Luckily $50 a Day Goes Far in a Socialist paradise

Congress is trying to up restrictions on travel to Cuba. You may have to wait to until next year to get your hands on the cigars and putas though:

WASHINGTON - Democrats controlling Congress are trying to loosen restrictions on allowing people of Cuban descent to visit their relatives on the island.

But efforts underway in Congress — including a measure adopted by a Senate panel on Thursday — appear unlikely to loosen the restrictions before President Bush leaves office in January.

Bush opposes efforts gaining steam in Congress to ease a longstanding embargo and recently-toughened travel restrictions on Cuba. His veto promises have carried the day despite majority support for loosening restrictions on travel to Cuba and trade with the authoritarian state.

The Senate panel would block enforcement of restrictions imposed in 2004 on family travel to Cuba. Prior to the 2004 policy change, Cuban-Americans could travel to Cuba once a year to visit relatives, spend up to $170 a day and visit for an unlimited duration.

Now, family visits are limited to once every three years for no more than 14 days. Spending is capped at $50 per day.

Read the whole story here.

Well, Death IS Better Than Representing Staten Island ...

The Staten Island GOP just cannot catch a break. First, their incumbent candidate, Vito Fossella, admitted that the woman who bailed him out of jail after a drunk driving arrest was the mistress who had had his bastard child.

Now, the guy local GOP party hacks picked to run for his seat, Francis H. Powers, has dropped dead:

Mr. Powers, who had never before run for public office, agreed to run after a series of elected officials declined to enter the race.

So I think we can put this one in the Dem column.

Senate Less Efficient Than That Wendy's Near Your Office Run By That Pimply Kid

The U.S. Senate is moving to privatize the cafeterias used by staffers and other Capitol Hill employees. Why, you ask? 'Cause they're tired of losing millions of dollars by running it themselves -- $18 million(!) since 1993:

The financial condition of the world's most exclusive dining hall and its affiliated Capitol Hill restaurants, cafeterias and coffee shops has become so dire that, without a $250,000 subsidy from taxpayers, the Senate won't make payroll next month.

The embarrassment of the Senate food service struggling like some neighborhood pizza joint has quietly sparked change previously unthinkable for Democrats. Last week, in a late-night voice vote, the Senate agreed to privatize the operation of its food service, a decision that would, for the first time, put it under the control of a contractor and all but guarantee lower wages and benefits for the outfit's new hires.

What went wrong? Well, it turns out that if you let the Congress run something, there's a very high probability that they'll fuck it up:

In a letter to colleagues, Feinstein said that the Government Accountability Office found that "financially breaking even has not been the objective of the current management due to an expectation that the restaurants will operate at a deficit annually."
***
The Senate Restaurants, as the food service network is known, has a range of offerings, from the ornate Senate Dining Room on the first floor of the Capitol, where senators and their guests are served by staffers wearing jackets and ties, to the huge cafeteria in the Dirksen Building and various coffee shops throughout the Senate complex.

All told, they bring in more than $10 million a year in food sales but have turned a profit in just seven of their 44 years in business, according to the GAO.

In a masterful bit of understatement, Feinstein blamed "noticeably subpar" food and service. Foot traffic bears that out. Come lunchtime, many Senate staffers trudge across the Capitol and down into the basement cafeteria on the House side. On Wednesdays, the lines can be 30 or 40 people long.

The irony of this situation is not lost on the lawmakers:

Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), speaking for the group of senators who opposed privatizing the restaurants, said that "you cannot stand on the Senate floor and condemn the privatization of workers, and then turn around and privatize the workers here in the Senate and leave them out on their own."

Subsidy Crop Looking Mighty Green This Year

Think the Farm Bill that Congress recently passed is bad? Guess again. It is even worse:

A major new program in the recently enacted farm bill could increase taxpayer-financed payments to farmers by billions of dollars if high commodity prices decline to more typical levels, administration and congressional budget officials said yesterday.
***
The final details of the new program were approved at the end of four months of House-Senate negotiations over the legislation and received almost no attention during floor debate last week. The voluntary program guarantees farmers a subsidy if they suffer losses because of low prices or poor crops.

