wiyakpa

You guys really need to get over this bs if you had one shred of proof of any of the allegations this would have went somewhere by now. For eight year’s the Clinton's were accused of more crimes then Al Capone that went no where to the point of hiring Ken Starr, his seven-year probe cost the tax payers $70 million and for what? At the end of the day who ended up in prison. Ken Starr is for stealing millions in a Ponzi scheme. Did we not learn anything from this time

Kurdistan Region president Massoud Barzani received on Tuesday Special Representative of the United Nations Secretary-General (SRSG) for Iraq Mr. Martin Kobler and his accompanying delegation in his office in Erbil. During the meeting, the two sides discussed future security and political situation in iraq after US troops withdrawals at the end of the year. shedding light on implementing article 140 of iraqi constitution. UN will continue to find suitable way to implement the article 140. President Barzani expressed his delight with the UN’s role in addressing the problems and implementing the article 140, expressing his support to UN in a bid to succeed its role in implanting the article 140. They also discussed the current political situation in the region in general and Syria in particular. Read more: http://dinarvets.com.../#ixzz1fEevkIA6

North Dakota: Measure to get rid of property tax on ballot Mon, May 2 2011 — Source: Valley News Live A proposed constitutional amendment to abolish property taxes in North Dakota has been approved for the ballot. Secretary of State Al Jaeger said Friday the initiative had enough petition signatures to qualify for the June 2012 primary election. It will be listed as Measure 2. http://www.citizensincharge.org/news/north-dakota-measure-to-get-rid-of-property-tax-on-ballot

could have something to do with the article that came out about the fall of there economy China: Heading for a Bust China's economy has turned from boom to bust with alarming speed. Read more: http://dinarvets.com/forums/index.php?/topic/93213-china-heading-for-a-bust/#ixzz1f9oxUPhQ

HR 2112 Appropriations for Agriculture, Rural Development, and the Food and Drug Administration - Voting Record Date: Nov. 17, 2011 Issues: Education, Health Issues, Agriculture Issues, Budget, Spending and Taxes Bill: Appropriations for Agriculture, Rural Development, and the Food and Drug Administration Roll Number: 857 Yea: 298 Nay: 121 Conference Report Adopted (House) http://www.votesmart.org/bill/votes/37381 HR 2112 Appropriations for Agriculture, Rural Development, and the Food and Drug Administration - Voting Record Date: Nov. 17, 2011 Issues: Education, Health Issues, Agriculture Issues, Budget, Spending and Taxes Bill: Appropriations for Agriculture, Rural Development, and the Food and Drug Administration Roll Number: 208 Yea: 70 Nay: 30 Conference Report Adopted (Senate) http://www.votesmart.org/bill/votes/37382 looks like all but a hundred and fifty one (151)elected people voted for this

NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2012 -- (Senate - November 17, 2011) AMENDMENT NO. 1084 Mr. KIRK. Mr. President, I wish to speak on the pending amendment. I rise in support of the Kirk-Manchin-Heller and Blunt amendment regarding Iran. What we know with regard to Iran is that they have persecuted 330,000 Baha'is in their country, registered their houses, kicked their kids out of university, made sure that they can do no business with the Iranian Government. We know Iran is the chief sponsor of the terrorist group Hezbollah that has had a grip on southern Lebanon. We know Iran jumped the Shiite divide to also support the terrorist group called Hamas in the Sunni community. We know Iran has been a state sponsor of terror as certified by Presidents Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush, and Obama. We know Iran recently sentenced an Iranian actress to 90 lashes for appearing in an Australian movie without a headdress. We know Iran recently arrested 70 of its fashion designers, for crimes I cannot even imagine that they would have committed. But, most importantly, we know the International Atomic Energy Agency has certified that now Iran has enriched uranium far beyond what it needs to run a civilian reactor program; that Iranian military personnel have been involved in acquiring information on the design of nuclear weapons; that the Iranians are working on the details of a warhead for their Shahab-3 missile that fits all of the profiles of a nuclear weapon. Finally, we know, according to the Attorney General of the United States, Eric Holder, that Iran and its Iranian Revolutionary Guards Quds force established a bomb plot with the Mexican cartel, the Zetas, to blow up a Georgetown restaurant, to kill a number of Americans, even talked about possibly killing Senators, in an effort to assassinate the Saudi Arabian Ambassador to the United States here in Washington, DC. I think it is clear with this bipartisan amendment that we all recognize we are at a turning point and that we need new sanctions against Iran. Without crippling sanctions, I believe we have then turned the international community on the path toward war, likely between Iran and our allies, in Israel. This would cause a needless loss of life. It would lead to higher energy prices for the West, an increase in instability in Europe when we can least afford it. Therefore, we need to level crippling sanctions, especially against the Iranian center of gravity, the Central Bank of Iran. The Central Bank of Iran is the principal funder of the Ahmadinejad regime itself. It is probably the source of funds so substantially provided to terrorist groups by Iran to Hamas and Hezbollah. It is the Central Bank of Iran that is supporting operations in Afghanistan and Iraq against our allies there. It is the Central Bank of Iran that is the principal underlying financial support for the Iranian nuclear program, and the Central Bank of Iran that is the paymaster for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards force, especially their Quds force. Likely the money that was planned for the Zetas to carry out the bomb plot in Washington, DC, had its origin point with the Central Bank of Iran. That is why 92 Senators, Republicans and Democrats, despite these partisan times, have joined to say we should level this crippling sanction against the Central Bank of Iran. I thank the 92 Senators who signed the Schumer-Kirk letter. Indications are that the Obama administration is going to take further actions on the Central Bank of Iran. This amendment lays out the full roadmap for what we should do. What does the amendment do? It is patterned after the bipartisan amendment adopted under the authorship of Democratic California Congressman Howard Berman, unanimously adopted in the House Foreign Affairs Committee, that says for any business, if you do business with the Central Bank of Iran, you cannot do business with the United States of America. We know that world financial arrangements and especially oil markets are complicated instruments, so under this bipartisan amendment we have a 180-day timeclock to make sure that especially key allies and friends of the United States can unhook from Iranian oil and the financial ties that bind them to Iran. This is particularly important for Turkey, for Sri Lanka, for Italy, and for Greece, who would all use that time under this amendment to unhook from Iran. In this, I think we are going to have a very willing partner in the Government of Saudi Arabia, recently obviously focused on, because the Iranians tried to kill their Ambassador to the United States. I will be meeting with that Ambassador tomorrow. I think this amendment lays the groundwork not just to work with Israel, not just to work with Saudi Arabia, but our allies, to collapse the Central Bank. Without action, I think we turn the Middle East and especially the Persian Gulf toward war. That is why we should take every nonmilitary action possible to avoid that conflict, to collapse the Central Bank of Iran. There are a number of bipartisan heroes in this story--Senator Lieberman, who has been a key actor on these issues and a partner with me on many of these issues; Senator Gillibrand also who has helped out; obviously Senator Schumer, who was the coauthor of the 92-Senator letter on the Central Bank of Iran; Senator Menendez, who also has an outstanding idea on creating an Iranian oil-free zone; and obviously my bipartisan partner on this and best friend in the Senate, Senator Manchin, who joined me on this effort. Together, we can have a clear statement about what has happened with the IAEA and the Iranian nuclear program, with their record on human rights, with their record on support for terrorism and, most importantly, according to the Attorney General, with a brazen attempt to attack the United States directly with this bomb plot. http://thomas.loc.go...p/~r112CjRYsk:: "Nuclear Option" Against Iran's Economy Paves Way for War Wednesday 16 November 2011 by: Kate Gould, Friends Committee on National Legislation [3] | Op-Ed The drumbeat for another round of draconian sanctions against Iran is growing louder on Capitol Hill. While Illinois Senator Mark Kirk's proposed legislation [4] to “collapse the Central Bank of Iran” was intended to be attached to the now-stalled international affairs funding bill, the pressure from Congress for another round of indiscriminate sanctions continues to build. Some U.S. officials have called sanctioning Iran’s Central Bank “the nuclear option” [5] because it would deal a devastating blow to the teetering global economy, and inflict untold human suffering in Iran. Still, such an initiative is expected to receive overwhelming bipartisan support, following a letter [5]Senators Kirk and Charles Schumer wrote to the administration calling for the administration to impose sanctions on the Central Bank of Iran, which 92 senators have signed. The Kirk initiative this week appears to be similar to one offered by Rep. Howard Berman [6] in the House Foreign Affairs Committee last week, and would effectively bind the administration into imposing sanctions against the Central Bank of Iran. The committee approved Berman's amendment. The Obama administration has signaled that it won't immediately seek sanctions on the Central Bank of Iran because, as the Los Angeles Times reported [8], “U.S. officials have decided that such sanctions could disrupt oil markets and further damage the U.S. and world economies”. Nobody mentioned these concerns during the Republican presidential candidate debate on November 12 in South Carolina, where candidates enthusiastically endorsed U.S. sanctioning of the Central Bank of Iran, along with calls for military action against Iran and funding violence through ‘insurgents’ in Iran. What if Iranians Created a Banking Crisis in the U.S.? You don't have to be an economist to understand that the most vulnerable sectors of any society bear the brunt of any economic crisis and that shutting down any economy in the world would damage the global economy. The full extent of economic consequences from U.S. sanctions on the Central Bank is still unclear, but the fact that the explicit goal of these broad sanctions is to destroy the Iranian economy is deeply troubling in and of itself. Many proponents of broad sanctions argue that inflicting such widespread suffering—either directly or through the Iranian people—will pressure the Iranian government to change course. For example, Rep. Sherman [9] (CA), a prominent proponent of broad sanctions against Iran, has gone so far as to endorse sanctions because they would cause suffering, writing in an August 9, 2010 op-ed in The Hill that “critics.... argued that [sanctions on Iran] will hurt the Iranian people. Quite frankly, we need to do just that.” [9] However, as Professor Robert Pape [10] of the University of Chicago pointed out at a recent congressional briefing [10], manufacturing an economic crisis in Iran is not likely to persuade the Iran government to abandon its abandon its pursuit of a nuclear weapons capability, nor would it be likely to persuade the Iranian people to submit to U.S. wishes. “Imagine, if you would, the Iranians were suddenly able in one single day to create a banking crisis in the United States that made it impossible for us to cash our checks…I don’t think it would make us do what Iran wanted,” Dr. Pape said. Dr. Pape has also pointed out that while sanctions are often marketed as a substitute for war, “economic sanctions are often a prelude to using military force.” [10] Once sanctions fail—as they almost always do—proponents for war use the failure of sanctions to justify military confrontation. In the case of Iran in particular, more than three decades of U.S. sanctions have failed to prevent Iran from pursuing a nuclear weapons capability. Indiscriminate Sanctions Pave Path to War Based on a comprehensive study of modern-day sanctions [10], Dr. Pape found that sanctions have failed to achieve their objectives in 95.7% of cases since World War I, and that sanctions are three times more likely to end in military conflict than success. While the U.S. did join the U.N. Security Council in imposing sanctions on Iraq and Libya, which ultimately ended in war, if the U.S. were to impose sanctions on the Central Bank of Iran, it would be the first time that the U.S. has ever imposed unilateral and extraterritorial sanctions on a central bank. Among other functions, the Central Bank of Iran regulates Iranian currency, just as the Federal Reserve regulates the U.S. dollar. Since central banks are accorded sovereign immunity, some argue [11] that it contravenes international law to sanction the Central Bank of Iran. Some Iranian officials have declared that any sanctions on the Central Bank would be treated as an act of war [12]. Sanctioning Iran’s Central Bank would be yet another blow to prospects for a diplomatic resolution to Iran’s nuclear program, at the expense of the global economy and the Iranian people. The U.N.'s Children Agency (UNICEF [13]) estimated that the oil embargo on Iraq, which included sanctions on Iraq’s Central Bank, contributed to the deaths of half a million children [13], which could be repeated after additional rounds of broad sanctions against Iran. Rather than prevent war, sanctioning the Central Bank would harden the resolve of the proponents for war in both the U.S. and Iran, and would give Iran's hardliners further incentive to pursue nuclear weapons as an attempt to deter a U.S. attack. http://www.truth-out...-war/1321457643

