Freedom Line Blog

Less than one year into the Obama Administration, unequivocal public opinion polls are saying a lot about his leadership ability, and may be providing an early clue into what might come to be his legacy.

Namely, unlike leaders such as Ronald Reagan or Franklin Roosevelt, he is turning the public away from his worldview, rather than persuading it to join him.

By now we’re well-familiar with Obama’s steady decline in public opinion polls.  In fact, he stands lower than any President at this point in his tenure.  But the latest Rasmussen poll shows something broader, which is good news for those of us who advocate individual freedom, but bad news for Obama.

By an enormous 66% to 22% margin, Americans state that they prefer less government and lower taxes to stronger government with higher taxes.  Amazingly, the tone-deaf White House and the Pelosi/Reid Congress continue to advance bigger government (ObamaCare, carbon cap-and-tax, new regulations over the struggling economy,etc.) and higher taxes (increase of the death tax, higher income taxes, healthcare penalties, etc.) despite these unequivocal results.

By a 62% to 21% margin, respondents also say that lowering taxes is a better way to create jobs than more federal “stimulus” is.  This is remarkable, considering the degree to which Obama, Pelosi, Reid and liberal pundits scapegoat lower taxes and less regulation as the alleged cause of our economic difficulties.  They’re obviously not making the case, and are losing the battle of ideas.

Furthermore, 62% believe that it would be better for the rest of the world and our allies to follow America’s lead, an all-time high.  In contrast, a tiny 8% report that America should increasingly follow our allies’ lead.  This again contrasts with Obama’s apologetic international demeanor and submission to new global constraints upon the U.S., especially on the heels of his Nobel Prize and Copenhagen boondoggle.

But more broadly, these striking results show that Obama is failing miserably at the task of persuading and leading Americans toward his point of view and policy agenda.  He presumably has several years to reverse this reality, but we may already be witnessing the early elements of the eventual Obama legacy.

This week’s edition of the Liberty Update, CFIF’s weekly e-newsletter, is out.  For those readers who don’t receive it in their e-mail inboxes or if you haven’t had a chance to read it yet, below is a summary of its contents:

CFIF Staff:  ‘Twas the Week Before Christmas
Batkins:  Congress to Raise Debt Ceiling. Why You Should Care
Release:  CFIF Calls on EPA to Reconsider Costly and Arbitrary Global Warming Regulation
Lee:  Chavez the Clown Completes Copenhagen Climate Circus
Senik:  Two Faces of Obama in Oslo
Ellis:  Working for The Man – Federal Employment Spike Exacerbates Dependency on the State

Freedom Minute Video:  Congress’ Gift to America – A Soaring National Debt
Podcast:  Bigger Government = Lower Approval Ratings – Interview the Heritage Foundation’s Dr. Matthew Spalding
Jester’s Courtroom:  The Devil Didn’t Make Him Do It

Editorial Cartoons:  Latest Cartoons of Michael Ramirez
Quiz:  Question of the Week
Notable Quotes:  Quotes of the Week

If you are not already signed up to receive CFIF’s Liberty Update, sign up here.

Every year around this time, we witness extraordinary acts of goodwill and generosity.  But this year, the “gift” Congress is giving to the American people is more debt.  In this week’s Freedom Minute, CFIF’s Renee Giachino discusses Congress’ decision to raise the debt ceiling and what that means for hard-working American families. 

Watch the video below:

WSJ Editorial – White House v. White House
Politics Daily – Reid’s Path to 60 Votes in Doubt
NY Times – Intelligence Improperly Collected on U.S. Citizens
The Hill – Sen. Nelson a “No” on Health Bill

Politico – Health Bill Deadlines Pile Up
Washington Times – No Mandate for Government Health Care
CBS News – Dem v. Dem on Health Care
National Review Online – Cap and Trade and Tax and Spend

Federal Debt: $12.134 trillion

Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) is one of the few good guys on Capitol Hill.  He and Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) have taken the lead to stop government-run health care in the Senate.  In fact, they’re using every procedural tool under the sun to defeat the Senate’s disasterous version of “reform.”

According to The Hill newspaper, DeMint is even prepared to go so far as to slow debate and force Christmas Eve votes.  As DeMint noted, “I think it’s our responsibility to stretch this out because every day we do we have time to tell Americans what’s in it.”

For those of you looking for something interesting to watch over the holidays, the Senate will likely be in session on Christmas Eve.

This is the final push against government-run health care.  If you haven’t done so already, call your Senators at 202-224-3121 and tell them to oppose the Senate health care bill.

