CFIF Contributing Editor Ben Boychuk discusses how today’s Republican Party resembles the Whig Party of 1850, why Donald Trump, Carly Fiorina and Ben Carson are popular candidates, and more.
Listen to the interview here.
Join CFIF Corporate Counsel and Senior Vice President Renee Giachino today from 4:00 p.m. CDT to 6:00 p.m. CDT (that’s 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. EDT) on Northwest Florida’s 1330 AM WEBY, as she hosts her radio show, “Your Turn: Meeting Nonsense with Commonsense.” Today’s guest lineup includes:
4:00 CDT/5:00 p.m. EDT: Francis Rooney, Former Ambassador to the Holy See – Pope Francis’ First Visit to the United States;
4:30 CDT/5:30 p.m. EDT: Evan Moore, Senior Policy Analyst at the Foreign Policy Initiative – U.S.-China Relations;
5:00 CDT/6:00 p.m. EDT: Sarah Westwood, Watchdog Reporter for the Washington Examiner – Hillary Clinton E-Mails; and
5:30 CDT/6:30 p.m. EDT: Timothy Lee, CFIF’s Senior Vice President for Legal and Public Affairs – Should the U.S. Emulate Europe on the Legal and Economic Fronts?
Listen live on the Internet here. Call in to share your comments or ask questions of today’s guests at (850) 623-1330
In recent weeks, as we enter the final 500 days of his presidency, we have periodically returned to the issue of Obama’s emerging legacy. On both domestic and foreign policy, his administration has been one of unprecedented failure, which we take no glee in saying because in so doing he has harmed the country.
On that issue, however, a new Gallup survey highlights another one of Obama’s more notable failures. Namely, the number of Americans who believe that the federal government poses “an immediate threat to the rights and freedoms of ordinary citizens” has reached a record high. Accordingly, the fact that the man who set out to reverse Ronald Reagan’s axiom that “government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem” has through his own actions brought Americans’ fear and distrust of the federal government to record highs. Through his inexorable and at times lawless agenda of increased federal government power, regulation, spending, deficits and encroachment into our lives, he has paradoxically validated Reagan’s belief and undermined his own.
Although Obama’s impact on America’s wellbeing at home and abroad has been disastrous (quick – name a single significant place in the world that is better off today than six years ago), at least it provides the opportunity for Americans to understand the cause-and-effect relationship of bigger government, more regulation, higher spending, higher taxes and weaker foreign policy and our declining national health. As Gallup notes, “the persistent finding in recent years that half of the population views the government as an immediate threat underscores the degree to which the role and power of government remains a key issue of our time.”
Hopefully, Americans quickly internalize the opposite lesson that Reagan provided, and act accordingly.
In an interview with CFIF, David Adesnik, Policy Director at the Foreign Policy Initiative, discusses America’s defense and strategy issues as they relate to the Iran Nuclear Deal and why we need serious engagement on foreign policy issues by America’s next president.
Listen to the interview here.
Below is one of the latest cartoons from two-time Pulitzer Prize-winner Michael Ramirez.
View more of Michael Ramirez’s cartoons on CFIF’s website here.
The Peachtree City, Georgia city council plans to vote TONIGHT on whether to use taxpayer dollars to build a Municipal Broadband Network for businesses. This will cost millions of your hard-earned tax dollars and put the city’s bond rating and other important services at risk. Tell Peachtree City Mayor Vanessa Fleisch and the Peachtree City Council Members TODAY that you do NOT want your tax dollars used to build a municipal broadband network. That is something the private sector can and does provide.
A few important facts to share with your Council Member:
Costly Municipal Broadband Failures
Burlington Telecom, VT
UTOPIA, Utah
MI-Connection, NC
CDE Lightband, TN
Contact Mayor Vanessa Fleisch and the City Council TODAY!
Group email to Mayor, Council & City Manager: [email protected]
Mayor Vanessa Fleisch
Twitter: @vanessafleisch
770-487-7657
Post 1 Council member Eric Imker
770-487-7657
Post 2 Council member Mike King
770-487-7657
Post 3 Council member Kim Learnerd
770-487-7657
Post 4 Council member Terry Ernst
770-487-7657
Throughout the “Net Neutrality” debate over whether the federal government should begin regulating Internet service under 1930s Depression-era laws intended for copper wire telephone service, we and others have warned that Obama Administration efforts to impose such regulation would dangerously stifle private investment and innovation in the telecommunications sector.
