The Senate as you are well aware by now passed a sweetened version of the bailout Tuesday evening. The House voted again today and complied, as I suspected they would. So the dirty deed is now done. Bear in mind that this bill was rife with waist added by the Senate on Tuesday night that had nothing to do with the economical turmoil.
$2 million tax benefit for makers of wooden arrows for children
$100 million tax break to benefit auto racetrack owners
$192 million in rebates on excise taxes for the Puerto Rican and Virgin Islands rum industry
$148 million in tax relief for U.S. wool fabric producers
$49 million tax benefit for fishermen and other plaintiffs who sued over the 1989 tanker Exxon Valdez spill.
People, are you not outraged? If so, ask yourself why you might be going to the voting booth in November to return the same people to office who just voted for one of the largest Federal power grabs in American history and threw almost a trillion dollars of money we don’t have down the toilet. Are those of you in South Carolina prepared to give Lindsey Graham another six years? Think twice. He’s one of the culprits. Richard Burr also voted for it on behalf of North Carolina. Senators Jim DeMint (R-SC) and Elizabeth Dole (R-NC) opposed the measure. Additionally, both Presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama voted for the bailout as did VP candidate Joe Biden.
I can’t get the vote information from the House yet. The Web site must be getting swamped with traffic because it’s timing out on me, but I’ll post it as soon as I have it available.
Update: I now have the House roll. Sue Myrick and Gresham Barrett flipped on this, voting for the bailout today, whereas they voted against it before.
As I’m sure you have heard by now, the $700 billion bailout failed to pass the House of Representatives today by a mere 13 votes. I was opposed to this bailout, so I am rather pleased, for now. They’ll try something again. I just have a huge issue with this theory that corporations can privatize all of their gains but socialize their losses. That just doesn’t seem quite right to me.
This video pretty much sums up my thoughts.
So how did your representative vote? Did they vote to use your tax dollars to bail out Wall Street fat cats or did they vote to save your tax dollars?
Voting for the bailout were:
Bob Etheridge (D-NC-02)
David Price (D-NC-04)
Mel Watt (D-NC-12)
Brad Miller (D-NC-13)
Henry Brown (R-SC-01)
Joe Wilson (R-SC-02)
Bob Inglis (R-SC-04)
John Spratt (D-SC-05)
Jim Clyburn (D-SC-06)
Voting against the heinous bailout were:
G.K. Butterfield (D-NC-01)
Walter Jones (R-NC-03)
Virginia Foxx (R-NC-05)
Howard Coble (R-NC-06)
Mike McIntyre (D-NC-07)
Robin Hayes (R-NC-08)
Sue Myrick (R-NC-09)
Patrick McHenry (R-NC-10)
Heath Shuler (D-NC-11)
Gresham Barrett (R-SC-03)
Boy, the South Carolina delegation sure sucks a nut. David Price is no surprise. He loves using your money to give special favors to all of his corporate friends. Same with Henry Brown. I expected Watt to be on the yea list as well because he is a Socialist. Overall it looks to be just about split down the middle. Now you know who is on your side and who is pining for the Rockefellers.
The U.S. Senate today overwhelmingly sent President Bush a spending bill of $634 billion to keep the government “operating beyond the current budget year.” If only that were the case. This budget passage, as every other, consisted of a hogfest of a Congressional pen of pigs in starched white shirts feeding from the trough that you and I provided. This thing is stuffed with thousands of earmarks in addition to $25 billion of taxpayer funded loans to help bailout the automakers. The bill was presented in its final form from the House to the Senate as H.R. 2638, Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2008, sponsored by none other than our very own Representative David Price (D-NC-04).
How did our representatives vote? As usual, in the Senate Jim DeMint stood up and vocally opposed the legislation. Lindsey Graham joined him in voting against it. Richard Burr made a rare and unusual move, voting Present, Giving Live Pair. What this means is that somebody else who not present at the vote and knew they wouldn’t be who planned on voting the opposite way Burr was made a deal with him to vote present so that the outcome wouldn’t be altered by their absence. In other words, for the sake of argument, let’s say Burr was hypothetically going to vote No, but John McCain was absent and was planning to vote Yes which would cancel out Burr’s vote anyway. McCain would ask Burr to vote Present then so that the same result is produced. As I said, this is just a hypothetical. Burr may have intended to vote Yes and made a deal with an absent Senator who wanted to vote against it. And we can’t forget Liddy Dole who as usual voted for her pork.
In the House we had the following voting for the waste:
The House passed H.R. 6899 last night, otherwise known as the Comprehensive American Energy Security and Consumer Protection Act. As I touched on yesterday, this is the House version of Lindsey Graham’s “Gang of 10″ bill that will do absolutely nothing to open up oil reserves off of our shores and lower gas prices. This bill is nothing more than political cover so that politicians can go into the November election lying to their constituents that they voted for offshore drilling, when they didn’t. Most of the coastal oil reserves will remain untapped under this bill and will have no effect. Furthermore, the states will get no royalties from the drilling, so which state is going to okay this and take the slight risk of an oil spill without any revenue from it? None of them will and Nancy Pelosi knows that. Let’s not forget the tax increase the oil companies will receive as well which will get passed on to you and me when we’re buying our gas.
