Freedom Line Blog

Yesterday, 60 members of the House Republican majority endorsed a bill that would “deregulate” health insurance purchases by allowing consumers to buy plans across state lines.  The idea is to let companies compete on a national scale, spreading the risk and lowering premiums.  The bill is gaining support as a free market counterargument against ObamaCare’s one-size-fits-all regulation of health insurance.

There is a caveat.  In order to liberalize the insurance market, the GOP-sponsored bill must take away the states’ power to regulate insurance.  The reason insurance plans cost different amounts in different states is because individual states have different regulatory schemes.  Those schemes are the product of public policy decisions hammered out at the state level.  Importantly for 10^th Amendment limited government types, the plan to “deregulate” the health insurance market comes at the expense of state sovereignty.

Ironically, the only way the House Republicans’ answer to ObamaCare gets passed is through an expansive reading of Congress’ ability to regulate interstate commerce “among the states.”  Members of Congress will (or at least should) have to struggle with which conservative principle they value more in this instance: the free market or federalism.  In a certain sense, federalism grants to states a public policy monopoly over all issues not expressly contained in the text of the U.S. Constitution.  That monopoly drives up prices for consumers in states with costly regulations.  Theoretically, if people want to pay less for health insurance, they could move to a state with less costly regulations.

Ideas like federalism have consequences.  As the Tea Party-flavored House GOP boards the ship of state, it will be interesting to see which crate of principles the revolutionaries toss over.

H/T: Los Angeles Times

At The Daily Beast, Leslie Gelb discusses the other January 1961 presidential speech that should get more attention from Americans today.  It was delivered by outgoing President Dwight Eisenhower.

Here are the Gelbian nuggets:

(1)   Put the national interest ahead of politics

(2)   There are no quick fixes to crises

(3)   Balance is the best strategy

(4)   Beware of spending beyond our means

(5)   Guard against the power of special interests

The fifth point is best remembered as the warning against the military-industrial complex.  The fourth point seems especially pertinent today with a $14 trillion debt that will surely “mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren (while) risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage.”

The entirety of Ike’s farewell address can be found here.

How fitting that on the 50^th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address news of Senator Joe Lieberman’s (D-CT) retirement hits the commentariat.   In today’s Senate, Lieberman is the last lion of an old-school approach to being liberal: hawkish on foreign policy, civil rights, and fiscal policy.  The statist mindset has so overtaken the modern Democratic Party that it’s hard to imagine “Give ‘em Hell” Harry Truman and Henry “Scoop” Jackson choosing to serve alongside the likes of Barack Obama and Barbara Boxer in what was once called “the most deliberative body in the world.”

Part of the corruption story of a once sane party is the outsize influence of public employee unions.  When public employees were allowed to unionize, Democratic politicians found it irresistible to negotiate sweetheart union contracts in exchange for campaign cash and poll workers.  After all, the wealth being wasted was just other people’s money.

With the economy sagging, the American people know who to blame.  Veteran Democratic pollster Doug Schoen says in today’s Wall Street Journal that if his party doesn’t start scaling back overpromised union benefits, independent voters will continue to vote Republican.  For current and future leaders of the Democratic Party looking for direction, it would be a good exercise to meditate on JFK’s famous admonition to “Ask not what your country can do for you.  Ask what you can do for your country.”

Following up on a previous diagnosis of all that ails California, CFIF Senior Fellow Troy Senik is out today with a prescription for the Golden State to get back on the road to recovery.

Senik’s piece in City Journal doesn’t hold out much hope for newly elected Governor Jerry Brown, but the author does shed light on one proposal that might garner enough votes for a simplified tax code:

California would therefore do well to take the advice of economist Arthur Laffer, not just because of his status as one of the authors of Reaganomics but because he is an example of the state’s woes, having packed up his California-based fund-management business in 2006 and relocated to Tennessee. By Laffer’s estimates, if California abandoned its current, highly progressive income-tax system in favor of a statewide flat tax of no more than 6 percent on personal income and net business sales, it could completely abolish all property taxes, state gas taxes, and state payroll taxes, as well as all current state and local sales taxes, without losing revenue. And that’s without factoring in the increased economic activity that such a dramatic change to the tax code would almost certainly generate. This change would once again require the support of a two-thirds majority in the legislature, but its appeal just might be broad enough to attract such a coalition.

Read the entire article here.

For this year’s celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, I’d like to suggest printing and reading King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail.  The work is part of the American literary and cultural canons, deserving rightful mention alongside other great statements of American principles like King’s “I Have a Dream Speech.”

King’s public witness reminds Americans that ours is a nation of aspiration.  May his words inspire us to keep fighting for individual freedom…together.

