Caffeinated Thoughts |
- Sarah Palin in India: Not Sure About 2012, But It’s Time for a Woman to be President
- The Hubris of The Des Moines Register: Iowa House Republicans Should Bow to Mike Gronstal
- Working Out The Differences
- Rich Man, Poor Man
- Sarah Palin: New York Times, There You Go Again
| Sarah Palin in India: Not Sure About 2012, But It’s Time for a Woman to be President Posted: 19 Mar 2011 10:00 PM PDT
She hit on the themes of individual freedom and limited government. In her speech she said:
She advocated for tapping domestic energy resources while exercising wise stewardship. She said that while there is a push for "green energy sources" she favors an "all-of-the-above" approach that also utilizes conventional sources. Only with a wise energy policy she notes will we have "energy security" and a growing economy. She subtlety hit at the Obama administration for stymying domestic drilling while pushing for one natural resource available in abundance in Alaska – natural gas.
After discussing the need for energy independence she then turned to the challenge of our growing national debt.
She then related these solutions to things that the Indian government did in the 1990s to bolster their economic growth – "You abolished import licenses; cut import duties; removed investment caps & broke the union’s grip on industry." She then challenged the notion of America's demise by saying the only thing in demise is the idea of big government:
She discussed the similarities between the United States and India, and noted that the partnership between the two nations is being driven by the people, not governmental bureaucracies, but through education and entrepreneurs. She also noted India's history of strong women leadership and used the opportunity to highlight her support of South Carolina's first female governor, Nikki Haley. She also talked about individual liberty and the dignity of every human life harkening to the life of Mother Teresa.
She said that the United States and India are both linked in their pursuit of individual freedom as both struggled to break from the yoke of the British empire.
During the question and answer session following the speech. She attacked President Obama's foreign policy by saying that we need "less dithering and more decisiveness." That we have have had a rich history of being on the side of those who seek freedom On China:
On the mainstream media:
She did say she wasn't sure if she was running yet, but she did say… "It's time a woman became president of the United States of America." Closing statement by the moderator:
Did she come across as presidential? I believe so, but those who aren't decided on her will have to watch the speech and the Q&A session and decide for themselves. Share and Enjoy:                 |
| The Hubris of The Des Moines Register: Iowa House Republicans Should Bow to Mike Gronstal Posted: 19 Mar 2011 09:00 PM PDT
This hubris is matched by Iowa Senator Mike Gronstalling (D-Council Bluffs) who has single-handedly prevented debate and votes on a number of House bills. The Register believes that he along with his Democrat caucus should determine the agenda for the state. You know what, let's just let them govern because they *obviously* know better than Iowa's unwashed masses. The writer of this editorial whines about the Voter ID bill… Apparently voter fraud isn't a problem in the mind of the Register or Iowa Senate Democrats! How having to show an ID disenfranchises anyone I'll never know since anyone (who is a legal resident of Iowa) can get a state ID for very little money. They complain that the bill would "have the effect of suppressing Democratic voter turnout." Does the writer believe that somehow Democratic voters would have a harder time proving residency (or citizenship)? Also don't forget the fact that Iowa Secretary of State Matt Shultz campaigned on this very issue and beat Michael Mauro handedly. I think Iowa voters have a different idea about this bill. The editorial also sets its sights on (can I say that anymore?) the public employee collective bargaining bill complaining that it would "undermine Democratic-leaning public-employee unions." Forget the fact that public employee collective bargaining, as it stands now, undermines the taxpayer! I guess they believe our state representatives need to look after the needs of the unions, not the people who sent them to the Statehouse in the first place. Then they write…
Cutting taxes helps bolster spending… which in turn helps the economy, helps create jobs… and guess what? It will increase tax revenue! I understand that a bunch of liberal journalists don't have a grasp of economics 101, but an income tax decrease is what we need right now, especially when accompanied with spending cuts that the House wanted to implement but the Senate balked at. Speaking of education cuts – everyone needs to cut during a recession, even schools. The state needs to cut spending (the lions share of the state budget is education), perhaps we shouldn't have added public funded universal pre-school a couple of years ago. If it were not for the gloat in spending over the last four years we wouldn't be in this position to begin with. Then they complain about other bills passed by the House…
Did they ever consider since Iowans threw out three Iowa Supreme Court justices that perhaps the constituents of some of these State Representatives actually wanted them to act on a marriage amendment? Many in Iowa do view this as problem. Also ask Council Bluffs residents if having Leroy Carhart come in to do late term abortions is a problem… it certainly is for the preborn children involved. This isn't some trivial issue, it is life and death and it merits our consideration. Regarding building up our economy what the heck do they think the tax cuts and spending cuts are all about? A spending cut bill was one of the first things the House did… the Iowa Senate is the one not taking the problem seriously. Evidently the Register believes the only way to bolster the economy was to keep the I-Jobs program going and increase the glut of state government. Let's keep going with failed policy. Yes Legislators were elected to address fiscal issues, and they are trying to do just that. However they can walk and chew gum at the same time. They can and should address other issues of concern for voters as well. The Iowa House has been incredibly fruitful this year. It's the Iowa Senate which has done nothing. But they can't criticize that because the wrong party is in charge over there. If the Register's editorial board were honest they'd admit it isn't that the House isn't solving problems, it's just that they don't agree with the solutions the House Republicans are providing. Essentially they're saying that House Republicans should only do what Senate Democrats want them to do. Iowans rejected Iowa Democrats' failed polices and ideas last November, apparently The Register wants us to forget that. Share and Enjoy: |
