Is McCain Backing Away From His Pledge To Regulate The Tobacco Industry?
Is McCain Backing Away From His Pledge To Regulate The Tobacco Industry?
Yesterday, the House of Representatives passed a landmark bill that would “empower the Food and Drug Administration to regulate the tobacco industry” and allow regulators to demand the “elimination of other hazardous ingredients in cigarettes.”
The bill, which provoked a veto-threat from the White House, mirrors a failed 1998 proposal spearheaded by Sen. John McCain (R-AZ). McCain’s bill sought to give the federal government unprecedented oversight over the tobacco industry and led many Republicans to caricature the legislation as a “very liberal, big government, big bureaucracy, not a Republican bill.”
McCain responded by pledging to “never” give up on the effort — promising to “hold tobacco companies liable for their efforts to endanger children” — and publicly praising the regulatory nature of the legislation:
Nicotine and tobacco products will now be subject to broad regulatory and oversight by the Food and Drug Administration and the industry will be required to pay over $500 billion to settle claims and fund vital anti-smoking and related health care initiatives…Second, our goal is to insure that nicotine and tobacco products are regulated by the FDA to protect public health. [News Conference, 3/20/1998]
But McCain may now be backing away from his pledge to regulate the industry. While still officially a sponsor of the Senate version of the latest tobacco bill, McCain has suggested that he “won’t commit to voting for it until he sees the final legislation” and regularly belittles government regulation on the campaign trail:
- Again, we get back to Senator Obama believes that big government is the answer — government is the answer. He’ll raise your taxes. He will increase regulation. [Town Hall, 7/10/2008]
- So I think it really has to do — the fundamental difference is our view of the role of government in America. Everything he has supported is bigger government, more regulation, higher taxes, et cetera. And I am a very proud conservative that believes in less government, in our nation’s security, and lower taxes, and a government that basically only intervenes in people’s lives when every other avenue has been exhausted. [Town Hall, 7/7/2008]
- I was one of many newly elected members who claimed with pride to be disciples of Ronald Reagan. I am as proud of that distinction today as I was then… I think all Reagan Republicans would describe the core values of a conservative as…opposition to unnecessary government regulation; and lastly, and very importantly, belief that the government that governs best governs least. [Reagan Library, 6/23/2006]
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‘Conditional Engagement’ Misreads Iraqi Consensus On U.S. Military Presence
‘Conditional Engagement’ Misreads Iraqi Consensus On U.S. Military Presence
Our guest bloggers are Brian Katulis, Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress Action Fund, and Peter Juul, a Research Associate at the Center.
The first problem highlighted in the previous post is that “conditional engagement” fails to outline the precise conditions when U.S. troops would depart –- it’s an exit strategy without an exit. Conditional engagement is a policy proposal that is unsure of what it wants to achieve, besides vague terms like “accommodation” and “sustainable security” – hardly much of an improvement on the amorphous goals defined by conservatives as “victory” or “success.”
The second main shortcoming is that it misreads Iraq’s interests and calculations, which have evolved and changed rapidly in the past few months alone:
2. Conditional engagement assumes that the carrots of continued military, economic, and political support are more appetizing then they are.
Conditional engagement falls into the same trap that the Bush administration has on Iraq for the past five years: overestimating how much leverage the United States has in Iraq and underestimating broader Iraqi opposition to a continued U.S. military presence.
Certainly, there is a lot of posturing going on among Iraq’s leaders these days, and a number of Iraqis who publicly state that they oppose the U.S. presence actually understand that they would not be in power if not for the security umbrella U.S. forces have provided.
But the core of the conditional engagement argument is based upon a presupposition of Iraqi dependency on the United States– a dependency that has visibly weakened in just the last eighteen months, and on several fronts:
- Growing financial independence – Stuart Bowen, the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, noted in a recent report that Iraqi government revenues for the 2008 fiscal year will likely reach $70 billion, which is double what was originally projected at the start of the year. Barham Salih, Iraq’s deputy prime minister in charge of reconstruction, reportedly said earlier this month that Iraq didn’t need any additional foreign funding for reconstruction.
- Increasing size and capacity of the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF). Military operations in Basra, Baghdad, Amara, and Diyala this year have all gone much better than previous operations. The overall size of the ISF has reportedly increased by 50 percent from 323,000 at the start of 2007 to a current size of approximately 500,000, according to U.S. government figures. Of course, everyone knows that the Iraqi military lacks key capacities – logistical support, airlift, and basic management structures – and this of course abstracts from a more complex reality posed by multiple independent militias, which are as much of a political problem and a reflection of internal power dynamics as it is a capacity challenge.
This increasing Iraqi capacity demonstrates that perhaps “conditional engagement” is more of a descriptive analysis of the current Bush administration policy, rather than a prescriptive analysis that offers a viable policy for a new administration. The problem with the current policy, as with conditional engagement, is that it never actually describes how to bridge Iraq’s internal divisions. More »
Bush’s ‘Sprint To The Finish’: Destroy The Planet
Bush’s ‘Sprint To The Finish’: Destroy The Planet
The Bush era of energy policy has been one of contempt for the planet and the economy — all for the benefit of Exxon and its ilk. Now he wants to tie our future to even dirtier, deadlier, costlier fossil fuels. Today in West Virginia, President Bush declared his plan for a “sprint to the finish” of his tenure:
We all want to be environmentally friendly people, but we also want to have practical policies that deal with the problems we face today and the problems we’ll face tomorrow if we don’t get going.
What are these “practical policies”?