H/T: University of Pennsylvania African Studies Center & MLKOnline

Senators Jim DeMint (R-SC), Mike Lee (R-UT), and Rand Paul (R-KY) have all joined the new Senate Tea Party caucus.  No word yet on movement favorite Marco Rubio (R-FL), or other stalwart fiscal conservatives like Tom Coburn (R-OK).

Politico notes that caucuses are more important in the House because of that chamber’s preference for majority rule.  In the Senate, one member can hold up or kill legislation if he’s willing to filibuster (or usually just threaten it).  Even so, it would be nice to see DeMint attract enough members to the Tea Party caucus so that the Senate has at least one institutional block against runaway spending.

Here’s more proof the Obama Administration is bent on destroying the sovereignty of states.  The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is threatening to sue South Dakota, Utah, South Carolina, and, of course, Arizona, unless their attorneys general say new state laws protecting secret ballots for union elections are unconstitutional.

The NLRB construes its enabling legislation to allow employees to unionize if a majority signs cards stating that desire.  That process is called “card check” and allows union organizers to bypass secret ballots that protect the identities of those who don’t want the union.  All four states passed laws last November 2^nd to guarantee workers in their borders of the right to a secret ballot.  Now, the NLRB says those laws conflict with current federal law, even though card check has not passed into legislation because it’s overwhelmingly opposed in Congress.

In effect, the pro-union forces running the NRLB are trying to do through administrative fiat what they can’t get passed through the legislative process.  Unless each state’s attorney general agrees with the NRLB in writing that the new law is unconstitutional, the NRLB will sue the states in federal court.  This is the same strategy the Obama Justice Department is using to challenge Arizona’s anti-illegal immigration law Senate Bill 1070.

But tortured legal arguments can’t trump common sense:

Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff said he believes the state is on solid ground. He plans to coordinate a response with the other three states.

“If they want to bring a lawsuit, then bring it,” Shurtleff said. “We believe that a secret ballot is as fundamental a right as any American has had since the beginning of this country. We want to protect the constitutional rights of our citizens.”

What’s next in Obamaland?  Test oaths?

H/T: Associated Press

Today, members of the Republican National Committee (RNC) chose Wisconsin GOP leader Reince Priebus to replace Michael Steele as chairman.  After a two-year tenure filled with allegations of mismanagement Steele needed to go.  With Priebus in charge, it would be an improvement if this is the last most people hear about the RNC chairman until the 2012 general election.

Love him or hate him, there is no denying that Newt Gingrich is the conservative movement’s best policy entrepreneur / political consultant / motivational speaker.  At today’s House Republican retreat, the former speaker laid down the gauntlet for restoring America’s greatness.

His speech before the new House majority framed the multiple crises facing the country in positive terms; calling for every full and sub-committee to designate 1/3 of their hearings to the theme of “Hope and Opportunity.”  The idea is to focus on solutions to America’s problems, such as inviting job creators to speak before committees on what they need government to do – or not do – to get America working again.

Most interesting to this writer is Gingrich’s call to redirect the 99 weeks of unemployment payments into a human capital program.  It would require recipients to enroll and complete job training programs, effectively turning welfare into workfare.  Moreover, the explosion of online education makes finding the right program easy to find and flexible to complete.  In today’s tech-heavy, certification-obsessed economy, tying the $133 billion spent on unemployment payments to job training is a great way to get out-of-work Americans on and off the welfare rolls as quickly as possible.

As a former radio spot writer for Gingrich Communications, I’ll admit I’m partial to Newt’s way of thinking.  The former speaker’s speech to the House GOP shows why.  With conservatives unlikely to move any major legislation due to Democratic control of the White House and Senate, Gingrich is proposing – I believe – the next best thing: changing the discussion from “the party of no” to “the party that restores American Exceptionalism.”

Let’s get to it.

Governor Mitch Daniels (R-IN) delivered his State of the State Address on Tuesday night to a joint session of the state legislature.  Among several terrific proposals to make government leaner and more efficient, Daniels suggested the following fiscal policy:

And, to hasten the return of an even stronger fiscal position, I again ask you to vote for lasting spending discipline by enacting an automatic taxpayer refund. When the day comes again when state reserves exceed 10 percent of annual needs, it will be time to stop collecting taxes and leave them with the people they belong to. Remember what the Hoosier philosopher said: “It’s tainted money. ‘Taint yours, and ‘taint mine.” Beyond some point, it is far better to leave dollars in the pockets of those who earned them than to let them burn a hole, as they always do, in the pockets of government.

