Starbucks awkwardly takes sides in the #shutdown

I woke up this morning and found this email in my inbox from Starbucks, asking me to sign the "Come Together" petition:

Marco Rubio demands end to "Washington's reckless spending"

Senator Marco Rubio published an op-ed in USA Today yesterday, emphatically stating that any increase in the debt ceiling must be accompanied by real and significant spending cuts, as well as entitlement reforms:

Missing the point about the fiscal cliff

Taking a nice stroll off the fiscal cliff

Since the election, the news has turned to the ongoing negotiations regarding the so-called "fiscal cliff," and the potential compromises that the Republican-controlled House and the Democrat-controlled Senate may make.

There are many questions being debated on the editorial pages and talk radio programs and cable television news shows:

Will the Bush tax cuts be allowed to expire?

Will the Democrats' rhetoric demonizing all those "millionaires and billionaires" actually be persuasive in getting Republicans to sign on to tax increases?

Reactions to the Super Committee Super Fail

File this under "News that Surprised Very Few People:" Turns out that Joint Deficit Reduction Committee, aka the "Super Committee," wasn't so super after all, and officially announcing today that they had failed to reach a deal.

RT @KatiePavlich: pretty sure the new word is for #fail is going to be #superMon Nov 21 12:57:47 via Twitter for iPhoneMichelle Malkin
michellemalkin

And, file this under "News that Surprised Absolutely No One:" Obama gave a prime time press conference in which he blamed the Republicans, demanded that people "pay their fair share" several times, blamed the Republicans, claimed that the failure to reach a deal jeopardized health care for the poor and medical research, blamed the Republicans, called for tax increases, blamed the Republicans, and oh, yeah, blamed the Republicans. 

Dramatic Chipmunk is shocked
that Obama blames the GOP.

Our president seems to lack the ability to give a press conference when things don't go his way without sounding like a petulant child.


I'm waiting for someone to make a mashup YouTube video with Obama press conferences and a toddler having a temper tantrum. Or maybe a remix of "Blame Canada!" from the South Park movie as "Blame Republicans!" Seriously, feel free to take these ideas, they're beyond my tech abilities, but just give me credit! (And a linkback, of course.)


Anyway, here's some reactions to the Super Committee Super Fail today from Marco Rubio, Adam Hasner, Newt Gingrich, and around the conservative blogosphere:

FIFTEEN TRILLION DOLLARS?!

Ugh...our national debt hit fifteen trillion dollars today.

$15,000,000,000,000.00!

(and the numbers continue to spin)

Blogger conference call with Karen Harrington

I just got off a conference call for conservative bloggers with Republican Congressional candidate Karen Harrington. It was the first time I had heard her speak directly (other than her YouTube videos), and I was impressed. Those of you in the Central Florida area, you'll want to come out and meet her on Thursday (event details here).

Harrington put up a decent fight last year as a first time candidate against Debbie Wasserman Schultz, garnering nearly 40 percent of the vote and forcing her to spend about a million dollars to defend what had previously been viewed as a "guaranteed" Democrat seat. DWS is once again raising a boatload of money, but most of it comes from PACs. Harrington noted her opponent's lack of support among actual people living in the district, and proudly touted her own campaign's grassroots support. "She's going to raise a lot of money, but it's not going to come from the constituents. It never has."

According to the Harrington campaign's sources, the redistricting process is expected to shift District 20 about three to four percent more Republican. So, if Harrington got 40 percent last time, with the district's new Republicans being likely to support her, she needs to shift the polls less than ten percent to fire Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

Folks, this seat is absolutely in play. Wouldn't it be fun to knock out the Chair of the DNC? Oh, is that violent rhetoric? Guess I'm one of those tea party terrorists that DWS and her left-wing buddies have been whining about lately...

Some commentary on the U.S. credit rating downgrade

In case you missed all the excitement on Friday, Standard & Poor's downgraded the United States' credit rating from AAA to AA+.

To put this in perspective, this is the first time our credit rating has been downgraded in over a century. The 1929 Stock Market Crash, the Great Depression, World War I and II, the Jimmy Carter years, September 11th...none of these events were damaging enough to downgrade our credit rating, but two and a half years under President Obama was.

Our AAA credit rating survived President Jimmy Carter.Sat Aug 06 00:55:05 via UberSocial for BlackBerryRory Cooper
rorycooper

After the jump, a selection of some commentary from around the conservative blogosphere:

Maybe this is why the markets are freaking out?

Here's a great infographic from Bankrupting America (the same group that produced the excellent "Honey Badger Goes To Washington" video) illustrating the scope of the debt ceiling problem:

Keep in mind, this only shows the last nine years of debt ceiling increases, and the debt ceiling bill that Congress finally passed this week doesn't actually reduce the debt, but only slightly slows the rate of growth. The Chinese are not impressed with these Congressional accounting tricks, and neither am I.

