Well, well, well…. (h/t – Instapundit)

Even Speaker John A. Boehner of Ohio, who made battling earmarks a cornerstone of his Congressional career since his election in 1990, said he would not have predicted that Congress could kick the habit.

“Think of this fight we have had for 20 years,” Mr. Boehner said in a recent interview. “If somebody would have asked me, ‘Will you ever get there?’ I would have had my doubts.”

But through a confluence of events, Mr. Boehner and the rest of the anti-earmark crowd did get there; the impact of the decision by leaders of the House and the Senate to ban earmarks for at least the next two years is already being felt.

When House Republicans were searching for cuts to offer Senate Democrats as part of a temporary spending plan to avert a government shutdown, they were able to reach into accounts set aside for earmarks and find nearly $2.8 billion that would have previously gone to water projects, transit programs and construction programs. No earmarks, no need for that money, and the threat of an imminent shutdown was eased.

Lawmakers said the absence of earmarks also allowed for a more freewheeling debate on the House floor during consideration of the Republican plan to slash $61 billion from this year’s budget since Democrats and Republicans were not caught up in protecting the special provisions they had worked so hard to tuck into the spending bill.

ACTUAL change you can believe in.  Boehner’s Congress has already shown to be a better steward of our money than every Congress in a generation before.

-Bruce (GayPatriot)

Well, if you’re at war,Democrat, why are you fleeing to the safety of another jurisdiction instead of manning the battlements as most people do in such conflicts.

Do these guys have any regard for popular elections?

“It sounds like war to me, and I think that’s what he’s declared this (legislative) session,” [Indiana House Minority Leader Patrick] Bauer said.

He said Democrats are ready to negotiate but won’t return to the Statehouse until Republicans stop pushing their “radical agenda.”

Um, Patrick, so, you’re telling Republicans elected to a majority in last fall’s election that their agenda is “radical,” so you’re going to take your marbles and run away?   Last fall, Indiana voters elected more Republicans than Democrats to the Indiana House, ending your term as Speaker.  That means, you no longer get to set the agenda.

And just like his Wisconsin counterpart, Jon Richards, he describes majority Republicans’ attempts to advance their agenda as war.  What is it with these Democrats, can’t they accept it when Republicans win elections?

Just amazing that Mr. Bauer, after forty years in the legislature, many in the minority, could call it “war” when the party that won a majority of seats in the most recent elections, moves to advance its agenda through the legislative process.  If the agenda were so radical, Bauer should be able to peel off enough Republicans to vote against it.  Failing that, he and his fellow Democrats should easily be able to persuade Hoosiers to reject Republicans in 2012 and replace them with less radical Democrats.

But, no, Indiana House Democrats, like their Wisconsin Senate counterparts, are acting like spoiled children who can’t get their way and run for the hills, er, the state of Illinois.   Don’t see any Republicans running away in states where Democrats are in control.  Nor did we see it in 2009 where there were a lot more such states. (more…)

My, my, my, my, what is it with Democrats in Midwestern States.  They see their party lose seats in the state house and when a bill comes up, they oppose, they run for the hills, er, a neighboring state.

Now, they’re shutting down the legislature in the Hoosier State:

Seats on one side of the Indiana House were nearly empty today as House Democrats departed the the state rather than vote on anti-union legislation.

A source tells The Indianapolis Star that Democrats are headed to Illinois, though it was possible some also might go to Kentucky. They need to go to a state with a Democratic governor to avoid being taken into police custody and returned to Indiana.

The House came into session twice this morning, with only three of the 40 Democrats present. Those were needed to make a motion, and a seconding motion, for any procedural steps Democrats would want to take to ensure Republicans don’t do anything official without quorum.

All to protect the power and perks flowing to public employee unions through their privileged bargaining positions.  Oh, yeah, and the cash that flows from the state treasury to the public employee unions and into Democratic campaign coffers — and for ads on their (i.e. Democratic candidates’ behalf.

Somehow, I just don’t think these will play well with Indiana voters — or those in other jurisdictions.

FROM THE COMMENTS:  ILoveCapitalism offers:

I love how all this exposes the Democrat leaders’ real agenda. Not civility. Not unity. Not bi-partisanship. Not post-partisanship. Just clinging to political power – and its companion, political money.

