Colorado's Referendum C - A Tax Increase

As that old saying goes, "if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it must be a tax." And that's what Colorado's Referendum C is about.

Politicians would have us believe that because they want to spend 13 billion dollars that has already been collected, and would normally be refunded to the tax payers of Colorado - that this is not a tax increase. Talk about Clintonesque.

One of the reasons Colorado weathered the recent recession was because, during the previous boom, spending had been limited by the TABOR ACT. Other states spent it when they had it and raised taxes when they didn't have it. TABOR limited spending based on inflation and state population increase. Spending still increased, but proportionately to the increase cost of providing state services.

The Heritage Foundation has a very good treatise by Alison Acosta Fraser on why Colorado's Taxpayer's Bill of Rights Should Not Be Breached .


The bottom line is: Are Colorado tax payers dumb enough not to see the legislature's spending of 13 billion dollars of their money as a tax increase?

Black Friday

I shoulda stayed in bed. Morning headlines have curled the milk on my oatmeal.

Read all about it: "Capitol Hill Blowout," money drunk congress passes bloated transportation and energy bill. It will stick since Bush bargained away his veto in order that congress pass CAFTA. Also Bush caves again - there will be no drilling in ANWA.

More, Hillary moves-to-the center tripe, from the Dallas News.

According to the NY Times Majority Leader Frist, breaks with Bush, supports stem cell research. (The only chuckle I got this AM was the thought of Frist running for president - when pigs fly). Bush sends 75,000 document to Judicial Committee. And Air America steals from old people and kids.

In the nomination cave, Bush sends some 75,000 documents to the Judicial Committee regarding Supreme Court nominee John Roberts's tenure with the Reagan administration. This administration has done more to weaken the presidency then any contemporary administration and are inhibiting those aides who are expected to supply candid advise to the president. Steven Calabresi, former staffer, writes in the Weekly Standard,

"IN MY EXPERIENCE as an executive branch staffer, I became persuaded that some senators and congressmen simply do not appreciate how intrusive and improper their document requests are in terms of the chilling effect they have on the internal deliberations of a co-equal branch of the government. I think that is the case here."

If the administration thinks that these documents will win PR points, then once more the Dems have pulled away the football - witness the latest knee jerk statement by Senator Kennedy in which he questions Roberts's "Commitment to Civil Rights." Its doubtful whether Kennedy has read any of the 75,000 document or has found any basis for his charge, but facts has never gotten in the way of the" bloated one" before.

And there is more Hillary, as a centrist, propaganda with her call for unity among Dems at the DLC. The only redeeming facet of this story is the negative reaction by moveon.org and other usual suspects.

Air America; the liberal, would be, answer to Rush Limbaugh, is being accused of diverting money for the elderly and inner city children to itself, but only a few blogs and a community newspaper are reporting the scandal, although the Washington Times has picked up on the story here . The real scandal is that we haven't read about this in the NYT or Wapo.

Liberal Journalist, Who Me

The scene on CSPAN was surreal. Two editors; Mark Whitaker from Newsweek and Jim Kelly from Time telling their audience that, no, journalist were not liberal. Editors from two of the very most liberal mags in the MSM were commenting on the state of journalism.

Although Whitaker did concede that journalist were hard on Reagan until it was clear that the public supported the President, and now that Bush's approval numbers were down the press has turned negative on GW.

So, according to Whitaker, public opinion drives press coverage. That seems to be a strange conclusion unless its the other way around and Whitaker is deflecting charges that negative press coverage is responsible for Bush's low approval rating.

Study after study has shown that Bush received from 32 to 71 percent negative press coverage compared to Kerry during the last election; but, according to Whitaker, the press is just now turning negative against Bush because his numbers are down. Evidently the press smells blood and is giving the public what they want to hear.

Parking Lot Debate

The last taunt hurled at me by my neighbor was a lip curling sneer that, " you just got it from Fox."

Several months ago we had another parking lot debate in which he decried the Bush deficit. At that time, I asked him to tell me how the deficit was affecting him personally. His only retort was the deficit was "bad." He didn't get his attitude from Paul Krugman or Mike Rosen. He seemed to have a "feeling" (that he couldn't explain) that the deficit was bad.

