Crisis of Abundance: Rethinking How We Pay for Health Care - Arnold Kling

P.J. O'Rourke on the Wealth of Nations - P.J. O'Rourke

Meanwhile, Dan Clifton at Americans for Tax Reform sent me the following list of congressmen who broke their pledge never to raise taxes by voting YES on the bill. Those in italics are Democrats.

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Congressman Jeb Hensarling (R-TX), Chairman of the Republican Study Committee (RSC), today issued the following statement as time on the House Democrats' "100 Hours agenda" runs out:

"The Democrats' 100 hours agenda has accomplished very little for people and families across America. On the other hand, they have done a great deal to expand government dependency and control at the expense of individual empowerment, incentive, and private enterprise. And it should be noted that while it took Democrats even less than 100 hours to raise taxes, not 1 cent is going to deficit reduction.

"Thus far, Speaker Pelosi and House Democrats have attempted to: empower the federal government to set drug prices that are already being successfully negotiated in the free market...federally mandate a higher wage that will keep younger workers from job opportunities; push students into a federally run bureaucratic loan program; and federally impose billions in fees and taxes that will cost American workers jobs and cause millions of Americans to become even more dependent on foreign oil. That is a whole lot of federal."

"Though very few of these agenda items will actually become law in their current form, Speaker Pelosi and House Democrats clearly have chosen to empower the federal government over families in America."

Signers of the letter pledge to sustain any veto made by the President on any tax increase submitted to him by Congress.

The problem in Washington hasn’t been a lack of revenue; it’s been a lack of spending restraint. Tax hikes are counterproductive and anti-growth and Congress should vigorously oppose them.

A copy of the letter is reprinted below. To sign onto it, please contact Tonnie Wybensinger in Rep. Feeney’s office at t.wybensinger@mail.house.gov.

Our Congressional Scorecard for the 110th Congress provides a comprehensive rating of how well or how poorly each member of Congress supports pro-growth, free-market policies and will be distributed to our members and to the public.

A Vietnamese pig farmer is using a new and interesting way to boost productivity. He believes that the melodies of Beethoven, Mozart and Schubert help promote productivity while his 3000 pigs have their noses in their troughs.

"I saw that my pigs started eating more and that they were gaining weight faster than usual," said [Nguyen Chi] Cong, who adds that he blasts the tunes of the composers daily from 7:00 – 11:00 am and 14:00 – 16:00 pm.

"I think I am the first farmer in Vietnam to apply this technique."

In response, Senator Gregg issued this statement:

“Despite reaching a good-faith agreement with the Democratic leadership that my fiscally responsible amendment, A Second Look at Wasteful Spending, would be taken up at another time, I was disappointed to learn that objections from another Democratic senator effectively blocked that agreement. I fully support ethics reform – in fact, I offered my amendment to strengthen the ethics reform package – so will continue to push for a vote on this reasonable proposal to reduce wasteful federal spending. I cannot support ending debate on this bill until the Senate has had a chance to fully debate and vote on a proposal to improve the government’s stewardship of taxpayer dollars, and I look forward to working with my colleagues across the aisle to achieve that goal.”

The unidentified Democratic senator that Gregg is referring to is the King of Pork, Robert Byrd.