Sometimes it seems like Congress didn’t learn anything from the housing crisis at all. Early Tuesday morning, leaders in the House and Senate unveiled an appropriations bill, called a “minibus,” to fund several government agencies for the fiscal year 2012. Tucked inside the 401-page bill was language to increase the limits for which the Federal Housing Administration can insure mortgage loans up to $729,750, effectively allowing the agency to back McMansions with taxpayer dollars. Adding further insult to hard-working taxpayers an independent audit revealed, just hours later, that there is a “close to 50%” chance the agency would run out of money and need a taxpayer bailout.

It’s as if Congress is actively trying to collapse the agency by inflating its limits while it’s already going bust. The situation is eerily similar to the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bailouts that have cost taxpayers nearly $170 billion to date. Yet, Congress is making the same mistakes by increasing FHA limits and exposing taxpayers to even greater risk, rather than reining the agency in and reforming it.? ?Since 2008 the FHA, which insures mortgage loans unlike Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae which buys those loans from banks, repackages them as securities and sells them to investors, has not had enough assets to cover its losses. Congress requires it to hold a 2% cash reserve rate. Last year it only had .5 % cash holdings and this year, only .24%–prompting calls for a future bailout.

One academic study has pegged the potential cost of that bailout between $50 billion and $100 billion.  Even more worrisome is the fact this bailout could take place without a single vote from Congress. Because FHA gets its financing from the Treasury Department, Secretary Tim Geithner could issue FHA an unlimited bailout all on his own, very much like the quarterly, billion-dollar bailouts that the Treasury Department gives Fannie and Freddie now.

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Unless we reverse course from the Obama Administration’s endless borrowing and spending policies, economic collapse is a certainty.

If our entitlement programs are not reformed, they will go broke and break their promises to millions of seniors, disabled and needy Americans. If the government never stops spending more than it takes in, it will go bankrupt. And, if liberals are successful in passing massive tax increases to continue their spending spree, millions more jobs will be destroyed, companies will ship new investments overseas, and our economy will be crippled for years to come.

None of these outcomes are desirable and all of them are preventable.

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Friends, in just a few days we have the chance to be a part of a national earthquake election to help save our country from fiscal disaster. On Tuesday, we have the opportunity to elect principled conservatives that will be part of the next generation of American leaders. I’ve been proud to support conservative candidates around the nation and in my home state that will fight for limited government, strong national security and traditional values.

For folks in South Carolina, please don’t take anything for granted this Tuesday. We need your vote and your help to encourage others to come out to vote for our inspiring slate of U.S. House candidates Tim Scott, Joe Wilson, Mick Mulvaney, Trey Gowdy, Jeff Duncan, and Jim Pratt.

And most importantly for our state, I encourage you to stand with Nikki Haley this Tuesday and vote for her to be our next governor of South Carolina. Nikki is a commonsense conservative leader that will help move our state forward. Nikki will be a strong governor that will stand up to Washington’s attempts of overreach into issues that should be handled at the state and local level. She will fight to cut wasteful spending and reduce taxes to encourage job growth and a strong state economy.

I’m proud to support Nikki Haley and all of our conservative candidates this Tuesday, and I hope you’ll stand with me.

Let’s make November 2nd the biggest Tea Party of the year.

It was good news to hear that House Democrats had adopted a ban on earmarks to for-profit companies. The bad news is their version of a ban wouldn’t apply to 90 percent of all earmarks.

Instead of adopting an all-out ban on earmarks House Democrats have decided to ban earmarks for for-profit entities, while continuing to green light funding for the next Bridge to Nowhere, ACORN or to clear the way for the Napa Valley Wine train.

House Appropriations Chairman Rep. David Obey told reporters Wednesday the ban would have stripped 1,000 earmarks from the last budget. What he didn’t say is that President Obama signed 11,320 earmarks, worth nearly $32 billion, into law last year.