WHY do you want to bring my people into this garbage?

because as I stated this is a bond auction( not a currency auction ) just like the fed does there selling t-bills

This is there bond auction listing and is old news it’s the fist one that they have had for a while. There is no currency auction(what most are used to seeing posted) for today as it’s a holiday

Keystone XL The Keystone XL extension was proposed in 2008.[9] The application was filed in the beginning of 2009 and the National Energy Board of Canada started hearings in September 2009.[10] It was approved by the National Energy Board on March 11, 2010.[11] The South Dakota Public Utilities Commission granted a permit on February 19, 2010.[12] The pipeline, however, has faced strong opposition from the environmental community. In its March 2010 report, the Natural Resources Defense Council stated that "the Keystone XL Pipeline undermines the U.S. commitment to a clean energy economy", instead delivering dirty fuel from oil sands and high costs.[13] On June 23, 2010, 50 Members of Congress spoke out against the Keystone XL pipeline. In their letter to Secretary of State Hillarious Clinton, they warned that "building this pipeline has the potential to undermine America's clean energy future and international leadership on climate change."[14][15] On July 6, 2010, House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman Henry Waxman urged the State Department to block Keystone XL, saying in a letter to the department that "this pipeline is a multi-billion dollar investment to expand our reliance on the dirtiest source of transportation fuel currently available".[16][17] On July 21, 2010, the Environmental Protection Agency said the draft environmental impact study for Keystone XL was inadequate and should be revised,[18][19] indicating that the State Department's original report was "unduly narrow" because it didn't fully look at oil spill response plans, safety issues and greenhouse gas concerns.[20] The final environmental impact report was released on August 26, 2011. It stated that the pipeline would pose "no significant impacts" to most resources if environmental protection measures are followed, but it would present "significant adverse effects to certain cultural resources". The final decision is expected by the end 2011.[21] In November 2011, TransCanada announced that it would work with the U.S. Department of State and Nebraska to define a new pipeline route to avoid the Sandhills region and Ogallala aquifer in Nebraska.[22][23] hmm doesnt even come close to the bs that Donald Ferguson is putting out. Warren Buffett bought out the last of bnsf in feb 2010 so looks like he is wrong there also