| Posted: 19 Mar 2011 07:00 PM PDT
This week, a conference committee on Senate File 209, the federal tax code coupling and FY 2011 supplemental appropriations bill, met several times to work out the differences between the House and Senate of the bill. If a bill is amended by one chamber and then rejected by the other, it often is sent to a conference committee comprised of Republicans and Democrats from both the House and Senate to work on a resolution. The conference committee met twice last week and four times this week. Both versions include changes to state tax laws to reflect the changes made at the federal level, and supplemental appropriations. The Senate version includes an expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit, while the House does not. Conversely, the House version makes the federal tax changes retroactive to 2010, providing additional tax relief to Iowa families and small businesses and it includes a key provision important to providing immediate and long term tax relief to Iowans, the Tax Relief Fund. The Tax Relief Fund is designed to capture the general fund ending balance, which is the balance Iowans overpaid in state taxes, and put that back into the pockets of Iowans. We also spent time this week on a number of bills important to improving Iowa's education system that will increase opportunities and strengthen the ability for families to choose where to send their children to school. HF 583 – Independent Accreditation of Nonpublic Schools. Iowa is the only state in the country requiring state accreditation of nonpublic schools. This bill makes it voluntary like 18 other states, and would allow for a nonpublic school to be accredited by nonpublic accrediting bodies. HF 584 – Driver Education by a Teaching Parent. Allows a parent teaching a student under competent private instruction to teach driver's education to the student over which they have custody and control. The course of instruction must be approved by the department of transportation and must meet at least the standards taught in public and private schools. Applying for an intermediate license requires a signed form designed by the department showing evidence of completion of the course. Regular requirements apply as far as a driving test for intermediate license and full license are concerned. HF 585 – Charter Schools. HF 585 amends the charter school and innovation zone school chapter of Iowa law. It separates the approval process for the two types of schools by requiring charter schools to be approved by the local school board, as opposed to the state board of education. Innovation zone school applications are still to be approved by the state board. It allows more entities to apply for a charter school, including community colleges, regents universities, nonpublic schools, private colleges, and nonprofits. Current law only allows for a principal, teachers, or parents to apply for converting an existing school into a charter. The bill also allows for the charter to be established in a new building and not just an existing attendance center, as allowed in current law. HF 588 – Independent Private Instruction. Allows for independent private instruction, which is a parent providing home school education to students that are not related. The bill limits enrollment to no more than four unrelated students. Independent Private Instruction is exempt from all school-related statutes and rules except compulsory attendance. Additionally, independent private instruction must provide private or religious based instruction as its primary purpose and must provide enrolled students with instruction in math, reading, language, science, and social studies. All of these bills passed the House and are on their way to the Senate for their consideration. State Representative Kraig Paulsen (R-Hiawatha) is Speaker of the Iowa House. Share and Enjoy: |
| Posted: 19 Mar 2011 05:31 PM PDT 
For the most part, I admire them. I applaud their work ethic. I salute their innovation. I am grateful when they gamble their resources to start a company and employ me, my family and my friends. But apparently… I have the wrong perspective. Increasingly and with elevated volume, I am hearing what is the "proper" view of this subject. We seem to be flooded, lately, with words and phrases such as: "The troubling wealth gap between the rich and the poor." "Wall Street greed." "The two Americas." The failed cornerstone of John Edward's presidential bid. "The 'haves' and the 'have nots.'" "Greedy CEO's." “The destruction of the middle class.” "Wealthy bankers." "Tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans." "Corporate welfare." Recently, marginally successful filmmaker, Michael Moore made the shocking statement, "What's happened is that we've allowed the vast majority of that cash to be concentrated in the hands of just a few people, and they're not circulating that cash. They're sitting on the money." Moore continued, "That's not theirs, that's a national resource, that's ours. We all have this… we all benefit from this or we all suffer as a result of not having it." I had no idea that someone else's money was a "national resource." Who knew that their money was actually mine? All of these words, phrases and sentiments are only slight variations of the same theme. The wealthy are evil, greedy, hoarders of their ill gotten riches and everyone else are noble, oppressed, honest Americans being held down by "the man." The purveyors of this misguided and erroneous philosophy would also have you to believe the lie that ours is a zero sum economy; that when the wealthy accumulate more