When Democrat leaders say words like unity, civility, bi-partisanship, etc., they really mean that Republicans should cave into them; let them win. If Republicans win – and apparently are serious about their principles – then it all flies out the window

Despite my best efforts, my fellow Californians last November elected Jerry Brown to a 4-year term as governor.  And despite their low view of the state legislature, Golden State voters simultaneously returned Democrats to power there, even electing a dead Democrat to the state Senate.

Whether we Republican like it or not (and I do not like it, not one little bit), voters have empowered the Democratic Party to address our state’s manifold problems.

With this as background, I ask my liberal friends who are cheering the protests by public employee unions and their national Democratic allies in Wisconsin as well as the flight of that state’s Senate Democrats, how would you feel if minority Republicans behaved as your current “heroes” are behaving?

How would you react if Tea Party protesters, taking successive days off from work and shutting down important industries, besieged the state capitol in Sacramento, sporting signs comparing Governor Brown to Hitler, Stalin or Osama bin Laden and his policies to Nazism, Communism or Islamic extremism (or used a sexual slur to refer to the Democrats’ union allies)?  How would you feel if the Republican National Committee were helping organize these angry protests while their participants said there rallies were akin to recent uprisings against dictators?

How would you feel if Republican legislators walked off the job and fled to Reno, preventing the state legislature from reaching a quorum and acting on legislation in line with promises Brown made on the campaign trail?

Please, please, please, please before you praise the Wisconsin 14 and the union protests, answer those questions.

*and the pro-union protests.

Kudos to Governor Scott Walker and Republican in the state Senate for standing up to the obstructionist Democratic legislators who have decided that the best way to serve Wisconsin is to flee to Illinois.  Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald is playing hardball, saying that

. . . his chamber would meet Tuesday to act on non-spending bills and confirm some of the governor’s appointees even if the Democrats don’t show up — a scenario that should outrage their constituents.

Senate Democrats acknowledged that the 19 Republicans could pass any item that doesn’t spend state money in their absence. The budget-repair bill they have been blocking requires a quorum of 20 senators to pass, while other measures require only a simple majority of the chamber’s 33 members.

Of those 33 members, 17 were elected last November to a 4-year term, 11 of them, Republican and 6, Democrat.  The remaining 16, 8 Democrats and 8 Republicans, will be up in 2012.  Republican challengers are going to have an easy time crafting campaign ads against those 8 Democrats.  They’ll just remind voters that when the chamber to which they were elected voted on important matters facing the state, the Democrats were hiding outside the state.

Come 2013, look for an even more Republican Senate in the Badger State.

So says Moe Lane (via Little Miss Attila) in a short post that’s well worth your time.  Seems the unions know they’ve lost and are trying to find a way to save face.

Guess to the “milk cartoon” Democrats, elections are only over when Democrats win them.

Oh, and the concessions have caused Stacy McCain to quip,  ”So after all this protesting, now the unions want a ‘compromise’? Yeah, they’re losing this battle and they know it.”  (Via Instapundit.)  Just a reminder, they may have lost the battle for people’s hearts and minds, but they still haven’t lost it legislatively.

Recall that on Main Street USA, Democrats lost the health care battle, only to win it on Capitol Hill.  Still, a high school friend of Glenn Reynolds wonders if this is, “the high water mark of Liberal America? Will their push be broken? Is the tide turning? All eyes seem turned to the Wisconsin Capital, waiting for a result.”

FROM THE COMMENTS:  Louise B nails it:  ”The only reason the unions are agreeing to the financial cuts now is because they know if they keep the collective bargaining, they can reverse the financial cuts later.”

UPDATE:  Apparently, Wisconsin voters were aware of Scott Walker’s stands on unions when they elected him to office:

He has never tried to disguise his stance on the issues of the day, and if it can be said that “[u]nions have always been his piñata, over and over,” then one can hardly be taken by surprise by his stance on unions in general, or on public sector unions in particular.