Fast forward to our recent debate I tried to point out that the deficit had fallen by almost $100 billion, according to recent "obscured" news reports. According to Mike Rosen:

Investor's Business Daily and the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal, two conservative venues, have been heralding the good news on the sharp decline in the federal deficit. Liberal newspapers have largely buried the story. Now, this isn't an arcane, technical report of little public interest. These same newspapers were screaming bloody murder when the deficit was growing in recent years....Office of Management and Budget Director Josh Bolton reports that the projected deficit for fiscal year 2005 has been cut to $333 billion, a reduction of almost $100 billion from the president's official budget submission in February. That's down to 2.7 percent of gross domestic product, about where it's
been, on average, for the last 30 years.

My neighbor isn't the only brain dead Bush basher of which I have run afoul. At one time I debated a fellow member of my gym. Comrade - as I call him, referring to his Marxist proclivity - knows just enough about politics as he learns from the MSM. Comrade is a conspiracist i.e. Bush attack Iraq for oil and to give VP Cheney and his friends at Haliburton big bucks. In our last debate I asked Comrade if he went online. He said, no he didn't have a computer at home, he had one at work, but didn't go online.

Alas, I realized that, if your opponent is not informed enough to debate the nuance of politics, you don't have a chance of winning a debate. You can't win against slogans.

What's a Supreme Court "Uniter?"

Senate Minority leader, Harry Reid (D-NEV) in the Democrat's weekly radio broadcast called for Justice O'Connor's "replacement to be someone who will build on consensus and unite the country." He wants a "uniter" on the Court. How in the hell can a Supreme Court Justice be a uniter. Every decision by the Court divides litigants into winners and losers. You can't get more divisive than that.

But here's the gambit: Reid is setting up a "straw man." He really can't define a uniter on the Court, but he sure can see a divider in every nominee the President sends to the Senate.

E.J. Dionne Jr.'s Silly Column

Democrats are reaching for every reason why President Bush should nominate their choice for the Supreme Court. Some are ridiculous, i.e. "Bush should nominate a justice that would be a uniter." As if we need another politician on the Court.

But now comes a very silly column by E.J. Dionne Jr in the Washington Post. He contents that since Bush won with only 50.7 percent of the vote, he must nominate a justice that is proportionately conservative and liberal. I don't think he made the same argument when Clinton was elected with only 41 percent of the popular vote; but hey, evidently Dionne's logic is beyond a red stater's comprehension.

Dionne does not let us know at what percentage a President could nominate justices of his choice. Would it be 60-40 or 75-25? Using Dionne's logic, we would not need a two party system.


So Bush should look for someone pro-abortion, but anti-gay ; maybe a Christian, that doesn't go to church; perhaps a Second Amendment supporter that fires blanks; or a justice that would only apply odd numbered amendments in his decisions.


He encourages outside groups to fight for minority rights, but does he really believe that a Bush nominee; of any stripe, other than a liberal, would be acceptable to the Left. NAAA, it must have been a slow day for a column idea.

PS: ironically the spell check correction for Dionne is "dimness."

Salazar, Bush Must Consult with Senate

In a recent letter by Ken Salazar (D-CO), the Senator tries to put the best spin on his broken campaign promise to give President Bush's judicial nominations an up or down vote on the Senate floor.

Evidently, he's betting that the electorate isn't paying close attention to the Democrat's obstruction policy.

He states, "I joined 13 of my Senate colleagues...To end the judicial nomination impasse that has threatened to destroy the...historic processes of the U.S. Senate."

Senator, you're obfuscating. The Constitution states, "Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings,..." Nowhere does it state that a super majority vote is needed for closure on a judicial nomination.

When the Democrats were in the majority your own Senator Robert Byrd changed Senate rules, according to columnist Robert Novak in a CNN report.

Byrd's use of a simple majority rule to make Senate rules fit the wishes of dominant Democrats during the 1970s and 1980s was revealed by legal scholars in January[2005].

It took Byrd's lawyers until March 20 for him to claim he did not do what he did. In fact, there is no doubt Byrd led the Democrats in championing majority rights when they had a majority.