It's cute how the MSM is surprised markets reacted badly to Congress running up $14 trillion in debt & then failing to do anything about it.Fri Aug 05 18:02:42 via UberSocial for BlackBerrySarah Rumpf
rumpfshaker

Honey Badger Goes to Washington! [VIDEO]

Here's some good silly fun. "Randall," whose "crazy honey badger" YouTube video has been viewed over 13 million times, has now partnered with a group called "Bankrupting America" to produce a new video called "Crazy Washington Honey Badgers."

Absolutely epic:


YouTube | BankruptingAmerica | Crazy Washington Honey Badgers

This...is the Washington politician! They have the hugest credit cards in the entire world! 14 point 7 trillion dollars! Thanks, American people! Talk about bada**, take me shopping!

Seriously, if you've somehow missed the original honey badger video, check it out here.

...and yes, the honey badger is a real animal.

$14.7 trillion in debt? That's cray-zay!

Reactions from Rubio, Hasner, & Webster to the Debt Ceiling Bill [VIDEO]

The debt ceiling bill has passed, and President Obama has signed it into law. I've collected the statements from several prominent Florida Republicans, Senator Marco Rubio, Senate candidate Adam Hasner, and Congressman Daniel Webster on the passage of this bill and have posted them here.

Rubio voted against the bill, Webster voted for it, and Hasner was opposed.

First, a statement released by Senator Marco Rubio earlier this afternoon:

I cannot support this plan because it fails to actually solve our debt problem, fails to diminish the risk of a credit rating downgrade and is not a long-term solution to avert a debt crisis.  This plan still adds at least $7 trillion to our debt over 10 years.  It fails to immediately start downsizing government, leaving 98 percent of deficit reduction until after the 2012 election.  By not addressing the biggest driver of our debt, health care spending, this plan ensures Medicare’s looming bankruptcy, while protecting ObamaCare’s $2.6 trillion blank check. It contains no real structural reforms to spending, such as a Constitutional balanced budget amendment.  It fails to reduce spending by what credit rating agencies say is at least $4 trillion to avert a downgrade.  Worst of all is that at a time of 9.2 percent unemployment, this plan fails to include pro-growth measures to help get people back to work and create new taxpayers to help us pay down the debt. In fact, I fear that the new ‘Supercommittee’ in this bill could lead to expedited consideration of big tax hikes on our struggling economy.  And if Congress rejects new taxes, then up to $850 billion of devastating automatic defense spending cuts would be triggered at a time when the world is as dangerous as it’s ever been.

Americans are looking at Washington with anger, disgust and concern that maybe America’s problems are just too big for our leaders to solve.  As I outlined in The Wall Street Journal in March, keeping America exceptional will require spending cuts and caps, saving Medicare and Social Security from bankruptcy, a Constitutional balanced budget amendment, tax reform and regulatory reform.  Above all, it will require courage.

Also, here is a video of Rubio's floor speech today:


YouTube | SenatorMarcoRubio | Rubio: "This Debate Will Continue"

After the jump, read the text of Rubio's remarks, as well as statements from Hasner and Webster.

Two silver linings in the debt ceiling deal

So, apparently we have a debt ceiling deal. Maybe. The House voted for it last night (you can see how your Member of Congress voted here) and the Senate will vote today.

There are some serious negatives with this bill. It's garnered harsh words from both the right and the left.  (Best comment goes to Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO 5th), who called the deal a "sugar coated satan sandwich.") Personally, I think they raised the debt ceiling too far and for too long. Obama got one of his major objectives: to not have to deal with this again before the 2012 elections.

Another criticism I have is that it seems that far too many of the spending cuts are put off until later. It reminds me of what University of Florida Athletic Director Jeremy Foley said regarding the mid-season firing of football coach Ron Zook in 2004, "What must be done eventually, should be done immediately." We know our national debt is too high, we know we're spending too much money, why not tackle it now?

It's not a perfect deal. Not by any long stretch of the imagination. But there were two "silver linings" in this deal that should give everyone hope, for very different reasons:

A welcome sight.

First, last night's vote marked the return of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, her first vote since she was shot in Tucson, AZ in January.

Her recovery continues to be nothing short of miraculous, and her return to Congress was one thing that everyone could agree was a positive and blessed event.

As Giffords posted on her Twitter account, "The #Capitol looks beautiful and I am honored to be at work tonight."


CNN Video | Giffords returns for House vote

Second, while I am disappointed that the Cut, Cap, Balance Act failed to pass the Senate and recognize that this was not a perfect bill, one significant achievement stands out in my mind: the fact that we had this debate at all.