And despite–or because of–this stance, the voters of Wisconsin elected him Governor in 2010, with a 6 point, 124,000-plus vote margin between himself and his opponent. Not a landslide, but not inconsequential either, especially given the fact that Walker has not shied away from stating clearly his public policy views. In doing so, the voters not only elected Walker, they endorsed his views, views he clearly articulated throughout his career in public life.

The relevant discussion did indeed take place last November.  Via Instapundit.  Read the whole thing.

Via the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential, we learn just how House Minority Leader treats those Democrats who didn’t back her in the vote for Speaker in the current Congress:  you lose your seat at the Democratic leadership table.

Rep. Dennis Cardoza suspected that his January vote against fellow California Democrat Nancy Pelosi for Speaker might cost him the informal leadership post he’s held for more than three years. He was right.

. . . .

“I felt that there was no soul-searching about why it happened after the election,” he explained. “I felt like the Speaker — because so many of the moderates had been defeated — that she tacked and the Caucus tacked hard left. It was so unrepresentative of what the message was of the American people and of my district, that I couldn’t — in good conscience and good faith — any longer support her candidacy.”

Emphasis added.

When Republicans and Democrats lose elections, they do the same thing, albeit in a slightly different manner; they blame Republicans.  Shortly, after their loss of Congress in 2006, Republicans began engaging in a bit of introspection, introspection which was intensified when they suffered further setbacks in 2008, coupled with the loss of the White House.

Introspective, many Republicans asked what had they done wrong (AKA “blaming” Republicans).  This week, we learned (yet again) that Democrats were doing something quite similar, pointing to Republican actions which caused their defeat in the 2010 elections.  And former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi trotted out the standard villain from their catalogue of demonology:  George W. Bush.

The San Francisco Democrat showed just how in denial she is on the day she handed over the gavelto the new Speaker, Republican John Boehner, when she listed her accomplishments, without considering that perhaps it just might have been those “accomplishments” which cost her that gavel.

Fascinating how the party accused of lacking the capability to admit its errors is the party which engages in introspection and the party supposedly composed of such smart folk is the one that refuses to question the merits of its policies — or accept that its policies (rather than the failings and/or machinations of its adversaries) could prevent its election.  Or secure its defeat.

For there to be a real change in the legislative landscape in 2011, Republicans elected to represent congressional districts or states in Washington must remember that they serve the people in those various jurisdictions and not the permanent denizens of the nation’s capital, a notion which many elected Republicans neglected in the past.

In her post on Republican investigations into Administration misconduct, Michelle Malkin reminds those Republicans of their duties:

Just a humble reminder: [Incoming House House Oversight Committee chairman Darrell] Issa’s job — and this goes for every GOP House leader — is not to mollify Beltway pundits.

Their job is not to manage White House p.r. and “reach across the aisle” and “get things done” for the sake of bipartisanship.

Their job is to protect taxpayers’ best interests, rein in a bloated, out-of-control federal government, and abide by their oaths of office.

Republicans need remember that Americans did not embrace the GOP this fall so much as they rejected the Democrats.  They gave us back our House majority on a kind of “trial basis.”  Should Republicans stand up to the Beltway establishment and for over-regulated individual and entrepreneur, they may well lose favor with the in-crowd in Washington, but retain the good will of the taxpaying folk beyond the Beltway for years to come.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo may well be one of the luckiest men in politics.   The son of a politician well loved in Democratic circles, he was tapped as Bill Clinton’s Secretary of Housing and Urban Development with little experience to qualify him for the job.

Just as he waltzed into that job, he practically walked into his current job.  When the then-scandal plagued incumbent bowed out of the race, Cuomo’s path to the Democratic nomination was unobstructed.  The Republican nominee imploded almost from the moment he first opened his mouth after he won his party’s contest for the Empire State’s top job.  Not just that, the GOP is all but dead in New York State.

To win, he just needed to keep his name on the ballot.  Now in office, he seems to be as politically skillful as he was lucky.  Although his party is beholden to the public employee unions, he knows he needs to stand up to them if he’s to solve the state’s fiscal problems.  And  with word that he’s seeking “a one-year salary freeze for state workers as part of an emergency financial plan he will lay out in his State of the State address on Wednesday”, it’s look like he’s prepared to do just that:

“The governor said during his campaign that the difficult financial times call for shared sacrifice,” said a senior administration official, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the governor’s address. “A salary freeze is obviously a difficult thing for many government workers, but it’s necessary if the state is going to live within its means.”