— “We use about 1.1 billion tons of coal a year. That sounds like a lot to me. It — and so the challenge is, how do we make sure that this reliable source of U.S. energy remains in the center of our strategy?”
— “First, we ought to be drilling offshore exploration, what’s called the Outer Continental Shelf.”
— “Secondly, we ought to expand oil production by tapping into oil shale.”
— “We ought to be drilling in Alaska.”
— “I believe that one really promising source of energy, so we can power our automobiles and become less dependent on foreign energy, is coal-to-liquids projects.”
This is a call for a “sprint to the finish” of civilization as we know it. The Wonk Room has explained how coal-to-liquids, oil shale, expanded offshore drilling would benefit no one but corporate polluters — and would dramatically worsen the climate crisis.
Two weeks ago, former Vice President Al Gore, Bush’s 2000 opponent, explained the roots of the Bush-era crises:
When we look at all three of these seemingly intractable challenges at the same time, we can see the common thread running through them, deeply ironic in its simplicity: our dangerous over-reliance on carbon-based fuels is at the core of all three of these challenges - the economic, environmental and national security crises.
We’re borrowing money from China to buy oil from the Persian Gulf to burn it in ways that destroy the planet. Every bit of that’s got to change.
But if we grab hold of that common thread and pull it hard, all of these complex problems begin to unravel and we will find that we’re holding the answer to all of them right in our hand.
The answer is to end our reliance on carbon-based fuels.
Standing before right-wing coal industry of West Virginia — which has devastated the state’s jobs, lives, and land — Bush claimed, “I love the fact that we’ve got people who understand the dangers we face, understand we’re facing ideological people that use murder to achieve their objectives, and want to hurt us again here at home.”
With his right-wing fealty to the fossil polluters who, if left unchecked, will destroy the planet, the president is describing himself.
The $1.3 Trillion Question: Does McCain Raise Taxes On Health Insurance?
The $1.3 Trillion Question: Does McCain Raise Taxes On Health Insurance?
Our guest bloggers are James Kvaal and Robert Gordon, Senior Fellows at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
Sen. John McCain had a read-my-lips moment on taxes yesterday, telling a town hall meeting that “I want to look you in the eye: I will not raise your taxes nor support a tax increase. I will not do it.”
Of course, only three days earlier, McCain said that higher taxes were “on the table” to solve Social Security. And he seemed to say the same to a group of donors last night. ThinkProgress has more of McCain’s muddled history on Social Security taxes.
Here’s another place where John McCain may be willing to raise your taxes: to pay for his enormous health care plan.
McCain has proposed new health insurance tax credits, which his campaign estimates to cost $3.6 trillion over the decade. He says he pays for it by taxing workers’ health benefits, which are largely tax-free today. McCain aides say the plan has no net cost and left it out of their budget plan.
McCain’s numbers add up only by raising taxes on middle-class families. To raise $3.6 trillion by taxing health benefits, you need both income and payroll taxes. But that means an $1,100 tax increase on a typical married couple earning $60,000 in 2013.
Alternatively, McCain could avoid tax increases by applying only income taxes – but not payroll taxes – to health benefits. And this is what his spokesman told the Daily Tax Report he does. But income taxes alone fall $1.3 trillion short of paying for his tax credits.
McCain aides say they pay for their health care plan without raising middle-class taxes, but that’s not possible. So which is it? Do they raise taxes on ordinary families by more than a thousand dollars or add $1.3 trillion to the deficit? It may be the biggest unanswered question in the candidates’ fiscal policies.
$236 Per American Driver: Big Oil’s U.S. Profits From The Last Year
$236 Per American Driver: Big Oil’s U.S. Profits From The Last Year
Sky-high gas prices mean hardship for American families but huge profits for big oil companies.
According to a new study from the Center for American Progress Action Fund, their U.S. profits from the last 12 months were the equivalent to $236 from every single person with a drivers license in America.
In the past year, oil and gasoline prices have broken all records. Oil reached $147 a barrel, and gasoline hit a new high of $4.11 a gallon earlier this month. Oil prices were 90 percent higher over the past three months than they were a year ago.
Today, Exxon Mobil announced that they had made $11.7 billion in the last three months, the most profitable quarter ever for an American company.
The other big five oil companies announced earnings 26% higher than this same period last year, putting them on track to break last year’s record profits.
High prices may be good for oil company profits, but they’re bad news for American families. Higher gasoline prices are costing ordinary families hundreds, or even thousands, of dollars a year.
In the past 12 months, the five largest oil companies have earned $148 billion world wide, including an estimated $47 billion in the United States. To put these numbers in perspective: if these U.S. profits were distributed evenly among American drivers, it would equal about $236 per driver.
For more information, check out the Center for American Progress Action Fund’s full report here.
UPDATE: Chevron has since released their Q2 2008 profits: $5.98 billion in the last three months, up 11% from the same period last year. While slightly less than predicted in our report, it doesn’t significantly change the per-driver share of the five companies’ U.S. profits over the past year which remains approximately $236 per American driver.
Doctor’s Orders: Kissinger Advocates Staying In Iraq
Doctor’s Orders: Kissinger Advocates Staying In Iraq
Former Secretary of State and all around foreign policy eminence Henry Kissinger argues in this morning’s Washington Post that previous calls for a timeline for US withdrawal from Iraq have been “overtaken by events.” In other words, things are going so much better, now we have to stay!
Almost all objective observers agree that major progress has been made on all three fronts of the Iraq war: Al-Qaeda, the Sunni jihadist force recruited largely from outside the country, seems on the run in Iraq; the indigenous Sunni insurrection attempting to restore Sunni predominance has largely died down; and the Shiite-dominated government in Baghdad has, at least temporarily, mastered the Shiite militias that were challenging its authority. After years of disappointment, we face the need to shift gears mentally to consider emerging prospects of success.
