On Monday in Maryland, President Obama announced his new budget in an empty classroom, with a globe, a microscope and a stack of books strategically placed on the teacher’s desk behind him. “We’re going to have to get serious about cutting back on those things that would be nice to have but we can do with out,” he said, in the language …
So Much For Thou Shalt Not Kill
South Dakota is apparently considering legalizing the murder of doctors who perform abortions.
House Will Not Move to Defund Health Care Reform in 2011 Budget
The House GOP leadership has allowed a rare open amendment process to the FY2011 budget on the floor this week. Thus far 403 amendments totaling 459 pages have been filed with more to come. Most of the Democratic amendments will try and reinstate many of the $100 billion in cuts. Many of the Republican Study Committee amendments will …
Grossman, AfPak and Scooter Libby
Hillary Clinton will announce later this week that veteran diplomat Marc Grossman will replace Richard Holbrooke, who died in December, as Special Envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan. Grossman is an accomplished career diplomat who will do his job in a discreet and reliable way. He’s not a bone-crusher like Holbrooke, but that approach …
Haley Barbour Denies Supporting “Amnesty,” But Not His Lobbying Work For Mexico On Immigration
Image from a Nov. 30, 2002 Justice Department filing by Barbour Griffith & Rogers
In statements Tuesday morning, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour denied supporting “amnesty” for undocumented immigrants, and his former lobbying firm, Barbour Griffith & Rogers, declared that it had “never advocated amnesty for illegal aliens.”
But …
Morning Must Reads: Opportunities
President Obama visits Parkville Middle School in Maryland on February 14. (REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque)
–Secretary of State Clinton on protests in Tehran: “We wish the opposition and the brave people in the streets across cities in Iran the same opportunities that they saw their Egyptian counterparts seize.”
Ask Michael Bloomberg
Billionaire media mogul, Democrat turned Republican turned independent, three-term New York City mayor. We’re taking reader questions for Mike Bloomberg to answer in the magazine. Submit your questions here.
Sleeping Bag Sessions
Senator Jeff Sessions, an Alabama Republican and ranking member on the Budget Committee, is an avowed free trader. Yet, Sessions is holding up the renewal of the Generalized System of Preferences, a trade agreement that has been around since the mid 1970’s. The GSP gives preference to 131 developing nations to sell certain goods in the …
The $100 Billion Baseline
The GOP’s jeers at the budget President Obama unveiled today — House Speaker John Boehner, tweaking the new White House slogan, scoffed that Obama was “spending the future” — highlight the vast gap between the two parties’ budget blueprints. But the chasm is likely to grow wider. Boehner’s promise to preside over an open …
In the ArenaUncategorized
Random Notes
I’m still sifting through the various somersaults the Obama Administration is spinning to cut the budget. I’ll have more to say about that, and the budget fight, over the next few weeks. Meanwhile, two thoughts:
1. All this would be an awful lot easier if we just…raised taxes. Not much. Just back to the Clinton levels for the …
The Trouble With Budget Debates: The Numbers Don’t Hold Up
Since Barack Obama arrived in office, he has predicted a return to stable deficits in the out years, the sort of message that lawmakers, creditors and the American people like to here. But there is problem: Obama’s projections have consistently been too rosy. So each year, his bean counters must readjust the projections. They keep the …
Shirley Sherrod Slaps Breitbart With Lawsuit—at CPAC
Shirley Sherrod, the former USDA official sacked after a deceptively edited video of her appeared online, has filed a lawsuit against Andrew Breitbart, the man who posted the footage on his web site BigGovernment.com. In a complaint filed on Feb. 11, Sherrod claims Breitbart harmed her reputation and caused her emotional distress and …
Rick Scott’s Tea Party Budget
Our colleague Tim Padgett reports on the red ink battle raging in sunny Florida:
…last week Scott — speaking not from the state capital, Tallahassee, but from the Tea Party hotbed of Eustis, Fla., to show his disdain for all things public sector — delivered a budget proposal that slashes $4.6 billion (7% of current spending) and
…