[ Hell, the unions were one of the biggest reasons for the financial problems of the US car manufacturers. On Dec. 20, 2008, the Bush administration made a bailout loan to G.M. of $4 billion available Dec. 29, $5.4 billion on Jan. 16, 2009, and $4 billion on Feb. 17 DETROIT -- The President and CEO of Ford Motor Co. received a pay package valued at $26.5 million in 2010, up 48 percent from 2009, according to an analysis by The Associated Press. Akerson, of course, is the CEO of General Motors, the former ward of the government that is now just a part-ward of the government. GM said today Akerson’s annualized target pay package is valued at $9 million. Akerson was named CEO just on September 1, so he didn’t pull in that whole package for the year. GM valued his actual 2010 compensation at $2.53 million, reported Deal Journal colleague Sharon Terlep. That figure includes $1.77 million in stock awards and a $566,667 salary just by way of comparison, one of Akerson’s predecessors — former GM CEO Rick Wagoner Jr. — pulled down total pay valued at $14.4 million for 2007, before GM fell apart and needed an unprecedented taxpayer-supported trip through bankruptcy court The highest-paid executive at Chrysler, Sergio Marchionne, who is head of both Chrysler and Italy's Fiat, is not affected by the pay restrictions because he receives his salary from Fiat. The pay czar's filing showed that the second-highest paid executive at Chrysler will receive $500,000 in cash salary this year and total compensation of $1.18 million. yep sure looks like its all the unions fault

sorry but this is already posted

wrong again The Truth: A spokesperson at the White House told TruthorFiction.com that no such letter came from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington DC. This eRumor may have been sparked in 2009 by a project with the U.S.D.A. Forest Service in Arizona in connection with the nation's Christmas tree that is destined for the National Mall in Washington, D.C.. Each year one of the 50 states contributes a huge tree for the occasion. In 2009, the Christmas tree was an 85-foot blue spruce from the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forests in Arizona. As a part of the project, the Forest Service invited elementary students to send in 5,000 hand-made ornaments for the tree. The Alliance Defense Fund, which defends religious liberties, said that initial instructions for the students specified that the ornaments needed to be 9-12 inches tall, able to endure cold winter weather, include a loop of wire for hanging, be able to be seen at least 75 feet away, and could "not reflect religious or political themes." An outcry of protest resulted and the Forest Service rescinded the prohibition of religious themes saying that it was a mistake that it was ever communicated that way A spokesperson for the Alliance Defense Fund told TruthorFiction.com that it program organizers that "The First Amendment does not allow government officials to exclude schoolchildren's ornaments for the capitol's Christmas tree merely because they communicate a religious viewpoint." Jim Payne, a U.S.D.A. Forest Service spokesman, said that the guidelines came from" old information posted on the U.S. Capitol Christmas tree website and has since been removed." Payne added that weather proofing and size are the only restrictions for the submitted ornaments. The Forest Service has the criteria for Christmas Ornaments posted on their website: Click for U.S.D.A Forest Service site. Christmas at the White House is annual tradition and each year volunteers assemble to deck the halls. Each year smaller Christmas trees are delivered to the White House to add to the holiday decoration throughout the mansion as well as one large tree to be placed and decorated in the Blue Room. The 2010 Christmas tree, an 18 1/2 foot Pennsylvania grown Douglas Fir, was delivered to the Executive Mansion on November 26th. http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/c/christmas-ornaments-white-house.htm Attend the National Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony Posted by Megan Slack on November 03, 2011 at 04:11 PM EDT Want to attend this year’s National Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony? The event is free and open to the public, and will be held Thursday, December 1 at 5:00 p.m. on the Ellipse of President’s Park. Tickets are available through an online lottery system, open now through 10:00 a.m. EST on Monday, November 7. http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog

not to lazzy no more about him then most .. and that is nothing for 24 yrs of service and most of those never voted were just that he passes on more votes then he votes against

I know I will probably get bashed to death for this but I have to ask anyway ..What has Ron Paul done for us in his 24 + yrs as a congressmen ?

Funny how its not listed on the federal registry 2011 Executive Orders Disposition Tables Barack Obama - 2011 Executive Order 13563 Improving Regulation and Regulatory Review Signed: January 18, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 3821, January 21, 2011 See: EO 12866, September 30, 1993; EO 13579, July 11, 2011 Executive Order 13564 Establishment of the President's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness Signed: January 31, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 6309, February 3, 2011 Revokes: EO 13501, February 6, 2009 Executive Order 13565 Establishment of the Intellectual Property Enforcement Advisory Committees Signed: February 8, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 7681, February 11, 2011 Top of Page Executive Order 13566 Blocking Property and Prohibiting Certain Transactions Related to Libya Signed: February 25, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 11315, March 2, 2011 Top of Page Executive Order 13567 Periodic Review of Individuals Detained at Guantanamo Bay Naval Station Pursuant to the Authorization for Use of Military Force Signed: March 7, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 13277, March 10, 2011 See: EO 13491, January 22, 2009; EO 13492, January 22, 2009 Top of Page Executive Order 13568 Extending Provisions of the International Organizations Immunities Act to the Office of the High Representative in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the International Civilian Office in Kosovo Signed: March 8, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 13497, March 11, 2011 Top of Page Executive Order 13569 Amendments to Executive Orders 12824, 12835, 12859, and 13532, Reestablishment Pursuant to Executive Order 13498, and Revocation of Executive Order 13507 Signed: April 5, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 19891, April 8, 2011 Amends: EO 12824, December 7, 1992; EO 12835, January 25, 1993; EO 12859, August 16, 1993; EO 13532, February 26, 2010 Revokes: EO 13507, April 8, 2009 See: EO 13498, February 5, 2009 Top of Page Executive Order 13570 Prohibiting Certain Transactions With Respect to North Korea Signed: April 18, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 22291, April 20, 2011 See: EO 13466, June 26, 2008; EO 13551, August 30, 2010 Top of Page Executive Order 13571 Streamlining Service Delivery and Improving Customer Service Signed: April 27, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 24339, May 2, 2011 See: EO 12862, September 11, 1993; Memoranda of March 22, 1995, and March 3, 1998 Top of Page Executive Order 13572 Blocking Property of Certain Persons With Respect to Human Rights Abuses in Syria Signed: April 29, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 24787, May 3, 2011 See: EO 13338, May 11, 2004; EO 13399, April 25, 2006; EO 13460, February 13, 2008; EO 13573, May 18, 2011; EO 13582, August 17, 2011 Top of Page Executive Order 13573 Blocking Property of Senior Officials of the Government of Syria Signed: May 18, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 29143, May 20, 2011 See: EO 13338, May 11, 2004; EO 13399, April 25, 2006; EO 13460, February 13, 2008; EO 13572, April 29, 2011; EO 13582, August 17, 2011 Top of Page Executive Order 13574 Authorizing the Implementation of Certain Sanctions Set Forth in the Iran Sanctions Act of 1996, as Amended Signed: May 23, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 30505, May 25, 2011 See: EO 12957, March 15, 1995 Top of Page Executive Order 13575 Establishment of the White House Rural Council Signed: June 9, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 34841, June 14, 2011 Top of Page Executive Order 13576 Delivering an Efficient, Effective, and Accountable Government Signed: June 13, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 35297, June 16, 2011 Top of Page Executive Order 13577 Establishment of the SelectUSA Initiative Signed: June 15, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 35715, June 20, 2011 Top of Page Executive Order 13578 Coordinating Policies on Automotive Communities and Workers Signed: July 6, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 40591, July 11, 2011 Revokes: EO 13509, June 23, 2009 Top of Page Executive Order 13579 Regulation and Independent Regulatory Agencies Signed: July 11, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 41587, July 14, 2011 See: EO 12866, September 30, 1993; EO 13563, January 18, 2011 Top of Page Executive Order 13580 Interagency Working Group on Coordination of Domestic Energy Development and Permitting in Alaska Signed: July 12, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 41989, July 15, 2011 See: EO 13547, June 19, 2010 Top of Page Executive Order 13581 Blocking Property of Transnational Criminal Organizations Signed: July 24, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 44757, July 27, 2011 Top of Page Executive Order 13582 Blocking Property of the Government of Syria and Prohibiting Certain Transactions With Respect To Syria Signed: August 17, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 52209, August 22, 2011 See: EO 13338, May 11, 2004; EO 13399, April 25, 2006; EO 13460, February 13, 2008; EO 13572, April 29, 2011; and EO 13573, May 18, 2011 Top of Page <a href="http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2011-08-23/pdf/2011-21704.pdf" class="pdfImage">Executive Order 13583 Establishing a Coordinated Government-wide Initiative to Promote Diversity and Inclusion in the Federal Workforce Signed: August 18, 2011 Federal Register page and date: 76 FR 52847, August 23, 2011 See: EO 13078, March 13, 1998; EO 13163, July 26, 2000; EO 13171, October 12, 2000; EO 13518, November 9, 2009; and EO 13548, July 26, 2010 http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/executive-orders/2011.html

