Mitt Romney Fans the Flames of Free Market Energy Policy

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  July 31st at 10:45 AM  | 

Mitt Romney actually stood for bold colors yesterday.  For conservatives, it should be the biggest story of the week. Conservatives are rightfully focused on the impending tax cliff that is facing American taxpayers at the end of the year.  But we must not forget the subsidy cliff either.  Dozens of special interest tax preferences, known as tax extenders, are slated to expire at the end | Read More »

The Politician and the Crackhead

By: Erick Erickson (Diary)  |  July 31st at 04:47 AM  | 

If Satan’s best trick is to make us believe he does not exist, his second best trick is to convince us that one more taste of sin will satiate our desire. It is the same with the politician and the crackhead. The crackhead holds the pipe in his hands and thinks, “Just one more hit and then I’ll get clean.” It is never really enough. | Read More »

Tech at Night: More sales tax issues, the Lieberman-Collins bill is still wrong

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 24th at 02:30 AM  | 

It’s easy to see why there’s sudden, strong opposition to the Marketplace Fairness Act, as yet another Republican governor, Terry Branstad, backs the bill. I again state my opposition to the lousy language backing the bill, including “fairness” and “loophole”. Yes, that language is being driven by marketplace losers, but both sides of this debate are ponying up cash. I favor the bill on its | Read More »

The Cycle of Government: Subsidize the Living; Tax the Dead; Benefit the Corporate Cronies

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  July 23rd at 11:46 AM  | 

In recent weeks, we’ve been subjected to mellifluous pandering to our nation’s farmers by liberals in both parties.  They admonish us about the need to provide farmers with a “safety net” and to protect them from catastrophic events.  To that end, they are pushing a massive $1 trillion Ag subsidy, which happens to contain over $750 billion in food stamp spending. Aside for the fact | Read More »

Obama’s Middle Class Tax Hikes

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  July 10th at 12:00 PM  | 

While Obama is prosecuting a flaccid war overseas and apologizing for our troops when they defend against Taliban attacks, he is fighting a no-holds-barred class war at home.  Once again, Obama has announced that he will orchestrate the largest tax hike in American history on those earning more than $200,000.  After all, taxing the rich is a great way to raise revenue; it worked so | Read More »

The False Narrative of the Grand Bargain on Tax Hikes

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  June 22nd at 10:48 AM  | 

Over the past few months, there has been a daily trickle of establishment Republicans coming out before the media in hostage style confession statements to declare that they would accept tax increases as part of a “grand bargain” to cut the deficit.  The latest member was Lindsey Graham, who stated his newfound opposition to the taxpayer pledge of Americans for Tax Reform, which he considered | Read More »

Tax Cuts for the Rich – Bad; Subsidies – Good

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  June 20th at 09:24 AM  | 

Barack Obama and the Democrats have promised to make this election a turning point in the fight to make the rich “pay their fair share” of taxes.  They are using biblical innuendo to suggest that it is immoral for the top 1% of earners (who happen to make 17% of nation AGI) to only pay 36.7% of the federal income taxes.  This is their hill | Read More »

Tax dollars paying for ‘marketing of livestock semen’

By: Dan Spencer (Diary)  |  June 14th at 08:00 AM  | 

You can’t make this stuff up. Your tax dollars are being used to market ”livestock semen.” Senator Tom Coburn (R-Oklahoma) has put together a new study titled “Treasure Map: The Market Access Program’s Bounty of Waste, Loot and Spoils Plundered from Taxpayers.” The report released today found that the federal government has spent more than $2 billion on a program to promote private companies marketing products | Read More »

The Tea Party, Reagan, and Why We Fight

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  June 12th at 11:15 AM  | 

Much ink has been poured over the past 24 hours regarding Jeb Bush’s controversial remarks about the state of the Republican Party.  In a wide-ranging interview with Bloomberg News, Bush said the following: “Ronald Reagan would have, based on his record of finding accommodation, finding some degree of common ground, similar to my dad, they would have a hard time if you define the Republican | Read More »

Romney’s ‘Strong Leadership’ ad rebuts Obama’s misleading attacks

By: Dan Spencer (Diary)  |  June 8th at 11:00 AM  | 

The  Romney campaign has released a new television, titled “Strong Leadership,” touting Romney’s economic record as Massachusetts governor:   “As governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney demonstrated strong leadership—reducing the unemployment rate and balancing budgets without raising taxes. As president, Mitt Romney will do the same to help create jobs and get our country back on track.” The ad highlights three of Governor Romney’s economic achievements:

Vote Yes on Broun Highway Bill Motion

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  June 7th at 07:56 AM  | 

Among the many Republican capitulations we have witnessed over the past year, one of the most egregious is their willingness to support the Senate highway bill.  We’ve chronicled the problems with the highway bill extensively in these pages over the past few months.  Aside for the policy issues, the cost of the bill is most problematic because it will engender future bailouts. The $109 billion | Read More »

An Earmark by Any Other Name

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  June 6th at 12:59 PM  | 

There’s an enduring rule in all aspects of life that is very applicable to conservatives in politics.  Whenever you achieve a rare, hard-fought victory, you do everything possible to ensure that the victory stays intact.  The House-adopted earmark ban is one of our biggest achievements over the past decade.  As such, we must not reinstate the practice of passing Miscellaneous Tariff Bills (MTBs), which are | Read More »

GOP Supporters of Increased Revenue are Motivated by Support for Big Government

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  May 30th at 02:57 PM  | 

It’s another week in Washington, and another story is out containing a plethora of quotes from Republicans who are willing to “put revenues on the table.”  Here are some quotes from today’s article in Politico: “Nobody wants to raise taxes, but the question is can you lower tax rates, lower loopholes and deductions and apply that to debt reduction? I think the answer is yes,” | Read More »

Harry Reid’s No Illegal Left Behind Policy

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  May 29th at 12:45 PM  | 

For those in the media who suffer mental gyrations over the lack of bipartisanship in Washington, here is a story that exemplifies the obstacle to working together. We all know that there are sharp disagreements over tax policy and immigration policy, but we can all agree that illegal aliens should not receive $4.2 billion in refundable tax credits.  Can we? Last July, the Treasury Inspector | Read More »

We Must End Gov’t Bias Towards Employer-Provided Health Coverage

By: Daniel Horowitz (Diary)  |  May 18th at 01:43 PM  | 

The liberal cycle of statism, at its core, originates from a government-induced problem.  When nobody is paying attention to an issue, liberals swoop in and impose a pernicious regulation or mandate on a private industry.  That regulation lays dormant for a number of years like a ticking time bomb.  Then, many years later, it blows up the industry.  Liberals summarily swoop in to accuse private | Read More »