1) Some question pep rally atmosphere at Obama speech
TUCSON, Ariz. – What was billed as a memorial for victims of the Arizona shooting rampage turned into a rollicking rally, leaving some conservative commentators wondering whether President Barack Obama's speech was a scripted political event. Not so, insisted the White House and host University of Arizona.
Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs said Thursday he and other aides didn't expect the president's remarks at the school's basketball arena to receive as much rousing applause as it did. Gibbs said the crowd's response, at times cheering and shouting, was understandable.
Cheering and shouting at a memorial service is understandable? (I don’t think it was a Pentecostal memorial service…)
1a) Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chafee Bans Talk Radio
In what could only be described as a bizarre and illogical first move as the newly elected governor of Rhode Island, Lincoln Chafee (I) announced a ban on state employees having any contact with radio broadcasters. The move is part of a broader attack on radio broadcasters by liberals across the nation in the wake of the tragedy in Arizona.
Shortly after the heartbreaking incident in Tucson, liberals across the spectrum immediately began assigning blame for it, without evidence, to conservatives and the tone of rhetoric in today’s politics. Even after this notion was completely debunked as anything was learned of the shooter, Jared Loughner, liberal leaders persisted. Even after President Obama wisely rebuked such a suggestion in his Tucson address.
Congressman Bob Brady (D-PA) chose to introduce a bill that would limit the exercise of free speech to that which a member of congress agrees with, dismissively saying: “Let the Supreme Court deal with freedom of speech. Let the Supreme Court deal with the Constitution. Congress passes laws. That’s what we do.”
Congressman Jim Clyburn (D-SC) and Congresswoman Louise Slaughter (D-NY) chose to call for a return to the Fairness Doctrine, looking for a better way “to control our airwaves.” Of course, Congress censoring the airwaves was an idea rejected long ago. In fact, the Fairness Doctrine was in place when President John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King were assassinated, so its connection with the incident in Arizona is nothing but opportunism on the part of elected leaders looking to stifle free speech and debate.
Taking a cue from Clyburn and Slaughter, Governor Chafee didn’t even wait for the FCC to take action against radio broadcasters, and instead muzzled all state employees unilaterally. Chafee’s spokesman defended the decision saying talk-radio is “ratings-drive, for-profit programming” and went on to say they don’t “think it is appropriate to use taxpayer resources” -in the form of state employee work time to- “support for-profit, ratings-driven programming.”
This attempt to conceal their personal animosity towards one broadcast vehicle and the free speech platform it provides is simply illogical and obtuse.
1b) Liberals Seek Ban on Metaphors In Wake of Arizona Shooting
After the monstrous shooting in Arizona last week, surely we can all agree that we've got to pass Obama's agenda immediately and stop using metaphors.
At least I think that's what the mainstream media are trying to tell me.
Liberals instantly leapt on the sickening massacre at a Tucson political event over the weekend to accuse tea partiers, Sarah Palin and all conservatives who talk out loud of being complicit in murder by inspiring the shooter, Jared Loughner.
Of course, to make their case, they first must demonstrate:
(a) Right-wingers have called for violence against anyone, especially conservative, pro-Second Amendment Democratic congresswomen;
(b) Loughner was listening to them; and
(c) Loughner was influenced by them.
They've proved none of this. In fact, it's nearly the opposite.
…Sarah Palin, for example, had a chart of congressional districts being targeted by Republicans. So did the Democratic Leadership Committee. Indeed, Democratic consultant Bob Beckel went on Fox News and said he invented the bull's-eye maps.
…President "whose asses to kick" Obama predicted "hand-to-hand combat" with his political opponents and has made such remarks as "if they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun" -- making Obama the first American president to advocate gun fights since Andrew Jackson.
These are figures of speech known as "metaphors." (Do liberals know where we got the word "campaign"?)
It's not that both sides did something wrong; neither side did anything wrong. The drama queens need to settle down.