Though Kissinger identifies himself as a friend and occasional adviser to John McCain, I’ve argued previously that the foreign policies that McCain has outlined bear little resemblance to the realpolitik of Kissinger, but rather reveal McCain’s strong commitment to a neoconservative ideology and agenda. Kissinger’s op-ed, however, indicates that Kissinger and McCain share the same mistaken assumptions about effect of US withdrawal on Iraqi politics.
The main problem with Dr. K’s prescription for Iraq is that he doesn’t recognize the US presence itself as a provocation, or how the open-ended and condition-less US commitment to Iraq acts as roadblock to genuine political accommodation. Kissinger suggests some negative consequences of setting a deadline (”largely defeated internal groups to go underground”), but doesn’t acknowledge that these have come to pass in the absence of a deadline. Kissinger also bizarrely claims that a deadline “will give Iran an incentive to strengthen its supporters in the Shiite community for the period after the American withdrawal.” I don’t know where Kissinger’s been, but Iran has been doing this since March 2003, and continues to enjoy very good relations with the same Iraqi Shia political elites currently supported by the US.
As I wrote last week, no government which derives its authority from a foreign military occupation, or even appears to, will ever be seen as legitimate in the eyes of its own people, and thus the Iraqi government will not be able to truly stand on its own until there is a firm US commitment to withdraw. Acknowledging and honoring the strong Iraqi consensus in favor of a US withdrawal is an essential step toward breaking through the current impasse between Iraq’s political factions, which was, after all, the stated goal of the surge in the first place.
House Conservatives Employ DeLay-Style Tactics To Kill Legislation That Would Rein In Oil Profiteers
House Conservatives Employ DeLay-Style Tactics To Kill Legislation That Would Rein In Oil Profiteers
Our guest blogger is Daniel J. Weiss, a Senior Fellow and the Director of Climate Strategy at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
Tom DeLay may be gone but he is not forgotten. During yesterday’s vote on the Commodity Markets and Transparency Act (H.R. 6604) to rein in oil profiteers, House Republican leaders pressured 13 of their members to switch their vote from “yes” to “no.” Thanks to these strong arm tactics and weak members, the bill to lower gasoline prices by controlling profiteers failed by a vote of 276-151, falling ten votes shy of the two-thirds majority required for passage under the suspension of the House rules. Once again, the GOP leadership used their power to help keep oil prices and profits high, while hurting the average driver.
Fadel Gheit, Managing Director and Senior Oil Analyst, Oppenheimer & Company testified before the House Energy and Commerce Committee:
I believe the surge in crude oil price, which more than doubled in the last 12 months, was mainly due to excessive speculation and not due to an unexpected shift in market fundamentals.
During the alloted time for voting, 291 members cast “yes” votes – more than enough to pass the bill. Then Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH), Whip Roy Blunt (R-MO) and their minions went to work. Thirteen Republicans flipped and joined the 16 Democrats and 122 Republicans already in opposition. Final result: the bill failed, and profiteers will continue to drive up oil prices.
The “Threatened Thirteen” who switched their votes to oppose controls and oversight on Enron-like profiteering:
– Tom Cole (R-OK), Chair of the National Republican Congressional Committee
– Andy Crenshaw (R-FL)
– David Davis (R-TN)
– Frank Lucas (R-OK)
– Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA)
– John Peterson (R-PA), retiring; House leader for oil drilling in protected coastal areas
– Joseph Pitts (R-PA)
– Rick Renzi (R-AZ), retiring due indictment for fraud, other charges
– Mike Rogers (R-MI)
– Jim Saxton (R-NJ), retiring
– Jean Schmidt (R-OH)
– John Sullivan (R-OK)
– Michael Turner (R-OH)
This story feels familiar because it is. In October 2005, then House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-TX) got three members to switch their votes in favor of a bill to weaken the Clean Air Act and other environmental safeguards to pass “Gasoline for America’s Security Act.” It would have eliminated health protections to help big oil companies build refineries. (Fortunately, it died in the Senate.) So although Tom DeLay is gone due to an indictment for felony conspiracy, his replacements still use the “hammer” from DeLay’s old toolbox.
Coburn’s Obstructionism Leaves 44,000 Paralyzed Veterans In A Lurch
Coburn’s Obstructionism Leaves 44,000 Paralyzed Veterans In A Lurch
While personally blocking more than 70 pieces of legislation, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) has portrayed himself as a champion against “wasteful” government spending. In reality, Coburn’s obstructionism has delayed, deferred, or killed legislation that would have expanded medical research and improved the lives of millions of Americans.
Responding to Coburn’s obstructionism, Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) crafted the Advancing America’s Priorities Act, a package of nearly 40 bills that Coburn and other conservatives prevented from coming to a vote.
The package included The Christopher Reeve and Dana Reeve Act, which would have “allocated $25 million for research on spinal cord injuries, rehabilitation and measures to improve the quality of life for paralyzed Americans.”