Since the amount of the subsidy for 2009 is tied to recent record prices, farmers could reap a windfall if prices drop suddenly.

"I don't think many people on the House side who voted for the farm bill realized there were $16 billion in potential higher costs in there," said Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Charles F. Conner. "The budget exposure is tremendous."

A blog item posted Monday by the agricultural magazine Pro Farmer described the new program, known as Average Crop Revenue Election (ACRE), as "lucrative beyond expectations," and said it is a "no brainer" for farmers to sign up for it.

The Agriculture Department estimates that subsidy payments to corn farmers alone could reach $10 billion a year if prices -- which have been $5 to $6 a bushel -- were to drop to $3.25 a bushel, a level seen as recently as last year.

Read the whole story here.

The White House has said it would veto the bill, a meaningless gesture since it passed with bipartisan majorities large enough to override any veto.

In short, if food prices stop their current steep rise, we'll still pay the same. It'll just come out of our tax dollars.

Sen. Ted Stevens and his BFF

It is hard to tell what is more annoying about this AP story: the facts it reports or the irritating isn't-bipartisanship-wonderful attitude it presents them in.

Here's the story. Senator Daniel Inouye, 83, of Hawaii hosted a fundraiser Wednesday for the reelection bid of Senator Ted Stevens, 84, of Alaska. That's unusual because Inouye is a Democrat and Stevens is a Republican. The AP says:

It's fair to say Inouye would like his Democratic Party to control the Senate by a greater margin. But not at the expense of Stevens, his friend and ally in the increasingly rough-and-tumble Senate.

So Inouye held a fundraising lunch for his friend on Wednesday to help Stevens with what promises to be his most difficult campaign in almost four decades.
***
Stevens' campaign hoped the noontime lunch just a block from the Capitol would net $50,000 or so from the anticipated 60-70 guests, said campaign treasurer Tim McKeever in Alaska.

Anchorage Democratic Mayor Mark Begich is running to defeat Stevens, and the hard-fought race is essential to Democrats' goal of padding the chamber with enough Democrats to roll over GOP delaying tactics.

So why did Inouye do it? Was it just because he and Stevens are long-time buds? That's what the AP story suggests:

But to Senate old-timers like Inouye, 83, and Stevens, 84 — each of whom has served in the chamber since the 1960s — friendship comes before party. In the increasingly bitter world of Washington, the friendship of Inouye and Stevens stands out. They call each other "brother." Both served with honor in World War II.

Heartwarming, isn't it? But there is another reason Inouye hosted the fundraiser, a little fact mentioned towards the end of the story:

The two have traveled the world together are the top two senators on the panel controlling the Pentagon budget. For years, they've used the post to deliver federal money to their states. They are also the chairman and top Republican on the powerful Commerce Committee.

Well isn't that special? These two old farts bonded over years and years of traveling the world on the taxpayers' dime and shoveling yet more of those taxpayer dollars into their home states. Good times, good times.

Oh, and by the way, Stevens is the focus of a federal corruption probe. That's why his re-election bid will be so "difficult." There is a good chance the guy will go to federal prison soon.

Still, doesn't it just make you feel great to know that these senators look out for each other, regardless of party?

Ethics Panel Slaps Craig; He Likes It

The Senate Ethics Panel (yes, I was surprised to learn it existed too) today released a reprimand of Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho*. The official document was, no doubt, sent to Craig underneath the stall door of the public restroom in Union Station. From the AP:

In a letter to the Republican senator, the ethics panel said Craig's attempt to withdraw his guilty plea after his arrest at a Minneapolis airport was an effort to evade legal consequences of his own actions.

Craig's actions constitute "improper conduct which has reflected discreditably on the Senate," the letter said.

Given the fact the Congress' approval ratings are right there in the toilet with Craig, that arguably is the biggest accomplishment of his Senate career so far. Unless you count that time he met Freddie Mercury on vacation in Berlin and inspired him to write "We Are The Champions" but I digress.

*corrected

Dems' Trillion Dollar Tax Raise Bill Has Some Good Things and a lot of Bad

My main criticism of Nancy Pelosi's reign is that she appointed people like Rangel to key chairmanships. At 76 he is close to death's door that he is trying to push a trillion dollar tax increase before he dies.