In his weekly “Information Age” column today, L. Gordon Crovitz highlights how quickly our somber prediction has proven true. In “Obamanet Is Hurting Broadband,” Crovitz summarizes how “The predictable effect of more regulation has arrived: Investment is plummeting”:
New data show the Obama Administration’s decision to regulate the Internet as a utility has already caused a steep drop in Internet Investment… [I]n the first half of 2015, as the new regulations were being crafted in Washington, major ISPs reduced capital expenditure by an average of 12%, while the overall industry average dropped 8%. Capital spending was down 29% at AT&T and Charter Communications, 10% at Cablevision, and 4% at Verizon. (Comcast increased capital spending, but on a new home-entertainment operating system, not broadband.) Until now, spending had fallen year-to-year only twice in the history of broadband: in 2001 after the dot-com bust, and in 2009 after the recession.” [emphasis added]
Since the 1996 Telecommunications Act, the Internet has thrived and played a central role in maintaining America’s status as the most prosperous, most entrepreneurial and most innovative nation in human history. That didn’t happen by accident, nor was it due to coincidence. Rather, it occurred precisely because the federal government during both the Clinton and Bush administrations refrained from suffocating it with destructive and politically-motivated overregulation. But Obama apparently thought he had a better idea. Unfortunately, we’re already witnessing the regrettable result.
Meanwhile, Gallup just released its annual survey of public approval of various sectors of American life. Standing at or near the top once again are the computer industry, the Internet industry and the telephone industry, all with high net positives. And at the bottom, once again, is the federal government, with an atrocious -29% net negative.
All of this suggests that we would likely be better off if the computer/Internet/telecom industries regulated the federal government, rather than vice-versa.
Join CFIF Corporate Counsel and Senior Vice President Renee Giachino today from 4:00 p.m. CDT to 6:00 p.m. CDT (that’s 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. EDT) on Northwest Florida’s 1330 AM WEBY, as she hosts her radio show, “Your Turn: Meeting Nonsense with Commonsense.” Today’s guest lineup includes:
4:00 CDT/5:00 pm EDT: Riley Walters, Research Assistant at the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign and National Security Policy at The Heritage Foundation – Domestic Terror Attacks and Plots Since 9/11;
4:30 CDT/5:30 pm EDT: David Adesnik, Policy Director at the Foreign Policy Initiative – Iran Nuclear Deal;
5:00 CDT/6:00 pm EDT: Ben Boychuk, CFIF Contributing Editor, writer, and political commentator – The American Political Scene; and
5:30 CDT/6:30 pm EDT: Sally Pipes, President, CEO and Thomas W. Smith Fellow in Health Care Policy at the Pacific Research Institute – Mega-Merger Madness in the Health Insurance Industry and the State of VA Care.
Listen live on the Internet here. Call in to share your comments or ask questions of today’s guests at (850) 623-1330
In an interview with CFIF, Clark Neily, Senior Attorney for the Institute for Justice, discusses his latest book, “Terms of Engagement: How Our Courts Should Enforce the Constitution’s Promise of Limited Government,” and the importance of and issues surrounding separation of powers, economic liberty, property rights, the Second Amendment, and more.
Listen to the interview here.
Amid an excellent piece detailing the perils of minimum wage increases in today’s Wall Street Journal entitled “A Post-Labor Day, Minimum-Wage Hangover,” CKE Restaurants CEO Andy Puzder provides yet another depressing snapshot of the emerging legacy of Barack Obama:
The real problem is that more than six years of progressive economic policies – higher taxes, more regulation, ObamaCare, Dodd-Frank and more – have eliminated opportunities. The poverty rate remains at levels generally observed during recessions. Child poverty is at its highest point in 20 years. The U.S. Census Bureau reports that for the first time since it began compiling the data, business closures each year have been exceeding new business startups. This is the result of an economy limping along at a 2.2% growth rate.”
Below is one of the latest cartoons from two-time Pulitzer Prize-winner Michael Ramirez.
