Rob Paris Blog

Rob writes about news, economics, politics and other things

Posts Tagged Legislation

Old wine, new skin

Jan 21

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SOPA is being withdrawn – at least the name. It’ll be back with slight modifications and a new name. Old wine, new skin. And it’s nothing new.

This comic is over 10 years old.

How would you like this wrapped?

This is all about the control of information. It’s not about piracy, or terrorism or the children.

But what if people think it’s about the children. It’s not like anybody is going to read these bills anyway. Call it something that everyone has to vote for, just because of the name. Call it something like “Protecting Children From Internet Pornographers Act”. Oh wait, that one already exists.

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Davey Crockett on government charity

Sep 29

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A few days ago the Senate announced that it would block stopgap funding. Not because they didn’t agree with the budget, but due to a dispute over federal disaster aid.  It’s easy to argue for spending money on disaster aid. After all, it was a disaster, an act of God – and what about the children? My answer: that’s what insurance is for.  ”Not yours to give” by Davey Crockett was compiled in 1884 and gives a great example of how this was handled almost 200 years ago – see this PDF  or podcast. The podcast is also embedded below. It’s one of my favorites.

Here’s an excerpt:

“Mr. Speaker–I have as much respect for the memory of the deceased, and as much sympathy for the sufferings of the living, if suffering there be, as any man in this House, but we must not permit our respect for the dead or our sympathy for a part of the living to lead us into an act of injustice to the balance of the living. I will not go into an argument to prove that Congress has no power to appropriate this money as an act of charity. Every member upon this floor knows it. We have the right, as individuals, to give away as much of our own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right so to appropriate a dollar of the public money. Some eloquent appeals have been made to us upon the ground that it is a debt due the deceased. Mr. Speaker, the deceased lived long after the close of the war; he was in office to the day of his death, and I have never heard that the government was in arrears to him. Every man in this House knows it is not a debt. We cannot, without the grossest corruption, appropriate this money as the payment of a debt. We have not the semblance of authority to appropriate it as a charity. Mr. Speaker, I have said we have the right to give as much money of our own as we please. I am the poorest man on this floor. I cannot vote for this bill, but I will give one week’s pay to the object, and if every member of Congress will do the same, it will amount to more than the bill asks.” He took his seat. Nobody replied. The bill was put upon its passage, and, instead of passing unanimously, as was generally supposed, and as, no doubt, it would, but for that speech, it received but few votes, and, of course, was lost.

The rest of the article explains what drove Crockett to give that speech. It’s worth the time to listen to it.

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Barack Obama on the national debt

Jan 6

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Raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure.

Sen. Barack Obama, March 16, 2006

Read Obama’s Plan for America – Fiscal for more background on Obama’s position on fiscal discipline… or at least former position.

The PDF, hosted on www.barackobama.com, includes these broken plans:

Restore Fiscal Discipline in Congress
Obama will reinstate pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) budget rules, so that new spending or tax cuts are paid for by spending cuts or new revenue elsewhere.

Cut Pork Barrel Spending
Obama will cut skyrocketing pork barrel spending projects by forcing more transparency about who is requesting projects and what the projects would accomplish before Congress votes to approve them.

Cut Down on Tax Haven and Tax Shelter Abuse
Obama will build on his bipartisan work to penalize companies that abuse the tax code and stop the use of tax havens.

Repeal Bush Tax Cuts for the Wealthy
Obama is committed to repealing the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans.

To repeat…

Raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure.

In Obama’s first two years as president, the debt ceiling has been increased three times (with a fourth one likely coming soon). One of these three was for $1,900,000,000,000, twice the previous record for change in debt ceiling.

When Obama took office the debt ceiling was $11,315,000,000,000. Now it’s $14,294,000,000,000. A 26% change. And thats before the upcoming increase.

I’d come up with a conclusion here, but I think Barack Obama said it best. Raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure.

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Bob Murphy on unemployment

Sep 16

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Bob Murphy shares some insight on unemployment and offers a very Keynesian solution.

Bob Murphy

Government efforts to “reduce unemployment” are, at best, like putting ice cubes on a thermometer to treat a fever.

For example, most pundits accept the claim that “World War II got us out of the Depression.” And it’s true that the official unemployment rate dropped like a stone with US entry into the war. But as economic historian Bob Higgs  points out, FDR had hardly “fixed” the economy: all he did was force millions of American men to leave the conventional workforce and jump into a slaughterhouse. By the same token, if President Obama made it mandatory for five million Americans to cross the ocean and paint the Great Wall of China, it’s possible that the official unemployment rate would drop.

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Regulatory Failure by the Numbers

Sep 13

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Richard W. Fulmer and Robert L. Bradley Jr. share 15 examples of regulatory failure in, Regulatory Failure by the Numbers.

Any time government regulators try to do much more than lay out the basic rules of the game, unintended consequences and moral hazards rear their ugly heads.

Richard W. Fulmer and Robert L. Bradley Jr.

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Government is not charity

Aug 19

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Great quote from Walter Williams article, The Founders’ Vision Versus Ours, on historical perspective and the role of government.

Madison

In 1794, when Congress appropriated $15,000 to assist some French refugees, James Madison, the acknowledged father of our Constitution, stood on the floor of the House to object, saying, “I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.” He later added, “(T)he government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects. It is not like the state governments, whose powers are more general. Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.” Two hundred years later, at least two-thirds of a multi-trillion-dollar federal budget is spent on charity or “objects of benevolence.”

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Insider trading is legal…

Jun 16

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Insider trading is legal… as long as you’re a member of the United States Congress. A bill has been proposed to stop members of Congress from trading on insider information, but the bill seems to be stalled in Congress. Convenient.