The winner of the most cretinous statement of 2011 -- and the list is now closed, so please hold your submissions -- is MSNBC's Chris Matthews, who on Monday night recalled Palin's statement, "We're not retreating, we're reloading," and said, I quote, "THAT'S not a metaphor."
Really, Chris? If that's not a metaphor, who did she shoot?
By blaming a mass killing on figures of speech, liberals sound as crazy as Loughner with his complaints about people's grammar. Maybe in lieu of dropping all metaphors, liberals should demand we ban metonyms so that tragedies like this will never happen again.
As for Loughner being influenced by tea partiers, Fox News and talk radio -- oops, another dead-end. According to all available evidence, Loughner is a liberal.
Every friend of Loughner who has characterized his politics has described him as liberal. Not one called him a conservative.
1c) Death threats against Palin increase
Death threats against Sarah Palin have reached an unprecedented level in recent days, an aide says.
In the wake of Saturday’s shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and others, the aide said that threats against Palin have spiked, ABC News reported.
…Palin on Wednesday condemned journalists and pundits for “manufactur[ing] a blood libel that serves only to incite the very hatred and violence they purport to condemn.”
A video posted on YouTube earlier this week – and since removed – featured a collection of threats made against Palin on Twitter since the shooting.
“Can somebody please shoot Sarah Palin,” read one. Another said: “Ugh! All the wrong people get shot. Why doesn’t this kind of thing happen at a Sarah Palin event?”
1d) Blood Libel? Oy Vey
Wasn't it moving to see progressive tweetdom and punditry unite in the defense of Jewry -- in the Middle Ages? As a member of this most oppressed minority, I personally want to thank you.
After all, how dare she? The media are so sick and tired of Sarah Palin's shtick (that's one of the words we use in private) that they created a stampede to Wikipedia to quickly figure out just how divisive this "blood libel" thing, whatever it means, could be to American discourse.
Now, just for the record, we Jews haven't been using the blood of gentile kids for our baking needs in at least a couple of decades, but in historical terms, blood libel refers to false accusations that Jews were murdering children to use their blood in religious rituals -- and an excuse for anti-Semitism. It was heavily utilized in the Middle Ages by some Christians and, with a few modifications, is a regular smear in the Muslim world today.
… If blood libel is really a distasteful parallel, it is only because we have intimately familiarized ourselves with the idea through a History channel documentary about the crusades. And if our institutional memories make us so thin-skinned, there are far more tangible reminders of genocide when we hop into our fancy German cars (which we do a lot, because we're in charge of everything). Or it is certainly as offensive as the heinous deeds of Sarah Palin, which include, among many other transgressions, talking.
And as Jim Geraghty of National Review helpfully noted, the term "blood libel" has been used many times by pundits and journalists from both sides of the ideological divide, including the esteemed Frank Rich of The New York Times, over the years.
1e) Tucson Survivor Blames Shooting On Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, Sharron Angle
Eric Fuller, 63, who was struck by a bullet in the hail of gunfire in Tucson that killed six and wounded 13 on Saturday, claimed Thursday that conservative figureheads such as Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck and Sharron Angle were to blame for the violence in Arizona.
"How many more demented people are out there? It looks like Palin, Beck, Sharron Angle and the rest got their first target," Fuller, a former campaigner for Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), told Democracy Now.
"Their wish for Second Amendment activism has been fulfilled -- senseless hatred leading to murder, lunatic-fringe anarchism, subscribed to by John Boehner, mainstream rebels with vengeance for all, even nine-year-old girls," he added, reading from comments he said he had written down while being treated for his wounds.
1f) Sharron Angle Defends Herself Against Ties to Arizona Shooting
Sharron Angle on Wednesday rejected criticism that she shares responsibility for creating a charged political atmosphere that might have contributed to the mass shooting in Arizona.
"The despicable act in Tucson is a horrifying and senseless tragedy and should be condemned as a single act of violence by a single unstable individual," Angle said in a statement that laid blame solely on the man authorities said attempted to assassinate Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., on Saturday.
