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Illinois Proves Destitution Will Be Good for Washington

Should Illinois residents be happy or nervous? Governor Pat Quinn and Illinois Democrats are acting like they take pension reform seriously. The Illinois Senate just followed the House by passing a bill that finally asks state retirees, including judges and legislators, to contribute towards their health care costs. Governor Quinn is talking up a plan for 2013 that would shift the costs of teachers’ pensions from the state to localities, cut retiree cost of living adjustments, increase public employee pension contribution rates, and raise the retirement age for the state’s public workers to 67.

Who could have imagined that a Democratic governor in irretrievably spendthrift Illinois (see: Live In Illinois? Get Out Now.) would not only broach constructive reform for pensions, but win favorable nods from both parties in Springfield and watchdogs like the Civic Federation? Was news that the state’s 2011 retroactive income tax hike funneled billions into the black hole of public pensions the last straw for residents, or was it the terrible prospects for Illinois businesses and anyone considering relocating to the state? Perhaps Illinois simply ran out of things to tax. Illinois may be the state to teach the nation that when things are bad enough, even Democrats can be responsible.

Illinois is in a unique position to show Washington how pain brings wisdom. The state is going to be broke for a very long time no matter what Governor Quinn does. Unfortunately, the learning curve is long and steep for the Obama White House and Democrats in Congress. They still have dreams of retaking Washington and freeing up more tax money from wealthy pocketbooks. Wealth through economic growth is an elusive concept for Barack Obama, so if he needs more money the only recourse is to go to whoever has some left.

Illinois may find itself in the sights of Washington Democrats desperate to secure the party’s future in November. How will Illinois pension reform play to a president determined to empower public employee unions?  Arne Duncan is asking us to pay teachers more money even though localities are unable to bear the cost of their employees (see: Will Taxpayers Support Raising Teacher Salaries 165%?). With union and public employee support crucial to the election, and the Medicaid costs Governor Quinn is seeking to control on track to escalate with the Affordable Care Act, Washington is backing states into a fiscal corner no matter what they do to control their spending.

How bad do things have to get before Washington takes the hint, has a moment of clarity and decides to follow the example of bottomed-out states like Illinois? Will Illinois become the nation’s inspiration, a model of responsibility and a lesson in how pain can bring fiscal prudence? Ask the president. He came from Illinois when the gravy days were still celebrated in Springfield. That explains a lot, doesn’t it?

Posted 11 May 2012 † Civil Bob § Illinois ‡ Comments (2) ° Tagged: Arne Duncan, debt, public employees

Cabinet Members Should Be Held Accountable

George Washington managed to do his job with a Cabinet of four. Barack Obama has more than twenty Cabinet and Cabinet-rank officials. Our president has demonstrated a knack for assembling Cabinet members that parrot his vision for America. Their talents are varied. Some are especially good at reciting buzzwords and phrases, creating a unified front through simple, mindless repetition. Janet Napolitano tossed out this gem in October 2011:

Nearly three years ago, when President Obama came into office and nominated me for this position, he and I both knew that we were inheriting a broken immigration system with a patchwork of laws and outdated requirements that were in desperate need of updating.¹

Her words sounded suspiciously similar to something Eric Holder said later that month:

“It is understandable that communities remain frustrated with the broken immigration system, but a patchwork of state laws is not the solution and will only create problems.”²

Both Holder and Napolitano were repeating the president:

Indeed, after years of patchwork fixes and ill-conceived revisions, the legal immigration system is as broken as the borders.³ 

Cabinet members have tremendous power to enforce and even set policy. Holder’s remark was backed by Justice Department lawsuits against states that crossed the president on immigration, a move the Supreme Court may reject when it delivers its decision on SB 1070 (see: Five Offensive Traits Democrats Share With Illegal Immigrants). The harassment continued today as Arizona’s Sheriff Joe Arpaio was sued by the Justice Department which, ironically, leveled charges of abuse of power.

Cabinet officials also have the opportunity to operate behind the scenes, quietly carrying out policies that contradict what Americans hear from the White House. When the auto industry bailout began in 2009, the Obama administration spoke ceaselessly of its mission to save autoworkers’ jobs. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner oversaw the actions of his department’s Auto Team, which orchestrated the closings of hundreds of small businesses and put tens of thousands of jobs on the chopping block. It seemed that every remark made by the president that year included the words “jobs” and “small business.” As the Auto Team operated in the background, he sold the nation a bailout based on the fear of job losses in a failing industry:

The prospect of uncontrolled bankruptcy in the automobile industry meant thousands of potential job losses in manufacturing and ripple effects throughout the economy.4

An inspector general’s report on the Auto Team noted plans to close up to 2,243 dealerships, and remarked that the job losses from closing these small businesses were not a consideration (see: The Small Business Shutdown Obama Doesn’t Discuss):5

Although there is some controversy over how many jobs will be lost per terminated dealership, it is clear that tens of thousands of dealership jobs were immediately put in jeopardy as a result of the terminations by GM and Chrysler.6

Obama Cabinet members also test the waters for new White House policies. Arne Duncan took time out from improving public education by collaborating with teachers’ unions to join Vice President Joe Biden in declaring his election year endorsement of gay marriage. The response from Obama backers must have been positive. The president came out as a supporter yesterday.

