I just wonder what the federal plan to let taxes go up in 2011 will trigger the very problems he predicts. We learn one thing from Democrats. Government services are essential and tax increases are a civic responsibility, even when those taxes will force business to close, businesses to leave the state, and the citizens who once held those jobs to forced on unemployment. Democrat tax and spend policies always lead to financial disaster and federal, state and local bankruptcy. Democrats never understand their tax and spend policies make it harder for private sector businesses to flourish. There’s lots of areas where the state is wasting money that can be cut. Here’s a couple areas just for starters…

In my small town, there was once a thriving business opportunity for mom and pop stores to rent video tapes and DVDs. These small businesses once employed folk, paid state and local taxes and added to Ohio’s economy. Then state’s public libraries decided they could increase their circulation figures by buying and lending videos and DVDs to the public. They competed for the video rental businesses with state tax dollars and offered the videos for free. One by one, those private businesses stopped renting videos and the stores closed. It’s really hard to compete against public “businesses” who have destroyed your private business.

Public library spending is a sacred cow area in Ohio’s state budget that has escaped scrutiny during many economic downturns. Maybe it time we examine all “essential programs” more closely.

Check out statistics on State Library expenditures and director salaries for additional cost cutting strategies in Ohio.

A second spending area for scrutiny is this… Sometimes states decide to create businesses that the private companies can not be run profitably. Governor Ted Strickland has been pushing spending tax money on passenger rail service as one more essential “Infrastructure project” to aid the Ohio cities. Democrat congresswoman Marcy Kaptur inserted $400 million dollars into the Stimulus bill to build passenger rail between Toledo between Chicago and Pittsburgh, including Cleveland and Sandusky. Once the money went to Columbus, legislators from downstate areas redirected the money to their communities. They pushed the idea of light rail traffic along the Cleveland, Columbus, and Dayton, Cincinnati corridor. A disappointed Marcy Kaptur plans to expand the new system linking Toledo to Cleveland for future state sponsored rail extensions. All this light rail will require state subsidies in future Ohio budgets and will burden tax payers if Ohio’s economy ever improves.

Ohio passenger rail once thrived in Ohio. In the 1920s, Ohio had a greater number  Interurban rail track mileage than any state in the country.  Interurban rail once provided passenger service in small cities like Mansfield and Ashland to large cities where passengers could catch main line train and travel around the country. Competition from automobiles coupled with the 1930s depression drove Interurban rail services into bankruptcy. When the economy recovered after WWII in the 1950s. President Eisenhower pushed congress to build the Interstate highway system. People chose to drive passenger cars because cars provided the freedom of movement train service never could. Consumers did not want the slow travel and inconvenience of rail services. Isn’t it odd that during the current Obama depression, we have public officials wanting to revisit another failed idea from the 1930s. Democrats have been telling themselves for generations about the glory days of the FDR era with it’s big government “infrastructure projects”  and have never critically evaluated the policies that prolonged the depression.

If Ted Strickland can not find a better way to balance the state budget than raising taxes, maybe a new cost cutter administration needs to be elected which can examine every state spending area and stop wasting money in the Ohio. Ohio needs to stop wasting money in all ways big and small.

A Texas company that administered Ohio’s $11 million appliance rebate program used hundreds of workers in El Salvador to process applications and answer customers’ calls.

Parago Inc. never told state officials that it would handle the rebates from an offshore call center, Lisa Patt-McDaniel, director of the Ohio Department of Development, said.

State officials never asked, either. The state’s application doesn’t specifically require companies to say where call centers are situated.

State officials learned of the El Salvador arrangement on the day the program began, after a customer asked a call center employee where he was and then complained to the state.

NBC4 covered the multiple problems the program has experienced:

Governor Strickland has responded (watch his response here):

I’m incredibly disappointed. Determined to never let it happen again. It shouldn’t have happened. We were unaware that this company would outsource these jobs. Perhaps we could have done a better job of vetting the company.

Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher – former head of the Department of Development – has yet to respond.

It is worth noting that during the Democratic primary when Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner accused Fisher of quitting the Department of Development at a time when Ohio most needed him, Fisher responded that he was still involved in state economic development programs.

So when will Lt. Governor Lee Fisher speak up?

Read more at Investors Business Daily …

The Internet is a large-scale version of the “Committees of Correspondence” that led to the first American Revolution — and with Washington’s failings now so obvious and awful, it may lead to another.