While the immediate budget savings from the freeze would be relatively modest — between $200 million and $400 million against a projected deficit in excess of $9 billion — achieving it would be politically meaningful.

And because such a step would not require legislative approval, Mr. Cuomo could achieve it while bypassing the Assembly speaker, Sheldon Silver, and the Democratic-controlled State Assembly, labor’s most powerful allies in Albany. (more…)

Incoming House Majority Leader Eric Cantor will be introducing a bill to repeal Obamacare.

He’s doing this exactly as it should be done, using simple language (well, as simple as legislative language gets) for total repeal.  The bill is short enough that the average Congressman could in the time it takes to make a latte.

Indeed, I’ve already read the whole thing — which is something that most Congressmen who voted for the original bill probably can’t say.

2010, Bob Cusack reports at the Hill, “was the year of the Tea Party“:

. . . the Tea Party was in many ways a net asset for the GOP as Republicans grabbed control of the House and cut into the Democratic majority in the Senate. 

However, there was collateral damage as Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.) and other Senate GOP hopefuls seen as the party’s best chance of winning general-election races were ousted in primaries. Some blamed Tea Party candidates for costing Republicans a Senate majority to go with their new majority in the House.

Now, the question will be whether 2011 becomes the year where the Republican House, consistent with Tea Party principles, rejects big-government programs and passes legislation repealing the statist initiatives passed in the 111th Congress while scaling back those federal programs which helped create the financial mess of 2008 and the ongoing economic downturn.

Let us hope that the powers that be in Washington, including some who held significant sway over Republicans like Castle, do not hold the influence they once did over elected Republicans.  And that instead Tea Party principles, nearly identical to those of a great man whose centennial we celebrate this year, guide those election officials.

2010 was indeed the year when the Tea Party helped transform the electoral landscape.  Maybe 2011 be the year when it transforms the legislative landscape. (more…)

To many on the left, including a number of leading members of the Democratic Party, whenever Republicans try to block big-government initiatives, they’re engaging in obstruction, as if progress requires ever more state interference in our lives.

They never seem to grasp that we believe the best way forward is with the least amount of government necessary to establish justice and insure domestic tranquility.  Progress comes not from the machinations of legislators and bureaucrats but through the actions of individuals and the private institutions we form in order to improve our lot and enjoy the benefits of mutual association

When conservatives try to legislate according to such progressive ideas, even if they know they are unlikely to see such legislation enacted given the conditions of the 112th Congress, Democrats are quick to describe their motivations as duplicitous or otherwise underhanded.  Just listen to what my Congressman (who himself has not worked in the private sector since the president was in grade school) has to say about the incoming House majority:

“I think what [Republicans are] going to do is try to keep on dramatizing the issues that they think are helpful to them,” [Henry] Waxman said. “The next two years I expect all their actions to be campaign oriented…. They’re all about messaging, they’re all about power, they’re all about politics. What they don’t seem to be concerned about is governing.”

So, you mean, trying to push the issues that matter to conservatives does not manifest a concern about governing?  Wonder why ol’ Henry just can’t accept that maybe, just maybe, they seek convey the message that they have heard those voters’ concerns as they use their power to act in accordance with the popular will and to advance the national interest.  I think that’s what called trying to govern. (more…)

Over at his blog, Michael Petrelis has put together a list of over 50 people, including yours truly, who have called for HRC’s Joe Solmonese to step down.  It’s fascinating that despite the change of power in the House in Washington, there is no talk for this Democratic partisan to step down from an ostensibly non-partisan organization.  Given his failure to understand the appeal of conservative ideas, Joe is ill-equipped to reach out to the new leadership in that chamber.

And while Republicans may not have won back the Senate, we learned yesterday that the power of those conservative ideas — and their advocates in the Tea Party — helped torpedo the Democrats’ omnibus spending bill.  If would seem that if an organization wanted to have influence in Washington, it would bring on leadership able to adapt to the new political climate.