Because Coburn and his conservative allies successfully killed the deal, he has attracted a number of right-wing admirers:
- Two months ago, I made a rather vivid attack on a group of U.S. senators I called “the Coburn Seven,” who were blocking consideration of this measure. I was convinced that Tom Coburn — known in the Senate as “Dr. No” for objecting to nearly all spending increases — intended to kill the bill. Then I made the worst mistake of the commentator: actually meeting the object of your scorn….Coburn politely assured me that his motivation was not stinginess. His main goal was to increase the number of people receiving treatment. [WP, 7/30/2008]
- “Now that he is a member of the Senate and I am back in the private sector, paying taxes and worrying about the debt, my view of Coburn has changed. I love the guy.” [The Hill, 7/28/2008]
- “But this other Advancing America’s Priorities Act, that has to be shut down. And Senator Tom Coburn, we we love him. Dr. No , he is up there crusading, it’s a one man crusade if you ask me, against what’s going on on Capitol Hill.” [The Laura Ingraham Show, 7/28/2008]
- “Much like the late conservative hero “Senator No” (Jesse Helms), Coburn seems to be the only conservative willing to block legislation that would exacerbate the $9.3 trillion dollar debt this Congress is passing on to future generations.” [Human Events, 7/14/2008]
Coburn’s so-called ‘idealism’ has real and negative impacts on Americans. According to the Paralyzed Veterans for America, the bill, which would have cost just $0.82 cents per family, would have benefited the 240,000 Americans, including 44,000 veterans, “who suffer from spinal cord injuries or paralysis.”
Unfortunately, these Americans now have to bear the burden of Coburn’s “idealism.”
Newt’s ‘American Solutions’ Is A Front Group For King Coal
Newt’s ‘American Solutions’ Is A Front Group For King Coal
This is the second post in our series of investigative pieces looking into ASWF. See the first post here.
Peabody Energy, the world’s largest coal company, became one of the top funders for Newt Gingrich’s American Solutions for Winning the Future (ASWF) this June, with a contribution of a quarter of a million dollars. IRS documents reveal that Peabody’s donation of $250,000 on June 9 — days after fossil-industry senators blocked global warming legislation — came on top of an April contribution of $25,000 from Peabody’s top Washington lobbyist, Fredrick Palmer:
Peabody, World’s Largest Coal Company, #4 Backer Of American Solutions For Winning The Future. Newt Gingrich’s 527 organization, American Solutions for Winning the Future, has received $275,000 in contributions from Peabody Energy, Inc. As of July 1, 2008, the world’s largest private-sector coal company is ASWF’s fourth highest contributor. [IRS, $250,000 6/16/08, $25,000 4/30/08]
Last year, a front group backed by Peabody smeared Kansas Governor Kathleen Sibelius (D) as a supporter of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for denying an air permit to new coal plants because of their potential global warming pollution. When challenged, Peabody declared, “We are pleased to support the message.”
On July 23, Peabody reported record profits of $242.6 million and record sales of $1.53 billion for its second quarter, on surging coal prices. Its 59.8 million tons of coal sold are responsible for about one percent of the world’s total global warming emissions that quarter.
Peabody Energy’s vision for “America’s Energy Future,” with U.S. coal consumption doubling by 2025, is shared by ASWF, as its “Platform Of The American People” attests:
– To combat the rising cost of energy and reduce our dependence on foreign energy sources, we support the United States using more of its own domestic energy resources, including the oil and coal it already has here in the U.S.
– We believe the United States should increase its use of coal because it is a domestically available energy source, is less expensive than imported foreign oil, and new technologies have dramatically reduced emissions from burning coal, as well as making it much less harmful to the environment.
– We believe that if research indicates we could build clean coal plants in the United States with no carbon emissions, it would be important to build such plants as rapidly as possible.
– We believe in using United States domestic energy sources such as clean coal and oil, even if it means drilling off our coasts and in Alaska, as well as offering tax credits for American businesses that develop new energy sources.
The fossil-fuel-dependent future that Peabody Energy is promoting through Newt Gingrich’s “Drill Here, Drill Now” billionaire-backed front group is catastrophic, as it “ignores the nightmarish damages that would be caused to our air, water and climate.”
In the words of NASA climate scientist Jim Hansen, “Instead of moving heavily into renewable energies, fossil companies choose to spread doubt about global warming, as tobacco companies discredited the smoking-cancer link.” ASWF is just the latest of these fossil-fueled front groups. Hansen concluded:
CEOs of fossil energy companies know what they are doing and are aware of long-term consequences of continued business as usual. In my opinion, these CEOs should be tried for high crimes against humanity and nature. Conviction of ExxonMobil and Peabody Coal CEOs will be no consolation, if we pass on a runaway climate to our children.
McCain’s Health Care Plan: Warren Buffet To Get The Same Credit As You
McCain’s Health Care Plan: Warren Buffet To Get The Same Credit As You
An editorial in today’s Wall Street Journal praises the equalizing quality of Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) plan to give every family in America a $5,000 tax credit to buy health insurance in the individual insurance market:
The McCain plan does not raise taxes, nor does it lower them. Instead, it takes the existing system of tax subsidies and treats everyone alike, regardless of income or job status….For the first time, low- and moderate-income families would get just as much tax relief as the very rich when they purchase health insurance.
But treating “everyone alike” is exactly the problem. Indeed, under McCain’s plan the sick and the not-yet sick, the poor and the wealthy would all receive a one-size-fits-all tax credit, regardless of their health history or income status.
Warren Buffet would collect the same $5,000 as his secretary. A chronically ill older patient, who requires more care or more expensive care, would obtain the same amount for health care as a younger and healthier American.
For poorer Americans, McCain’s credit would be like a five foot rope for a ten foot hole. A $5,000 tax credit for a low income family is not enough to cover the average price of an insurance policy (approximately $14,000) and would leave many poor families — who are unable to make up the difference in premium costs — without insurance.