President Obama Enacted the Dream Act by Executive Order-Fiction! Summary of the eRumor: This is a forwarded rumor that says the Dream Act, a bill that grants permanent resident status to immigrants under certain conditions, was enacted into law by President Obama by Executive Order on June 24, 2011. The Truth: There is a Dream Act but there no such White House Executive Order enacting it into law. The Dream Act is a bill that was fist introduced in the Senate back in 2001. This bill would grant conditional permanent resident status for certain long-term residents who entered the united states as children, if they met certain criteria. The word DREAM is an acronym for Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors. The Hill, a newspaper that reports on the daily business in Congress while it is in session, has been following the progress of this act and in a May 11, 2011 article said the Dream Act would include immigrants whose parents brought them to the United States illegally when they were children. According to the text of the Dream Act, some of the conditions that must be met by immigrants are that they must currently be residing in the United States and have a "good moral character during the entire period of conditional permanent resident status." Eligibility can also be granted to those who have "acquired a degree from an institution of higher education in the United States or has completed at least 2 years, in good standing, in a program for a bachelor's degree or higher degree in the United States." There is also a condition for those who have served or are currently serving in the U. S. Military for at least 2 years. If they are no longer serving and have been discharged they must show proof of an honorable discharge. Over the years, the bill has failed to pass in both the House of Representatives and the Senate, which are the two necessary steps for a bill before it can be signed into law by the President. The Dream act has been brought up a number of times since 2001. The last time, in 2010 before the 111th Congress under the leadership of Nancy Pelosi. Congress passed the bill on December 8, 2010 but it was met by tough opposition from the Senate according to an article posted that day in The Hill. The bill was brought up again before the Senate and the House of Representatives on May 11, 2011 and on June 1 it was referred to the House subcommittee. Currently the Congressional Bill is HR-1842. Text of the bill and status information can be found by clicking this link. The Senate Bill is S-952 and the text of the bill and status information can be found by clicking this link. updated 8/15/11 A real example of the eRumor as it has appeared on the Internet: Check out what happened on Friday (6-24-2011) Dream Act: Obama passes amnesty by executive order Written by Gil Guign at Border & Immigration Breaking News Featured June 23, 2011 Arizona Last Friday with no fan fare no press coverage and with every effort made to hide his actions from the American people, President Obama, enacted the DREAM Act by executive order. Opposed by a majority of the American people and twice defeated in Congress the DREAM Act grants amnesty to any illegal alien residing in the United States if she/he agrees to enlist in the U.S. Military or enter college. The Obama administration memo from the John Morton Director of I.C.E. (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) directs I.C.E. Agents now to use prosecutorial discretion with regard to enforcing immigration laws. Director Morton says that Obama Administration policy directs border patrol agents not to enforce immigration laws: When ICE favorably exercises prosecutorial discretion it essentially decides not to assert the full scope of the enforcement authority available to the agency. You read that right. According to the Obama administration, favorable enforcement means NOT enforcing the law! According to one of the first press reports to break this important story the new Obama policy is cut and dry: federal immigration officials do not have to deport illegal aliens if they are enrolled in any type of education program if their family members have volunteered for U.S. Military service or even if they are pregnant or nursing. Arizona and the voter ID law Just recently Obama�s Department of Justice (DOJ) blocked Arizona from enforcing its voter ID law. Arizona is one if not the biggest portal of illegal immigration in the nation with half a million illegal aliens coming through the sate annually. Arizona �s Attorney General Tom Horne recently stated that he believed that blocking of the law facilitated massive voter fraud by illegal aliens. Attorney General Tom Horne accused the Obama administration Tuesday of trying to thwart Arizona �s voter-ID laws in a bid to get more illegal immigrants to the polls presumably to cast ballots for the president and Democrats. Horne acknowledged that a brief filed by the Department of Justice in a case to be heard next month by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals centers around the agency�s argument that Arizona�s law requiring proof of citizenship to register is preempted by federal law. But Horne, a Republican, told Capitol Media Services he sees something more sinister. The 2012 presidential elections First we have amnesty passed by executive order, then we have President Obama�s DOJ blocking voter ID in Arizona . What could possibly be the president�s motive? This story has the potential to bring the Obama Administration to its knees. The momentum can be on our side and just e-mailing it to others can create a critical mass. Don�t assume you have no power. You do! If you are in favor of this, then by all means, delete this message. If you are not, then pass this along to help everyone realize just how much is at stake, knowing that apathy is the greatest danger to our freedom. This is truly scary! Of course we are not a democracy, we are a Constitutional Republic . Someone should point this out to Obama. Of course we know he and too many others pay little attention to The Constitution. There couldn't be more at stake than in Nov 2012. If you are as concerned as I am, please pass this along. as far as I can check this appears to be true. Some comments about allowing the ones in the military to be citizens makes me wonder HOW they were allowed to join in the first place. Was their ID so good that it passed without the government finding out they were illegal http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/o/Obama-Dream-Act-Executive-Order.htm

ac is am contractor not really worth the time for yrs he said we all illegally holding dinar it was never going anywhere bla bla bla and how in the Hizell did you change your statement w/o editing your post? I wanna have that editing power! am just good

reads like AC is back

ill probably get bashed to death for this but what has he done in congress for us in the last 24 yrs hes been drawing a Congressional pay check anything?

I didn't see or here one so I went looking on the net for it. no harm no foul still a good post

this is from oct 19-2009 http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2009a/10/130702.htm

if its so bad why is the NRA backing it? Hearing Scheduled for H.R. 822, the National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act of 2011 Friday, September 09, 2011 For months we have been reporting on a critically important bill: H.R. 822—the National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act of 2011. This vital NRA-backed legislation, introduced earlier this year by Congressmen Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) and Heath Shuler (D-N.C.) will enable millions of permit holders to exercise their right to self-defense while traveling outside their home states. Thanks to much hard work and action taken by NRA and our members, H.R. 822 has now garnered 242 cosponsors in the U.S. House. On Tuesday, September 13, the House Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security will hold a hearing on the bill. There is currently only one state (Illinois) that has no clear legal way for individuals to carry concealed firearms for self-defense. Forty states have permit systems that make it possible for any law-abiding person to obtain a permit, while most of the others have discretionary permit systems. (Vermont has never required a permit.) H.R. 822 would make a major step forward for gun owners' rights by significantly expanding where those permits are recognized. Dozens of states have passed Right-to-Carry laws over the past 25 years because the right to self-defense does not end when one leaves home. However, interstate recognition of those permits is not uniform and creates great confusion and potential problems for travelers. While many states have broad reciprocity, others have very restrictive reciprocity laws. Still others deny recognition completely. H.R. 822 would solve this problem by requiring that lawfully issued carry permits be recognized, while protecting the ability of the various states to determine the areas where carrying is prohibited within their boundaries. The bill would not create a federal licensing system, nor would it establish a minimum federal standard for the carry permit; rather, it would require the states to recognize each others' carry permits, just as they recognize driver's licenses and carry permits held by armored car guards. Rep. Stearns has introduced similar legislation since 1995. To read our fact sheet on H.R. 822, please click here. And remember to watch this alert for updates! Copyright 2011, National Rifle Association of America, Institute for Legislative Action. This may be reproduced. It may not be reproduced for commercial purposes. 11250 Waples Mill Road, Fairfax, VA 22030 800-392-8683 Contact Us | Privacy & Security Policy http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Read.aspx?ID=7072