The one good element of his plan would lower the US corporate tax rate, which is currently the second highest in the industrialized world, behind Japan.

On the bad side, Rangel proposes to increase the child credit for people who do not owe tax, which turns the IRS into a welfare program as it actually pays people money to filers who owe no income tax. To pay for this, Rangel would increase the marginal tax on earners of $150K or more to 40%. To put that in perspective, the average US family pays a 4% federal tax while the top 50% of earners already pay 97% of the burden.

If you live in expensive cities like New York, San Francisco or DC, you pay through the nose to support the rest of the country and still do not feel rich at $150K. That magic earnings number is also the point at which you cannot deduct student loan expenses or health expenses. You are certainly not rich.

If Rangel would propose a higher tax on those who make a million or more, I might be game. But $150K is way too low to start to penalize people who have already lost their ability to deduct major expenses.

Another Congressional Pet Peeve Hearing Disgrace

Congressmen often hold hearings based more on their personal pet peeves than what is within the bounds of Congress' legitimate purview. Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia, for instance, is a big baseball fan (I see him at Nats games often, wearing a mitt like an eight year-old) so he used Congressional subpeona power in hearings to drag a bunch of baseball stars before the cameras to ask embarrassing questions and humiliate them. This type of hearing resembles more a kangaroo court than a Congressional inquiry and accomplishes nothing but intimidation.

Rep. Bobby Rush of Illinois had his own Hip-Hop pet peeve hearing recently. It was another ridiculous incursion of authority into private enterprise and a total waste of taxpayer money.

Still, lawmakers like Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.), chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection, say artists and record companies must do more to censor lyrics that promote a lifestyle of violence, drugs and misogyny.

I hate that kind of music too, so I don't listen to it. If you hate it, don't buy it, organize a boycott or march or awareness campaign against it. That is freedom; banning it is not.

In another sorry episode, John Kerry succeeded very well in using his Senate post and the spectre of Congressional hearings to ensure he could continue to get Red Sox games on Comcast in his Georgetown manse and not have to switch to a dish after MLB signed an exclusive "After Innings" contract with Directv. The rich Senator, alas, didn't want to switch to Directv, which is easy, fast and cheap to do, so he stretched his Congressional privilege way too far to rewrite the settled contract in his personal favor because a Senator who is worth $500MM should not have to switch to Directv.

The enforcement of contracts, along with property rights, are the two major underpinnings of the prosperous US economy and are enshrined in the Constitution. Sadly, Kerry, with all of that Congressional intimidation power, got his way:

When the exclusive deal was announced, Sen John Kerry (D-MA) asked the Federal Communications Commission to investigate the deal… he then pushed for Congressional hearings. During a hearing last week in the Nation’s Capital, he pushed baseball to resume talks with iN Demand—which is owned by affiliates of Time Warner, Comcast and Cox. The parties then went back to the table… and the deal was reached

Two Wrongs Don't Make a Right

Mount Obey is about to blow. And not in a good way...

House Appropriations Chairman David Obey (D-Wis.) warned President Bush on Tuesday that he would bottle up a critical $190 billion war spending bill in his committee unless Bush agrees to a goal of ending combat operations in Iraq by January 2009 and other conditions.
[...]
Obey also announced his backing for a war surtax on income, ranging from 2 percent to 15 percent of every American’s tax bill, to raise about $150 billion a year to pay for the war.

“If you don’t like the cost, then shut down the war,” Obey said.

2% to 15%? Yikes. I know he's just blowing smoke by trying to raise the issue of the cost of the war, but a special tax to help finance the clusterfuck over there isn't something to joke about.

Via Roll Call. Sorry, subscription required.

Congress Ate My Steak

I was about to order the prime steak at my favorite local restaurant when I noticed the new price: $46. That is up from $36 the last time I ordered it a few months ago. The reason: beef prices are skyrocketing in tandem with corn prices, which are skyrocketing because of growing demand for ethanol. Corn prices increased 80% in 2006 alone and might double this year.

