The US House voted by 248 to 163 a bill to prohibit the use of funds for US military operations in Libya. A majority of Congress are dissatisfied with President Obama's decision to go ahead with operations in Libya in March and then to continue without congressional authorization. It is unlikely to become law but represents the sentiments of a majority of Americans. Why are we spending money and wasting weapons bombing a governments we do not have a strategic interest in - let the Europeans fund their own effort with regard to Libya. Obama's actions are making Rep. Ron Paul's (R-TX) non-intervention positions more popular these days.
The House Appropriations Committee has already passed FY 2012 funding bill (HR 2112) that provides $7 billion less than Obama administration requested for agriculture and related agencies. The bill eliminates funding for the U.S.-Brazil WTO (World Trade Organization) Agreement negotiated by the administration to avoid $800 million in trade countermeasures.
Bloomberg is already reporting that today the "House Appropriations Committee passed today a $649 billion defense spending bill that trims $9 billion from President Barack Obama’s budget while boosting ground combat vehicles and special operations programs. . . . The full committee endorsed reducing the $530 billion base defense budget by no more than $9 billion -- less than half the $20.4 billion reduction made in the current year’s defense budget, which ended up at $513 billion. Still, House defense appropriation chairman C.W. Bill Young (R-FL), said it was “a difficult task” for the panel to find cuts. They were needed because “in this time of financial crisis, no one should be exempt from tightening their fiscal belts.” The House bill includes a $119 billion for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the lowest figure since $102.6 billion approved in fiscal 2005, a reflection of decreased troop levels in Iraq."
The Senate has yet to act on its own version of a defense bill. The responsible defense appropriations chairman, Democrat Senator Daniel Inouye (D-HI) has not disclosed any proposed actions.
Today, the Senate has begun consideration of two New Jersey district judge nominees and will vote on the nominations today. Thus they will most likely be confirmed. he Senate will also vote on cloture on Sen. Tom Coburn’s (R-OK) amendment that would repeal an ethanol tax credit - the 45-cent-per-gallon Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit and 54-cent ethanol import tariff.
Today, the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee Voted unanimously supported outgoing CIA Director Leon Panetta (age 72) to be the next Secretary of Defense. His nomination has been sent to full Senate for consideration. And easy passage is expected. Penetta previously served as President Bill Clinton's Director Office of Management and Budget and then as his White House chief of staff. Penetta seems to know where all the skeletons are buried. Wonder if we will ever learn about those skeleton in future books.
The UPI noted yesterday, "Federal spending earmarks, officially banned in the U.S. Congress, live on under other guises, Capitol Hill observers say. The $690 billion military bill the House passed in May included hundreds of millions of dollars in extra spending authorizations through a new funding mechanism called the Mission Force Enhancement Transfer Fund . . . The process is officially competitive, but many requests look tailored to specific beneficiaries. Rep. Niki Tsongas D-MA) put in $4 million 'to develop innovative nanomaterials and nanomanufacturing processes for war fighter systems.' The Center for High-rate Nanomanufacturing at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, Tsongas' hometown, got a $4 million earmark from her last year, and the appropriation likely would continue it -- provided the Senate Armed Services Committee goes along."
With respect to the economy, The Hill writes today, “President Obama on Tuesday dismissed the notion that he doesn't fully grasp the scale of economic anxiety in the U.S., calling the idea that he was calm about joblessness ‘nonsense.’ The president rejected the suggestion that Americans think he should be angrier about the poor state of the economy, and strongly asserted that he understands the struggles facing many households because of the slow recovery.”
It’s certainly understandable why so many Americans see the president as out of touch on the economy. Following weeks of bad news on unemployment, housing, inflation, and growth forecasts, Obama responded by saying, “There are always going to be bumps on the road to recovery. We’re going to pass through some rough terrain . . . . We know that.”
But calling the gloomy economic news simply a “bump in the road” isn’t the only reason the president seems out of touch. Over two years after Obama and Democrats in Congress passed their nearly $1 trillion stimulus bill, with promises that it would keep unemployment from exceeding 8%, the unemployment rate is 9.1% and millions have lost their jobs. And yet in North Carolina yesterday, President Obama joked that “Shovel-ready was not as… uh… shovel-ready as we expected.”
Recall that this is after the president and his Democrat allies went on and on in 2009 selling “shovel-ready jobs” that would get funded with stimulus money. Obama said, “…I can say that 14 days after I signed our Recovery Act into law, we are seeing shovels hit the ground.” Vice President Joe Biden said, “The Recovery Act, as we call it, provides a necessary jolt to our economy to implement what we refer as ‘shovel-ready’ projects . . . .” And Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) said, “I have heard colleague after colleague say: well, what job is going to be created through this spending? Well, let me tell you very directly. If you have a shovel-ready project, we can put that into place tomorrow. There are thousands of them across the country ready to go.”
But two years later after millions of jobs have been lost and almost a trillion dollars has been added to our debt burden, the president jokes, “Shovel-ready was not as… shovel-ready as we expected”? As illustrated by William Warren in his latest cartoon, "the emperor has no cloths!"
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| Couple of Weiners |
Tags: Washington, DC, US House, US Senate, Obama, Shovel ready, jobs, no jobs, confirmations, defense, FDA, Libya, appropriations, earmarks, ethanol subsidies, Political Cartoons, Rep. Anthony Weiner, Weiner Cartoons, Weiner Resigning, Weinergate, William Warren, Emporer, no clothes, To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
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