Republicans in Washington, D.C. and around the country should be listening to the Hoosier State governor who just might be the right man for the presidency in 2012.  Check out the entirety of Daniels’ speech here.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates is finding a much more favorable response from Japan than China about how to get tougher with North Korea.  On the Tokyo leg of Gates’ weeklong Asian tour, the Pentagon chief “discussed the potential export to allies of missile defense capabilities both countries are developing,” according to reporting by Reuters.

CFIF recently profiled missile defense expert Brian Kennedy about the rationale for implementing a broad-based system of missile defense to deter not just a North Korean nuclear strike, but also one from China.  You can read the entire article here.

Believe it.  In an op-ed for BusinessWeek, the scourge of concentrated wealth and power sees a lot to love in the new, Tea Party-infused legislators walking around Capitol Hill.  Specifically, Nader isolates five issues that could bring the movement’s limited government mantra into conflict with establishment Republicans.

(1)   Ron Paul’s fight to curb the power of the Federal Reserve

(2)   Heightened criticism for corporate welfare programs (e.g. everything from ethanol subsidies for biofuel to “green” initiatives designed to get federal tax dollars)

(3)   Trimming the military budget (Apparently, Defense Secretary Robert Gates already got the memo; sort of)

(4)   Renewal and expansion of the World Trade Organization, NAFTA, etc.

(5)   Whistleblower protection for bureaucrats and corporate workers

The limited government foundations of the Tea Party movement will make predicting voting outcomes this session iffier than when Republicans could be assumed to oppose any Democrat plan.  If necessary, we’ll see how many of the new Constitutionalists in Congress are ready to buck convention and vote their principles instead of their party.

Rasmussen Reports is out today with some interesting survey results.  In the wake of severe budget deficits Americans’ support for public employee unions is sinking to new lows.  According to Rasmussen’s telephone survey, 45% of respondents oppose allowing public employees to unionize, while an equal number favor the practice.  Just last May, 53% of Americans favored unions for public employees.

The 8% drop in approval rating combined with the rise in outright hostility undoubtedly concerns the mandarins over at the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), the nation’s largest public employee and health care workers union.  This kind of growing opposition will surely earn more hysterical charges from AFSCME President Gerald W. McEntee’s like this one that 60 Minutes engaged in media bias when it granted air time to reform Governor Chris Christie (R-NJ).

It’s time to get serious.

Judging by this announcement list of top staffers, Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) thinks highly of people who worked on former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney’s (R-MA) failed 2008 presidential campaign.  Of eight top staff positions, Rubio gave three to former Romney for President people.

With Romney lining up support for a 2012 presidential run via PAC donations and outsourcing staff to rising Republicans, don’t be surprised if Rubio endorses Romney for the White House.  If it comes early enough, it just might be the thing that cinches a Romney-Rubio ticket.

Teagan Goddard of Political Wire repeated a rumor going around about former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R-NY) getting some of his political hands together for another run at the White House.  Presumably, those are the same people that talked their boss into a suicidal primary strategy: skip Iowa, abandon New Hampshire, and bypass South Carolina for an all-or-nothing shot in Florida.

Of course, by the time the Florida primary rolled around, the GOP nomination was a two-horse race between John McCain (R-AZ) and Mitt Romney (R-MA).  (Governor Charlie Crist’s late support of McCain sealed the deal for the Maverick’s Sunshine State win.)  In the process, Giuliani spent a ton of money effectively not contesting the nomination until it was too late.

And now he wants to do it all again.  I’m sure his “brain trust” won’t mind dusting off the 2008 playbook while cashing 2012 checks.

According to a blogger at the Huffington Post California just inaugurated a “Right-Wing Republican” as governor.  He’s referring to Jerry Brown, aka ‘Governor Moonbeam’ and the man proposing sharp cuts, tax increases, and budget raids to balance the state’s deficit-ridden balance sheet.   In HuffPo world, that combination merits being tarred and feathered as the second coming of another rock-ribbed fiscal conservative, outgoing governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Please.  If Brown’s budget proposal looks suspiciously similar to Schwarzenegger’s it’s because there are precious few options for governors of any party to try.  Sure, nobody thinks they’ll actually solve the problems, but that’s because actually solving California’s budget woes will take some serious undoing of cherished political prizes.

Republicans want to hang onto the 2/3 requirement for passing a budget and maintaining Prop. 13’s cap on property taxes, while Democrats act as though rich (i.e. working) people will pay any price to live within a 100 miles of a beach and subsidize a green welfare state.  Neither party is serious about making investments in the state’s infrastructure (e.g. road, power, and water grids), a precondition for economic and social improvement.