So who in the Carolinas voted for this hoax? Who will lie to you between now and Election Day and claim they voted to lower your prices at the pump? A lot of them.
Democracy Corps is James Carville’s organization. This poll was taken from August 20th through August 26th.
NC-01
Party
% of Vote
G.K. Butterfield
D
76%
Dean Stephens
R
18%
NC-02
Party
% of Vote
Bob Etheridge
D
55%
Dan Mansell
R
38%
NC-03
Party
% of Vote
Walter Jones
R
67%
Craig Weber
D
21%
NC-04
Party
% of Vote
David Price
D
70%
BJ Lawson
R
25%
NC-05
Party
% of Vote
Virginia Foxx
R
48%
Roy Carter
D
46%
NC-06
Party
% of Vote
Howard Coble
R
71%
Teresa Sue Bratton
D
23%
NC-07
Party
% of Vote
Mike McIntyre
D
56%
Will Breazeale
R
35%
NC-08
Party
% of Vote
Robin Hayes
R
50%
Larry Kissell
D
42%
NC-09
Party
% of Vote
Sue Myrick
R
58%
Harry Taylor
D
31%
NC-10
Party
% of Vote
Patrick McHenry
R
54%
Daniel Johnson
D
39%
NC-11
Party
% of Vote
Heath Shuler
D
66%
Carl Mumpower
R
27%
Now you should bear in mind that the samples were very small, less than 100 people in each Congressional district, so there is going to be a larger margin of error than in most polls. However, most of these percentages seem fairly accurate to me. The only two I question is NC-05 and NC-08. I don’t think that Virginia Foxx is in a statistical tie with Roy Carter, though I don’t doubt he isn’t close to her. I also think the gap between Robin Hayes and Larry Kissell is smaller than the eight point spread shown in this poll. Shuler is crushing Mumpower which I have been saying since the birth of this blog would be the case no matter which Republican Heath runs against. Plus, the fact that Mumpower’s race has been akin to a Barnum & Bailey juggling act only makes it more so. I don’t know why NC-12 and NC-13 were not included on this poll, but I think the conventional wisdom is that neither Mel Watt nor Brad Miller have much to worry about this year.
All and all, I don’t see any of the Congressional districts in North Carolina switching parties this year. I think all of the incumbents are going to be retained. If Kissell loses, I’m afraid my friends at BlueNC will become suicidal.
Update: I mistakenly had the Fifth District Democratic candidate listed as Roy Cooper instead of Roy Carter. That has been corrected.
Citizens Against Government Waste is a taxpayer watchdog group that ranks our Congressmen on their effectiveness of responsibly managing our tax dollars and not spending it on frivolous pork barrell spending. Overall, the current Congress sucks the toejam off a homeless man’s foot in this regard, but our representatives from both North and South Carolina were a little better than most. A rating of 100% is a taxpayer hero and a rating of 0% is a government elected thief stealing your money in order to pander to his constituents at reelection time. Our two states received no 100s or zeros, but came close on both ends.
Our four Senators did a pretty good job. Both Burr and DeMint received an honorable mention by the CAGW, each scoring a 97%. Graham came in with an 87% and Dole with 73%. Overall, these scores are acceptable. The House? Not so much….
The Republicans did decently for the most part, which surprised me because southern Republicans typically are some of the worst abusers for earmarking in Congress. The Democrats all performed abysmally and Henry Brown, Robin Hayes, and Walter Jones could use some work themselves.
He talked about his bill to boost the number of federal investigators of excessive oil speculation, saying, “Right now, we need more cops on the beat,” according to his prepared remarks, Barb Barrett reports
Why isn’t Etheridge, Price, and Miller back in Washington getting us some relief on gas prices and gas taxes?
Since Etheridge does not understand the concept of not drilling where there is no oil I will explain. Sir, you cannot get oil where there is none. I hope that was easy to understand.
How about cutting a lot of the excise taxes involving gas, diesel, propane and other forms of energy? That would put more money into our pockets and enable the workers and retirees of our great nation the ability to survive without sacrificing food or medicine that we need. But I do not see Democrats like the three above to do becuase it is too easy and takes away from the power of of the federal purse strings.
This week, Etheridge will help with hearings in the House Agriculture Committee on whether excessive speculation is wrongly driving up oil prices.
“I do think folks believe there’s manipulation, and we want to get to the bottom of it and find out,” Etheridge said. “When gas was $2, I thought that was ridiculous. At $4, it’s crippling people.”
Oil analysts said as much in hearings in late June, where they blamed much of the price run-up on speculators. Meanwhile, business interests insisted that they, too, need relief.
Perhaps speculators are artificially pumping up the price of oil. It’s happened before in other industries. I am leery, however, with Etheridge and other members of Congress meddling with the market. OPEC has stated that the price run up also has to do with an increase in global demand and a supply that isn’t keeping up. If Congress ends up passing regulations that somehow cap the increase in oil prices or artificially force it down we will run into another shortage like we did in the 1970s.