… Angle said efforts to blame her or other Tea Party figures in the attack were "irresponsible." She said suspect Jared Loughner "was obsessed with his twisted plans long before the Tea Party movement began."
… "The irresponsible assignment of blame to me, (former Republican vice presidential candidate) Sarah Palin or the Tea Party movement by commentators and elected officials puts all who gather to redress grievances in danger," Angle said. "Finger-pointing towards political figures is an audience-rating game and contradicts the facts as they are known."
1g) The Missed Warning Signs:
A 2009 study warned that the rise of right-wing extremism could spur violent attacks. But the report was attacked by Republicans, including now-Speaker John Boehner.
Newsweek blames the right too! UNBELEIVABLE! This piece has a lie or half-truth in nearly every paragraph!
Two years before the Tucson massacre, the Department of Homeland Security warned in a report that right-wing extremism was on the rise and could prompt "lone wolves" to launch attacks. But the agency backed away from the report amid intense criticism from Republicans, including future House Speaker John Boehner.
The report, which warned that the crippled economy and the election of the first black president were “unique drivers for right-wing radicalization and recruitment,” described the rise of “lone wolves and small terrorist cells embracing violent right-wing extremist ideology [as] the most dangerous domestic terrorism threat in the United States,” according to a copy reviewed by The Center for Public Integrity.
In the wake of last weekend’s attempted assassination of Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, which left six dead and 14 wounded, the report’s warning of a lone wolf attack from someone with extremist tendencies seems prescient.
But when the April 2009 report was issued, it was overwhelmingly criticized by conservative commentators and lawmakers, who derided it as political propaganda from the Obama administration. Some experts worry that its findings were ignored due to political blowback.
1h) NewsBusters agrees with me…Newsweek Stubbornly Pretends Loughner a 'Lone Wolf' Right-winger
Jared Loughner, the suspect arrested in Saturday's shooting death of a federal judge and critical wounding of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Arizona), is no right-winger and certainly not a military veteran.
All the same, Newsweek published an article today suggesting that Loughner's deadly rampage on Saturday was the consequence of conservative politicians dismissing the warnings of a Homeland Security report from 2009 warning about "lone wolf" attacks by right-wingers, particularly those who are armed forces veterans.
1i) AZ Aftermath: Halperin Condemns Conservatives for Not 'Turning Other Cheek'
NewsBusters has exhaustively documented the ways in which the liberal media and Dem politicians have sought to exploit the Arizona shootings, seeking to pin blame on a range of Republicans and conservative media figures.
It was thus nothing short of surreal to listen to MSNBC analyst Mark Halperin this morning. Surveying the situation, Halperin praised the media and politicians for their reaction to the shooting . . . while condemning Fox News and conservative pundits for treating the tragedy like "war and fodder for content."
When Joe Scarborough rightly suggested that Halperin had it backwards, the Time man wouldn't back down.
MARK HALPERIN: I just want to single out one thing. I don't want to over-generalize but I think the media and the politicians have behaved pretty well so far. The thing I'm most concerned about now is the anger on the right-wing commenatariat: on Fox, and George Will, and other conservatives are, in some cases justifiably upset at liberals. But they're turning this right now, in the last 24 hours, back into the standard operating procedure of all of this is war and fodder for content, rather than trying to bring the country together.
JOE SCARBOROUGH: Wait a second, Mark. I think they would say that you have that backwards. That a shooting was turned into fodder to attack conservatives.
HALPERIN: And I, and I, and I already made that criticism as well. They're right. But rather than seizing on it and turning the other cheek, they are back at their war stations. And that's not going to help us.
1j) The Worst Sheriff in America
There are many heroes who showed indomitable courage and grace under fire during this weekend's horrific Tucson massacre. Blowhard Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik was not one of them.
If the White House has any sense, President Obama will stay far away from the demagogic Dupnik and his media entourage when he visits Arizona on Wednesday to memorialize the victims. Indeed, if the White House is truly committed to unifying the country, it will explicitly disavow Dupnik's vulture-like exploitation of the shooting rampage.