‘Conditional Engagement’: An Excuse To Stay In Iraq
‘Conditional Engagement’: An Excuse To Stay In Iraq
Our guest blogger is Brian Katulis, Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
Earlier this spring, the Center for a New American Security issued an Iraq policy paper with an identity crisis, a paper that poses as an exit strategy but ultimately advocates a course of action that looks a lot like what the Bush administration and its conservative supporters have endorsed in Iraq.
Shaping the Iraq Inheritance builds upon the core prescriptions of an initial CNAS Iraq report (pdf) released in June 2007. At its core, the “conditional engagement” strategy, as described in the report, tries to carve out a “moderate middle” dependent on simplistic renderings of competing policy proposals on the left and the right. But it is important not to get distracted by the framing mechanism of the four options CNAS presents on Iraq (unconditional engagement, conditional engagement, conditional disengagement, and unconditional disengagement); the core arguments of the CNAS suffer from internal inconsistencies and disconnections from key realities in Iraq and the Middle East.
Although the conditional engagement strategy has thus far attracted little public attention in the Iraq debate, it is worth taking some time to offer constructive criticisms on the proposal in order to more realistically assess U.S. options in Iraq. In a series of posts over the next few days, we’ll offer commentary on the key shortcomings of the CNAS conditional engagement strategy:
1. Conditional engagement does not differ from the Bush administration’s current approach because it fails to define the conditions that would enable U.S. troops to depart Iraq.
The fundamental problem with the conditional engagement strategy is that it fails to clearly define — in precise terms — when the Iraq mission would be accomplished, and when U.S. troops could depart. In a telling chart on page 42, the report stakes out a position that places the strategy in the same space as the current Bush administration policy - supported by most conservatives - a “conditions based” drawdown of troops where the conditions are never really defined beyond vague terms like “accommodation” and “sustainable security.” More »
Sen. Whitehouse: ‘I Call On Administrator Johnson To Resign’
Sen. Whitehouse: ‘I Call On Administrator Johnson To Resign’
In a sobering speech on the Senate floor, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) formally announced the request for a Department of Justice investigation into the potential criminal conduct of EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson, whom he called “a man after Spiro Agnew’s own heart.”
Whitehouse listed five charges of “putting the interests of corporate polluters before science and the law” in ozone, lead, soot, tailpipe emissions, and global warming pollution; and four charges of degrading “the procedures and institutional safeguards that sustain the agency;” before discussing “his apparent dishonesty in testimony before Congress”:
And in what is perhaps the gravest matter of all, I believe the Administrator deliberately and repeatedly lied to Congress, creating a false picture of the process that led to EPA’s denial of the California waiver, in order to obscure the role of the White House in influencing his decision.
Today, Senator Boxer and I have sent a letter to Attorney General Mukasey, asking him to investigate whether Administrator Johnson gave false and misleading statements, whether he lied to Congress, whether he committed perjury, and whether he obstructed Congress’s investigation into the process that led to the denial of the California waiver request.
Watch it:
After listing yet more “signs of an agency corrupted in every place the shadowy influence of the Bush White House can reach,” Sen. Whitehouse concluded:
Administrator Johnson suggests a man who has every intention of driving his agency onto the rocks, of undermining and despoiling it, of leaving America’s environment and America’s people without an honest advocate in their federal government.
This behavior not only degrades his once-great agency – it drives the dagger of dishonesty deep in the very vitals of American democracy.
The American people cannot accept such a person in a position of such great responsibility. I am sorry it has come to this, but I call on Administrator Johnson to resign his position.
I yield the floor.
Watch it:
Join Sen. Whitehouse in calling for Johnson’s resignation here.
Full text of Sen. Whitehouse’s speech: More »
O’Reilly: Top 1% Would Have To Finance ‘Folks Who…Smoke Reefers 24/7′
O’Reilly: Top 1% Would Have To Finance ‘Folks Who…Smoke Reefers 24/7′
Today, in a Washington Times op-ed, Bill O’Reilly complains that if President Bush’s tax cuts “on those making $250,000 or more” are repealed, “me and other rich folks” — who as “part of the 1 percent of Americans that paid an astounding 40 percent of all federal income tax in 2006″ — would have to finance “folks who dropped out of school, who are too lazy to hold a job, who smoke reefers 24/7“:
That means people who drink gin all day will get some of my hard-earned money. Folks who dropped out of school, who are too lazy to hold a job, who smoke reefers 24/7 all will get some goodies in the mail from UncleBarack and Aunt Nancy, funded by me and other rich folks.
O’Reilly’s characterization of the 99% of Americans who earn less than $250,000 a year notwithstanding, his argument that the richest Americans are overburdened by taxation is demonstratively false. According to Internal Revenue Service data, “the share of income reported by the very wealthy has risen faster than the group’s share of income taxes.”
In fact, “the average tax rate of the wealthiest 1% fell to its lowest level in at least 18 years,” allowing the wealthiest 1% of Americans to garner “the highest share of the nation’s adjusted gross income for two decades, and possibly the highest since 1929.” The “average tax rate in 2006 for the top 1%, based on adjusted gross income, was 22.8%,” down from “28.9% in 1996, and…24% in 1988″:
Just Like Lieberman, McCain Playing Dress-Up
Just Like Lieberman, McCain Playing Dress-Up
Back when he was running for reelection in 2006 against anti-war candidate Ned Lamont, Joe Lieberman sought to blur his long-standing hard-line position on Iraq. Casting himself a a critic of the Bush administration, Lieberman insisted “No one wants to end the war in Iraq more than I do.”
