In This Issue:
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1. Mortgage Bailout
2. Broken Promises
3. Free Speech Smackdown
4. No Coal for U!
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Big Brother Bailout- Let the Taxpayer Beware
Ever make a bad decision with money? Take a risk that didn't pay off? Well, if you’re lucky, the federal government might just bail you out. And by doing so, big brother is making sure that you’ll continue to make the same bad decisions over and over again.
So goes the saga of Fannie and Freddie Mae. Last week a Democrat -led Congress intent on paying off voters before the election, granted billions of dollars in taxpayer funds to bail out the government -backed mortgage companies. It appears the $170 million Fannie and Freddie spent on lobbyists over the past decade really paid off.
As Larry Kudlow points out:
"Budget assistance for home buyers is already staggering. The Housing and Urban Development department spends $52 billion a year. The home mortgage interest deduction is worth about $80 billion yearly. Capital-gains exclusion is estimated at $29 billion. And the local property-tax deduction comes to roughly $14 billion. That’s a total of $175 billion in annual assistance to the housing sector. And that’s before we get to the Fannie-Freddie bailout."
To his credit, John McCain has opposed the Fannie/Freddie bailout, and vowed to restructure both entities. Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama would likely keep things exactly as they are, pumping in more and more taxpayer money to subsidize bad mortgages.
Unfortunately, housing bailouts aran’t limited to the federal government. Several weeks ago, Milwaukee residents lined up thousands deep to get free flood assistance – even though most of them hadn't suffered any flood damage. If that weren't bad enough, Governor Doyle pledged taxpayer money to help rebuild the un-insured vacation homes that used to sit alongside Lake Delton. Doyle’s scheme involves condemning the property for transportation purposes and compensating the homeowners for the price of the land. The homeowners can in turn use the pay- out to build new homes that will be in danger of floating away the next time a big rain comes.
Promises, Promises
Politicians are well known for breaking promises. But that doesn't mean they shouldn't be called out when they do – especially when their promise is the centerpiece of their election strategy.
In 2002 and for several years thereafter, Governor Doyle promised to use every strategy available to him to balance the budget, except one – raising taxes. The key was to reduce the size of government by cutting 10,000 state government jobs.
So after six years in office, how’s the Governor doing?
Not well if you ask the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. So far, Doyle has cut only 2,730 – barely a quarter of what he promised before he was elected. Now, Doyle says he really didn't mean what he said – he merely wanted to reverse the growth in government, but he hasn't accomplished that either. With each biennial budget, Doyle raises state spending (and borrowing) more and more.
Doyle’s pledge not to raise taxes went out with the bath water too.
The Journal-Sentinel was astute in pointing out Doyle’s job-cutting flop, but they didn't ask the obvious question: If Doyle has “reversed” the growth in government, why are we raising taxes and spending more? Is it so employees can continue to get paid for not working?
More Government Accountability Bull
On August 28th, The Wisconsin GAB is holding a public hearing on proposed rule changes that would severely restrict free speech during an election. The board, which consists of six retired judges, is taking their cues from so-called good government groups who want to clean up campaigns by eliminating speech.
These folks have bought into the notion that money spent during elections corrupts politicians and increases the negative tone of campaigns – and that they must explore regulating political speech, to make it less negative.
But limiting the ability of citizens to speak their minds politically, will only serve to protect incumbents from the very constituents to whom they should be accountable. If incumbent politicians face no real opposition because their would-be critics have been silenced, they will be far more likely to ignore their constituents and become tools of the special interests.
The proposed rule changes were drafted for the GAB by the ultra-liberal Brennan Center for Justice, which sports such intellectual luminaries as Alec Baldwin on its advisory board and receives the lion’s share of its funding from billionaire George Soros of MoveOn.org. Ironically, the Brennan Center is itself one of the dreaded third-party interest groups the new rules are intended to silence. The real goal of the Brennan Center is to help elect and retain liberal politicians and judges at all levels of government. To that end, the Brennan Center opposes such common-sense measures as photo ID for and proof of citizenship for voting, and preventing convicted felons from voting. Liberals believe they need vote fraud to keep their people in office.
Groups like the Brennan Center are shameless in their zeal to control every aspect of our lives – and by controlling political speech, it will guarantee more liberal legislators in office to push their intrusive big-government policies, and more liberal judges on the bench to back them up.
Coal in Our Stocking
Last week, we discussed the economic harm that would befall Wisconsin if the Governor’s Global Warming Task Force recommendations were enacted. This week, we have our first concrete example.
On Saturday, Governor Doyle announced his opposition to a new coal-fired heating plant for UW-Madison buildings. Instead, the campus will have to rely on more expensive ways of heating its buildings, which, of course, will come out of the taxpayers’ pockets.
Even more worrisome is the precedent such a decision might set for a proposed new coal plant in Cassville. If environmentalists have their way and that proposed plant is nixed, Wisconsin could be in for much more expensive electric and home heating costs, with dubious rewards.
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