United States National Debt An Analysis of the Presidents Who Are Responsible for the Borrowing By Steve McGourty Update History Fifth revision started 14 Oct 08 21 September 2008, fourth Revision 6 May 2007, third Revision June 2006, second Revision April 2005, first Revision July 2003, Original The chart below, Figure 1, shows the United States national debt (per Microsoft’s Encarta Encyclopedia[1] and US Government data[2]) with the various Presidents’ terms marked by vertical lines. Under President Clinton the growth in debt ceased, but note the radical change in direction since George W. Bush entered office. There is no question and a lot of mathematical proof that the steepest upward rises in debt since the end of World War II, started with President Reagan and continued with other so called Neo-Conservatives. (See red in Figure 1 below.) (Click on any graph in this paper to get a larger view.) Figure 1 For those who would prefer to see this debt data presented on a log scale click this link. The log scale certainly shows the WWII debt in a different perspective, and tends to flatten the more recent debt numbers. Changing the scale does not mask an obvious slant towards increased debt during Neo-Con administrations. While the data prior to 1946 is included for historical reference, most of this paper will concern itself with the years since World War II -- the last time this nation was in an all out war. The undeclared wars since 1946 have never required the mobilization of the entire population and thus would skew the modern data. Most of one lifetime is a wide enough sweep of time to cover[3]. For the mathematically inclined, if you take the first derivative of the data presented to find the slope of each President’s debt increase, you will find that the Republican slopes are consistently more positive than the Democratic slopes. For everyone else, this just means that unbiased mathematical proof exists to support the claim that since 1945, Republican presidents have borrowed more than Democratic presidents regardless of the inflation rate[4]. The government has adjusted its projections since last year, they now show a one year slow down of incurred debt as our current president leaves office. To achieve this fiscal miracle the government accountants are assuming that the Bush tax cuts will not be renewed, thus it will appear to bring in more government revenue. This allows the current administration to claim less growth in debt at the same time they are calling for making these cuts permanent. Of course if the tax cuts are made permanent the debt for that year will more than triple. Historical Perspective "I place economy among the first and most important republican virtues, and public debt as the greatest of the dangers to be feared. To preserve our independence, we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt." Thomas Jefferson, third US president, architect and author (1743-1826) Figure 2 Please note the graph above, Figure 2, is using a log scale, otherwise as you can see in Figure 1, the older debt is over powered by inflation. Our nation began its existence in debt from the Revolutionary War. Jefferson argued to eliminate the debt, and Hamilton argued it was necessary to keep the nation together. The Hamiltonians won, the conservatives of their time, and consequently it has also been argued that this difference between these two founders was the beginning of the liberal/conservative split in our country. Figure 2 shows that we keep that original debt until the Jackson administration. Jackson did not believe in debt, or banks for that matter, and he made a real effort to eliminate all federal debt. He got it down to $18,000 just before leaving office. As you can see there has not been another serious attempt to reduce the debt significantly since then. It is clear that debt increases from every major war, and it’s equally clear to see that the debt is hardly ever reduced. Even when it is reduced it ain’t by much, or for very long. This obvious fact seems to be overlooked by the folks that tell us they want to reduce your taxes and shrink government – every time they increase the debt it is forever, because this nation does not pay its debt off, ever! Since 1938 the Democrats have held the White house for 35 years, the Republicans for 36. Over that time the national debt has increased at an average annual rate of 8.5%. In years Democrats were in the White House there was an average increase of 8.3%. In years the Republicans ran the White House the debt increased an average 9.2% per year. Those averages aren’t that far apart, but they do show a bias toward more borrowing by Republicans than Democrats even including World War II. If you look at the 60+ year record of debt since the end of WWII, starting with Truman’s term, the difference between the two parties’ contributions to our national debt level change considerably. Since 1946, Democratic presidents increased the national debt an average of only 3.2% per year. The Republican presidents stay at an average increase of 9.2% per year. Republican Presidents out borrowed and spent Democratic presidents by a three to one ratio. Putting that in very real terms; for every dollar a Democratic president has raised the national debt in the past 63 years Republican presidents have raised the debt by $2.84[5]. Prior to the Neo-Conservative takeover of the Republican Party there was not much difference between the two parties’ debt philosophy. They both worked together to minimize it. However the debt has been on a steady incline ever since the Reagan presidency. The only exception to the steep increase over the last 30 years was during the Clinton presidency, when he brought spending under control and the debt growth down to almost zero. Comparing the borrowing habits of the two parties since 1981, when the Neo-Conservative movement really took hold and government spending raced out of control, it is extremely obvious that the big spenders in Washington are Republicans and their party’s presidents. The only Democratic president since then, Mr. Clinton raised the national debt an average of 4.3% per year. The Republican presidents (Reagan, Bush, and Bush II) raised the debt an average of 10.8% per year. That is, for every dollar a Democratic President has raised the national debt in the past 30 years, Republican presidents have raised the debt by $2.52[6]. Any way you look at it Neo-Conservative Republican presidents cannot or will not control government spending. For the first eighteen years after WW II, Truman (1945-53), Eisenhower (1953-61) and Kennedy (1961-63) all worked vigorously to keep spending under control. Of the seven years Truman was in office, the national debt came down in four. In 1946 & 7, with a Republican Congress for his first two years in office he brought down spending. The following year, with a Democratic Congress he reduced what was commonly called the “War Debt” again. Two of the eight years Eisenhower served as President saw debt reduction during the years when Democrats were in charge of Congress, 1956 & 7. Kennedy reduced the debt by over 4% his first year in office, 1961, then it went up slightly his next two years. JFK was dealing with a Democratically controlled House and Senate when he managed to reduce the debt. Since 1961 the United States national debt has never gone down. It is interesting to note who controlled Congress versus what party was in the presidency during the seven years that the debt was reduced throughout the terms of Truman, Eisenhower and Kennedy. Three times the Democratic Party controlled both Houses of Congress and the Presidency (1948, 1951 & 1961). The other four years all had a mix of control, with Republicans in the White House (1956 & 1957), in charge of Congress (1946 & 1947), but never both. At no time since 1945 when Republicans have been in total charge of both elected branches of government have they ever reduced spending. They talk about it a lot, but they never deliver. While the debt did go up every year during Johnson’s time in office (1963-69), he was the last president before Clinton to submit a balanced budget, and Johnson did this during a time of a very hot Cold War. Johnson’s average was a debt increase of 3% for the six years he served. He had a Democratic Congress to work with all his years in office. Even Nixon (President from 1969 to 1974, when he resigned in disgrace) only had one year when he raised the debt more than 6%, 1971. His average was 5% for the six years he was in office. Between uncontrolled inflation and Ford’s conservative bend the debt increased 17% his first full year in office (1975), and 13% his second (1976). Ford’s plan to impose a policy of price controls failed to bring government overspending and inflation under control. Both these Presidents faced an opposition Congress controlled by Democrats during their time in office. Starting in 1977 President Carter tried to control government spending even during inflationary times. The national debt increased an average of 9% per year while he was in office, and his policies eventually brought inflation under control with the help of a semi-cooperative Democratic Congress. He was thrown out of office after one term for making and implementing the hard decisions required to cut spending and deal with the energy crisis. (Had we followed his policies all these years we would not be dependant on foreign oil as we are now under Republican leadership.) As President Reagan entered office in 1981 he repeatedly called for a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution, yet never submitted a balanced budget himself[7]. Many on the right reflexively blame the Democratically controlled Congress for the “big spending” during his administration, even though Republicans controlled the Senate for the first six years of his two terms. Only during the last two years of the Reagan administration was the