The only way California heals its self-inflicted budget wounds is if it repeals all of the constitutional amendments mandating budget appropriations.   To do that, Republicans will likely have to agree to end Prop. 13’s property cap, a move that would likely increase property taxes.  Though unpalatable to many, removing the cap would return discretion to counties and cities (historically better than Sacramento at balancing budgets) while giving voters an outlet for their displeasure with the next Election Day.

None of this will be easy or popular.  Then again, neither is California politics.

When it comes to how a bill becomes a law, the route popularized in most textbooks and School House Rocks is of little value.  Instead of clear procedural steps the process is rife with secret votes, waived rules, and last minute amendments that completely change a bill hours before final passage.  The failure of the Pelosi-Reid Congress to abide by any semblance of a consistent process made lawmaking into nothing more than the personal whims of liberal elites.

No longer.  The incoming majority of House Republicans is poised to pass House Resolution 5, a fundamental overhaul of the way the House does business.  Today, the Heritage Foundation’s Foundry Blog teases out the five most important changes.

(1)   Members introducing new legislation must provide a statement of what powers the Constitution grants to Congress to enact the bill.

(2)   Any bill that increases mandatory spending must adhere to a “Cut-As-You-Go” rule requiring the legislation to cut an identical amount of spending elsewhere.

(3)   All bills must be posted online in their entirety three days before the House votes on them.

(4)   The text of any amendment must be publicly available for at least 24 hours before the House votes on it.

(5)   Vote avoidance maneuvers like “Deem-And-Pass” are eliminated.  If members want to raise the debt ceiling – or socialize medicine – they must do so on the record.

Rep. David Dreier (R-CA) is fond of saying, “process is substance,” by which he means that how a bill becomes a law is just as important as what is in the bill.  Passing House Resolution 5 will go a long way towards restoring the public’s confidence in Congress’s ability to play by a set of fair, easily understood rules.  If House Republicans go further and insist on restoring the lost constitutional limits on federal power, they will enjoy a long ride in leadership.

Well, that didn’t take long.  Speaker-elect John Boehner (R-OH) and incoming Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) announced today that the new Republican leadership will make good on its campaign promise to repeal ObamaCare.  Next Monday the bill hits the Rules Committee, followed by a Friday floor session deciding the rule for debate.  With 242 members, the House GOP is virtually assured of a favorable pro-repeal vote.

But since Democrats still hold the Senate hostage, no actual repeal is happening anytime soon.  Right now, though, that isn’t the point.  As Politico reports:

The repeal effort is not expected to succeed, given that Democrats maintain control of the Senate and the president can veto the legislation. But Republicans could embarrass the White House if they persuade a number of Democrats to vote with them, and over the long term, plan to try to chip away at pieces of the law.

That yeoman work will begin quickly under new House Government Reform and Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA).  His sights are set on investigating just about every consequential action by the Obama Administration.  Ladies and gentlemen, set your DVRs!

With much of the 2012 presidential election coverage centering on Republican candidates, it’s worth noting – as this blog from the National Interest does – that President Barack Obama posted lopsided support among African-American and Hispanic voters during the 2008 campaign (95% and 67%, respectively).  Those numbers will likely grow as Hispanics continue to increase their share of the voting base.

So, what’s a WASP-ish GOP frontrunner like Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, or even Sarah Palin to do?  Any contestant eyeing a general election takedown of Obama-Biden (or even, heaven forbid, Obama-Clinton) should make travel plans for Santa Fe, New Mexico.  There newly inaugurated Governor Susana Martinez can teach them how to frame a winning position on illegal immigration: “It’s not about the Mexican population.  It’s about the Mexican border.”

That message, combined with Martinez’s career as a state prosecutor and traditional values stances, earned her 30% of the Hispanic vote in a heavily Democratic state.  It’s the kind of success story that just might earn her a place as the next Vice President of the United States.

In a not-quite-as-bad-as-reported op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, State Treasurer Bill Lockyer (D-CA), downplays the Golden State’s fiscal outlier status among the several states.  Setting aside some of his premises, it’s worth zeroing-in on a paragraph that should be the starting point for debates on spending at any level of government.

Fiscally, we have to get smarter, think longer and stop hoping for a miracle. Californians have to assume more responsibility for deciding what they want government to do and how much they’re willing to pay for public services. We have to design a saner system for financing public schools.

Like a majority of voters everywhere, Californians are attracted to pricey programs, but are allergic to their costs.  Ergo, budget deficits.  With House Republicans facing a divided Senate and a liberal President, making a commonsense case for balancing spending with revenues will be the single most important task during the next Congress.  Let’s hope fiscal conservatives at all levels of government are united on this front.