In years past, the debt ceiling would be approached and Congress would vote to raise it as a "routine" matter, just standard operating procedure, with very little attention from the media or the American people. There might be a bit of partisan wailing and stamping of feet from the representatives who didn't belong to the majority party (as Marco Rubio recently pointed out), but the debt ceiling would be raised, with little debate and even less reform.

This time, however, under intense pressure from their constituents and a media that was actually, finally paying attention, Congress had to address the issue of our national debt. I doubt that in years past a bill like the Cut, Cap, Balance Act would have even made it inside the Capitol Building, much less been debated and passed in one of the chambers. If the "first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem," then Congress took an important step this summer by admitting there really is a spending problem.

So, yes, the bill is not perfect. We haven't solved the problem; we haven't balanced the budget or significantly reduced the national debt yet. But it is a start, and we have to start somewhere.

Let's take this for what it is, a single step in the right direction, and focus on figuring out the steps to follow...like the 2012 elections...

Marco Rubio: Save the Whole House or It Will All Burn Down [VIDEO]

Have I mentioned recently how very, very awesome my Senator, Marco Rubio, is? Here's the bazillionth example, a video of a passionate speech that was delivered by Rubio on the Senate floor yesterday regarding our debt crisis (the ease with which he delivers a smackdown to John Kerry is a nice added bonus):

YouTube | SenatorMarcoRubio | Sen. Rubio: "Save The Whole House or It Will All Burn Down"

I would love nothing more than compromise. But I would say to you that compromise that's not a solution is a waste of time.  If my house was on fire, I can't compromise about which part of the house I'm going to save. You save the whole house or it will all burn down.  We either save this country or we do not.  And to save it, we must seek solutions.

That, my friends, is what hitting it out of the park looks like. Complete text of Sen. Rubio's remarks after the jump (as provided by Rubio's press office):

The debt ceiling debate on Twitter

I was feeling a little snarky yesterday and sent out this tweet: 

BREAKING: Obama releases his #debtceiling plan: Executor of Nigerian estate emailed & will be wiring us $14 trillion.Fri Jul 29 19:41:01 via UberSocial for BlackBerrySarah Rumpf
rumpfshaker

Apparently people thought that was funny; last time I checked, it's been retweeted ("forwarded" for you non-Twitterers) over 80 times. Glad y'all found it amusing. Thank you, thank you, I'm here all week...

Elsewhere on the Twitterverse, after President Obama gave another one of his whiny "the Republicans won't do what I waaaaaaant" speeches and implored Americans to contact their members of Congress to work on a bipartisan solution to the debt ceiling crisis, the official @BarackObama twitter account began an ill-advised deluge of tweets targeting just Republican Members of Congress.

You heard the President. So here's what we're doing: throughout the day we'll post the Twitter handles of GOP lawmakers in each state.Fri Jul 29 16:12:59 via webBarack Obama
BarackObama

Tweet at your Republican legislators and urge them to support a bipartisan compromise to the debt crisis.Fri Jul 29 16:18:59 via webBarack Obama
BarackObama

The White House showed, once again, that the Democrats really do have their own way of defining words. Only in the Democrat Dictionary™ does "bipartisan compromise" mean "nag Republicans to do what we want." And they proceeded to spam twitter for hours, listing the GOP Representatives in all fifty states.

The backlash was swift and vicious. @BarackObama lost over 33,000 followers and many members of Congress tweeted their displeasure with this tactic. Dennis Ross, a Republican from Florida's 12th District, posted this:

Dear President Obama - tweet mention bombing Members of Congress with folks NOT from our districts - #tweetledumbFri Jul 29 18:35:44 via webDennis Ross
RepDennisRoss

All Obama's twitter spam seemed to accomplish was annoying a lot of people and further highlighting the fact that the President has yet to produce his own debt ceiling plan (the aforementioned Nigerian email promises notwithstanding!). Here's a great tweet from another Florida Congressman, Tom Rooney, from the 16th District:

Here's President Obama's plan, for a quick comparison to the House GOP plan: http://t.co/7BFLgJ2Fri Jul 29 17:34:48 via webTom Rooney
TomRooney

In case you missed the joke, the link purporting to be Obama's debt ceiling plan goes to a blank page. Nicely done, Rep. Rooney.

Best description of the debt ceiling debate I've seen so far

This is pure genius. A website called "Havoc on the Hill" has summed up the debt ceiling debate with a series of photos with snarky word balloons.

Havoc on the Hill | The Great Debt Ceiling Debate

You should definitely go check out the entire series, but here are some samples:

Nonpartisan evaluation of the debt ceiling debate

This debt ceiling debate is getting crazier by the day. Republicans fighting over whether to support their own leadership's plans, tea partying hobbits declaring war, and Obama lecturing us to eat our peas.

