The Politics of Hurry

So the Obama Administration uses the word “crisis” quite often, and as we’ve discussed before, Rahm Emanuel wholeheartedly approves. For a party that criticized the use of fear tactics after 9/11 in admonishing citizens for giving up their constitutional rights, there seems to be no end to their willingness to circumvent the legal processes that make up the checks and balances that have kept this type of naked power grab in check for over 200 years, but here we go anyway… The end result – bad legislation enacted as a result of the politics of hurry.

Let’s start with the most blatant overstepping of bounds with the czars…

Czars – on what Constitutional authority do these appointees of the President base their activities? Here’s the latest tally from Something New Every Day:

- Border Czar Alan Bersin
- Energy Czar Carol Browner
- Urban Czar Adolfo Carrion, Jr.
- Infotech Czar Vivek Kundra
- Faith-based Czar Joshua DuBois
- Health Reform Czar Nancy-Ann DeParle
- TARP Czar Herb Allison
- Stimulus Accountability Czar Earl Devaney
- Non-proliferation Czar Gary Samore
- Terrorism Czar John Brennan
- Regulatory Czar Cass Sunstein
- Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske
- Guantanamo Closure Czar Daniel Fried
- Great Lakes Czar Cameron Davis
- Special Master for Compensation Kenneth Feinberg
- Cybersecurity Czar (yet to be named)

Special envoys that fall into the czar category:

- Afghanistan/Pakistan special envoy Richard Holbrooke
- Mideast peace envoy George Mitchell
- Special Advisor for the Persian Gulf and Southwest Asia Dennis Ross
- Sudan special envoy J. Scott Gration
- Climate special envoy Todd Stern

Paygo – a legislative farce from both parties. Clever semantics meant to confuse the American people with the veil of fiscal responsibility. Notice that any talk of “paygo” only applies to spending they haven't discussed yet or it isn’t applicable to the grandiose plans they have already pitched with no ability to pay for.

Stimulus – the 1st real emergency: No measureable effect whatsoever - especially in the "saved jobs" category. They projected top unemployment at 8%. It is currently at 9.4%. Biden says they “guessed wrong”. Less than 15% has been spent. What happened to shovel-ready? We can’t afford for them to “guess” on this level.

How’s this for an example of shovel-ready? A perfect example of how the administration is not thinking things through clearly in their rush to pass emergency legislation: The massive stimulus bill that added a whopping $25 per week to many Americans paychecks has now made hundreds of thousands ineligible to continue receiving their food stamp benefits. With the generosity of the government, they took more away from the families they purport to protect the most. The government giveth, and then they taketh away.

Bailout – the ongoing emergency: TARP money can be paid back – but not all of it… only limited amounts as the government sees fit. Now, repayments are being viewed as revolving funds – which also STILL have no Constitutional authority. This is another example of what happens once you give the government a new power or the right to impose a new tax – It. Never. Goes. Away.

GM/Chrysler bankruptcy settlements – the too-big-to-fail emergency: The UAW came out with larger chunks of ownership in both companies which is really strange because they had NO ownership going in! Not to mention this injustice was committed at the expense of secured creditors such as retirement and pension funds. The President has absolutely NO CONSTITUTIONAL AUTHORITY to make these decisions, strike deals, or use funds in this manner. The bigger question is will they be willing to make the hard decisions they forced management into these past 10-20 years?

Meanwhile, the government continues to repay their unions buddies in the overnight and airline industries by changing the rules of operation for successful companies to now benefit unions by making it easier for them to organize. Small insertions into the turbo legislation now modifies the Railway Labor Act to benefit companies like UPS, but more so the Teamsters – who desperately want to organize at FedEx. UPS has no problems with this since it will hurt FedEx. Neither does the union. Big surprise. I use this as an example of liberals bringing down efficient success instead of requiring others to step up and compete. Instead of all boats rising in the tide, all boats fall by draining the swamp.

Healthcare – the most pressing emergency (now for a decade or more...): This impending debacle will be paid for via a “downpayment” (notice that isn’t “pay-as-you-go”) by increasing taxes (on a dwindling segment of) on $250K earners to the tune of $634 Billion, plus yet-to-be-identified phantom savings of $313 billion that the White House parrots are calling “scoreable”. Does Obama stop to think that the same people he’s telling to take less for their services are the same people he expects to increase taxes on to pay for this exercise in socialized futility? Let’s hope this remains a challenge in Congress.

Climate change (cap and trade) – the manufactured emergency: We are the only civilized country willing to damage our own economy further by these unilateral policies. Don’t believe the hype.

And in all of this drunken spending that is so necessary to ward off impending doom that only the government can foresee, the apologists at NYT say this was all set in motion by Bush . Just can’t let go and take responsibility for once, can they?

I say the only thing we need to expedite is the days and weeks until the 2010 elections to stop this madness. It is nothing short of “sound-bite legislation” which cannot be good. Americans are already showing significant signs of buyer’s remorse as many polls will indicate. However, for now we can expect “the politics of hurry” to be the call over the Summer - as if we haven’t waited decades enough already, that this now has to be done in less than 5 weeks or the door will close forever.

Someone be sure to latch the windows too.

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