It’s hard to imagine rational people living in San Francisco.  As detailed in the newest edition of San Francisco Weekly, voters by the bay have repeatedly approved billion dollar bond measures even though in many cases the old bonds would have been sufficient but for the incompetence and malfeasance of city hall.  In another instance, the city tried to save money by mixing elderly patients with younger mentally disturbed ones.  After one elderly patient was attacked four times the staff’s response was to put up a sign saying, “Don’t Hit.”  Apparently, it was not effective.  By the second of a six page article, the author seems exasperated by the parade of horribles.

These are dramatic examples of how the city wasted time and money and made people’s lives miserable — with no apparent repercussions for those responsible. But these are far from isolated incidents (see the “Annals of Incompetence” sidebar on page 12). And in each case, it comes back to the same basic problem of accountability: Plenty of public figures make promises, but no one is responsible for keeping them.

But there is a mechanism for holding them accountable.  However repugnant these occurrences are, though, the population most at fault isn’t the one occupying the seats of power.  It’s the people who continue to elect and empower them.  As long as a polity can vote out its leaders the system of representative democracy works.  In a certain sense, it’s hard to blame the wardens of an insane asylum for mismanagement when their superiors keep cutting checks.  In the carnival of incoherence that is San Francisco, the first step towards rational government is as close as the next election cycle.

HT: Townhall.com

A hat tip to James Delingpole of The Daily Telegraph (UK) is in order for his continuing coverage of the metastasizing Climategate controversy. The Russians are now weighing in with charges that global warming alarmists used only 25% of data reported by Russian scientists; intentionally leaving out information showing no signs of warming. Much of this doctored research was in turn folded into the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) report, the definitive statement supporting the calls for international regulation of energy consumption. (For a counter-argument using all the available climate data, see this report published by the Heartland Institute.) With the Copenhagen climate conference degenerating into anarchy and finger-pointing soon there may be another appellation added to “discredited” and “fraudulent”: convicted.

As Lord Christopher Monkton explains in this interview, he and another climate skeptic are requesting prosecution of the researchers responsible for destroying information sought through Britain’s version of the Freedom of Information Act. Others are calling for investigations into whether there is a case for criminal fraud against scientists using government grants to produce misleading reports. Many of the people who’ve profited from this scurrilous research are present or arriving in Copenhagen. When looking back on the group photos a few years from now, one wonders how many of them will be behind bars, owing millions in damages, or drummed out of office. Most likely, not enough.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) forecasts that current climate change legislation in the Senate will increase spending by $833 billion.

According to the budget office, not only would Cap-and-Trade legislation effectively tax and regulate all carbon emissions in the country, but it would also add $854 billion to federal coffers.

The cost estimate concluded, “CBO estimates that the annual cost of [cap-and-trade] would amount to tens of billions of dollars for private-sector entities and hundreds of millions of dollars for public entities… Public and private entities would also be required to report information on greenhouse gases to a federal registry.”

In short, the bill is an unmitigated disaster and must be defeated.

Click here for the CBO study.  More of CFIF on climate change here and here.

Sen. Tom Coburn – The Health Bill is Scary
National Review Online – The Value-Added Tax
Politico – Gary Johnson as the Next Ron Paul?
Howard Dean – Senate Bill Wouldn’t Bring Real Reform

Michael Barone – Dems Head for the Exits
George Will – When the Charm Rubs Off
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette – Congress Raises Debt Ceiling
The Hill – House Passes Pelosi’s $174 Billion Jobs Bill

Federal Debt: $12.130 trillion

It turns out money can buy neither happiness nor certainty.  As information continues to leak out about the desert kingdom’s financial mirage, the overleveraged city state of Dubai is proving to be an object lesson in the importance of free markets.  In about five years’ time the second largest member of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) went from off the map to the center of attention for the world’s glitterati.  In the face of opulence, many disregarded obvious contradictions.

Neo-conservatives were willing to overlook its dictatorial government on the grounds that it promoted an alternative to political Islam.”

Also overlooked were the inhumane conditions inflicted on the hundreds of thousands of foreign workers, most from India and Pakistan, imported to construct the place to awe-inspiring effect. Nature was stage-managed at great expense, both financial and environmental: lush golf courses in the desert; a ski hill inside the world’s biggest shopping mall; sand rearranged on offshore islands that replicated a map of the world (with Israel notably absent). No expense was spared to bring celebrities to burnish the Dubai brand—among them Tiger Woods, Roger Federer, and Clinton. Dubai proposed a new oxymoronic economic model: state-owned capitalism. It was a trade-off: personal freedom for the promise of the best “quality of life on the planet,” like George Orwell’s 1984 with Gucci, McDonald’s, and a happy ending.