Within hours of the bloody spree, Dupnik mounted more grandstands than a NASCAR tour champion. A vocal opponent of S.B. 1070, the popular state law cracking down on illegal immigration, Dupnik immediately blamed Arizona for becoming a "mecca for prejudice and bigotry."
To date, there is no public evidence that accused shooter Jared Loughner was in any way motivated by the national rancor over illegal immigration and the Arizona law (though open-borders extremists from the Justice Department on down most certainly wish it were so). When he complained about non-English speakers, Loughner's nonsensical diatribes were aimed at illiterates in general -- not illegal aliens -- and "grammar control" by the government.
No matter. Dupnik vehemently singled out "people in the radio business and some people in the TV business" like Rush Limbaugh for creating the New York Times-patented "Climate of Hate." Sounding more like an MSNBC groupie (which, surprise, he confesses to be) than a responsible law enforcement official, Dupnik baselessly suggested that the shooting was part of a larger conspiracy and railed against "vitriol" from limited-government activists who are stoking "anger against elected officials."
1k) Tucson Shooting Hero Joe Zamudio Sets Ed Schultz Right On Owning A Pistol (YouTube)
Start at 2:30: This part brought tears to my eyes:
Ed: "Did you ever think of drawing your firearm or had you made the determination you didn't have to?"
Joe: "Sir, when I came through the door I had my hand on the butt of my pistol and I clicked the safety off; I was ready to kill him. But I didn't have to do that, and I was very blessed that I didn't have to go to that place. Luckily, they'd already begun the solution, so all I had to do was help. If they hadn't grabbed him and he had been still moving I would have shot him; I would have shot the man holding the gun."
Ed Schultz: "You would have used that firearm?"
Joe: "You're damn right. This my country; this is my town. You don't get to walk around hurting people, killing innocents and little girls. It's not right, man."
2) Record $14 trillion-plus debt weighs on Congress
WASHINGTON – The United States just passed a dubious milestone: Government debt surged to an all-time high, topping $14 trillion — $45,300 for each and everyone in the country.
That means Congress soon will have to lift the legal debt limit to give the nearly maxed-out government an even higher credit limit or dramatically cut spending to stay within the current cap. Either way, a fight is ahead on Capitol Hill, inflamed by the passions of tea party activists and deficit hawks.
Already, both sides are blaming each other for an approaching economic train wreck as Washington wrestles over how to keep the government in business and avoid default on global financial obligations.
Bills increasing the debt limit are among the most unpopular to come before Congress, serving as pawns for decades in high-stakes bargaining games. Every time until now, the ending has been the same: We go to the brink before raising the ceiling.
All bets may be off, however, in this charged political environment, despite some signs the partisan rhetoric is softening after the Arizona shootings.
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner says failure to increase borrowing authority would be "a catastrophe," perhaps rivaling the financial meltdown of 2008-2009.
Congressional Republicans, flexing muscle after November's victories, say the election results show that people are weary of big government and deficit spending, and that it's time to draw the line against more borrowing.
Defeating a new debt limit increase has become a priority for the tea party movement and other small-government conservatives.
…In a letter to Congress, Geithner said the current statutory debt ceiling of $14.3 trillion, set just last year, may be reached by the end of March — and hit no later than May 16. He warned that holding it hostage to skirmishes over spending could lead the country to default on its obligations, "an event that has no precedent in American history."
…And there are many temporary ways around the debt limit.
Hitting it does not automatically mean a default on existing debt. It only stops the government from new borrowing, forcing it to rely on other ways to finance its activities.
…The overall national debt rose above $14 trillion for the first time the last week in December. The part subject to the debt limit stood at $13.95 trillion on Friday and was expected to break above $14 trillion within days.
2a) Reid says debt-limit boost is a must, but can't justify 2006 opposition
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said Congress must increase the federal debt limit before it is reached, but struggled to justify his own 2006 vote against it.