Citizens Against Government Waste found that Mr. Obey nabbed 64 earmarks worth more than $115 million in 2009. Among them was $335,000 to relocate endangered mussels, $125,000 for a scenic trail and $5 million for lighthouse reconstruction. None of those earmarks would be touched by his ban.

Neither would the $1,750,000 House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat, secured for the Presidio Heritage Center or the $500,000 earmarked by House Majority Leader Rep. Steny Hoyer, Maryland Democrat, for oyster research.

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In light of the Christmas terror attempt, we must make sure that our airport security is as strong as possible. Unfortunately, Democrats in the Senate appear intent on confirming a new leader for the Transporation Security Administration (TSA), that would presumably make good on President Obama’s campaign promise to union bosses that he’d force TSA into collective bargaining even though it would weaken our security. [A nominee who has also submitted false testimony to Congress about improperly accessing private background information.] If that were to happen, the same union bureaucracy that has crippled the American auto industry and made service at Post Offices the punch line to jokes could soon be a way of life at America’s airports.

If TSA were forced to collectively bargain with union bosses it could weaken security by:

• Requiring TSA to get union bosses permission before implementing security and workforce changes. If the unions decided the changes were too burdensome on their employees, weeks or months of negotiations could ensue, causing unacceptable delays in implementing new safety protocols.
• Requiring TSA managers to promote based on seniority, not merit, and making it more difficult to discipline failing employees.
• Requiring TSA to share sensitive intelligence information to third parties during negotiations with union bosses, making future leaks of classified material more likely.

Democrats have responded by pointing out that the Customs and Border Protection agency (CBP) allows collective bargaining, and if it works for the border agents, why not TSA? The answer is that collective bargaining is not working for CBP, its weakening their ability to keep us secure. Setting aside the obvious, that this agency has struggled to fulfill its mission as there are 12 million illegal aliens in the U.S., CBP has had numerous problems with collective bargaining. Take these four recent examples of the agency being forced to negotiate with unions that took months to resolve:

1. Arbitration with unions over how and whether CBP can discipline employees who fall asleep on the job. (CBP lost)
2. Arbitration with unions over whether CBP has to negotiate with the union on how much training an officer who fails the firearm exam needs. (CBP lost)
3. Arbitration unions over whether CBP can investigate (just investigate, not discipline) officers who get into an off-duty fight. (CBP eventually won)
4. Arbitration over whether CBP has to negotiate with Unions on the re-assignment of personnel, an issue that would likely arise as TSA as well. (CBP lost)

So, union bosses litigated for months – sometimes years – against the CBP to prevent them from disciplining employees that sleep on the job, retraining failing officers, investigating officers for violence, and reassigning personnel to higher priority posts. And this is the system Democrats want to implement at the TSA when the agency is already struggling to stop terrorists? It makes no sense to weaken our airport security just to reward campaign donors from the last election. Lets keep our focus at TSA on security, not politics.

A defining moment is coming in this year’s health care debate.

Yesterday, Democrat leaders announced they may soon bring Harry Reid’s new health care bill to the Senate floor in an effort to grant the President’s wish for a government takeover of our nation’s health care by Christmas. This is in spite of the fact that 99 senators have never seen Reid’s new bill that was written in secret. Reid even hinted he may rush to a vote before the bill’s been public for 72 hours, as even Democrats have demanded.

To begin debate on this new version of Obamacare, Reid will play a shell game. He needs 60 senators to “vote to proceed” to an unrelated piece of legislation, and once he clears that hurdle he will strike that bill’s text and insert his new health care bill. But don’t be fooled by senators that will say they oppose a government takeover but just wanted to allow debate on health care, they are not being honest.

The simple fact is this: Any senator that votes to proceed to the Reid-Obama bill is voting for a government takeover of health care.

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The people of Honduras have struggled too long to have their hard-won democracy stolen from them by a Chavez-style dictator. The Honduran Congress, the Honduran Supreme Court, and the Honduran military have acted in accordance to the Honduran constitution and the rule of law.