Yet, the end to Dubai’s financial crisis is far from happy; especially if negotiations with other UAE members stall, and Dubai seeks a bailout – and closer ties with – Iran.  Like security, many people (and nations) will trade their freedom for “guaranteed” prosperity.  Let’s hope that in the wake of Iran’s latest missile test-firing Dubai doesn’t increase the Islamic Republic’s sphere of influence any further down the Arabian Peninsula.

Cold weather got you down?  Is your child distraught and having trouble sleeping because of the government’s global warming scare tactics? 

Watch the clever video below, put together by our friends at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, and learn how you too can cash in on global warming alarmism.

The Senate can be a magical place sometimes. Taking advantage of a clever procedural tool, Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) has forced the upper chamber to read a 767-page amendment out loud.  (One has to feel sorry for the people reading the amendment.)

Senator Bernie Sanders (Socialist-VT) introduced his single-payer amendment to the health care bill but Senators DeMint (R-SC) and Coburn put their foot down.  They are now using all available procedural tactics to kill the bill, even if they have to kill the voice of a few Senate staffers in the process (a worthy sacrifice).

Senator Coburn commented, “We’re going to understand what single-payer is all about and read the bill.”

If you’d like to understand more about socialist health care, click here or here.  More of CFIF on health care here.

***Update***

Senator Coburn did battle once again with Senator Max Baucus (D-MT) and the exchange was priceless.  Senator Coburn asked that Senators fully read and understand the bill before they voted.

Senator Baucus, we’ll say, was less than optimistic about the comprehension level of his colleagues. The video (one minute mark) displays our nation’s sad state of affairs.

Even though there isn’t much hope of Republicans winning a majority in the U.S. Senate after the 2010 election, President Obama may have a few new conservative voices critiquing his administration. Of the four Republican candidates endorsed by the Senatorial Conservative Fund, the two most likely to get elected are running to replace moderate members of the GOP. But while replacing Kay Bailey Hutchison with Michael Williams would be an improvement for Texas conservatives looking for a more aggressive advocate, that scenario pales in comparison to the starkly different paths confronting Florida’s Republican primary voters.

In that race former Florida house speaker and Tea Party darling Marco Rubio just pulled even with Charlie Crist, the current Republican governor and a closet liberal. CFIF has previously covered the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s decision not to endorse in contested primaries. Now, it looks like that decision, coupled with Rubio’s successful linkage of Crist to Obama, is hurting the once front-running Crist. After Doug Hoffman’s narrow loss in the New York 23rd congressional special election, many pundits opined that conservatives like Rubio would be persona non grata in the GOP. Like everything else coming out of Washington these days, the “experts” were wrong about what Americans want.

WSJ Editorial – The Audacity of Debt
McClatchy – Health Care Reform for Christmas?
Time Magazine – Person of the Year 2009
Real Clear Politics – Hide the Decline … And More

The Hill – Democrats Threaten to Hold Health Bill Hostage
Politico – Congress Punts Problems to 2010
Breitbart – Net Neutrality and the First Amendment
Atlanta Journal-Constitution – More Inconvenient Truth for Al Gore

Federal Debt: $12.126 trillion

barbaric:   (1) Of, relating to, or characteristic of barbarians.   (2) Crude or unrestrained in taste, style, or behavior.

Perhaps California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is simply desperate to retain some element of his fading spotlight as he drifts toward political retirement?  After all, we live in the age of reality TV, in which even self-embarrassment such as White House party-crashing is an acceptable price for publicity.

Sadly, that possibility would be preferable to the possibility that he’s simply lost what remained of his intellectual bearing.

Appearing today on ABC’s Good Morning, America, Schwarzenegger attempted to outdo even the Obama White House on the topic of climate change absurdity.  Even though he has presided over California as it has hemorrhaged jobs and descended to economic basket-case status, partly due to costly state environmental policies, he denied any contradiction between the global warming agenda and economic prosperity, saying, “we in California have proven it over and over that you can protect the economy, and you can protect the environment.  I don’t think you have to choose.  I think it is nonsense talk to say ‘let’s talk first about the economy.'”