The bill, H.R.682 – Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act (STOCK Act), sponsored by Washington Democrat Brian Baird, has only been able to garner 7 sponsors in 18 months.

It is a little suspicious that members of Congress routinely outperform the market. According to Stephen Bainbridge,

A 2004 study of the results of stock trading by United States Senators during the 1990s found that that senators on average beat the market by 12% a year. In sharp contrast, U.S. households on average underperformed the market by 1.4% a year and even corporate insiders on average beat the market by only about 6% a year during that period. A reasonable inference is that some Senators had access to – and were using – material nonpublic information about the companies in whose stock they trade.

See this article by Stephen Bainbridge for more information.

Read the full text of H.R.682 – Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act.

See a summary of the bill below:

1/26/2009–Introduced.Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act – Amends the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and the Commodities Exchange Act to direct both the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to prohibit purchase or sale of either securities or commodities for future delivery by a person in possession of material nonpublic information regarding pending or prospective legislative action if the information was obtained:

(1) knowingly from a Member or employee of Congress;
(2) by reason of being a Member or employee of Congress; and
(3) other federal employees.

Amends the Code of Official Conduct of the Rules of the House of Representatives to prohibit designated House personnel from disclosing material nonpublic information relating to any pending or prospective legislative action relating to either securities of a publicly-traded company or a commodity if such personnel has reason to believe that the information will be used to buy or sell the securities or commodity based on such information. Amends the Ethics in Government Act of 1978 to require formal disclosure of certain securities and commodities futures transactions to either the Clerk of the House of Representatives or the Secretary of the Senate. Amends the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995 to subject to its registration, reporting, and disclosure requirements, as well as requirements for identification of clients and covered legislative and executive officials, all political intelligence activities, contacts, firms, and consultants. Requires the Comptroller General to include political intelligence activities, contacts, firms, and consultants in its annual compliance audits and reports.

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A solution to US health reform

Feb 25

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While listening to Nancy Pelosi talk during the bipartisan meeting on health reform, I came up with the ultimate solution to health care reform. I won’t take all of the credit for it, it was mostly Nancy’s idea.

Ms. Pelosi wants to pass new legislature so that everybody can have access to health care. Not just healthcare, but better healthcare. The new health reform will lower costs, increase accessibility and increase performance. This is great. I didn’t realize that all of this can happen with the stroke of a pen. Capitalism and the markets are totally unnecessary… And that’s when it hit me.

If she can just legislate the way to better healthcare, she should start at the heart of the problem. Don’t mandate healthcare for everybody. Mandate away the need for healthcare at all. Mandate an end to cancer. That’s right, make it impossible to get cancer, with the stroke of a pen. Not just cancer, mandate away diabetes and obesity and heart disease and asthma and osteoporosis and depression and AIDS. Once we’re legislated our way out of all of these health problems, we’ll be in great shape. Then we can start getting into the more exciting things. Legislate my ability to fly. Legislate my ability to have mind control. Oh, and legislate the end to war and famine.

Thanks.

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College Football Playoff Act of 2009

Dec 9

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H.R. 390: College Football Playoff Act of 2009 approved legislation to force college football to ban the promotion of a postseason NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision game as a national championship. The bill favors a switch to a ‘more fair’ playoff system.

I don’t see what the real objection is. Congress has nothing else on its plate now. And anyway, its right there in the Constitution :

U.S. Constitution – Article 1 – Section 11 – Clause 3

The Congress shall have Power To Define and Regulate all Competitive Collegiate Activities that Define a National Champion for the common Entertainment and general Welfare of the United States. All Championship Competitors must be Drawn in uniform throughout the several States, and with the Indian Tribes.

The Congress shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to Declare a National Champion upon Completion of the Competition, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur.

That’s right, the Constitution gives Congress the express power to determine how a college football playoff system should work.

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House passes climate-change bill

Jun 27

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Government.

My favorite quotes from this article involve…

Scare tactics.

“Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan of Ohio countered that, without the bill, the United States would remain energy-dependent on people who want to “fly planes into our buildings.”


Filibusters.

That wasn’t good enough for House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio), who delayed the roll call vote by reading page-by-page through a 300-page managers’ amendment Democrats added at around 3 a.m. Friday. Boehner seemed to relish the hour-long stunt, picking out the bill’s most obscure language and then pontificating about what it might – or might not – mean. Republicans laughed along with him and roared with applause when he was done.


Nothing to read.

“Republicans accused the Democrats of ramming the bill through the House. Rep. Joe Barton (R-Tex.), managing the debate for his party, asked repeatedly if there was even a copy of the current version of the bill anywhere in the House chamber. Democratic Rep. Ellen Tauscher – sitting in the speaker’s chair although she’s already been confirmed as Obama’s undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security — repeatedly dodged the question.


If you want to read, you can’t vote.

“Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), one of the bill’s sponsors, finally rose to say that a single copy of the current version of the bill was available at the speaker’s desk – and on the Internet, which members would have to leave the floor to access.”


Poor planning and games.

“Even as the House raced toward a Fourth of July recess, Republicans unwittingly gave Democrats more time to whip their members Friday by calling for a series of amendments to an unrelated spending bill. When the Republicans realized what was happening, they quickly tried to withdraw the amendments, but the Democrats wouldn’t let them.”


Chocolate bribes.

“Pelosi plied undecided members with chocolate-covered Dove bars in a series of small group meetings. White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel worked the phones, and administration officials whipped members at a White House luau Thursday night.”

If you want to laugh, read the original article…

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