People are asking, “Is the government doing us more harm than good? Should we change what it does and the way it does it?”

Pruning the power of government begins with the imperial presidency.

Too many overreaching laws give the president too much discretion to make too many open-ended rules controlling too many aspects of our lives. There’s no end to the harm an out-of-control president can do.

Bill Clinton lowered the culture, moral tone and strength of the nation — and left America vulnerable to attack. When it came, George W. Bush stood up for America, albeit sometimes clumsily.

Barack Obama, however, has pulled off the ultimate switcheroo: He’s diminishing America from within — so far, successfully.

Read more at Investors Business Daily …

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) recently sent around a memo focusing on “Democratic Senate candidates have become more competitive in four key races.” Critical battleground state Ohio was left off the list. Maybe this news report helps explain why:

Focusing on Ohio’s economic development , Meet Dem. Lt. Governor Lee Fischer, tells Fox News Toledo he is running against the Democrat administration in Washington. He attributes Ohio’s failed economy on Washington policies of the Bush administration, while ignoring the small detail that the Democrat party controlled the congress since 2006 and the Presidency since 2008.

Even MSNBC is critical of Lee Fischer’s prospects in Ohio

Are President Obama’s coattails shrinking? The Fix Thinks Obama Might Be A Drain On Lee Fisher’s Struggling Campaign

Boccieri Bucks Calls to Refund Rangel’s Money

Renewing American Leadership

July 21, 2010 6pm

There should be no mosque near Ground Zero in New York so long as there are no churches or synagogues in Saudi Arabia. The time for double standards that allow Islamists to behave aggressively toward us while they demand our weakness and submission is over.

The proposed “Cordoba House” overlooking the World Trade Center site – where a group of jihadists killed over 3000 Americans and destroyed one of our most famous landmarks - is a test of the timidity, passivity and historic ignorance of American elites.  For example, most of them don’t understand that “Cordoba House” is a deliberately insulting term.  It refers to Cordoba, Spain – the capital of Muslim conquerors who symbolized their victory over the Christian Spaniards by transforming a church there into the world’s third-largest mosque complex.

Today, some of the Mosque’s backers insist this term is being used to “symbolize interfaith cooperation” when, in fact, every Islamist in the world recognizes Cordoba as a symbol of Islamic conquest.  It is a sign of their contempt for Americans and their confidence in our historic ignorance that they would deliberately insult us this way.

Those Islamists and their apologists who argue for “religious toleration” are arrogantly dishonest. They ignore the fact that more than 100 mosques already exist in New York City. Meanwhile, there are no churches or synagogues in all of Saudi Arabia. In fact no Christian or Jew can even enter Mecca.

And they lecture us about tolerance.

If the people behind the Cordoba House were serious about religious toleration, they would be imploring the Saudis, as fellow Muslims, to immediately open up Mecca to all and immediately announce their intention to allow non-Muslim houses of worship in the Kingdom.   They should be asked by the news media if they would be willing to lead such a campaign.

We have not been able to rebuild the World Trade Center in nine years.  Now we are being told a 13 story, $100 million megamosque will be built within a year overlooking the site of the most devastating surprise attack in American history.

Finally where is the money coming from?  The people behind the Cordoba House refuse to reveal all their funding sources.

America is experiencing an Islamist cultural-political offensive designed to undermine and destroy our civilization. Sadly, too many of our elites are the willing apologists for those who would destroy them if they could.

No mosque.

No self deception.

No surrender.

The time to take a stand is now - at this site on this issue.

RANGEL: What are you talking about? Are you just trying to make copy? What job? The one I got?

RUSSERT: Yeah, these are potentially very serious violations.

RANGEL: How do you think I got my job? I was elected. How do you think I lose it?

RUSSERT: Well, there’s two ways, you can lose it if your colleagues voted you out of here because of ethics violations or if your constituents don’t support you.

RANGEL: What station are you from?

RUSSERT: NBC, MSNBC.

RANGEL: Well, you’re young. I guess you do need to make a name for yourself, but basically you know it’s a dumb question and I’m not going to answer it.

RUSSERT: How is it a dumb question?

RANGEL: It’s allegations made by some people.

RUSSERT: Sir, sir, you did not file taxes on your properties in the Dominican Republic allegedly. If that comes to be true, is that not a problem?