Salazar goes on to state that 14 Senators "pledged to use the right of filibuster only under 'extraordinary circumstances,...' In addition this agreement includes an admonition to the President that he consult with the Senate before proposing judicial nominees - a historic tradition and practice contemplated by our Founding Fathers and one followed by our Presidents from George Washington to Bill Clinton." (Bold letters added).

Notice how the Senators parses his words; "practice contemplated by our founding Fathers." They may have contemplated, but they didn't implemented. Senator John Cornyn (R-TEX) writes: ...

The Founders believed that the president — not the Senate — should control the nomination of judges, including Supreme Court justices. As Alexander Hamilton noted in Federalist No. 66, I[i]t will be the office of the president to nominate, and with the advice and consent of the senate to appoint. There will of course be no exertion of choice on the part of the senate. They may defeat one choice of the executive . . . but they cannot themselves choose — they can only ratify or reject the choice, of the president." Hamilton explained why this was important in Federalist No. 76, where he wrote that "one man of discernment is better fitted to analyze and estimate the peculiar qualities adopted to particular offices than a body of men . . . . A single well directed man by a single understanding, cannot be distracted and warped by that diversity of views, feelings and interests, which frequently distract and warp the resolutions of a collective body." Thus, as renowned constitutional scholar and historian David Currie has pointed out, President George Washington consulted with the Senate on the negotiation of future treaties, yet "no comparable practice emerged with regard to appointments; from the outset the President simply submitted the names and the Senate voted yes or no. . . . Madison, Jefferson, and Jay all advised Washington not to consult the Senate before making nominations."

On Tuesday, Bush is to meet at the White House with Senate leaders, Democrats as well as Republicans, to discuss the court vacancy. The group is to include Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., and Sen. Patrick Leahy, the ranking Democrat on that panel.

But to what end. When the President makes his nomination and it is not a candidate approved by Democrats; Senator Schumer is sure to claim that the president did not act in good faith.

"Advice and Consent," Democrats' Big Lie

Regarding Supreme Court nominees: Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has previewed the Democrats' efforts to rewrite the meaning of "Senate Advice and Consent." Expect Democrat Senators to repeat over and over on Meet the Press, CNN, NYT et al., that Senate "Advice" in the Constitution obligates the President to consult with the Senate BEFORE he nominates a Supreme Court justice. Failure to do so will be spun by Schumer and Pat Leahy (D-VT) as unconstitutional; or at least, against precidence. And Schumer is counting on a gullible public to buy into his big lie.

John Cornyn (R-TEX) tried to get out front of the Democrat gambit with a letter to the President in which he wrote:

The Constitution nowhere "dictates that federal judges be nominated by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate," as Senator Schumer contends. Instead, the Constitution says that only the President shall nominate. It has long been recognized and understood that the Senate's "Advice and Consent" role is limited to the appointment, and not the nomination, of judges: the Constitution explicitly states that "[t]he President . . . shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint . . . Judges." Much is made of the word "Advice," but the Advice and Consent Clause establishes only that the Senate's approval is necessary, but not sufficient, for the President to appoint an individual - just as the Senate's approval is necessary, but not sufficient, for the President to ratify a treaty. The Senate must give advice on a nomination or a treaty submitted by the President, but it is the President who must, both initially and ultimately, decide.

Schumer would have us believe he just wants to have a reasonable conversation with the President where he will advise that maybe. Luttig is too conservative, as is Janice Brown or that Gonzales would be confirmed. And then, after he advises the President, he would "Consent" to an up or down vote in the Senate. Hopefully most of the public have not recently fallen off a pumpkin truck.

But from the Boston Globe, comes the truth. Mark Pryor (D-AK) refers to future action by the Gang of 14 Senators who thwarted the GOP's "nuclear option" to end judiciary filibusters.

One Democratic signer to that agreement, Senator Mark Pryor of Arkansas, said the agreement will be tested if Bush does not solicit advice from senators and sends up a conservative nominee who could alter the power equation of the court.
''We know that if President Bush wants to test the agreement, he can send a very, very conservative nominee and not consult with the Senate," Pryor said. ''The more that President Bush and the White House consults with the Senate, particularly the Judiciary Committee, the less likely it is there will be a filibuster."

Unfortunatelyely the only way the President can fight the big lie is agree to take Senate advise. Perhaps he could call for written suggestions of not more than 50 words and then file them in the big circular file.