The Kansas Chamber of Commerce’s political action committee and Americans for Prosperity spent tens of thousands of dollars on campaign mailers last year claiming that moderate GOP state lawmakers supported the Affordable Care Act. But since most of those moderates were defeated, has the new Legislature worked to “stop Obamacare”? No. “I’m not surprised,” former Senate President Steve Morris of Hugoton told the Topeka Capital-Journal. “The whole thing was bogus to start with.” So why did groups treat the federal law like a major state legislative issue? “Candidates polled voters, and if Obamacare elicited the greatest emotional response from the voters, then that was the issue the candidate ran with,” said Clayton Barker, executive director of the Kansas Republican Party. “Emotional voters turn out and vote – and in an election, votes are what matters.” How do those voters feel now?
Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., blasted the announcement this week by the U.S. Secret Service and the National Park Service that because of staffing reductions resulting from sequestration, public tours of the White House will be canceled beginning Saturday. “This is perception politics run amok,” Roberts said in a statement. “The White House spends tens of thousands of dollars each year on Christmas decorations and elaborate events, but when asked to trim its budget they opt to close the White House gate to the American people.”
Columnist Kathleen Parker contends that the White House’s recent spat with Washington Post associate editor Bob Woodward is “part of a pattern of behavior by the Obama administration that suggests not just thin skin but a disregard for the role of the press.” She added: “This is no tempest in a teapot, but rather is the leak in the dike. Drip by drip, the Obama administration has demonstrated its intolerance for dissent and its contempt for any who stray from the White House script.”
In an article headlined “Agriculture has slipped from D.C.’s radar screen,” Politico noted that only nine days after the Chrysler ad on the Super Bowl had Americans feeling warm and fuzzy about farming, President Obama “skipped over farmers entirely in his State of the Union address, never mentioning the yearlong farm bill stalemate in Congress nor even including ‘agriculture’ among the thousands of words spoken that night.” Rep. Collin Peterson, D-Minn., said, “The president and his people I don’t think even get it.” The office of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack responded: “The president has repeatedly called on Congress to pass the long-term farm bill rural America deserves, and the administration continues to urge action this year.”
It was no surprise that the White House meeting today with congressional leaders didn’t result in any agreement regarding the sequester. President Obama is still pushing for a “balanced approach” involving both spending cuts and revenue increases. But House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, is having none of it. “The discussion about revenue, in my view, is over,” Boehner said.
Columnist Cal Thomas (in photo) urged GOP lawmakers not to back down on the sequester cuts, which are scheduled to start going into effect Friday. “Whatever the short-term political price, Republicans must stand for the Constitution, the country and the future,” he wrote. “Allowing the president to have his way again risks harming all three.”
Kansas Sens. Pat Roberts and Jerry Moran were among the 27 lawmakers who were part of a losing attempt Tuesday to filibuster the confirmation of Chuck Hagel (in photo) as defense secretary. The Senate went on to confirm Hagel (with Roberts and Moran voting “no” again). Roberts had said that he didn’t want to filibuster. “It is a choice that could lead to a lot more problems,” he told Politico. The senators also went against the advice of former Kansas Sen. Bob Dole, who endorsed Hagel last week and said his “wisdom and courage make him uniquely qualified to be secretary of defense and lead the men and women of our armed forces.”
Though much of the public is still tuned out of the sequester debate, 49 percent said they would blame Republicans in Congress if the automatic spending cuts happen, while 31 percent would blame President Obama, according to a new survey from the Pew Research Center and USA Today. Also, 49 percent said they would rather see the cuts delayed, while 40 percent said they would prefer having the cuts go into effect rather than delaying them again. Just 19 percent want a deal that includes no tax increases, as the GOP wants, while 76 percent want the deal to include both tax hikes and spending cuts, as Obama wants.