Needless to say, when Lieberman returned to the Senate as an Independent, he re-dedicated himself to the task of supporting and enabling the Bush administration’s disastrous “global war on terror” framing, and furiously attacking any Democrats who pointed out how demonstrably flawed and counterproductive that framing has been for understanding genuine threats to U.S. national security. Lieberman has continued his attack dog role in the ‘08 campaign, shedding whatever shred of “independent” credibility he had left by attacking the motives and principles of anyone who doesn’t share his and John McCain’s enthusiasm for endless war against an undifferentiated Islamofascist horde.
Interestingly, just as Lieberman tried to blur his pro-war image for his 2006 Senate reelection bid, John McCain has been experimenting with new, sane foreign policy looks, dressing up his militaristic hegemonism in multilateralist drag, and insisting that he “detests war,” while promising more wars to come. Unfortunately, a few journalists have responded positively to McCain’s liberal internationalist karaoke, ignoring McCain’s actual record, his advisers, and the majority of his past statements, highlighting a few notes of pragmatism in an attempt to buttress the tired “Maverick McCain” narrative.
McCain’s latest head-fake in the direction of the mainstream has been his grudging acknowledgment of a 16-month Iraq withdrawal timetable, which Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has indicated he supports. As McCain tries to blur his position to appear slightly less completely out of step with both the American and Iraqi political consensus, it’s become Lieberman’s job to hold the hard-line on Iraq.
It’s quite simple: Lieberman’s position is McCain’s. Both continue to be committed to the War on Terror, the war in Iraq, and coming soon, a war in Iran. Despite their presentation of themselves as men of principle, both are savvy politicians who understand the need to fudge their positions at various times to make them a bit more palatable to voters. But don’t be fooled. Just as Lieberman reverted to type once he won reelection, so a President McCain will cast off any pretense of international cooperation or consensus building as he pursues victory against the “transcendent challenge of our time.”
McCain Doesn’t Speak For McCain On Raising Payroll Tax
McCain Doesn’t Speak For McCain On Raising Payroll Tax
After calling the “present” Social Security “setup” — in which “we are paying present-day retirees with the [payroll] taxes paid by young workers in America today” — “an absolute disgrace,” Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) reversed his pledge to not raise payroll taxes and suggested that he might preserve the “present setup” by increasing payroll taxes:
STEPHANOPOULOS: So, that means payroll tax increases are on the table, as well?
MCCAIN: There is nothing that’s off the table. I have my positions, and I’ll articulate them. But nothing’s off the table.
I don’t want tax increases. Of course I’d like to have young Americans have some of their money put into an account with their name on it. But that doesn’t mean that anything is off the table…
McCain’s reversal “drew a sharp rebuke Monday from conservatives” and has led the McCain campaign to backtrack from the senator’s promise that “everything is on the table.” During an appearance on the Fox News Channel today, Tucker Bounds, McCain’s national spokesperson, said that raising the payroll tax is “absolutely out of the question”:
KELLY: You’re off point. We’re talking on a go-forward basis. McCain gets in the White House, is he going to raise the payroll tax? Might the Social Security tax go up? Is that on the table?
BOUNDS: No Megyn there is no imaginable circumstance where John McCain would raise payroll taxes. It’s absolutely out of the question.
Watch a compilation:
- In 2005 on Meet the Press, McCain said, “As part of a compromise I could” support lifting on the cap on Social Security taxes to apply them to incomes above $90,000. [MSNBC, 2/20/2005]
- During an interview with the National Review, McCain promised to not raise payroll taxes under any circumstances. [National Review, 3/5/2007]
- In 2007 on Fox News Sunday, McCain denied his earlier comments and said, “I want to right now tell you I will not support a tax increase. I don’t see how it would be — it’s off the table, certainly, now.” [FNC, 4/30/2007]
- In 2007, McCain said, “I am against tax increases. I am against increases in taxes. I think there are ways to fix Social Security without that.” [SFSSS, 6/2007]
Lifting the current payroll tax cap (currently $102,000) “on the employer side to make businesses pay Social Security taxes on all of the income of the highest paid employers…is the fairest way to help shore up the finances of Social Security“:
According to the Social Security and Medicare Board of Trustees, the longrange, 75-year actuarial deficit is equal to 1.95 percent of taxable payroll. Eliminating the cap on both the employer and employee side would be more than enough to bring the system into long-range balance. Removing the cap on the employer side would thus go a long ways toward restoring solvency as well as help ensure greater progressivity and fairness in the payroll tax.
The Billionaires Behind Newt’s ‘American Solutions For Winning The Future’
The Billionaires Behind Newt’s ‘American Solutions For Winning The Future’
The same old men that propelled George W. Bush into office in 2000 and 2004 are behind Newt Gingrich’s multimillion-dollar front group, American Solutions for Winning the Future (ASWF). ASWF has capitalized on the energy crisis caused by the Bush presidency to promote a “Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less” campaign. Although the campaign’s priorities are just a rebranding of an oil-company agenda, ASWF’s well-funded drill-drill-drill message has achieved significant success, with 1.3 million people signing their petition:
We, therefore, the undersigned citizens of the United States, petition the U.S. Congress to act immediately to lower gasoline prices (and diesel and other fuel prices) by authorizing the exploration of proven energy reserves to reduce our dependence on foreign energy sources from unstable countries.
The Wonk Room has covered in depth how the “solutions” promoted by “environmentalist” Newt Gingrich: increased offshore drilling, oil shale mining, coal-to-liquids, and tar sands — would be ecological disasters without economic benefit, except for Big Oil executives and their even wealthier investors. That group has likewise prospered richly under Bush, while the rest of the nation falls into disrepair.