View more of Michael Ramirez’s cartoons on CFIF’s website here.
Timothy Lee, CFIF’s Senior Vice President of Legal and Public Affairs, discusses Hillary Clinton’s conduct as Secretary of State, the Iran deal and how speech regulation is used to silence dissent.
Listen to the interview here.
In our latest Liberty Update we highlighted in “10 Years After Katrina, Failed Global Warming Prophecies Accumulate” how global warming alarmists continue to rely on predictions of imminent doom, despite the fact that their record of prediction is one of failure after failure.
Add another glaring and amusing example to that list. In 2008, ABC News ran a “news” feature entitled “Earth 2100.” It’s worth watching the 9-minute clip, which suggests such possibilities as milk at $12.00 per gallon and gas at $9.00 per gallon, as recalled by The Daily Caller:
Newsbusters notes that then GMA anchor Chris Cuomo, who teased the special at the time, said to [Bob] Woodruff of the predictions, ‘I think we’re familiar with some of these issues, but boy, 2015? That’s seven years from now. Could it really be that bad?’
Woodruff replies, ‘It’s very soon, you know. But all you have to do is look at the world today. You know, you’ve got gas prices going up. You’ve got food prices going up. You’ve got extreme weather. The scientists have studied this for decades. They say if you connect the dots, you can actually see that we’re approaching maybe even a perfect storm. Or you have got shrinking resources, population growth, climate change. So the idea now is to look at it, wake up about it and then try to do something to fix it.”
In related news, gas recently dipped below $2.00 per gallon in many parts of the country. So much for that.
As Barack Obama plays the role of broken record again on his boondoggle to Alaska, it’s imperative to keep in mind how a global warming alarm movement that constantly relies upon predictions of doom maintains a 25-year record of failed predictions.
Below is one of the latest cartoons from two-time Pulitzer Prize-winner Michael Ramirez.
In confronting the growing challenge of China, as with Japan in the 1980s and other challengers in the past, the easy and simplistic response is to advocate protectionism. But America remains the most prosperous and innovative nation in human history on the basis of free trade, not protectionism. If closing borders to trade was the path to prosperity, then North Korea would be a global exemplar.
On that chord, Senator Marco Rubio (R – Florida), set to give a much-anticipated foreign policy speech on the campaign trail today, offers a refreshing commentary in today’s Wall Street Journal entitled “How My Presidency Would Deal With China.” In his piece, Rubio advocates free trade and passing the Trans-Pacific Partnership as effective tools for confronting China, resisting the cheap and easy protectionist platitudes:
My second goal is protecting the U.S. economy. For years, China has subsidized exports, devalued its currency, restricted imports and stolen technology on a massive scale. As president, I would respond not through aggressive retaliation, which would hurt the U.S. as much as China, but by greater commitment and firmer insistence on free markets and free trade. This means immediately moving forward with the Trans-Pacific Partnership and other trade agreements.”
Protectionism and irrational alarm over trade balance only serve to undermine American growth. After all, the 1930s Great Depression in the U.S. witnessed trade surpluses in 102 of that decade’s 120 months. The better answer is to maintain America’s standing as a nation of free trade, through which we will overcome today’s challenges just as we have previous decades’ similar challenges.
In this installment of the Freedom Minute, CFIF’s Renee Giachino discusses the massive toxic spill caused by the EPA in a Colorado river, the agency’s response to the disaster and the double standard by which business and the feds are held to account.
In recent days we’ve noted how the American public now opposes Obama’s Iran nuclear weapons agreement by 2-to-1 margins, and how opposition in both the Senate and House of Representatives is approaching 2/3 veto-proof majorities.
Apparently, opposition within military and intelligence communities is similarly broad.
In a new piece this week, Michael Barone lists a number of military and intelligence figures appointed during the Clinton and Obama administrations who voice sharp opposition to the proposed deal. From well-known names like General Michael Hayden to General Barry McCaffrey and several others, it’s an impressive list. As Barone concludes, “These are all highly respected retired military officers whose judgment should command respect, and their criticisms of the Iran deal are certainly withering.”