Not to mention the problem that Solmonese hasn’t shown much of a knack for playing hardball with Washington Democrats, letting them play lip service to the agenda of HRC and other left-leaning gay groups while doing little to enact that agenda.

Now, while I have been as critical of Solmonese as I have been of “Equality California’s” Geoff Kors, in the wake of last month’s elections, I refrained from calling for the latter’s resignation.  Simply put, while Kors is equally as partisan as Solmonese, his strategy of backing Democrats paid off; his fellow partisans held onto power in the (once-)Golden State.  He would continue to have influence in Sacramento.

And yet Kors is the one stepping down while the only individuals calling for Solmonese to step down are activists, pundits and advocates outside his organization.

Guess HRC must have an agenda a bit different than that of actually advocating for gay Americans.  Perhaps, their real goal is turning out gay votes for Democratic politicians.

With all the goings-on in the lame-duck session of Congress, there is much to write about, but, I, alas, have had less time than I would like to keep up with the news and to follow the blogs.

In what little attention I have paid to the news, I have noticed how the president has blundered badly this week.  He neglected to consult his allies before he negotiated with his partisan adversaries on extending the Bush tax cuts and acted as if blind-sided by the criticism which ensued.  Surely, a politician has to be prepared for attacks from all sides.

Jennifer Rubin called his press conference earlier this week this “worst press conference  – ever“:

I don’t mean just for Obama. I mean any president. Or head of state. When I wrote this morning that he doesn’t do well in defeat, you didn’t know how right I was, huh? Let’s count the ways.

Calling Republicans “hostage takers.” Not helpful. Saying Republicans opposed middle class tax cuts. Not true — they wanted no tax increases for anyone. Accusing Republicans of holding out tax cuts for the rich as the “Holy grail.”

Others had similar reactions.  Asking us to “Remember all that nonsense from the David Brookses and Chris Buckleys of the world in 2008 about” Obama’s “first-class temperament”, Rand Simberg, for example, quipped, “It’s hard to take anything they tell us seriously, at this point.”  (Via Instapundit.)

In another post commenting how “glum” he was in his presser, Rubin found it yet another example of his difficulty in facing defeat. In “his post-election “shellacking” press conference,” Rubin observed, “he became peevish.”

Rubin’s former Commentary Contentions colleague Peter Wehner notes the contradictions in Obama’s campaign image and his record in office: (more…)

If my experience is a guide, then conservatives and other Californians skeptical and/or incredulous about Jerry Brown’s re-election last month are engaging in some pretty fascinating conversations about the once and future governor.  And while some believe his election does no bode well for the state, not all of us are certain his third term will be a disaster.

I’ve even wondered if his eccentricity could serve us well.  He may well be beholden to no interest, least of all the all-powerful public employee unions.

But, our expectations run the gamut from one woman suggesting that he’s going to be a very good governor because he wants to erase the stain of his past tenure while yet another believes that he’ll hold the line on spending and stand up to interest groups because he knows this one’s for the history books and given his age (he’s 72), he has no intention to run for reelection in 2014.  He won’t thus be concerned about burning bridges to the groups who helped him win this time around and whose support would be essential to securing the Democratic nomination and another term.  His concern is not the minutiae of electoral policies, but leaving the stand on sound fiscal footing to secure his legacy.

What is striking is that while many conservatives, including yours truly, are skeptical that he will serve the state well, some, also including yours truly, wonder if maybe he’ll surprise us all.  But, incredulous we may be that our fellow Californians elected him (despite his record), when we talk about the incoming Brown Administration, we’re not all forecasting doom.  And we’re having some pretty fascinating conversations, speculating about how he’ll govern.

But, once he takes office, our conversations about his Administration may be less stimulating (as they must needs become less speculative) as we will find out which scenario plays out.

*NB:  Title tweaked after initial publication.

Apologies for the slow blogging, but have been quite busy editing the final draft of my dissertation.  Via Hotair, caught something revealing would-be Democratic Senate Leader Charles Schumer said:

Schumer, who handily won re-election this year, acknowledged the anger vented by tea partyers and others during the election but insisted that didn’t extend to upper-income tax cuts.