RANGEL: It doesn’t really sound like NBC asking these dumb questions.

STU: No, it doesn’t.

RANGEL: It just shows what has really happened to a channel that did have some respect.

GLENN: Oh, my gosh.

PAT: Man!

GLENN: Stop! What an indictment!

PAT: Wow.

GLENN: What an indictment!

PAT: Mmm.

GLENN: You know, it sure doesn’t sound like NBC. You’re right, it doesn’t. It doesn’t sound anything like NBC. NBC, you should wake up to that. It doesn’t sound like NBC. Here’s a guy that everybody, every single person who has a heartbeat knows, come on. He hasn’t paid his taxes! He’s the chairman of the ways and means committee. Does he still have that or did he lose that?

STU: I do think he lost it.

PAT: Temporarily stepped down.

STU: Temporarily.

GLENN: He temporarily stepped down. He’s the guy who wrote the tax code. How many times? He filed, they nailed him. He filed again, they nailed him again. It is so clear this man is guilty of ethics violations, so clear, yet they won’t finish anything because he is so powerful, and I really, truly believe he knows where all the bodies are buried. Here’s the thing. You are either a victim or you are an oppressor. If you are in congress, you are a victim or oppressor. He is both the victim and oppressor. That’s a really sweet gig if you can get it. I believe Barack Obama and his administration are the victims and the oppressor. What a great, great gig. He knows where all of the bodies are buried.

Look, this is why I say 8/28 is so important and the idea that we’re going to fix this through politics is nonsense. You can’t fix this through politics unless you have people who are unafraid. How do you become unafraid? Well, I have to tell you, I can’t answer that because I and my staff, I think, spend most of our time afraid. I shouldn’t say that. There is an underlying understanding of what we are facing. I believe many members of this audience feel the same way if they are standing up. You know, you know what you’re facing. So you’re not it’s not that you’re not afraid. It’s that you have commitment. You are committed to something.

Now, I spent most of my life as an alcoholic afraid someone would find out, someone will find out. So if that’s what you’re afraid of, well, then you’re in trouble. You’re never going to survive. And that’s who we’ve been sending to Washington, people who have stuff to hide. Get all of that out of your system. Play your cards face up on table. You’ve got to be a man or a woman of honor and integrity. You have to be somebody that says, you know what? You are going to say whatever you want about me but I know the truth. I stopped doing those things. I changed my life. My word is my honor and when somebody comes in like Charlie Rangel and closes the door and says, let me tell you something, let me tell you something, I know who you are, I know that you did X, Y and Z, you can say, “Yep, and so do my constituents. Get the hell out of my office.” Otherwise they are going to smear you and use it and just slaughter you, slaughter you, and they will they won’t kill you first. What they will do is they will try to coopt you.

What was it that Trent Lott said about the new incoming Republicans? He said, when we get these people in here, these tea partiers, we must coopt them immediately. Well, how do you think they coopt you? They do, A, Mr. Smith goes to Washington: Now listen, son, you don’t understand. You just shadow me for a while and I’ll help you out. And before you know it, you’ve done so many things exactly like Mr. Smith goes to Washington where you are like, no, wait, hold it just a second; that’s not what they told me. And then that person who’s helping you is standing behind, they are like Trent Lott, “And I just want you to know, son, you didn’t know that. Now, I find that hard to believe and so will your constituents.” They coopt you that way, or they come into your office and say, you know, son, we all have had sexual problems and we all had those things and, boy, I think that would be awful for that to happen and your family to find out. And that’s how you coopt. Who is Charlie Rangel? Charlie Rangel is a guy who can get away with everything because, well, now, son, I hate to tell you this. He’s got enough people, enough dirt on enough people, he has enough power now that he can get away with murder. And NBC, you’re allowing them to do it! “Well, now, this doesn’t sound like NBC.” No, you’re right. It doesn’t. And shouldn’t that be the headline in front of every reporter at NBC?

PAT: Yeah, not that he called it stupid, a stupid question. I think the real story there in that little rant by Charlie Rangel is that he said he didn’t sound like NBC, meaning NBC doesn’t they don’t challenge these guys.

STU: They’re so sure they won’t get a tough question from MSNBC, they can’t even define the network by they won’t even believe a reporter who identifies themself that way when they ask a tough question.

PAT: Yeah. Stu I mean, what does that say about your news department?