In an interview on NBC's "Meet the Press," Reid said failing to increase the $14.3 trillion debt limit, which the administration has warned will be reached sometime this spring, is not an option.
"We can't back out on the money we owe the rest of the world," he said. "We can't do as the Gingrich crowd did a few years ago — close the government."
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Reid: Tea Party will disappear once economy recovers
However, NBC's David Gregory pointed out that in 2006, Reid and President Obama both voted against an increase to the debt limit. The president was a senator from Illinois at the time. Press secretary Robert Gibbs said it was intended to make a statement and that the increase was not in danger of being voted down.
Reid, who said he voted to increase the debt limit "99 percent of time," said he could not remember that specific vote.
3) Half of All States Now Suing to Stop Obamacare
If it is allowed to be implemented, Obamacare will eventually do deep and irreparable harm to our nation’s budget deficit. But while Obamacare is more of a long-term threat to fiscal health at the federal level, it is a clear and present danger to the states. Of the 34 million Americans who gain health insurance through Obamacare, over half (18 million) will receive it through Medicaid.
While Obamacare will pay for all of the benefit expansion for the first three years of the law, and 90% of it after that, Obamacare never pays for any of the state administrative costs for adding those 18 million Americans to their welfare rolls. That amounts to billions in unfunded federal mandates for states to absorb. That is why 33 Republican governors signed a letter to the White House and Congress making an emphatic appeal that Obamacare’s Medicaid provisions be repealed.
It is also why the newly elected governors of Ohio, Oklahoma, Maine, and Wisconsin have all decided to sue the Obama administration in hopes of stopping Obamacare. Specifically, Gov. Mary Fallin of Oklahoma has announced that the Sooner State will pursue its own case against the law, while Govs. John Kasich (R) and Scott Walker (R) (of Ohio and Wisconsin respectively) will add their states to Florida’s multi-state suit. And yesterday, newly sworn-in state Attorney General William Schneider announced Maine would also join the the Florida litigation. That brings the number of states on the Florida suit to 23 and the total number of states suing to stop Obamacare (which includes Virginia and Oklahoma) to 25.
3a) House GOP to move quickly on healthcare 1099 tax repeal
Republicans signaled Wednesday that repealing a controversial tax provision in the healthcare law is one of their most pressing priorities.
House Republicans have renumbered the bill repealing the tax requirement as H.R. 4, signaling it will be one of their first pieces of business.
The bill would repeal language requiring companies, starting in 2012, to report all goods and services transactions valued at more than $600 to the IRS. Republicans and Democrats, and even the White House, have since said they support repealing this language, which would raise $19 billion over 10 years and was included to help pay for the healthcare law.
3b) Health care reform law back on House agenda for Tuesday
…The GOP is planning a two-day debate beginning Tuesday evening and ending Wednesday evening, with a vote that will most likely send the bill to the Senate, where it is unlikely to see the light of day.
On Thursday, Republicans are planning to bring up a bill that would instruct committees to draft replacement bills. Republicans, with the help of four Democrats, have already cleared the main procedural hurdle to bring the bill up for a final vote.
Republicans plan to release the rest of the official schedule next week, but the new movement on the health care repeal is the first sign that the politics and policy are back on the agenda a week after the shootings in Arizona that left Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) in critical condition.
4) The Internet Is Threatened By Government Regulation
I’ve posted on this issue before, but this article is an excellent summary of the problem with the FCC’s December 21 power grab…
…On December 21st, while most of us were eagerly awaiting the holidays, the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) voted to significantly change how the internet operates by imposing net neutrality rules on the broadband providers who connect you and me to the World Wide Web. Net neutrality rules refer to certain government regulation of broadband providers. The FCC justifies this unprecedented step of issuing rules to govern the network management of broadband providers as necessary to preemptively “protect” consumers from potential future discrimination by Internet providers.