Well, this morning we got a brutal, nonpartisan evaluation of the situation. This was the top story on the Drudge Report:

Hat tip: @bccohan

Yep. Second quarter GDP results came out, a disappointing 1.3%, less than the expected 1.9%.

Lots of scary articles on Drudge this morning. Gold is soaring, and the Dow plunged 125 points on the opening bell. Apple apparently has more cash on hand than the U.S. government. And consumer confidence at a two year low.

Oh well. It's all Bush's fault, right?

Recycling Reagan

Check out this excellent National Review article by Jonah Goldberg:

National Review | Jonah Goldberg | The Reagan Playbook No Longer Applies

President Obama still tries to blame what he can — and what he can’t — on Bush, but that’s growing ever more lame. Increasingly, however, he’s also trying to claim the Reagan mantle for himself.

...In his prime-time debt-ceiling address, he quoted Reagan’s support for a debt-reduction deal in 1982 that included tax increases. Afterwards, Obama chided, “Those words were spoken by Ronald Reagan. But today, many Republicans in the House refuse to consider this kind of balanced approach.”

Translation: See, I’m a mainstream guy who agrees with Reagan. Meanwhile, these knuckle-dragging tea partiers are to the right of the most conservative president in our lifetimes. Come back, independents! Love me, moderates!

While Obama’s invocation of Reagan worked on a lot of liberal pundits, it was a clunker with conservatives. Of course, it’s doubtful Obama thought it would actually persuade the GOP. After all, the 1982 deal that raised taxes was one of Reagan’s greatest regrets. The Democrats promised to cut $3 in spending for every $1 in tax increases. They lied, a fact Reagan resented until he died.

...Indeed, one of the reasons the tea parties are so “outrageously” intransigent and uncompromising is that they’ve seen what compromise has gotten in the past. In other words, they’ve learned the lessons of history. 

I, too, have found it very interesting how Obama has attempted to co-opt the Reagan legacy for his own purposes, and how the media has encouraged this idiocy.

What Obama fails to realize is that Reagan's power wasn't in his specific policies, but rather a lot of it derived from his power as a communicator, and communication is much more than giving good speeches reading a TelePrompter well.

Reagan paid attention and listened to what the American people had to say, and then reflected that back to his audience when he spoke. He comprehended the hopes and dreams of the average American citizen better than perhaps any modern President, and imbued his speeches with a sincere understanding of those ideas. That's why he was the "Great Communicator." Unless Obama learns how to do this, he can invoke Reagan's name a million times but never have his power.

Debt Ceiling Rap [VIDEO]

This is hysterical. From the creative minds at ReasonTV (as seen on The Five yesterday):



YouTube | ReasonTV | Remy: Raise the Debt Ceiling Rap

Still making it rain and it be so pleasing.
Did I say make it rain? I meant quantitative easing!
...printing the cash, inflatin' the monies,
Callin' up China, "Hey, yo, we straight outta twenties!

Heh. OK, it's not Tennyson, but it is pretty funny.

On their YouTube channel, Reason posted a few links with more information about the debt ceiling:

• Five Facts About the Debt 
• The Facts About the Debt Ceiling
• Reason.com Topics: Government Spending 

Compromise?

Anyone else feel like the debt ceiling negotiations have been going like this? Sigh...

(Hat tip: @rachelveronica)

Why it's unconstitutional for Obama to raise the debt ceiling unilaterally

I have been seeing an unusual (and somewhat alarming) Constitutional issue pop up during the last few months' debt ceiling debate: does the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution authorize the President to raise the debt ceiling without approval from Congress?

This post will be a little more legalese than you are used to reading here, but please bear with me. Obama admitted recently that his attorneys are not convinced that they could win the argument that the Fourteenth Amendment really does grant him the power to raise the debt ceiling, but the idea keeps resurfacing.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geitner engaged in a common misinterpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment in a recent Huffington Post interview, we have multiple examples of the current administration's, shall we say creative, view of the law (most recently with the "Fast and Furious" debacle), and now Obama has admitted he sought legal advice on the issue (which means he's thinking about doing it!), I think it's important to discuss the constitutional law issues with as many people as possible so we are prepared if the White House does try this maneuver.

Let's start with the text of Section 4 of the Fourteenth Amendment, the section that has been cited as potentially granting authority to the President to raise the debt ceiling. As you can see, there is nothing in the text that mentions the President or any sort of executive power or rights whatsoever:

Stephen Kruiser interview of Adam Hasner

My friend Stephen Kruiser recently interviewed Adam Hasner about the Florida Senate race, the Cut, Cap, Balance Act and debt ceiling debate, and other important issues relevant to the 2012 election.

You can watch the interview here (about 11 minutes):

Kruiser Control | Adam Hasner | KC Extra: Debt Battle is 'Line in the Sand' Moment for National and Fiscal Security

For more Kruiser Control videos, click here.