Publius' Newsstand

• The McConnell Plan: A comprehensive alternative...

  Want a real jobs bill? Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has it:

  McConnell mentioned two steps to reduce uncertainty about the economic future when I interviewed him recently.... One is to declare the effort to enact Democratic health care reform–ObamaCare–over. “That would be a great relief to American business looking at health care taxes,” he told CNN.... Instead, the president wants Republicans to join him in tweaking ObamaCare and making it a bipartisan bill. That, in McConnell’s view, is a non-starter. The other McConnell idea is an extension of the Bush tax cuts, but not Obama-style. The president wants to preserve the tax cuts for individuals earning less than $200,000 a year and couples making less than $250,000. McConnell would extend the tax cuts... for all taxpayers.

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• Paul Ryan’s Express: A congressman with a presi...

  One to watch in 2012, Paul Ryan may be a Gingrich-style idea man without the baggage.

  Liberals accuse Ryan of cutting future Medicare benefits. True enough—but they’re missing the point. “Any reform would do that,” he says. “They want to do it by a government monopoly and rationing. We attack the root cause of health care inflation by introducing free-market mechanisms into the system.” Ryan’s political problem is that he’s a congressman with a presidential-level agenda. The Roadmap is a realistic way to clean up America’s fiscal mess, but there is no chance of it becoming law as long as Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid run Congress and Barack Obama is president.

  Only one way to fix that.

    Views: 53 Comments: 0

• GM stake compromises Obama in Toyota's recalls

  A clear conflict of interest for GM majority-owner Barack Obama:

  After all, the Obama administration bought a 60 percent stake in General Motors costing taxpayers more than $50 billion and is thus vested politically in the company's success. That GM's value must exceed at least $83 billion (bearing in mind that the company's highest-ever market valuation was $60 billion in 2000) before taxpayers can be made whole is the prism through which the administration's words and actions on the auto industry should be viewed. One important concern among auto industry analysts upon GM's emergence from bankruptcy has been whether and how the Obama administration might use regulation and the tax code to tilt the playing field in GM's favor.

    Views: 64 Comments: 1

• Dreaming: Pelosi says Democrats Will ‘Definitel...

  Reality is going to be tough on the soon-to-be former Speaker of the House.

  Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is literally laughing off the suggestion House Democrats could lose their majority in the midterm elections. In an interview with CQ-Roll Call Tuesday, the top House Democrat said her party would “definitely” retain control of the chamber and emerge from the November balloting with “much more than a simple majority...” “We will not be taken by surprise,” she said emphatically, echoing a pledge her lieutenants have made to not repeat Democrats’ mistake in 1994 when the GOP caught them napping amid a rising tide of voter anger and swept them from power. “I am not yielding one grain of sand. My responsibility is to protect and preserve my incumbents and that’s what I intend to do. ... I’m fighting for every seat.”

    Views: 57 Comments: 0

• Special to Replace Murtha Highly Competitive

  Battle may hinge on who can provide the most pork, as Murtha was renowned for, unless voter discontent is great enough to trump that.

  The 12th district is politically competitive, to say the least. The southwestern Pennsylvania district voted by a small margin for Sen. John McCain in the 2008 presidential race, and often elects Republicans to local office. Murtha, meanwhile, has always won re-election by convincing margins. In 2008, he won by 20 points despite a last-minute gaffe about his own district on the campaign trail in the waning days before the election. CQ Politics is moving the rating of this race to Tossup due to the makeup of the district and because the manner in which both parties will pick their nominees makes it anyone’s game. What’s more, special elections are unpredictable – as this election cycle has already demonstrated.

    Views: 88 Comments: 0

• Climate-change legislation buried under record ...

  This post is sponsored by Snow, longtime personal nemesis of mine, but a hero today. Thank you, Snow! No chance at Cap and Tax in 2010:

  Voters are mostly concerned with jobs and the economy. Global warming is at the bottom of their list. And now, on top of that, the paralyzing snowfalls have made the prospect of winning support for a climate bill this year even less likely. Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) on Tuesday used the D.C. snowstorm to make a political jab, saying that it provides evidence for global warming skeptics. “It's going to keep snowing in DC until Al Gore cries “uncle,” the conservative Senator tweeted on Twitter. Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) said the blizzards that have shut down Congress have made it more difficult to argue that global warming is an imminent danger.

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• Climategate: Plausibility and the blogosphere i...

  Good piece by Jerome Ravetz. An excerpt:

  Even worse, for the warming case to have political effect, a mere global average rise in temperature was not compelling enough. So that people could appreciate the dangers, there needed to be predictions of future climate – or even weather – in the various regions of the world. Given the gross uncertainties in even the aggregated models, regional forecasts are really beyond the limits of science. And yet they have been provided, with various degrees of precision. Those announced by the IPCC have become the most explosive. As all these anomalies and unsolved puzzles emerged, the neat, compelling picture became troubled and even confused.

  Much more at the link.

    Views: 47 Comments: 0

• Dick Morris: GOP Can Retake Both House and Sena...

  Morris is pretty astute on these things. I'm starting to agree with him on the possibility of retaking Congress. He also sees reason for the GOP to challenge Obama at a possible health care summit.

  Martella noted that President Obama plans to host a televised meeting with Republicans and Democrats in Congress to discuss healthcare reform. He asked: “Will this be anything more than a dog and pony show, and should Republicans attend at all.” “Republicans should go, and they should win the debate that meeting will be,” Morris responded. “It won’t be an effort to find a solution. It will be a contest to sell their view to the American public."

    Views: 120 Comments: 0

• China PLA officers urge economic punch against ...

  Trouble brewing on the China front? It's amazing how everyone just loves us now, since Obama took over. Senior Chinese military officers have proposed that their country boost defense spending, adjust PLA deployments, and possibly sell some U.S. bonds to punish Washington for its latest round of arms sales to Taiwan.

  While far from representing fixed government policy, the open demands for retaliation by the PLA officers underscored the domestic pressures on Beijing to deliver on its threats to punish the Obama administration over the arms sales. "Our retaliation should not be restricted to merely military matters, and we should adopt a strategic package of counter-punches covering politics, military affairs, diplomacy and economics to treat both the symptoms and root cause of this disease," said Luo Yuan, a researcher at the Academy of Military Sciences.

    Views: 68 Comments: 0

• Oxford student screams 'Kill the Jews' at Israe...

  It's not hate, though, it's just about a free Palestine. Sure.

  Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister was met by a protester screaming “slaughter the Jews” as he spoke at the Oxford Union. Antisemitic and anti-Israel abuse was shouted throughout Danny Ayalon’s speech on Monday evening, with students causing numerous disruptions to the event. During the hour-long session one student ran towards Mr Ayalon shouting the Arabic phrase “Itbah Al-Yahud” [Slaughter the Jews]. As many as 10 others, carrying Palestinian flags, made attempts to attack Mr Ayalon but were intercepted and removed by security.

    Views: 103 Comments: 0

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