Apparently oblivious to the Climategate scandal surrounding the global warming activists at Britain’s University of East Anglia, he went so far as to say that on the issue of global warming, we should “pay more attention to the universities.”  And ignoring California’s catastrophic loss of jobs to surrounding business-friendly states, Schwarzenegger continued, “in California, the biggest job creation is in green technology, we have seen an increase there of over 36%, we have been increasing the amount of jobs in all those different areas.”

Perhaps most preposterously, the man who played Conan the Barbarian had the audacity to label anyone who rightfully questions man-made global warming hysteria as “still living in the Stone Age.”

No, Governor Schwarzenegger, you’re the one who has continuously regressed back to the Stone Age with such profoundly mindless comments as these during your tenure.  What a sad, sad spectacle for a once-promising political newcomer and purported reformer.

Byron York posts a great article today culled from his discussion with an anonymous Democratic strategist. The topic is the rationale motivating Democrats to pass comprehensive health care “reform” over the vociferous objections from a majority of the public. For the White House, it’s the fierce urgency of now. In the Senate, it’s the calculation that senators vulnerable in next year’s election will be at risk of losing their seats with or without passing the bill. And in the House, it’s the belief by party stalwarts like Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) that the 20 or 40 members likely to be defeated because of the bill are nominal players.

But when pressed by York to explain why Democratic leaders keep pushing for something a majority of the public doesn’t want, his interlocutor reveals the essence of the liberal conceit.

“Because they think they know what’s best for the public,” the strategist said. “They think the facts are being distorted and the public’s being told a story that is not entirely true, and that they are in Congress to be leaders. And they are going to make the decision because Goddammit, it’s good for the public.”

How democratic.

Despite a catchy tease about New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg being a do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do carbon emitter, the New York Times goes out of its way to minimize criticizing him. Sure, the self-made billionaire frequently travels to Bermuda and other international locales on a private jet while urging others to conserve energy. And yes, he preaches the virtues of public nutrition while emptying the salt shaker on his pizza. But, cautions the Times, you must understand: Mayor Mike is rich, and rich people like riding on private jets. They’re comfortable, quick, and apparently serve sushi. Besides, you’d ride in one too if you could.

This is not Bloombergian hypocrisy; it is a paradox, shared by most of humankind. I’ve lived within a block or two of a subway station since birth, yet owned a car since I got a driver’s license. There is a long list of public figures — from movie stars to politicians to journalists — who preach conservation for everyone else, while living in mega-homes and flying in Gulfstreams. It is probably not a good idea for the rest of us to look down our noses at people who cannot resist such temptations until we can afford them ourselves.

At which point the newly wealthy would succumb to the temptation to indulge in similar naughty expenditures?

The truth is that Bloomberg and the author of this tortured article aren’t engaging in hypocrisy or a paradox. They’re just opting out. Instead of abiding by the logical conclusions stemming from Nannystate environmental and food policies, they are choosing to exercise their freedom of discretion. Kudos to Bloomberg for saving rainwater to reduce his foundation’s energy costs. Bravo to the author for keeping autoworkers, road maintenance staff, and car dealers employed by owning a car instead of using the subway. But they should recognize that in each case it is the combination of personal wealth and a lack of prohibitory laws that allows each to adopt the level of self-imposed denial they deem sustainable.

Byron York – Why Democrats Push Health Care, Even If It Kills Them
Michael Tanner – Harry’s Mad Health-Bill Hurry
New York Times – Lieberman Gets Ex-Party to Shift on Health Plan
Rich Lowry – Slipshod Social Democracy

The Times – Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth
Fox News – Congress’ Kitchen Sink
WTOP – Federal Employees Owe $3 Billion in Unpaid Taxes
Rasmussen – Obama’s Job Approval Hits New Low   

Federal Debt: $12.122 trillion

Here in Los Angeles, talk radio guru Bill Handel conducted a provocative interview today with Stephan Kinsella, an intellectual property lawyer from Texas who is also a libertarian legal theorist associated with the Ludwig Von Mises Institute.

Kinsella is an interesting guy. He is a patent lawyer, yet doesn’t believe in the legitimacy of intellectual property rights.  But his current cause is making the case that blackmail should be legal.  Kinsella points to the recent sex scandals surrounding Tiger Woods and David Letterman and notes that Woods bribing former paramours to keep quiet would be legal, whereas Robert Halderman’s attempt to solicit a bribe from Letterman in exchange for his silence got him arrested. 

Kinsella is in favor of extortion laws that seek to deter the use of force, but sees no reason to prohibit seeking money for the preservation of someone’s reputation (making the interesting case that no one has a right to what other people think of them).  Many (maybe even most) listeners will disagree, but there’s plenty of interest to listen to here.