Congress completely controlled by Democrats, and the records show that the growth of the debt slowed during this period. It appears that the frequently referenced Reagan’s Conservative mythology is contrary to the truth, he was an award winning, record setting liberal spender and government grower. The fact is that Reagan was able to push his tax cuts through both Houses of Congress, but he never pushed through any reduced spending programs. His weak leadership in this area makes him directly responsible for the unprecedented rise in borrowing during his time in office, an average of 13.8% per year. The increase in total debt during Reagan’s two terms was larger than all the debt accumulated by all the presidents before him combined. From 1983 through 1985, with a Republican Senate, the debt was increasing at over 17% per year. While Mr. Reagan was in office this nation’s debt went from just under 1 trillion dollars to over 2.6 trillion dollars, a 200% increase. The sad part about this increase is that it was not to educate our children, or to improve our infrastructure, or to help the poor, or even to finance a war. Reagan’s enormous increase in the national debt was not to pay for any noble cause at all; his primary unapologetic goal was to pad the pockets of the rich. The huge national debt we have today is a living legacy to his failed Neo-Conservative economic policies. Reagan’s legacy is a heavy financial weight that continues to apply an unrelenting drag on this nation’s economic resources. George Bush Sr. meekly followed in Reagan’s shadow after his election in 1988, by increasing the debt on average a mere 11.8% a year during his four years as President. In his last year in office he quite responsibly worked with Democrats to raise taxes to help reduce the massive yearly increases in the national debt. This bipartisan plan got the growth down to under 11% in 1992, but it was too little too late and didn’t make much difference in the overall trend. The Neo-Conservatives controlling the Republican Party rewarded him for putting the nation’s future above his party’s ideology by throwing him out of office even though it had hardly been a year since he was credited with winning the Gulf War. In 1993 President Clinton inherited the deficit spending problem and did more than just talk about it; he fixed it. In his first two years, with a cooperative Democratic Congress, he set the course for the best economy this country has ever experienced. Then he worked with what could be characterized as the most hostile Congress in history, led by Republicans for the last six years of his administration. Yet, under constant personal attacks from the right, he still managed to get the growth of the debt down to 0.32% (one third of one percent) his last year in office. Had his policies been followed for one more year the debt would have been reduced for the first time since the Kennedy administration. Contrary to the myth fostered by our right-wing friends, under a Democrat, revenue increased and spending decreased. When President Bush II came into office in 2001 he quickly turned all that progress around. With the help of a Republican controlled Congress he immediately gave a massive tax cut based on a failed economic policy; perhaps an economic fantasy describes it better. The last year Mr. Clinton was in office the nation borrowed 18 billion dollars. The first year Mr. Bush II was in office he had to borrow 133 billion[8]. The first tax cut Bush pushed through a willing Republican Congress caused an upswing in government borrowing that was supposed to stimulate the economy, but two years later Bush had to push through yet another tax cut. The second tax cut was needed because it was clear that the first one did not work. Economic history tells us the second did not work either. As a result of all his tax cutting with no cutting in spending, in 2003 President Bush set a record for the biggest single yearly dollar increase in debt in the nation’s history. He did it again in 2004, increasing the debt more than half a trillion dollars. Since 2003 total borrowing has typically been around $500,000,000,000 per year. Even Mr. Reagan never increased the debt that much in a single year; Mr. Reagan’s biggest increase was only 282 billion, half of GWB’s outrageous spending. As a result of the fact that the debt was already pretty high when Bush II entered office, his annual rate of increase is only averaging 7% per year so far. In 2006 he was holding press conferences bragging that the debt was increasing at the rate of only 300 billion dollars a year, yet in reality it was twice that. Again the facts do not match Neo-Con rhetoric. Of course 7% growth is a misleading figure as it does not make clear that by so drastically increasing the total debt, the amount of the annual US budget dedicated to service the debt has grown to almost 10%. Thanks to misguided Neo-Con ideological thinking, over a tenth of our budget does nothing to contribute to the growth or health of the nation. If interest rates go up our country will be in real trouble. It does not matter if you call it a war or an occupation, supporting Iraq is expensive. It just boggles the imagination of any fiscally responsible person that the Republican Congress and President have repeatedly cut taxes during this overly aggressive and very expensive era for our military. The nation is borrowing money so that we can spend more on our military than all the other nations on Earth combined, and still the Neo-Cons are calling for even more tax cuts and even more military spending. Mr. Bush is constantly claiming that the economy is great! What he leaves out is that he is buying that simulated good economy with his borrowed dollars; it is a false economy that is starting to crash. Recent bank and insurance company failures are proving that this federal borrowing can not go on forever, but what is the answer we are being given to this problem – borrow more money to cover the bad debt already out there! If a Democrat was suggesting this course of action you can bet a bevy of Republicans would be screaming in unison that Congress is Socializing Wall Street. Trickle Down Theory Myth History has shown that the “trickle down theory” does not work. Republican President Hoover tried the “trickle down” theory (his words) to solve economic problems during the last few years of his only term, when the greatest economic depression this country has ever faced began. It is often called the Republican Depression because it was their financial philosophy that led to the collapse of the economy. Tax cuts for the rich did not work and things got worse. (We are seeing the same problem repeat itself encouraged by the deregulation of the financial industry.) President Roosevelt got into office, raised taxes on the rich, created jobs for the poor and turned things around. Mr. Reagan employed Hoover’s failed trickle down theory again in the ‘80s and again it did not work. The rich got richer, but the poor got poorer and the economy declined. Mr. Bush Sr., who always had a problem with the “vision thing”, continued the failed policy of his immediate predecessor. Mr. Clinton took a more progressive approach and, as Roosevelt had done, turned the Hoover model upside down. Instead of making the rich richer in the hope that they would spend that money and thus create demand and therefore jobs, he created a tax environment that encouraged the creation of jobs directly. It was an economic environment where everyone could get rich, not just a few, and it worked. Lots of jobs and lots of new millionaires were created while Clinton was in office. More new millionaires were created during the Clinton administration than at any other time in our history. President Bush II slipped into office and once again applied the Neo-Con manta of the old trickle down tax model and immediately created a need to raise the debt level to pay for an unjustified tax cut in 2001. Predictably (and before 9/11) the nation lost jobs and there were fewer new millionaires. Not learning from his past mistakes, Bush pushed through yet more tax cuts in 2003, 2005 and 2006 -- all while expanding the military, the largest single component of the budget. He and his lap dog Republican Congress never learned from their mistakes. As a result, the national debt has increased an average of $1.5 billion per day since the beginning of 2002. While it is a great jabbing sound bite, the facts show that the “tax and spend” rhetoric Republicans often spew about Democrats is not as bad as it sounds. Taxing before spending actually reflects good government. The facts also show that it most often takes a Democratic President to control and reduce spending. The truth is that the Republicans are the party of “borrow and spend”. They hate taxes, but love to spend; their solution is to put off paying till later for our security today. They prefer to see our children pay for their debt. Neo-Conservative thinking has run up over an 9.5 trillion dollar debt that will not be paid off for a generation or more, and is still increasing at an astounding rate with no end to deficit spending in sight. Every time we have seen massive tax cuts there was a bubble in the economy followed by a recession. Tax increases on the wealthy have caused a slow steady growth in the economy. Figure 3 The graph above in Figure 3 illustrates the myth that you can cut taxes and increase spending and expect to get increased government revenue. Interestingly, since Johnson, every Democrat has increased revenue more than spending. However in the opposite case, under all five Republican Presidents, since Nixon, government revenue has decreased and spending has increased. This is positive, unambiguous proof that cutting taxes does not increase revenue. Yet Republicans are still trying to sell that old canard. The contrast between Clinton’s tax policies and the second Bush’s are dramatically evident