Voting 268 for and 155 against, the House on Thursday approved an amendment to HR 2642 that would appropriate $162.5 billion to pay for Iraq-Afghanistan war costs well into 2009.
Why did these Democrats vote against funding the troops? Their earlier attempts at passing a law to force a removal of troops from those two countries failed. I guess we know who supports the military and who doesn’t in North Carolina.
People have asked me about local and state offices and why I blame the democrats for the failures in this state. The issue cannot be sugar coated, the democrats are in charge in North Carolina and locally. They are
responsible for how bad things are getting here and to keep electing them to office is a further sign of either the voters being blind or just going along for the ride.
I stood inside of Mount Peace Baptist Church today and listened to Lindy Brown say that she needed more people like the ones that were represented there in that church on candidates day. She was probably not talking about me but the other DEMOCRATS. She is a county commissioner. I am the exception. I was one of 2 Republicans amongst 34 other democrats. Even Bev Perdue was there. I looked everyone in the eye that I greeted or was greeted. I proudly said I was Republican candidate for House district 33 after a couple democrats made it clear they were democrats. You see Dwight Spencer made it clear to the crowd that we were Democrats and Republicans.
Representative Etheridge was there and allowed to speak. He said that the country would make history. Elect a woman, a African-American or the oldest President ever. I could have taken him to task on the dig at Senator McCain, but I didn’t. It was out of respect to the parishioners of the church not point out the partisan-meanness of Rep. Etheridge. I was there to show that I truly wanted to represent all of the people and that Republicans wanted to represent everyone also.
Paul Terrell III
Terrell III for State House
Republican nominee for 33rd district-North Carolina State House
Dan Mansell of Selma filed today as a Republican candidate for Congress in the 2nd District. His filing sets up a likely rematch with incumbent U.S. Rep. Bob Etheridge, Democrat from Lillington.
Mansell is the only Republican to file so far in the district. Filing closes on Friday.
This district is certainly Republican capable if they work at it. Only one Republican has represented the 2nd since 1901 and he won the seat during the Republican Revolution of 1994. It is suspected that he would have won reelection had he not been involved in a car accident in which some shady circumstances were involved.
WASHINGTON - A year ago, U.S. Rep. Bob Etheridge took to the floor of the House to oppose the buildup of troops in Iraq, calling President Bush’s plan to send 20,000 additional men and women into combat “more of the same.”
On Wednesday, Etheridge said the military is making progress.
Etheridge, a Lillington Democrat, flew into the war zone Wednesday morning in his first trip to Iraq since 2006. There, he listened to classified briefings from military officials. He ate lunch with soldiers from North Carolina. And, as night fell, he saw the hopeful image of lights twinkling from homes in the Iraqi countryside.
“I think from what I’ve seen here, it is working,” Etheridge said in a conference call with reporters. “It is making a difference.”
Quite true, there has been much progress in Iraq. The first clue on that is how the Democrats have dropped it as an issue and how the media has stopped talking about it.
The message from Etheridge, whose district includes Southeast Raleigh, was supportive of the short-term stimulus package being considered by Congress, but he is also concerned about the long-term debt included in President Bush’s budget.
In a statement, Etheridge said that the stimulus package is a “good first step” towards “jump-starting the economy.”
The average North Carolina household would receive a tax rebate of $914 under the plan.
No, that is not true. They will not receive a “rebate” because you can’t get a rebate on money you never paid to begin with. This stimulus plan is nothing but a welfare handout. The money needs to be rebated to the people who are actually paying the taxes and carrying the economy. Instead it’s nothing but a Marxist transfer of wealth from those that produce to those that do not. It will not boost the economy in any way.
“It’s not ‘teaching to the test’ when you draw from the curriculum of what students are actually being taught in class,” he said. “What assessment is about is student growth.”
The No Child Left Behind Act with its increased accountability for states, school districts and schools, will prove to be the most effective education legislation in recent history, he predicted. “If that law is renewed, it will become an educational model,” Etheridge said.
I was surprised by this praise for NCLB. Most people I hear criticize it and I am personally opposed to it because I think one of the larger problems with American education is that the Federal government has too much involvement.
On recess from their work at the Capitol, U.S. Reps. Bob Etheridge, Brad Miller and David Price have been touring their districts over the past few days. They’ve visited high-tech workers at Research Triangle Park, farmers and businesspeople in Wake and Johnston counties, and elderly retirees in Chatham County.Some of their concerns are familiar ones — the war in Iraq and illegal immigration, for example. But many residents also had questions for their congressmen about issues that hit them in the pocketbook. They wondered whether the nation’s economy can withstand Washington’s spending habits and a weakening real estate market.
Some of the complaints in the article are genuinely concerning, but most of it was just bed wetting and whining from people who don’t feel they are responsible for themselves and old people who care more about their Social Security than they do about their grandchildrens’ futures.
