Yup, I’m back. And I have roughly a week’s worth of stuff to cover, so let’s go.

Top story seems to be that The Obama/Holder Justice Department has no problem with Google’s vertical integration takeover of Motorola Mobility. Interesting. I also await word on whether Google will drop all aggressive patent lawsuits, as they claim to use patents only defensively.

Some people never learn. Google and Microsoft support the runaway FCC against Republican attempts to constrain the regulators to using clear, consistent, fair rules for spectrum policy. Sure, I understand that some such as Darrell Issa are unhappy about the unlicensed spectrum restrictions, but my view on this bill is mend it, don’t end it. What we do need to end is the ability of the FCC to micromanage industry by managing the FCC in a reasonable and responsible way. Greg Walden’s bill should pass in some form.

Read More →

Yup, I’m back. And I have roughly a week’s worth of stuff to cover, so let’s go.

Top story seems to be that The Obama/Holder Justice Department has no problem with Google’s vertical integration takeover of Motorola Mobility. Interesting. I also await word on whether Google will drop all aggressive patent lawsuits, as they claim to use patents only defensively.

Some people never learn. Google and Microsoft support the runaway FCC against Republican attempts to constrain the regulators to using clear, consistent, fair rules for spectrum policy. Sure, I understand that some such as Darrell Issa are unhappy about the unlicensed spectrum restrictions, but my view on this bill is mend it, don’t end it. What we do need to end is the ability of the FCC to micromanage industry by managing the FCC in a reasonable and responsible way. Greg Walden’s bill should pass in some form.

Read More →

Historically when the left takes power in a country they begin to rewrite their history. Barack Obama, a quintessential leftist, has started doing that in the run up to his re-election. In his speech in Kansas last week, Obama claimed that at no time in our history had we ever spurred economic growth and prosperity by cutting taxes and deregulating.

He conveniently had to overlook John F. Kennedy’s tax cutting in the 1960′s. But more importantly and more relevantly, he had to ignore the Reagan Revolution of the 1980′s that brought about an explosion of economic growth. As Newt Gingrich pointed out yesterday, in one month in 1983 the Reagan Recovery generated more than one million new jobs.

Barack Obama and the Left must dismiss and gloss over this point. They must fixate on income inequality. They must fixate on poverty. Never mind that all levels of society saw benefit from the Reagan Revolution. While it was not equal, the overwhelming number of Americans alive at the time saw their standard of living go up.

The left would respond by arguing that it went up too much for some and not enough for others. What they are actually saying is that they’d rather it had not gone up at all then to see some get even richer. While, as Reagan noted, the right measures the success of a welfare program by how many people are able to get off it, the left measures the success of welfare programs by how many people get on it.

And so it is that Barack Obama has to throw Bill Clinton under the bus to make his case for re-election. In an interview with WVEC-TV, Barack Obama claims he has no responsibility for the present economic mess. In addition to the rise of ATM’s and the internet killing jobs, he said, “We didn’t create the condition. We haven’t solved it fully yet because it was three decades in the making.”

Three decades back was 1981, the year Ronald Reagan came to office. And that “three decades in the making” covers Bill Clinton’s term, which until yesterday had been heralded as a success by the Democrats.

But it cannot be a success to Barack Obama. It must be written out of the history books and pretended to have never happened.

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Historically when the left takes power in a country they begin to rewrite their history. Barack Obama, a quintessential leftist, has started doing that in the run up to his re-election. In his speech in Kansas last week, Obama claimed that at no time in our history had we ever spurred economic growth and prosperity by cutting taxes and deregulating.

He conveniently had to overlook John F. Kennedy’s tax cutting in the 1960′s. But more importantly and more relevantly, he had to ignore the Reagan Revolution of the 1980′s that brought about an explosion of economic growth. As Newt Gingrich pointed out yesterday, in one month in 1983 the Reagan Recovery generated more than one million new jobs.

Barack Obama and the Left must dismiss and gloss over this point. They must fixate on income inequality. They must fixate on poverty. Never mind that all levels of society saw benefit from the Reagan Revolution. While it was not equal, the overwhelming number of Americans alive at the time saw their standard of living go up.

The left would respond by arguing that it went up too much for some and not enough for others. What they are actually saying is that they’d rather it had not gone up at all then to see some get even richer. While, as Reagan noted, the right measures the success of a welfare program by how many people are able to get off it, the left measures the success of welfare programs by how many people get on it.

And so it is that Barack Obama has to throw Bill Clinton under the bus to make his case for re-election. In an interview with WVEC-TV, Barack Obama claims he has no responsibility for the present economic mess. In addition to the rise of ATM’s and the internet killing jobs, he said, “We didn’t create the condition. We haven’t solved it fully yet because it was three decades in the making.”

Three decades back was 1981, the year Ronald Reagan came to office. And that “three decades in the making” covers Bill Clinton’s term, which until yesterday had been heralded as a success by the Democrats.

But it cannot be a success to Barack Obama. It must be written out of the history books and pretended to have never happened.

Read More →

Republican leadership is waging a civil war against conservatives over the budget, due to their visceral fear of a government shutdown.  Their inexplicable fixation on the 1995 political paradigm has traumatized them from repeating the alleged mistakes of Newt Gingrich and the 104th congress.  Such a one-dimensional focus should logically dictate that we attempt to replicate the successes of that era as well.

While the political liabilities of the ’95 government shutdown are debatable, the political successes of welfare reform are incontrovertible.  By 1996, Republicans, with the overwhelming support of the public, forced President Clinton to sign the most sweeping welfare reform act in decades.

Unfortunately, the Democrats gutted the most potent accountability mechanisms of the bill with the Obama stimulus in 2009.  In addition, the ’96 reform bill, imposing work requirements and spending caps, was only applied to 1 of 77 anti-poverty programs.  RSC Chairman Jim Jordan has introduced The Welfare Reform Act of 2011 to address these issues.

Here are some of the major provisions:

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Republican leadership is waging a civil war against conservatives over the budget, due to their visceral fear of a government shutdown.  Their inexplicable fixation on the 1995 political paradigm has traumatized them from repeating the alleged mistakes of Newt Gingrich and the 104th congress.  Such a one-dimensional focus should logically dictate that we attempt to replicate the successes of that era as well.

While the political liabilities of the ’95 government shutdown are debatable, the political successes of welfare reform are incontrovertible.  By 1996, Republicans, with the overwhelming support of the public, forced President Clinton to sign the most sweeping welfare reform act in decades.

Unfortunately, the Democrats gutted the most potent accountability mechanisms of the bill with the Obama stimulus in 2009.  In addition, the ’96 reform bill, imposing work requirements and spending caps, was only applied to 1 of 77 anti-poverty programs.  RSC Chairman Jim Jordan has introduced The Welfare Reform Act of 2011 to address these issues.

Here are some of the major provisions:

Read More →