For weeks leading to his arrest, Zelaya flouted the constitutional authority of the Honduran Congress and Supreme Court, and claimed for himself extra-constitutional control of his nation’s military and political institutions. Every institution from the Electoral Tribunal to the Supreme Court ruled that his actions were unjustified and illegal. Zelaya’s open defiance of democratic norms has set Honduras on a path toward violence, instability, and tyranny.

I am hopeful that as President Obama grows in office, he will eventually turn away from despots like Ahmadinejad, Chavez, Castro, and Zelaya, and give the United States’ full-throated support to the people of any country who are fighting for the same values we cherish and defend in America. The people fighting for freedom around the world, in Iran and Honduras, should never have to wonder which side America will choose between freedom and tyranny.

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Last week, I led a group of Republican senators that wrote to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urging her to immediately relist North Korea as a State Sponsor of Terrorism and we also introduced an amendment to force the Obama Administration into action.
 
Yesterday on ABC’s This Week, I was pleased to hear Secretary Clinton’s response that they are now considering relisting North Korea. This is a very important step that I hope President Obama will agree to.
 
However, just days before Secretary Clinton’s statement, her spokesman bluntly claimed the State Department doesn’t believe there are any recent acts by North Korea that can be defined as supporting terrorism:
 

REPORTER: A group of Republican senators has written a letter to the Secretary urging her to relist North Korea on the terror list. They specify certain unnamed ongoing terrorist activities. Do you share that assessment, and where do you want to go with that?

STATE DEPT. SPOKESMAN PHILIP CROWLEY: …As for North Korea, I think we’re aware of that letter. But as far as I know, firing off missiles and over-heated rhetoric is unwise and unhelpful, but does not meet the legal definition of terrorism.

REPORTER: They seem to say – but they don’t refer to those tests as a terrorist activity – to say that other ones are ongoing, that those are — Is there anything else that you’re aware of?

MR. CROWLEY: To list a country on the terrorism list, there’s a legal requirement there. And what we’ve seen so far, I don’t think meets that legal test.
 

Based on this statement, I eagerly await the State Department to certify:
 

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“Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same.” – Ronald Reagan

America recently celebrated 232 years of independence. Back in 1776, a new nation was set apart to be founded on principles of limited federal government, equal rights, religious freedom, liberty and economic opportunity – all of which have become ingrained in the American experience.

It is these principles that lay at the heart of the conservative movement. They support our policies and underline our ideas. The war of ideas gets more aggressive by the day and it’s imperative that conservatives not cede the field to the left. Liberal activists work overtime to push an agenda that limits our freedoms and expands the hand of government in our lives, forcing their way into our schools, our jobs, our churches and even our homes. More than ever conservatives need to stay alert and involved in what’s going on at the local, state and federal levels of government.

Last year’s immigration debate is a shining example of the difference your involvement can make. Calls, comments and blog posts from the grassroots level triggered a national dialogue impossible for Congress, as well as the mainstream media, to ignore.

Thanks to modern technology, online communities such as RedState provide convenient forums for debate and information sharing. RedState has been critical in the fight to secure our borders, win the War on Terror, end wasteful spending and uphold our values.

If we don’t continue to challenge those in power pushing the liberal agenda, we could spend decades attempting to fix all the damages from what we let slip through. It’s vitally important that grassroots communities of the conservative movement stay invested and involved in what’s going on in Washington. If we’re going to preserve America’s freedoms for the generations to come, the change will come from the outside – not from inside the walls of Congress. It’s your voices and your ideas here at RedState that empower those of us in Washington demanding change.

Despite all the negativity whirling through the media, there is much for conservatives to be optimistic about as we rise to meet the challenges of the 21st century. The “morning in America” that conservatives look back on with fondness doesn’t have to be a memory of the past. It can be a hope for the future as ordinary people working together to effectively promote conservative principles accomplish extraordinary things.

Thank you, RedState, for promoting freedom and traditional principles through a dynamic new forum. I look forward to participating in the ongoing discussion. And Happy 4th Birthday — no doubt there will be many more to come.