So who is behind ASWF? The key funder is right-wing casino kingpin Sheldon Adelson, who has pumped over $3 million into the organization since its beginning in 2006. Adelson is flanked by 56 other such donors who have given at least $10,000. Donors can give unlimited amounts to this 527 corporation, making it an ideal mechanism for the superrich to influence the presidential season. In the first of a Wonk Room series, we discuss the seven right-wing billionaires bankrolling this “non-partisan” organization:
The ASWF Billionaires
SHELDON ADELSON
Net Worth: $26.0 billion
Donations to ASWF: $3,066,340
Bush Pioneer
The Casino Kingpin
BACKGROUND: The third richest man in America, Adelson made his first millions with the dot-com trade show Comdex, then purchased the Las Vegas Sands Hotel and Casino, tearing it down to construct the Venetian in 1999. Since he took the Sands Corporation public in 2004 and began establishing casinos for the Asian market in Macao, his wealth has ballooned at a rate of “almost $1 million an hour” to $26 billion, mostly in China. A major GOP donor, Adelson sits on the board of the “conservative Republican Jewish Coalition.” Armed with, in his language, a “big pair of brass monkeys,” Adelson “is fiercely opposed to a two-state solution” in Israel. In addition to supplying over $3 million to ASWF, Adelson co-founded Freedom’s Watch, a “big neoconservative slush fund” with ties to the American Enterprise Institute.
QUOTES:
“You know, I am the richest Jew in the world.” [New Yorker, 6/30/08]
“We’re the largest investor of any kind in the history of China.” [New Yorker, 6/30/08]
On AIPAC’s support for aid to Palestinians: “If someone is going to jump off a bridge, it is incumbent upon their friends to dissuade them.” [Jewish Telegraphic Agency, 11/15/07]
“Why is it fair that I should be paying a higher percentage of taxes than anyone else?” [New Yorker, 6/30/08]
CARL LINDNER
Net Worth: $2.3 billion
Donations to ASWF: $650,000
Bush Pioneer
The Banana Republican
BACKGROUND: Carl Lindner, Jr., “a Cincinnati businessman with international interests ranging from banking to bananas, is one of the nation’s wealthiest men” and “gives heavily to political campaigns.” He built a dairy empire into the holding company American Financial Group, making giant profits off the savings and loan industry, junk bonds, and Chiquita Brands International Inc., where he “oversaw the payment of roughly $1.7 million to a Colombian paramilitary group.” Using political connections in the 1990s, “Lindner opened European markets for Chiquita bananas,” but “it came at a high cost: more expensive goods for American citizens; the threat of fewer jobs in industries that buy American-manufactured steel; and certain economic instability for Caribbean and African nations and its citizens.”
EPA Gags Staff: ‘Do Not Respond To Questions’
EPA Gags Staff: ‘Do Not Respond To Questions’
An email released by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) reveals that Environmental Protection Agency officials were directed on June 16 not to answer any questions from the press, the Inspector General, or the Congress’s investigative arm, the Government Accountability Office.
That same week, President Bush asserted executive privilege to block the Congressional investigation into White House interference with EPA decisions on global warming and smog regulations.
According to PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch, “Inside the current EPA, candor has become the cardinal sin.” Furthermore, “while this directive is of questionable legality, an agency specialist risks discipline or even termination for disregarding a direct order.” The email, from Robbi Farrell, chief of staff in EPA’s enforcement office, was sent to managers in EPA’s Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance with the repeated admonition for all staff:
Please do not respond to questions or make any statements.
The full text:
Sen. Barbara Boxer, the California Democrat who heads the Senate environment committee, said that the administrator had turned “the EPA into a secretive, dangerous ally of polluters, instead of a leader in the effort to protect the health and safety of the American people.”
Senate Conservatives Vote Against Low-Income Energy Assistance, Push Oil Drilling Myth
Senate Conservatives Vote Against Low-Income Energy Assistance, Push Oil Drilling Myth
Yesterday, Senate conservatives voted down bipartisan legislation that would have “provided an additional $2.5 billion in funding for the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP),” a federal program “that helps low- income families pay their cooling and heating bills.”
Arguing that “the chamber should focus on crafting a comprehensive plan to address high energy costs before taking up specific pieces of the debate,” conservatives insisted that drilling for more “gas and oil” would do more to help struggling families pay for heating oil.
Watch a compilation video of conservative senators pushing the false myth that drilling will help low-income families pay their heating bills:
But drilling for oil will do nothing to “alleviate and bring down those natural gas prices for us.” As the Energy Information Administration (EIA) has explained, “access to the Pacific, Atlantic, and eastern Gulf regions would not have a significant impact on domestic crude oil and natural gas production or prices before 2030.” But because United States demand for oil far outstrips production — we consume 25 percent of the world’s supply but have two percent of the proven reserves — further exploitation of domestic resources will not have a long-term impact either. After 2030, the EIA found, “any impact on average wellhead prices is expected to be insignificant.”
This winter, the “average cost of heating a home…will total about $1,114 – 14.6 percent more than last year,” forcing “low-income families [to] spend on average about 15 percent of their income on home energy bills.” Unfortunately, rather than voting for substantive relief, conservatives continue to propagate false myths for political purposes.
Transcript: More »
Holtz-Eakin on McCain’s Draconian Budget Cuts: ‘The Horrified Folks Better Get Ready’
Holtz-Eakin on McCain’s Draconian Budget Cuts: ‘The Horrified Folks Better Get Ready’
At an event at the Tax Policy Center last Wednesday, McCain adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin defended the draconian cuts to spending required to balance McCain’s budget and pay for his tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy by saying:
The reception among the Washington establishment has been one part disbelief — because, oh my god, no one actually does that in Washington (that’s not true they’ve just forgotten) — and one part horror that he might succeed. Well, the horrified folks better get ready.