from this data. By setting up taxes to help the middle class and small business Clinton stimulated economy so much that we saw the largest increase in government revenue in history. The Neo-Con “trickle down” policy clearly does not work. You cut taxes and you reduce government revenue, period. That is the real truth, no matter how many times we are told you must make the wealthy just a little richer to improve the economy. That does not work and the numbers above prove it. US Debt v. GDP Many people in this country describe our current level of national debt as insignificant relative to the GDP. Below, in Figure 2 (a chart comparing the US debt, in red, to the debt’s percent of GDP, in blue) are some facts that those folks might not be aware of… Figure 4 The ratio of debt to GDP had been generally dropping since the end of World War II. When Mr. Reagan entered office the percent of US debt relative to GDP was down to 33.3%. He argued vociferously to reduce the level of all that liberal spending. However the only real effort he pursued was to get taxes cut while increasing spending. You can see in Figure 2 above that cutting taxes and increasing spending predictably made the debt increase - in real dollars and as a percent of GDP. During his eight years in office the percentage of debt to GDP grew to 51.9%. This amounts to a 64% increase in debt relative to GDP while Reagan was in the White House -- a rather significant increase by anyone’s measure. The percentage of debt to GDP continued to grow until 1996, when Mr. Clinton began to get government spending under control. The US debt peaked at 67.3% of GDP under his administration. By the end of the Clinton administration this percentage had dropped to 57.6%. Debt as a percent of GDP dropped almost 10% in four years under a Democratic President with a hostile Republican Congress. Mr. Clinton showed steadfast fiscal leadership against all odds and in spite of right-wing attacks and misinformation. Mr. Bush II inherited a shrinking government and debt in 2001. With his first budget he managed to increase the debt to GDP ratio to 60.0%, by cutting taxes but not spending. By 2004 this ratio had risen to 63.7%, as a result of additional tax cuts but no significant corresponding cuts in spending. Government estimations (which are notoriously low) predict that the debt to GDP ratio will grow to 69.3% by 2008, two percent higher than the previous peak in 1996. Mr. Bush will completely wipe out the gains we made under a fiscally responsible Democratic President. Some of Mr. Bush’s debt can be blamed on the justified and almost forgotten Afghan war, and the ill-conceived Iraqi war and occupation. Now, years later, with a so called “booming” economy, per the mantra of tax cutting logic the debt ratio should be going down. Yet it is still growing. Using government projections, US debt will double under Mr. Bush’s leadership (or lack of it) in real dollars. The nation has to wonder when the fiscally conservative side of Mr. Bush will reveal itself. He only has a few months left in office and while he talks about reducing the debt, the fact is that he has so far only increased it. He keeps telling us that cutting taxes will pump up the economy and thus generate more revenue for the government. The facts do not support his, the Gipper’s, his Dad’s or Hoover’s unsubstantiated trickle down claims on this point. It is interesting to note that the projected GDP keeps getting rosier with every new forecast out of the Bush administration. They keep telling us how great the future will be if we will just end all regulation and taxes, thus allowing the market to do as they please. We have seen that this is not working and no one should believe the projected GDP being put out by the government either, it just does not make sense in light of reality. No matter how you choose to look at the massive debt that the liberal spending Republicans are generating, it is creating an oppressive burden on this nation. (Even the conservative Mr. Greenspan agrees with that conclusion.) Under Republican leadership the debt has doubled in size relative to the GDP. To call the doubling of our debt insignificant is at best demonstrating a gross misunderstanding of the situation. At worst it is an out right lie designed to mislead the public into accepting tax and trade policies that will ruin our future economy for the sake of short term gains for the very wealthy, meanwhile devastating the Middle Class. Isn’t Congress In Charge of Spending? “All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with amendments as on other bills…” US Constitution, Article 1, Section 7 “The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United Sates; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States:…” US Constitution, Article 1, Section 8 The Constitution makes it clear that Congress theoretically holds the purse strings of government. However the Presidents set the direction for the country, and have great power to push the nation in whatever direction they choose. During the time span covered by this paper, history has shown that Congress tends to follow much more than it leads when it comes to most matters, especially fiscal ones. Since the Neo-Con Republicans took over both Houses of Congress and the White House in 2000 they have been unwilling or unable to say no to the President’s disastrous economic policies. The Republican controlled Congress has marched to President Bush’s tax cut mantra since he entered office. Unfortunately for the future of our nation, Mr. Bush has not seen fit to shrink spending even though he has insisted on cutting taxes during a time of war and occupation. Despite his rhetoric, his actions show controlling spending has certainly not been one of his priorities. For eight years we have watched as government spending continues to increase and he continues to insist on cutting taxes. He continues to tell us reduced taxes will somehow generate more tax income for the government, yet all real evidence disagrees with this misguided concept. Figure 5 below is a chart showing when the debt increased or shrank and the political parties of the President and both Houses of Congress from 1938 to the present. The parties in charge of the various branches of government are colored blue for Democrats and red for Republicans. The debt is colored blue the years it decreased and red for the years it increased. There are four rows containing debt or political control data for each year. The power of this chart is revealed by concentrating on the vertical columns of the data. Each column provides a Congress-by-Congress record of the parties in power from the 75th Congress to the first year of the 110th. For easy reference, the President’s names are spaced chronologically across the top of chart, again color coded for their respective parties. Figure 5 The chart confirms that the Neo-Cons got control of both Houses of Congress in 1995, and singular control of our government from 2000 to 2006, and yet, as the debt charts prove in Figures 1 & 3 above, even with all that power in 12 years they never controlled spending. When Mr. Reagan was in office he had a Democratic House and a Republican Senate to deal with. But the “Great Communicator” used the bully pulpit to force both Houses of Congress to go along with his tax cuts on the promise that spending cuts would follow. However, the spending was never reduced. The mixed-party Congress, with no presidential leadership, failed to follow through on reducing spending. How did Mr. Clinton lead the nation into fiscal responsibility? When there was a Democratic run Congress he worked with them to put a policy in place that the Republicans dumped the minute Mr. Bush entered office. That reasonable and responsible policy was; if you cut taxes you must make a corresponding cut in spending. They called it “pay as you go.” We need that kind of responsible leadership again. Under President Clinton the Republican Congress lived within the ‘pay as you go’ rule and spending was extremely well controlled. The Republicans rapidly abandoned this rule when Mr. Bush entered office in 2000 and deficit spending started skyrocketing immediately. Republicans have proven they do not have the guts or the political will to do what it takes to get spending under control. For the country’s sake we were hoping a new Democratic Congress would change the direction of this otherwise certain economic train wreck. They tried, but could not overcome Republicans using the filibuster more times than in any other Congress to block all progressive bills. Republicans chose gridlock over progress. One thing the chart above makes clear, in stark contrast to their rhetoric, is that in the last 60 years when Republicans held all the power, they never used it to reduce the debt; in fact they always increased it. If you want deficit reduction you need Democrats in control, because the “borrow and spend” Republicans have never done it on their own. The Debt Tax In 2002 the debt tax was eighteen cents out of every federal tax dollar. This is the amount required to pay the interest on the existing national debt, and pays nothing toward principal. Due to the drop in interest rates it is now about ten cents out of every federal tax dollar and if interest rates increase it will only get more onerous. If the Neo-Conservatives really wanted to lower our taxes, they would have lowered the debt and thus the debt tax. That would insure a permanent tax cut for the whole country (but it would not help them with their apparent goal to further concentrate the nation’s wealth in the hands of a few). Political Labels No Longer Accurate There has been an interesting evolution taking place in the nation’s political parties over the last 30 years. Back when Mr. Reagan was elected the first time, the majority of Republicans believed in responsible government spending. Controlling spending was one of the major