Far from a demonstration of government's ability to protect its citizenry, the FCC’s decision illustrates the dangers of unchecked government. Regulators, such as FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, are appointed by the President and enjoy the jurisdictional authority delegated to them by Congress. Not only are they outside of the reach of voters, they can be disdainful of Congress and the judiciary. In passing these net neutrality rules, for example, this FCC acted in defiance of a previous congressional decision rejecting a net neutrality amendment and a recent court ruling specifying that the FCC lacked the authority to regulate network management.
… Additionally, the prohibition on charging content providers for delivery, and discouraging priority pricing for those who would like to pay for a special fast-lane on the Internet highway, will shift costs to consumers and businesses. This means that users will be paying more for services that are less tailored to their actual needs and desires.
The FCC and proponents of net neutrality rules rightly argue that an open Internet encourages investment and innovation, and even Genachowski acknowledges that some regulation “will stifle innovation, investment and growth.” The question we are faced with, however, is not whether we want an open Internet (which we already have), but whether we want an Internet regulated by consumer demands and the market pressures of innovation in technology, or an Internet regulated by government.
… A survey of how the Internet functions in reality, however, reveals that the biggest threats to free speech and political organizing are governments, not private actors. Companies who restrict access to certain sites face competition for customers. Customers unhappy with the restrictions flow to more open providers. Compare that to what happens in China, where Internet censorship is the most stringent in the world. When governments decide to exercise censorship, citizens’ only outlet is to escape into the underground to share forbidden information (emphasis mine).
5) For the Left, There Are No Sacred Texts
A number of well-known spokesmen on the left have voiced reservations not only about the Republican decision to have members of Congress -- both Republicans and Democrats -- read the Constitution aloud at the opening of the latest session of Congress. They have also voiced reservations about the American veneration of the Constitution.
Three examples:
In a recent appearance on MSNBC, Washington Post staff writer Ezra Klein said: "The issue with the Constitution is that the text is confusing because it was written more than a hundred years ago and what people believe it says differs from person to person."
Joy Behar asked her guests on CNN's Headline News, "Do you think this Constitution-loving is getting out of hand?"
Congressman Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., complained that "They are reading it (the Constitution) like a sacred text."
What troubles Klein, Behar and Nadler?
The answer is that for leftism -- though not necessarily for every individual who considers himself a leftist -- there are no sacred texts. The two major examples are the Constitution and the Bible.
One cannot understand the left without understanding this. The demotion of the sacred in general and of sacred texts specifically is at the center of leftist thinking.
The reason is that elevating any standard, any religion, any text to the level of the sacred means that that it is above any individual. Therefore, what any one individual or even society believes is of secondary importance to that which is deemed sacred. If, to cite the most obvious example, the Bible is sacred, then I have to revere it more than I revere my own feelings in assessing what is right and wrong.
But for the left, what is right and wrong is determined by every individual's feelings, not by anything above the individual.
This is a major reason why the left, since Karl Marx, has been so opposed to Judeo-Christian religion. For Judaism and Christianity, God and the Bible are above the self. Indeed, Western civilization was built on the idea that the individual and society are morally accountable to God and to the moral demands of that book. That was the view, incidentally, of every one of the Founders including deists such as Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin.
This is entirely unacceptable to the left. As Marx and Engels said, "Man is God, and God is man." Therefore, society must rid itself of the sacred, i.e., God and the Bible. Then each of us (or the society, party or judiciary) takes the place of God and the Bible.
6) Opinion: Elected Officials Flunk Constitution Quiz (hat tip Dave)
When the Republican House leadership decided to start the 112th Congress with a reading of the U.S. Constitution, the decision raised complaints in some quarters that it was little more than a political stunt. The New York Times even called it a "presumptuous and self-righteous act."
That might be true, if you could be sure that elected officials actually know something about the Constitution. But it turns out that many don't.
In fact, elected officials tend to know even less about key provisions of the Constitution than the general public.
For five years now, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute has been conducting a national survey to gauge the quality of civic education in the country. We've surveyed more than 30,000 Americans, most of them college students, but also a random sample of adults from all educational and demographic backgrounds.