Listen here:
The “Washington establishment” aren’t the only folks who are horrified by what would need to be a 40% cut in non-defense domestic spending. Here are some others:
–340,000 kids who’d lose Head Start funding
–2.1 million grade-school students who’d be effectively cut from Title 1 school funding
–1.6 million aspiring college students who’d lose access to Pell Grants
–3.4 million families who would lose WIC assistance for low-income women, infants, and children
Better get ready.
McCain Adviser Steve Forbes: Cap-And-Trade Wouldn’t ‘Get Very Far’ Under McCain
McCain Adviser Steve Forbes: Cap-And-Trade Wouldn’t ‘Get Very Far’ Under McCain
Speaking with CNN’s Glenn Beck on Friday, former GOP presidential candidate and current McCain economic adviser Steve Forbes disparaged Sen. McCain’s signature plan to put mandatory reductions on greenhouse gases with a cap-and-trade system. McCain has repeatedly pointed to his record on promoting global warming legislation as a key distinction between himself and the current president. Forbes predicted:
I think cap and trade is going to go the way of some other things, as you may remember, when he came into office, Bill Clinton had a proposal of tax carbons and stuff like that. I don’t think those things are going to get very far as people start to examine the details of them.
Watch it:
On July 9, conservative journalist Larry Kudlow reported that he was told “on deep background” by a “senior McCain official” that McCain was off cap-and-trade. The campaign publicly responded that “any notion that the senator is abandoning or minimizing his support for cap-and-trade is ‘totally false.’” Forbes is signaling that Kudlow may be right, and McCain will follow in the footsteps of George W. Bush. As a candidate in 2000, Bush pledged to impose mandatory reductions of carbon dioxide, but reversed that position once he took the oath of office. In 2001, newly elected Vice President Dick Cheney said of Bush’s pledge, “It was a mistake.”
Contrary to right-wing talking points, a cap-and-trade system is not in fact a tax (or even a “stealth tax”). Critically, cap-and-trade provides “emissions certainty” — ensuring that pollution does not exceed a certain level, whereas a carbon tax would place no such limits. At WorldChanging, Alan Durning explains how the most flexible regulatory system for managing global warming pollution would be using both policy instruments: cap-and-trade and a carbon tax. With the stark need to arrest global climate change as fast as possible, we will need all the tools in the chest.
Transcript: More »
McCain: The Iraq Invasion = A Matter For Historians; The Surge = A Matter For The Voters
McCain: The Iraq Invasion = A Matter For Historians; The Surge = A Matter For The Voters
In recent interviews on ABC’s This Week with George Stephanopoulos and CNN’s Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, John McCain showed that he really still does not grasp, or at least is not willing to admit, the numerous negative and far-reaching consequences of the US war in Iraq.
Challenged by both Stephanopoulos and Blitzer on his support for the 2003 invasion, McCain continued to insist that Saddam Hussein “did pose a long-term threat to the security of the United States of America,” but then suggested that truly answering that question is “a job for the historians.”
To Stephanopoulos:
MCCAIN: I said that Saddam Hussein caused a — imposed a threat to the United States of America and our security. And the Oil for Food scandal, the $12 billion he was skimming, the fact that he had said that he had in operation and he wanted to have weapons of mass destruction, the fact that this society that he ruled in such a brutal fashion was really awful. And he did pose a long-term threat to the security of the United States of America.
But that’s a job for the historians.
To Blitzer:
MCCAIN: I’d be more than happy to go through all of that again, and historians will. The fact is that Saddam Hussein was bent on the development of weapons of mass destruction, and I’ll be glad to discuss that.
Got that? Support for the Iraq invasion = a matter for historians. Support for the surge = a matter for the voters.
One might be a bit more favorably disposed toward McCain’s attempt to consign the Iraq invasion to the history books and move on if McCain gave any indication that he understood the numerous disastrous consequences of that invasion, but he does not. Even in the most charitable interpretation, the surge has succeeded only in containing some of the worst effects of the Iraq war. In terms of reconciliation between Iraq’s sectarian and political factions, the tactics related to the surge have only entrenched and, in some respects, exacerbated existing tensions.
As has been the case with the current administration’s Middle East policy since March 2003, the next administration’s Middle East policy will largely be concerned with grappling with and attempting to mitigate those consequences. The fact that McCain doesn’t even recognize that they exist — because to do so would be to admit that he made the wrong call in 2003 — is a serious problem.
It’s transparent spin for McCain to present the surge (however he’s defining it this week), rather than the invasion itself, as “the crucial point” upon which to judge his national security record. This is like a gambler protesting that he shouldn’t be criticized for having lost a thousand dollars at the craps table, because “the crucial point” is that he just won back twenty dollars at blackjack. The wise choice, of course, would have been not to gamble in the first place.
McCain Offers Top Social Security ‘Privatization’ Advocate As Surrogate
McCain Offers Top Social Security ‘Privatization’ Advocate As Surrogate
Our guest blogger is Robert Gordon, Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
Today, the McCain campaign is putting forward economist Martin Feldstein as a surrogate.
Feldstein is widely acknowledged as the “chief intellectual force behind privatization” of Social Security. That’s Feldstein’s own term. He wrote “The Case for Privatization” and “Privatizing Social Security: The Ten Trillion Dollar Opportunity.”
McCain personally