grass roots objectives that Reagan touted in his many campaign speeches. The Democrats wrongly defended deficit spending at the time. Once Reagan got into office he kept talking about needing a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. Yet all the while he was giving lip service to the idea of smaller government, behind our backs and with the help of a mixed Congress he was making it larger. He gave tax cuts to the rich and astronomically increased the debt. He obfuscated the issue so well that here we are over 30 years later and it seems the only party that got the message was the Democrats, both at the grass roots level and at the national level. Most of the folks talking about responsible government spending these days are Democrats. The Republicans were curiously silent on the issue of debt reduction (and term limits) during their time in charge. One might say that between 2000 and 2006 a fitting label for the Neo-Con Republicans was liberal spenders, and the Democrats were the fiscal conservatives. Where have all the Republican deficit hawks gone? Not too surprisingly they are reappearing since the Democrats regained control of both Houses of Congress in 2007. Suddenly they are very interested in the debt, and are shocked at all the deficit spending. They are now quite willing to stall Congress in anyway they can to prevent spending that the majority party thinks in necessary. Their tactics have shown repeatedly that Republicans care more about their power than their country. It was interesting to watch Mr. Bush and his Party fight the Democratic Congress as it tried to implement the will of the people. However that is probably not the best outcome for the county. If all the President and Congress do is fight, then nothing gets done; we have too many problems to put them on hold while politicians bicker over fiscal ideology. Grim Future? The Government’s figures project a larger growth in GDP than debt for the next few years, possibly leveling off in the future. This may or more probably may not happen. What we have seen out of the Bush administration’s economic policies so far does not encourage one to expect a very rosy outcome. Job growth and pay is at a modern low as we watch our jobs go overseas at record rates. President Bush had no plan to change this situation and in fact encouraged it with his tax policies. As the Middle Class inevitably shrinks in America there will be a very negative effect on sales of everything, thus lowering the GDP. As the GDP shrinks the massive national debt will only grow into more of a burden on the jobless next generation who will have to deal with it, because the current generation has failed to. It is obvious that not dealing with the massive debt now could very well crush our nation’s future economy. We should be getting our financial house in order to face the future cost of the retirement of the Baby Boomers, funding Medicare and above Cold-War level defense spending. Instead of solving the big problems the President is inventing ways to divide the nation and leading us further into debt. He shows no sign of comprehending the problem, much less having a plan to deal with it. Our only hope is for the new Democratic President to help Republicans understand that it will take compromise, not arrogance, to solve our country’s debt and other problems. With courage and wise leadership the grim future predicted above can be avoided. However it can only be avoided if we elect leaders willing to face the truth about where we are and where we need to go regardless of the effect on their or their party’s’ reelect ability, like President Jimmy Carter did to address the first oil crisis. He put the power of government behind reducing our dependence on foreign oil. He also made the brave decision to ask citizens to actually change the way they live and conserve. History has proven his choices were the right ones and his methods worked but he was very unpopular for making us face the truth. Our future leaders will need to find his courage to ask for unpopular sacrifices of all Americans to bring the nation’s economy back to a sustainable model. Summary and Conclusions This missive is clearly biased against deficit spending. Getting past the hysteria, bias and rhetoric, certain facts about the United States national debt stand out: 1. Since the Neo-Conservative movement has become the dominant force in the Republican Party the national debt has grown and continues to grow at an unsustainable rate, by any measure you care to use. 2. Experience has shown that “trickle down tax cuts” only work to concentrate the nation’s wealth into fewer hands and never help to rebound the economy. 3. Mr. Bush has no viable plan to deal with the debt he has already created, and we cannot count on him to contain government spending in the future. 4. The only time we have seen national debt reduction in the past 60 years was when Democrats were totally in charge of our government or when one party was in the White House and another ran Congress. 5. In the past 60 years when Republicans were in control of the presidency and both Houses of Congress, neither debt, nor government spending was ever reduced. The last time a Republican Congress reduced the national debt was in 1947, under Truman’s leadership. 6. The last time the debt was reduced was in 1961 during President Kennedy’s first year in office. It has been almost a half century, 46 years, since this nation has paid down any of its exponentially increasing debt. (Had President Bill Clinton been in office one more year we would probably have seen a debt decrease in 2001.) 7. The failure of the financial and insurance markets can be directly related to the tax and regulation policies of the Neo-Cons. Relatively recent history tells us that there is a simple solution to the growing debt problem: Congress must adhere to a ‘pay as you go’ rule regardless of the party in control. Unfortunately it requires a President like Bill Clinton, who was truly committed to balancing the budget, to lead the Congress, regardless of the party in charge, to do the right thing for the future of the nation. Fortunately our nation is fundamentally strong and it has always had the strength to overcome bad presidents and their failed economic and foreign policies. Our economy can and will endure the downward vortex of this misguided Neo-Conservative trend as well. However, for the sake of our nation, our jobs, ours and our children’s future let us all hope that we see an end to the dominance of the short sighted, Middle Class-killing, Neo-Conservative economic polices soon. Acknowledgements: Thanks to my wife Charli, for her expert editing, insightful suggestions and encouragement. I would also like to thank the dozens of folks that have written with suggestions for improvement. I read them all and truly do appreciate them. Almost every suggestion that comes in is positive and many have helped this paper get better with each revision. Sources and Related Websites: The GDP to debt data can be found at the US Government web site: http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2006/pdf/hist.pdf Link to IRS data (the IRS is a bit slow in updating their data, the newest data found on this website is from 2004): http://www.irs.gov/taxstats/article/0,,id=130546,00.html An Excel spreadsheet with the debt data and the chart above can be found at the following URL; http://www.cedarcomm.com/~stevelm1/usdebt.xls Here is a link to see what the current debt is: http://brillig.com/debt_clock/ If you found this paper interesting you may like others I have written: http://www.cedarcomm.com/~stevelm1/Bush_opinion.htm <br style="mso-special-character:line-break" clear="all"> [1] The debt totals in Encarta show the actual amount of money borrowed by the United States in a given year. This total is often different, and typically larger than, the total a given budget might have stated. Budgets are planning documents; the borrowed totals given here are what actually happened. That is why even though the budget was balanced during Bill Clinton’s last few years in office, the debt record here shows an increase. The budget was balanced but the nation still borrowed more money than the budget predicted, or the treasury brought in. [2] Government data on debt and the GDP can be found at: http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2006/pdf/hist.pdf [3] There is no statistical trick being played by providing data starting with 1938. It simply represents exactly as far back as the author could find reliable data. In fact it would better illustrate the point of this paper not to provide any of the Roosevelt years, but I had the data so why not present it for reference. [4] Some might argue that nominal dollars (dollars adjusted for inflation) would provide a more ‘fair’ presentation of this data. That might be true and I challenge them to gather that data and see if it proves their point. Then they should write a paper with that point of view, or send me the data, and I will use it. This paper uses unbiased published government data in real dollars and is written with the open bias of a citizen who does not like to see his government spend money it does not have. [5] This number is derived from an average of the six Republican and five Democratic Presidents’ average debt increase for their terms. [6] This number is derived from an average of the three Republican and one Democratic Presidents’ average debt increase for their terms. [7] Mr. Reagan also reversed all the programs Mr. Carter had put in place to make us more energy independent. <a href="http://cedarcomm.com/%7Estevelm1/usdebt.htm#_ftnref8" title="">[8] In 2002 Bush’s borrowed 23 times more than was borrowed in Clinton’s last year in office, $420 billion v. $18 billion. In only two years the unchecked Neo-Con leadership managed to get spending completely out of control. http://cedarcomm.com/~stevelm1/usdebt.htm