Voters “did say ‘repeal health care,’ they did say ‘reduce the size of government.’ But not a single one of them from the tea party or anywhere said ‘give tax breaks to the wealthiest,’” Schumer said in a rare moment of candor.

This led Allahpundit to quip:

So the midterms were a referendum on repealing ObamaCare, by the Democrats’ own admission? There’s your tax-cut compromise, then: Republicans will agree to let the cuts lapse for households earning over a quarter mil in return for the left agreeing to torpedo our new health-care boondoggle, per the voters’ wishes according to none other than Charles Schumer himself.

There you have it fellas (& gals), Charles Schumer believes voters want to reduce the size of government and repeal Obamacare.  I trust this Democrat to get the ball rolling on helping them achieve these goals.

From her new berth at the Washington Post, the Hebrew Athena alerts us to a striking new poll:

In November, 36.0% of American Adults identified themselves as Republicans; 34.7% considered themselves Democrats, and 29.3% were not affiliated with either major party. That’s the largest number of Republicans since February 2005 and the first time ever that Rasmussen Reports polling has found more people identifying as Republicans than Democrats.

Interesting trend.  Let’s see if it holds up once Republicans take over in the House.  If they hold true to the Reagan/Tea Party principles of more personal and economic freedom and a less intrusive governments, methinks the trend will hold.

Shortly after last month’s elections when Republicans recaptured Congress, I had planned a post, urging Republicans not to repeat the mistake they made just after the 1994 elections when, in the race for House Majority Whip, they rejected the principled Bob Walker for the opportunistic Tom DeLay.  That one-time Republican leader was back in the news as I prepared to travel to San Francisco to celebrate Thanksgiving with the most important person in the state (my now 2-year-old nephew); the Texan “was convicted [last] Wednesday on charges he illegally funneled corporate money to Texas candidates in 2002“.

While I believe it’s likely the conviction will be overturned on appeal, I did not shed a tear for DeLay.  More than any other Republican leader in the House, he was responsible for abandoning “The Spirit of ’94″ and focusing on building a permanent Republican majority, not on conservative principles, but on lobbyist connections (and financing).  Had he not led the Republicans away from the small-government principles which secured their election in 1994, they may well have had a more lasting majority.

For Tom Delay Republicans, politics was about power not principles.  And in a republic, you can’t hold onto power very long unless you stand for something beyond its maintenance.

Fortunately, the incoming majority party’s slate lacked any Tom DeLays, with its leadership representing a diverse array of conservative opinion.  While incoming Speaker John Boehner supported the TARP bailouts, incoming House Republican Conference Chairman Jeb Hensarling,  in the words of former House Majority Leader Dick Armey,  having “the best voice in opposition” to TARP.

There will be no Tom DeLays in the Republican leadership of the 112th Congress.  And that’s a good thing for the GOP.

FROM THE COMMENTS: DaveP reminds us, “The other thing to remember about Tom DeLay is what an abject failure his ‘K-Street’ program actually turned out to be in practice. Never forget that.” Good point.

Since I mentioned Tim Scott in a post I wrote on the high number of racially motivated attacks on black Americans, I wanted to share with you something I read about the election of this fine man to Congress.  Politico reported than the “89-year-old grandfather” of the Congressman-elect  ’was with him [on the] Tuesday night . . .  he won a seat in South Carolina’s 1st District“.  Born in 1921, Scott’s grandfathter would have thus, according to the Second Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution (later amended by the 26th), been eligible vote in 1942 .

Four years later, Strom Thurmond would win election as governor of the Palmetto State.  It’s highly unlikely that Scott’s grandfather voted in that election despite his eligibility, given that Southern states then prevented most black citizens from registering to vote.

Sixty-four years after Scott’s grandfather likely was unable to vote in the contest electing Strom Thurmond to the chief executive officer of South Carolina, that old man would see his grandson defeat Thurmond’s son in the Republican primary for a congressional seat in that very state.

And given dissatisfaction on the right with the man who succeeded Thurmond in the U.S. Senate, four years hence, Tim Scott could well be the conservative choice to fill the U.S. Senate seat of the one-time champion of segregation.

Let us hope Tim Scott’s grandfather is around to vote for him in that election.