Freedom Line Blog

Wondering what some liberal icons will be wearing this Halloween?  CFIF’s Renee Giachino presents you with a speculative guide on what House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Vice President Joe Biden and others with be posing as this October 31.

A nice jab from the folks over at Politizoid:

Along with Reps. John Dingell (D-MI) and Barney Frank (D-MA), another incumbent Democrat congressman is looking at the very real possibility of losing his seat on November 2^nd.  And because of his stunts, it couldn’t happen to a better poster child for partisan politics than Florida’s Alan Grayson.  Byron York provides a nice summary of Grayson’s offenses:

Grayson has been involved in so many dust-ups, scrapes and other indignities that it’s surprising to realize he has only been in office 20 months. From describing the Republican health plan as hoping the sick will “die quickly” to calling a top official at the Federal Reserve a “K Street whore” to saying of former Vice President Dick Cheney that “blood … drips from his teeth while he’s talking” to “Taliban Dan” — well, a lot of people in Florida and Washington won’t be sad to see him go.

A poll taken by Sunshine State News at the time of the ad controversy showed Webster with a 7-point lead, 43 percent to 36 percent. Barring any unforeseen events, that’s likely to hold. The 8th District was Republican for almost 30 years, until the Obama-Grayson victories of 2008. Now it appears to be moving back to the GOP.

You know it’s shaping up to be a bad year for Democrats when the congressman most associated with pressuring banks to accelerate the growth in subprime mortgages says he hopes government mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are dead within a year.  House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D-MA) told CNBC host Lawrence Kudlow that he no longer supports “pushing lower-income people into housing they couldn’t afford…”

So what could be motivating Frank’s flip-flop?  Kudlow thinks it could be the rare example of a politician admitting his mistake.  I’m betting it has more to do with the rise of Sean Bielat as a serious contender to challenge Frank in the upcoming general election.

The same week Frank offered his mea culpa to Kudlow, Frank’s campaign staff circulated information that Bielat was formerly a registered Democrat before switching to the Republican Party.  The implication is that Bielat can’t be trusted because he switched parties.

But in an impressively worded explanation, Bielat manages to highlight his resume as a former House page, Marine and Harvard graduate, and why at each step along the way he was more and more conflicted with the Democrats’ liberal agenda.  There’s even a polite reminder that Ronald Reagan was once a Democrat until its leftward tilt helped him discover his inner conservative.

Frank is obviously concerned about Bielat’s appeal this year because of his line of attack on Bielat: Don’t vote for Sean; he used to be a Democrat.  Too bad for Barney, though, because he still is.

The ostentatious Representative Barney Frank from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts never shies away from reporters or combative political opponents.  He once said to a constituent at a town hall meeting, “Ma’am, trying to have a conversation with you would be like trying to argue with a dining room table.  I have no interest in doing it.”

Now, amidst rumors that Democrats are planning to delay the swearing-in of Republican Scott Brown if he were to win the special election in Massachusetts, Frank issued yet another linguistic tour de force.

Representative Frank opined, “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve been asked in a long time.  That is insane, the suggestion could only come from a demented right wing source… That is conspiracy theory at its most contemptible.”  BAM!

Barney, you’re wrong.   ‘Conspiracies’ like this happen all the time in Washington’s political meat grinder.

Remember, Massachusetts Democrats changed the rules on filing Senate vacancies twice, once in 2004 when it would have aided Democrats, and again in 2009 to ensure a 60th Democratic Senator.

Remember, Representative Bill Owens (D-NY) was sworn in on a weekend so that Speaker Pelosi could secure his vote for health care reform.

Remember, Representative Vern Buchanan (R-FL) almost had his swearing-in delayed because Speaker Pelosi wanted to reduce the number of Republicans.  Pelosi ultimately decided to seat Buchanan so that his district would have representation.  After Buchanan’s election, however, one Democrat noted, “No one who’s in a disputed election like this should get too comfortable in the House of Representatives.”

Because Massachusetts can take its time with certification and because the Senate, under Article I §5, “shall be the Judge of Elections, Returns and Qualifications of its own Members,” then there is plenty of legitimate legal ground for Democrats to delay the ceremony.

However, since the public backlash against even the idea of a delay is so strong, it appears that the eventual winner will be sworn in the normal course, but “normal” might not occur until February if the Senator happens to have an “R” after his name.

Barney, you might be entertaining but you’re still crazy.

Remember when sub-prime mortgages had Congress demanding more accountability (i.e. oversight) of the housing industry? It seems like a lifetime ago that the spark igniting the current recession (derivatives of risky mortgage deals) was a priority on Congress’s to-do list. That was before health care, cap-and-trade, and Afghanistan moved it to the back burner. Apparently, the issue is still simmering because there’s news of an impending compromise between Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Barney Frank (D-MA). At issue is whether to head the yet-to-be-created “Consumer Financial Protection Agency” (CFPA) with a single director or board of commissioners.

And just what would be the CFPA’s mandate? Here’s a description from the L.A. Times:

To begin with, be aware that the agency’s powers and oversight would extend far beyond mortgages and real estate — into all credit cards, debit cards, consumer loans, payday loans, credit reporting agencies, debt collection, stored-value cards and even investment advisory and financial advisory services, to name only part of the list.

And this from CNN:

The consumer agency would be a brand new regulator whose chief concern is looking out for consumers. It would write rules aimed at ensuring that financial products like mortgages and credit cards are fair, more transparent and more easily understood.

Raise your hand if you remember the last time a government agency made a process, form, or program easier to understand. At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter if the new regulator is a single director or a board of commissioners. The most direct effect of creating yet another federal agency will be an increase in both taxes to fund it and transactions costs to comply with it. If Democrats really wanted to help consumers and taxpayers, they’d step back and let prosecutors and plaintiffs sue for fraud. After all, no court will enforce a contract that was signed under duress.

Then again, that’s not really the point, is it?

It is straightforward logic that taxes discourage production and investment.  But judging by their latest bright idea to tax financial transactions, Democrats such as Barney Frank and their Big Labor overlords either don’t understand this or simply don’t care.

Fresh off a worldwide crisis from which it hasn’t even yet recovered, the financial industry is hardly the sector that tax-hungry liberals should attempt to further cripple.  This is particularly true in an era when market participants can relocate operations almost anywhere in the world, as the past decade’s out-migration from the United States has shown.  Ignoring this, liberals are now proposing a tax of 0.1% to 0.25% on almost every form of financial transaction.  So how exactly is this supposed to help America’s financial industry recover?

Worse, the proceeds would be directed toward (you guessed it) ObamaCare or more futile “stimulus” spending, despite warnings from economists about the negative consequences for markets.  “I was one of the ones who suggested the idea,” says Congressman Frank.

Which, come to think of it, is almost argument enough for any sane person to oppose this bizarre new proposed tax-grab.

Seemingly upset about everyone picking on their favorite community organizing group, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-MI) and House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D-MA) want to know if Conress’ efforts to stop ACORN from receiving any more federal funds are, get this… constitutional.

Specifically, Conyers and Frank have submitted a formal request to the Congressional Research Service (“CRS”) asking it to analyze the ACORN defunding measures recently passed by the House and Senate to determine “their possible unconstitutionality and whether they could constitute an unlawful bill of attainder.” 

In addition, the two Chairmen want CRS to analyze the “recent ‘sting’ activity concerning ACORN” — referring to the brilliant videos commissioned and released by Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com —  including a run down of  “federal and state laws that could apply to such videotaping and distribution of conversations without the consent of all parties.”

And they wonder why Congress’ job approval ratings are in the dump.