It was frustrating to hear how White House press secretary Jay Carney views the aviation job losses that could come with President Obama’s proposed elimination of a tax break for corporate and private jet owners: “I would say that making choices about budgets and deficit reduction always involves difficult choices,” Carney told reporters include KAKE News anchor Susan Peters last week, also characterizing the break as among “narrow special interest loopholes.” The president didn’t help his message much in Wichita when he earlier told Peters himself: “The reason people buy corporate jets is because it’s extremely convenient and they can afford it. And they don’t need an extra tax break, especially at a time when we’re trying to reduce the deficit. Something’s got to give.” That “something” should not be more of the aviation-manufacturing workforce in Wichita. The 27-year-old tax break allows general-aviation aircraft to be depreciated over five years rather than seven. Getting rid of it would generate $300 million a year – not enough to make a different in the deficit but enough to deter jet shopping.
Little evidence exists to suggest that modest increases in the minimum wage lead to job losses, so the battle ahead in Congress is really one between free-market orthodoxy and basic human decency. We would invest our money in decency. In his State of the Union address, President Obama called upon Congress to boost the federal minimum wage to $9 an hour by 2015, up from the current $7.25. The wage would rise in steps and after hitting the maximum in two years would thereafter be indexed to inflation. Adjusted for inflation, the minimum wage in the late 1960s was about $10 per hour, and it was even higher in the 1980s. President Obama’s call to raise it to $9 is far from excessive. The state of Washington is already higher. Conservatives may argue that the market should set wages, but they argued the feds should let GM fail, too. Working people need a raise. Congress should give them one. – Battle Creek (Mich.) Enquirer
At a time when the U.S. economic recovery has slowed to a standstill, President Obama’s State of the Union speech seemed to come from an alternate universe as he prescribed more tax hikes and costly federal regulations. His call for a 24 percent increase in the minimum wage to $9 an hour would be especially damaging. Hiking the minimum wage discriminates against entry-level workers. The higher it goes, the minimum wage not only raises business costs and reduces the number of available jobs, but also biases the labor force toward workers who already have work experience – or just eliminates jobs altogether. You only need to go back to the last minimum -age hike to see its negative effects. In 2007, Congress passed an ill-timed minimum-wage bump – a two-year, 40 percent, phased-in increase from $5.15 to $7.25 an hour by 2009. The result was a plunge in working youths. To protect entry-level jobs and priceless working experience, Congress should hold off on any new wage increases. – Detroit News
The threat of automatic budget cuts on March 1 has caused the Department of Homeland Security to hold back $40 million for a power plant and $50 million for construction at the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility in Manhattan, the Topeka Capital-Journal reported. “I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see them wait and see what happens,” said Rep. Lynn Jenkins, R-Topeka. “If the sequester kicks in, they’re going to have to reprioritize.” Kansas may also have to increase its investment in the research facility beyond the $140 million that’s been pledged, but the congressional delegation remains optimistic that the facility will be completed. “Maybe Kansas has to put a little more money in that the original plan didn’t call for,” said Rep. Mike Pompeo, R-Wichita. “It makes sense for America, not just Kansas. Ultimately, that will drive us to get NBAF constructed.”
Nearly two years after Kansas Sens. Pat Roberts and Jerry Moran derailed President Obama’s nomination of former Kansas Attorney General Steve Six to the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver, the court now has three of the 18 vacancies on federal appeals courts nationwide, noted Carl Tobias, University of Richmond Law School, on the Hill’s Congress Blog. Robert Bacharach, who was first nominated in June 2010, was recently renominated and is awaiting a full Senate vote; Kansas and Utah seats await nominees. “Because openings in 10 percent of circuit judgeships and in one-quarter of 10th Circuit positions can undermine justice, President Obama must rapidly nominate, and the Senate speedily consider, exceptional nominees for the appellate vacancies,” Tobias wrote.
Of the major issues that President Obama mentioned in his State of the Union address, comprehension immigration reform might stand the best chance of occurring. Obama outlined reform concepts that have broad support among the public and growing bipartisan support in Congress, including increased border security and a pathway to citizenship. Sulma Arias, executive director of Sunflower Community Action in Wichita, applauded Obama for “creating a sense of urgency around fixing the broken immigration system.” But Arias said that sending immigrants “to the end of the line is not a solution, because it assumes that ‘the line’ is an equitable and a fair process.” She added: “Hundreds of thousands of people have been waiting for 12 years or more to become citizens. The broken immigration system promotes breaking the law because there is no way to play by the rules.”