With so many officials in his Cabinet, the president can contribute to our country in ways we could never imagine with a smaller cadre of advisers. For example, Energy Secretary Steven Chu brought us Solyndra, Eric Holder gave us Fast and Furious, and Janet Napolitano’s TSA brought us a vote on unionizing airport screeners. Labor Secretary Hilda Solis even finds time to devote to labor rights for illegal immigrants while millions of Americans are unemployed (see: Illegals Have an Ally in Our Labor Department).

Eric Holder has shown us that the power of the Cabinet to enforce policy dictates can rival the president’s. Members don’t have to worry about being reelected. None of the examples mentioned required the approval of Congress. Synergy can be a good thing when people work together toward a worthwhile goal. It is a bad thing when it causes bureaucrats to band together in thoughtless pursuit of one man’s agenda. Cabinet members are picked to advise the president, but are we paying for advisers, or suffering the actions of lackeys, sycophants, and loose cannons whose only goal is goading Americans to accept the nonsense spewing from their boss’s mouth? Only the president and vice president are up for reelection. Voters and Mitt Romney need to make sure that Mr. Obama’s Cabinet is running with him.

List of References

Posted 10 May 2012 † Civil Bob § Government Ethics ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: 2012 Election, Obama

Job Creation Is Not What the Unemployed Need

If you are unemployed you know the story. After a while, suggestions from friends and family on finding a job start to sound less helpful and seem to include a trace of blame. The weeks pass. You hear advice about lowering expectations, about limited options because of your age or career path, and about finding something to bridge the gap and bring in some cash. Someone tells you that there must be jobs available because they saw a “help wanted” sign in a storefront across town, a position that pays enough to buy food after you lose your house. You do not hear the same remarks from unemployed acquaintances pursuing their own pointless job searches. They know the score. The weeks go by. Your fears are confirmed. Time is your enemy, destroying your chances of ever working again.

Job creation will not help the unemployed. The term is a hoax that no longer has anything to do with a growing economy and an optimistic business sector. Job creation means federal intervention to control the economy and pay for work. This is Obama economics at its very worst, an abysmal failure that has consigned millions of Americans to membership in our newest lower class.

In addition to achieving near-record sustained high unemployment, Barack Obama is presiding over some of the longest work searches in our history. Ironically, as the unemployed are forced to devote more time to hunting for jobs their chances of success diminish. After 27 weeks of searching for work, the chances of finding a job are 40% less than at five weeks of unemployment.¹

Unemployed Americans deserve better than lies and election year misrepresentations. Is there a dark, cynical contest among Cabinet members to best each other’s claims about the Obama administration’s success with the economy? How many times did Labor Secretary Hilda Solis think she could stuff the word “added” into her review of April’s jobs numbers, and how does she justify the administration taking credit for 62,000 new jobs that she claims pay well while over 5 million Americans are jobless for the long-term? Solis’ recitation of the president’s campaign platform blames Congress and suggests that we hire public employees and spend on education, infrastructure, and clean energy. She never mentions that the only reason the administration had success with the unemployment rate in April is that more Americans gave up hope of finding a job.²

There is little to misconstrue in the Labor Department’s April numbers. The employment situation is still a train wreck. 2.4 million Americans are not counted as unemployed because they gave up looking for work. 7.9 million work part time because they can’t find anything better. 41.3% of the jobless are long-term unemployed,³ scheduled to drop off of the radar entirely when they make the decision to stop wasting their time looking for a job.

We do not hear a lot of boasting from the White House about its success growing a lower class of unemployed and underemployed Americans. Instead, we get job creation policies that select groups of supporters to spend on and PR campaigns to convince the public that America’s future depends on their contributions. Explaining away March’s jobs numbers, the head of the Council of Economic Advisers claimed that “…the President’s Budget proposal to increase and modernize the nation’s infrastructure is well targeted to support the economy today and in the future.”4 For Americans not versed in references to special interests, this means spending on union labor. We heard the same line of thinking from the president last week when he spoke to an AFL-CIO building trades group (see: Unions Vital to Campaign to Deceive Middle Class Workers), and again yesterday morning as he manipulated the Afghanistan situation into an excuse to spend more on his campaign favorites.

Lying about supporting small businesses while propping up some of the president’s most costly and damaging supporters like unions, public employees, immigrants’ rights groups, and struggling clean energy companies has brought us to where we are now. The president and his Cabinet are not deterred. They will continue to spread the word about their successes to Americans who polls show will buy what they are being sold in numbers sufficient to keep Barack Obama in the White House. A while back Civil Candor made the dubious suggestion that Congress consider a suicide tax credit for the families of jobless Americans who have had enough and want to lower the odds of their fellow unemployed finding work (see: Ten Demands on Behalf of Fed Up, Pissed Off Americans). We are not there yet, but for the millions looking for jobs it must feel like Washington is doing everything in its power to get us there.

List of references

Posted 06 May 2012 † Civil Bob § jobs ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: Hilda Solis, unemployment