The Energy Bill of 2005, through a combination of subsidies, tariffs and mandates, caused the massive food inflation that is occurring. Congress didn't like $3/gallon gas so they created $3/gallon milk. Oh, and they also made steak a luxury food again.

You Craiging?

Thanks, Sen. Larry Craig. I've been thinking for a while about the need for a neat little word to describe someone who publicly engages in very homophobic behavior while secretly engaging in very homosexual behavior. A lot has been written on his toe-tapping misadventures already, so I'm enjoying all the new, uh, twists. Like this:

[Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force] did express some empathy with Craig in regard to the reaction of his GOP Senate colleagues. They have called for an ethics committee review of his case, which they did not do in response to revelations that Sen. David Vitter, R-La., was on the contact list of a Washington-area escort service.

"The double standard is shocking," Foreman said. "We'll throw the closet queer under the bus, but if you see a female prostitute, that's just fine."

A Ron Paul Disappointment

The libertarian hope for president, Ron Paul, likes his pork as much as every other member of Congress. A WSJ editorial today (subscription only) pointed out that Paul has requested approximately $400 million in earmarks this year.

They include such urgent national wartime priorities as an $8 million request for the marketing of wild American shrimp and $2.3 million to fund shrimp-fishing research.

When we called Mr. Paul's office for an explanation, his spokesperson offered up something that is worthy of pork legends Tom DeLay or Senator Robert C. Byrd: "Reducing earmarks does not reduce government spending, and it does not prohibit spending upon those things that are earmarked."

If you can make sense of that explanation, you are much smarter than I am. In any event, Paul's feeding at the trough of senseless government spending that serves more the elected official than it does the taxpayer, and the country, is very disappointing.

Congressman to World, "I'm a Hypocrite"

File this under "do as I say not as I do".

Nearly everyone on Capitol Hill these days just loves to beat up on earmarks. Unless, of course, the money is headed their way. In a stark example of this paradox, freshman Rep. Kevin O. McCarthy (R-Calif.) e-mailed constituents last week, touting the $200,000 he secured for nurses in Kern County, Calif., then bragged about voting against legislation to appropriate the money. McCarthy secured $200,000 for California State University, Bakersfield to help counter the shortage of trained nurses in his rapidly growing district. But he voted against the $607 billion health care spending bill that included the money because it was $10.6 billion more than President Bush had requested.

In particular, McCarthy complained that the bill included $2 million for the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service in Harlem -- money the powerful House Ways and Means chairman secured for the institute bearing his name, which helps low-income and minority students launch careers in politics.

"Taxpayer dollars are not a congressman's personal spending account," McCarthy e-mailed.

More here.

The "Yellow Pages" Test

Congressman Tom Feeney (R-FL) has put forth simple criteria for determining whether or not Congress should pass new regulations or not.

The Laffer Curve, game theory and the classic supply-and-demand diagram are all well established in the economics lexicon.

Less well-known, but arguably more valuable to some House Republicans, is a new economics theory dubbed the “Yellow Pages test.” House Financial Services member Tom Feeney, R-Fla., says he uses the test to determine whether the federal government needs to regulate or be involved in a certain business.

If he can find at least two businesses listed in the Yellow Pages that offer a similar service, Feeney says, then the federal government should steer clear. Fellow conservative and Financial Services member Jeb Hensarling, R-Texas, who actually coined the term “Yellow Pages test” at a hearing last week, agrees.

The government has no business messing around in the private market, Hensarling argued, suggesting that the test ought to be used often.

This advance in economic theory was offered during a committee debate over federal regulation of wind insurance coverage. If it can be applied to wind insurance brokers, one can easily see its extension to other facets of the business world.

As evidenced by the now notorious “D.C. Madam” case, local governments might want to reconsider, for example, whether to interfere with the escort business since there are plenty of those listed in the phone book — all providing, one presumes, a similar service.

Zing! I would also note that many of California's medical marijuana dispensaries are listed in the phone book, but that didn't stop Rep. Feeney or Rep. Hensarling from voting against an amendment last week that would have stopped the federal government from messing around in that private market.

Via Congressional Quarterly (sorry, subscription required).