Americans who have become weary of Washington’s endless battles over spending and taxes – and the stagnating economy that stalemate has produced – got a chance to hear about a different path on Tuesday night. President Obama’s message in the State of the Union address was clear: It doesn’t have to be this way. The country doesn’t have to get bogged down by demands for endless austerity and government contraction. It doesn’t have to defer investments in education and public works. The poor don’t have to remain on society’s lower rungs, and the middle class can aspire to do better. Obama said his proposals to bring about growth with government action would not have to raise the deficit. What is required to move the country forward is political will, which has been missing for too long. While many of the president’s proposals were familiar, and will probably be snuffed out by politics, his speech explained to a wide audience what could be achieved if there were even a minimal consensus in Washington. – New York Times
The big question of President Obama’s second term is whether he wants to forge bipartisan compromises in the next two years, or whether he wants to spend these years campaigning against Republicans to regain Democratic control of the House in 2014 and then finish his presidency with another liberal crescendo. Judging by his inaugural address and Tuesday night’s State of the Union, we’re guessing he’s going for Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Obama’s second inaugural was a clarion call to “collective action,” as he put it, and Tuesday’s speech showed what he thinks that should mean in practice. “The American people don’t expect government to solve every problem,” he said, while proceeding to offer a new government program to solve every problem. It was what a Democratic president might expect to pass in a liberal Democratic Congress. It was not an olive branch for bipartisan deal-making with the House GOP. In its ambition and partisan framing, the agenda sounded like the opening bell in the 2014 congressional campaign. – Wall Street Journal
Last year 36,383 Kansans with Medicare who reached the Part D “doughnut hole” saved more than $24 million on prescription drugs as a result of discounts provided in the Affordable Care Act, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. In addition, 284,396 Kansans with traditional Medicare used one or more free preventive services in 2012, including 27,437 who each received an annual wellness checkup.
Members of the Kansas congressional delegation were particularly critical and dismissive of President Obama’s State of the Union address. Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., said that Obama “delivered the same message of higher taxes and spending, more regulation of our lives and businesses, and refused to address the need for solvent Social Security and Medicare programs. It is no wonder our economy is shrinking and businesses not hiring.” Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., complained that “rather than at least a path toward fiscal responsibility, we got another campaign speech.” Rep. Mike Pompeo, R-Wichita, said that Obama “just doesn’t get it. The government doesn’t drive the creation of successful manufacturing. All the government has to do is get out of the way and American businesses will take care of the rest.”
Columnist Cal Thomas argues that President Obama’s latest compromise on the contraception mandate still doesn’t go far enough. He objects that private businesses (such as Hobby Lobby) are not exempt, and thinks that Catholic institutions might still get stuck with paying for the free coverage that will be provided by the insurance companies. But columnist Margaret Carlson faults the Catholic bishops for not accepting the compromise and moving on. “Even though the new regulation shows that the president has taken the bishops’ objections into account, they refuse once again to declare victory and move on to aiding the poor and comforting the sick,” she wrote. “They will not be satisfied, apparently, if even one employee of a Catholic-aligned institution is getting birth control through insurance.”
Rep. Mike Pompeo, R-Wichita, has been appointed to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. “I have long held great faith in our intelligence services, and I am excited at the prospect of working with them to ensure Americans’ national security,” Pompeo said in a statement. One of the issues that Pompeo needs to review is the Obama administration’s policy on using drones to kill suspected terrorists, including American citizens living abroad. An Eagle editorial notes that there are many questions about which suspects meet the criteria and when the policy can apply.