PAT: And Russert says NBC, MSNBC to show the special, the very special liberal credibility there.

STU: And he uses it. Not only is he aware of it, but he actually tries to utilize it to get an answer to the question. I swear I’m a friend: MSNBC. That’s embarrassing. You should

GLENN: Play it again, please. This is an indictment of NBC and you know, I know nobody I wish reporters would actually listen. I wish, I wish that they would actually watch and they would have an open heart or an open mind, but they don’t. Anybody who’s watching is only playing gotcha. Anybody who’s listening is only recording from gotcha. I wish people had an open heart and they could see, this is Tim Russert and

PAT: His son.

GLENN: I’m sorry. This is Luke Russert, Tim Russert’s son. The guy you revered. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. And he asks the tough questions, and the response from Rangel.

RUSSERT: But you are not worried about losing your job?

RANGEL: What are you talking about? Are you just trying to make copy? What job? The one I got?

RUSSERT: Yeah, these are potentially very serious violations.

RANGEL: How do you think I got my job? I was elected. How do you think I lose it?

RUSSERT: Well, there’s two ways, you can lose it if your colleagues voted you out of here because of ethics violations or if your constituents don’t support you.

RANGEL: What station are you from?

RUSSERT: NBC, MSNBC.

RANGEL: Well, you’re young. I guess you do need to make a name for yourself, but basically you know it’s a dumb question and I’m not going to answer it.

RUSSERT: How is it a dumb question?

RANGEL: It’s allegations made by some people.

RUSSERT: Sir, sir, you did not file taxes on your properties in the Dominican Republic allegedly. If that comes to be true, is that not a problem?

RANGEL: It doesn’t really sound like NBC asking these dumb questions, but it just shows what has really happened to a channel that did have some respect.

I believe in a free country people have the right to choose. This year I had to put my principles into action because I was laid off from my job.  I had to face this question on a personal basis. I lost my company provided health insurance and had to choose to pay or not pay for health insurance.  I had three choices: do not purchase insurance and take my chances, buy COBRA, or purchase insurance from my husband’s company. Had we been too financially strapped to pay extra for my own coverage, I might have chosen to take the risk of no coverage.  I chose the least expensive option and now have coverage because could MAKE MY OWN CHOICE.   The new health care individual mandate says that someone who has lost their job, has less money, is struggling to pay their mortgage, pay their utilities, and buy food for their families will be required to pay for health insurance. The individual mandate takes away one of my options.

This is like saying that government has the right to force you to purchase products it deems to be in your best interest. Individuals are not smart enough to make their own decisions, so the government will force them to make proper choices. The commerce clause of the constitution was once limited to mandating states allow commerce between the states and states were not permitted to apply tariffs on goods transported between states. The 1942 Wickard v. Filburn decision, the Supreme Court reinterpreted the commerce clause to mean government could regulate how much wheat you were allowed to grown on your own land for your own consumption. From that decision, we get mandated compact florescent light bulbs, government regulated flow restricted toilets and individually mandated national health care purchases. All these decisions belong in the crapper.

Elena Kagan agrees with John Boccieri’s interpretation of the Commerce Clause and her confirmation to the Supreme Court, and the belief that government has the power to force citizens to do what government officials think best. With Kagan we will loose more of our individual freedom. She will most defiantly be confirmed to the Supreme Court by the Democrats who have more than enough votes in the Senate to confirm her nomination.  She will support the rights of government to usurp more power from individuals because of the misguided interpretation of the Commerce Clause.  Elections do matter and we must remember why we must vote for good Constitutional conservatives to take over the Senate come November.  We won’t be able to take back her nomination but we can prevent any more liberal tyrants to be confirmed.

Senator Tom Coburn agrees…

By Her Own Words, Kagan Will Violate Her Oath

July 20, 2010 8:58 AM
By Sen. Tom Coburn

The Supreme Court confirmation hearings for Elena Kagan provided key exchanges about the Commerce Clause, natural rights, and other issues that have convinced me to vote against her nomination. Based on her own testimony, she’ll violate her oath as soon as she’s sworn in.

The hearings, though, were not merely about Elena Kagan per se but about the political culture and philosophy that shaped her views. Her answers exposed profound flaws in the prevailing Big Government wisdom of the Supreme Court and Washington over the past few decades.

Read More from Senator Tom Coburn in: National Review Online