wealth, somebody down the food chain necessarily loses money. Under this paradigm, the existence of tycoons like Bill Gates “steals” opportunity from the poor and removes wealth from the “fixed” economy. So we have to ask the question, is there an agenda behind the rhetoric or are these people just genuinely concerned about the "downtrodden?" Well, I guess both could be true but there certainly is very little doubt regarding an agenda. Many of these people desire a fundamental change in the economic model that has made America a bastion of prosperity and the economic envy of the world for so many years. They would like to drive a stake into the heart of free market capitalism and replace it with European style socialism. And it seems they have some momentum. Since the election of Barrack Obama, they have a fellow traveler in the White House. Surely you remember the president's statement about a point at which someone has “enough” money. Bolstered by such sentiment being expressed from the bully pulpit, the socialist thinkers seem to boldly be coming out of the closet. According to a February 2010 Gallup poll, “61% of liberals say their image of socialism is positive” and “53% of Democrats have a positive image of socialism.” Overall, 36% of Americans view socialism favorably. Socialism has never worked. It will never work because it fails to ensure the happiness and prosperity of its citizens because it is predicated on economic mythology. There will always be some people with more money than others. Better a system that enables the poor to improve their circumstances than a system that punishes success, because that is a system that punishes the very people it purports to help. Share and Enjoy: |
| Sarah Palin: New York Times, There You Go Again Posted: 19 Mar 2011 10:45 AM PDT
The New York Times just can't seem to get much of anything right lately. No wonder they're facing economic and reputation woes. Their article falsely reporting on my record as governor is full of spin, and I shall call them out on it. Regardless of the recent political posturing, ACES (Alaska's Clear and Equitable Share) is a success for all stakeholders who want more domestic energy supplies for our great country. The Alaskan people (who collectively own the natural resources, via our state constitution), the resource producers who bid on the right to develop our oil and gas, and consumers all benefit under ACES. It incentivizes production and development. It works. Amazingly, to the uninformed (or to those who really don't want to incentivize oil exploration in America) ACES is spun to sound like an oil windfall profits tax and its progressivity is made to sound excessive. In reality, it was born of a need to have a tax structure that did three things: 1. It could not be created under a cloud of political corruption and self-dealing like the former Alaska administration and legislature's PPT oil valuation structure. That's a critical fact that is now frequently overlooked years later. Remember the legislators and oil industry players who went to jail because of bribes leading to votes in favor of the former administration's PPT, which was unfairly tilted in favor of the resource producers against the resource owners (i.e., the people of Alaska)? Have we conveniently forgotten the fact that a corrupt process brought forth PPT, and I and others set out to change it by cleaning up the corruption? 2. It had to align the interests of Alaskans and the oil producers through exploration and production credits in partnership so that they benefit proportionally from commercialization of Alaska's sovereign resources. This is very different from a government overtaxing personal or corporate income in which the government has no ownership stake in whatever it is that is being taxed. 3. It had to use a progressivity system that protects the producers from commercial strain when oil prices are low, otherwise the producers would seek development opportunities elsewhere. ACES does incentivize industry, but beware that Big Oil will always do what it does best for its shareholders: it will look out for its bottom line and always claim that it needs even more tax breaks. More power to them for trying, but resource owners deserve A CLEAR and EQUITABLE SHARE (ACES) of the value of their commonly-owned oil and gas. ACES accomplished all three. The current criticism of this fair valuation makes no real sense. As an article at Big Government notes: "The number of oil companies filing with the Alaska Department of Revenue has doubled indicating that competition has indeed increased. Alaska has the second most business friendly tax set-up — up two spots since the passage of ACES. Additionally, a report from Governor Parnell's Department of Revenue indicated that 2009 yielded a record high in oil jobs. Even more recently, the newest employment numbers from Alaska show that oil job numbers were higher in January 2011 than in January 2010, indicating that jobs are growing at the seasonal level. Parnell argues that state revenues are in jeopardy, but it is estimated that his proposal would reduce revenues by $100-200 million." Most importantly, Alaska enjoys a $12 billion surplus thanks to ACES and the sound fiscal policies of my administration. It's kind of amusing to see state legislators claim credit for the surplus when they didn't vote for ACES and they cried to high heaven when I vetoed their wasteful spending. Of course, I could have made a lot more friends in Juneau if I had spent the surplus. But I chose to put billions in savings for a rainy day and return a portion to the people of Alaska (it was their money after all). I paid down hundreds of millions of dollars into our under-funded pension plans, then set aside another billion to forward fund education. That's sound fiscal policy. I'm proud of it, and Alaska is stronger today because of it. Now, if others would like to claim credit for it, fine. As Ronald Reagan used to remind us: "There is no limit to what a man can do or where he can go if he doesn't mind who gets the credit." But let's not pretend that ACES wasn't a key factor in the surplus, and let's not pretend that it hasn't been a success. As for AGIA, it's moving along according to plan. Share and Enjoy: |
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