the hard drive of the machine that enables the voice of the leader of the free world.” Recent postings include one in which the teleprompter said that “when people can’t see past the gloss and the smooth lines, and thin brackets and sleek screens, not bothering to see the real me, the real guts, it hurts. I have a brain, people.”