Last year, on Sept. 11, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton got that “3 a.m. phone call.” Her failure to answer leaves a permanent black mark on her record. Clinton’s blindness to the magnitude of the department’s failure regarding the attack on the U.S. Embassy in Benghazi was on display in her recent testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Her testimony revealed a leader unapologetic for her failure to act or understand the threat. Worse, she showed no real interest in learning from the incident. Taking “responsibility” for the attack means nothing without follow-up. It appears that the only thing she hopes to learn from the experience is that if you play nice with the press and with Congress, you can suffer no consequences for abject failure. That said, the bumbling of Benghazi and the indifference toward learning from the disaster cannot be erased from reality. The ghosts of Benghazi will always follow Clinton. – James Jay Carafano, Heritage Foundation
It’s possible that Hillary Clinton may decide not to run for president in 2016, but there is very little reason to believe such a decision would be a result of her handling of the Benghazi attacks. According to a recent Wall Street Journal poll, Clinton leaves her post as secretary of state with an eye-popping 69 percent approval rating. If Clinton’s approval numbers were this high during a month in which she endured a hostile congressional grilling over Benghazi, there is no reason to expect that the incident is going to plague her in any meaningful way. Clinton’s response to Benghazi is another factor working in her favor. She has not dodged the issue, and she has demonstrated a willingness to accept responsibility for mistakes that were made and to work to fix the problems that have been identified. – Jim Cottrill, Santa Clara University
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced this week that all military combat jobs will be open to women, who in fact already have served in ground combat in Iraq and Afghanistan. Restrictions have gradually been eased over time, but full equality in all service branches now has the unanimous support of the Joint Chiefs, and that is overdue. Being denied some combat assignments and other front-line duties limits the rank to which servicewomen can aspire, which in turn limits the talent pool the military can draw from. Removing gender discrimination simply means equal opportunity. If individuals can’t qualify for certain kinds of duty because of physical limitations or other factors, they won’t get the job, whether men or women. But some and perhaps many women will qualify for combat roles now off-limits, and America’s military will be stronger for it. – San Jose Mercury News
Women have been in combat since the United States began combat operations in Afghanistan in 2001. They have fought and served with distinction. However, placing women in infantry and other front-line units is a different issue, and it has nothing to do with their courage or capabilities. The people making this decision are doing so as part of another social experiment. Infantry or Special Forces units have the mission of closing with and destroying the enemy, sometimes in close hand-to-hand combat. They are often in sustained operations for extended periods, during which they have no base of operations nor facilities. Their living conditions are primal in many situations with no privacy for personal hygiene or normal functions. This decision to integrate the genders in these units places additional and unnecessary burdens on leaders at all levels. – Jerry Boykin, Family Research Council
“It became obvious this week that the Republican Party top to bottom has to start taking Barack Obama seriously,” Peggy Noonan wrote in the Wall Street Journal. “All the famous criticisms of him are true: He has no talent for or interest in sustained, good-faith negotiations, he has no real sense of alarm about the great issue of the day, America’s debt. He’s a chill presence in a warm-blooded profession. But he means business. He means to change America in fundamental ways and along the lines of justice as he sees it The proper response to such a man is not – was not – that he’s a Muslim, he’s a Kenyan, he’s working out his feelings about colonialism. Those charges were meant to marginalize him, but they didn’t hurt him They damaged Republicans, who came to see him as easy to defeat…. It will take guts and unity to fight him. Can the GOP, just in Washington, for now, develop those things?”
President Obama called for immigration reform in his inaugural address Monday, saying the nation needs “a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity.” The public agrees. More than 6 in 10 Americans favor allowing illegal immigrants to eventually become U.S. citizens, according to a new Associated Press-GfK poll. Among Republicans, 53 percent favor a pathway to citizenship. That’s up 22 percent from 2010.
It seems unlikely that President Obama’s proposed ban on assault weapons will clear Congress. But there is broad support among the public for his call for expanded background checks on gun purchases, according to a CBS/New York Times poll. Overall, 92 percent of Americans support universal background checks. That includes 89 percent of Republicans and 85 percent of those living in households with a National Rifle Association member.
President Obama stuck mostly to broad themes in his inauguration address today, calling on Americans to work together as one nation and one people to fulfill the promises of the Declaration of Independence. But he also listed several policy goals, including climate change, gay rights and immigration reform. Our editorial Sunday said that the president should make repairing the nation’s economy and the government’s finances his highest priority.