Included in the adult sample was a small subset of Americans (165 in all) who, when asked, identified themselves as having been "successfully elected to government office at least once in their life" -- which can include federal, state or local offices.
The survey asks 33 basic civics questions, many taken from other nationally recognized instruments like the U.S. Citizenship Exam. It also asks 10 questions related to the U.S. Constitution.
So what did we find? Well, to put it simply, the results are not pretty.
…But those elected officials who took the test scored an average 5 percentage points lower than the national average (49 percent vs. 54 percent), with ordinary citizens outscoring these elected officials on each constitutional question. Examples:
· Only 49 percent of elected officials could name all three branches of government, compared with 50 percent of the general public.
· Only 46 percent knew that Congress, not the president, has the power to declare war -- 54 percent of the general public knows that.
· Just 15 percent answered correctly that the phrase "wall of separation" appears in Thomas Jefferson's letters -- not in the U.S. Constitution -- compared with 19 percent of the general public.
· And only 57 percent of those who've held elective office know what the Electoral College does, while 66 percent of the public got that answer right. (Of elected officials, 20 percent thought the Electoral College was a school for "training those aspiring for higher political office.")
Overall, our sample of elected officials averaged a failing 44 percent on the entire 33-question test, 5 percentage points lower than the national average of 49 percent.
7) Illinois Braces for Tax Increases
Facing one of the biggest budget shortfalls of any state, Illinois took the risky step of jacking up income and corporate taxes even as its economy struggles to shake off the recession.
In a deal hammered out by the state's Democratic leadership, the lame-duck legislature pushed through a 67% increase in the state income tax and a 45% increase in the corporate tax.
The new income-tax rate would add about $1,040 to the tax bill of a family of four earning $60,000 a year, and the new corporate rate would move the state into the top 10 among corporate taxers nationally.
7a) Tackling Deficits: The Chicago Way, and the Other Way
While it’s being reported that every state (except Florida) had snow on the ground this week, 46 states are digging out of another kind of mess — a combined deficit of at least $127 billion. Democratic and Republican state leaders alike are grappling with structural budget deficits, many of whom are proposing budget cuts to tackle the problem.
But then there’s Illinois.
President Barack Obama’s home state is beleaguered by a $15 billion budget deficit that is said to be the worst in the nation. And apparently the last thing on Democrat Gov. Pat Quinn’s mind is budget cuts. Instead, he intends to sign a bill passed by the state legislature that would raise state income tax by 67 percent (from 3 to 5 percent) and borrow $12.2 billion to pay the bills ($6.2 billion of which are past-due). (Quinn campaigned on a pledge to only raise taxes by one percentage point.)
8) Gates: North Korea will pose direct threat to US
BEIJING – North Korea's development of nuclear weapons and long-range missiles poses a direct threat to the United States, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Tuesday, a blunt assessment of the risk posed by an erratic dictatorship that considers the U.S. its foremost enemy.
North Korea will have a limited ability to deliver a weapon to U.S. shores within five years using intercontinental ballistic missiles, Gates predicted. North Korea has threatened to test such missiles, and has already conducted underground nuclear tests that prove it has manufactured at least rudimentary nuclear weapons.
"With the North Koreans' continuing development of nuclear weapons and their development of intercontinental ballistic missiles, North Korea is becoming a direct threat to the United States, and we have to take that into account," Gates said.
The risk of war on the Korean Peninsula is also rising because South Koreans are fed up with provocation and harassment from the North, Gates said.
"We consider this a situation of real concern and we think there is some urgency to proceeding down the track of negotiations and engagement," he said.
9) Lebanon's government falls as Hezbollah pulls out
BEIRUT – Lebanon's national unity government has collapsed after Hezbollah ministers and their allies resigned over a U.N.-backed tribunal investigating the assassination of Former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.
The state-run National News Agency announced Wednesday that 11 ministers were stepping down from the 30-member Cabinet headed by Western-backed Saad Hariri, the slain prime minister's son.
Hezbollah needed the backing of more than a third of the ministers to bring down the government.
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