Join CFIF Corporate Counsel and Senior Vice President Renee Giachino today from 4:00 p.m. CDT to 6:00 p.m. CDT (that’s 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. EDT) on Northwest Florida’s 1330 AM WEBY, as she hosts her radio show, “Your Turn: Meeting Nonsense with Commonsense.” Today’s guest lineup includes:
4:00 CDT/5:00 pm EDT: Clark Neily, Senior Attorney for the Institute for Justice – Separation of Powers;
4:30 CDT/5:30 pm EDT: Quin Hillyer, Newspaper Columnist and Writer – Candidates 2016, Including Trumps Visit to Alabama Quin’s Interview with Scott Walker;
5:00 CDT/6:00 pm EDT: Sarah Westwood, Watchdog Reporter for the Washington Examiner – Hillary Clinton E-Mails; and
5:30 CDT/6:30 pm EDT: Timothy Lee, CFIF’s Senior Vice President for Legal and Public Affairs – Iran, Puerto Rico and the First Amendment.
Listen live on the Internet here. Call in to share your comments or ask questions of today’s guests at (850) 623-1330
At CFIF, we stand for the rule of law and with American taxpayers, investors, savers and seniors against the destructive proposal floated by some in Washington, D.C. of changing longstanding law to allow Puerto Rico to declare bankruptcy.
Accordingly, we’re happy to see that in her weekly “The Americas” column in today’s Wall Street Journal, Mary Anastasia O’Grady highlights the way in which pro-bankruptcy advocates undermine the rule of law by disregarding contractual property rights:
The governor, and the legislature which his party controls, made a conscious decision when they approved the budget not to put the funds aside for that payment. ‘They are explicitly legislating default because they think that puts the creditors on their knees. Then the creditors will have to make concessions… Creditors have protections [in bond contracts],’ he adds, ‘and a court of law is going to enforce those agreements.’ Securitized bonds provide bondholders with a property right to a designated cash-flow stream.”
As we specified previously, better alternatives exist:
For example, the Puerto Rican government could actually pay the hundreds of millions of dollars it owes to the power authority (PREPA), or Congress could impose greater oversight over Puerto Rico. Remember, a financial control board was effective in reforming the District of Columbia’s finances 20 years ago, accomplished on a bipartisan basis by a Republican Congress and a Democratic president. Ultimately, that might be the way to put in place comprehensive, structural reforms so that Puerto Rico never again spirals out of control.”
The solution is adherence to the rule of law and the enforcement of mutually bargained-for contract, not yet another bailout imposed upon American taxpayers.
As we recently noted, we’ve reached a strange state of political affairs when the definition of “success” in the Obama Era is reduced to scraping together a 1/3 minority of either chamber of Congress to salvage an executive accord with the terrorist state of Iran.
With clear majorities in both the House and the Senate already opposed to the accord, and an overwhelming majority of Americans also opposed, Obama’s remaining hope is that he can convince 1/3 of either house to stick with him. Should that occur, expect another one of his tawdry “victory” dances afterward.
According to the latest tally from The Washington Post, however, even achieving that 1/3 minority level of support is in jeopardy. In the House, 290 votes are required to override an Obama veto of a resolution rejecting the accord. The Post confirms that “all 246 House Republicans are expected to vote against the deal,” with 18 Democrats either already against the deal or leaning against the deal, for a total of 264. With 82 Democrats either for the deal or leaning toward favoring it, that means only 26 of 88 undeclared Democrats are needed to reach the veto override threshold.
In the Senate, meanwhile, 67 votes are required to override an Obama veto. The Post calculates that “56 Senators – including all Republicans plus two Democrats (Sens. Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) and Bob Menendez (N.J.)) – are either overtly against the pact or presumed foes.” According to its estimate, 31 Democrats are either on record supporting the agreement or leaning that way, leaving 13 undecided.
Persuading 11 of that remaining 13 to do the right thing rather than march in lockstep with a president who will be out of office in little more than one year will be an uphill climb. Each day, however, brings new disturbing revelations regarding the mechanics of the accord, including this week’s news that Iran will essentially be allowed to self-report on its nuclear activities. That drip, drip, drip only makes support for Obama’s deal less defensible, and increases the justification for rejecting this dangerous capitulation.
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