Posts filed under 'General News'
Update 5:57am: Boehner has been re-elected as Speaker, which is a shame as I doubt even the scare of discontent among conservatives will be enough to make him work towards more conservative ends. End update
The Republicans won a majority in both the House and Senate at last year’s mid-term election, not because they necessarily stood for certain actions or programs or initiatives (with the exception of some local candidates, as a whole they stood for no new actions), but rather because the voters want someone to stop or at least slow Obama down.
Unfortunately, shortly after winning this majority of both houses of Congress, the remaining Republicans in the lame-duck session of the Congress late last year sided with the Democrats to pass a full-year funding measure which does nothing to slow Obama, and in fact helps him as it makes it easier for him to bypass congress with executive actions on things such as amnesty for illegal immigrants. This was a clear betrayal of the people who voted for Republicans last year who expected Republicans to pass a short-term spending bill which would put the next spending bill under the control of this congress which has a Republican majority in both houses and barely needs to worry about appeasing Democrats, and thus would allow for defunding of programs which Republicans (and their voters) oppose.
Sadly, this was par for the course for much of the Republican leadership, especially Speaker Of The House John Boehner.
The good news is that the new House must elect a speaker, and John Boehner faces serious challenges, such as conservative Louie Gohmert.
Texas Republican Louie Gohmert announced Sunday morning on Fox News’ “Fox and Friends” that he would throw his hat into the ring, saying he’s officially a candidate for the speaker gig.
Gohmert’s announcement comes as Boehner’s approval from conservative voters sags.
Gohmert’s office also sent a statement to TheBlaze[..]
***
After the November elections gave Republicans control of the Senate, voters made clear they wanted change. There have been numerous examples of problematic Republican leadership, but we were hopeful our leaders got the voters’ message. However, after our Speaker forced through the CRomnibus by passing it with Democratic votes and without time to read it, it seemed clear that we needed new leadership. There had been much discussion. But, until yesterday, no one had stepped up.
I applaud my friend Rep. Ted Yoho for putting his name forward as an alternative to the status quo. Ted is a good man for whom I could vote, but I have heard from many supporters and also friends in Congress who have urged me to put forward my name for Speaker as well to increase our chances of change. That is why I am also offering my name as a candidate for Speaker.
[..]
At this point, the Speaker’s election is not about a particular candidate. It is about whether we keep the status quo or make the change the country demands. I am putting forward my name for consideration as Speaker and hope that with a new Speaker, be that me or someone else, we can fight for the ideals and principles that the voters wanted when they elected us in November.
***
In TheBlaze’s Saturday poll on who should be the House Speaker, Gohmert snagged 16 percent of the vote, putting him firmly at No. 2 on the seven-person list.
TheBlaze readers’ favorite pick among the options provided: South Carolina Republican Trey Gowdy, whose nearly 10,000 votes gave him 70 percent of the poll participants.
(h/t Zach Noble, The Blaze)
Today we have confirmation that the moves to dump Speaker Boehner and respect the wishes of the electorate are growing, seemingly to the amazement of Capitol Hill newspaper The Hill:
A bloc of at least 15 conservative lawmakers will vote Tuesday to deny John Boehner a third term as Speaker[..]
The incumbent Speaker, who is facing long-shot challenges from two Tea Party favorites — Reps. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) and Ted Yoho (R-Fla.) — needs support from a simple majority of the lawmakers present to secure another two years as the House leader.
That magic number won’t be known until the vote, given a number of absences. Rep. Alan Nunnelee (R-Miss.) will miss the vote as he undergoes medical treatment. A number of New York Democrats will be attending a funeral of former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo. And the inclement weather could delay some lawmakers trying to make their way to Washington.
(h/t Scott Wong, The Hill)
It will be an interesting vote in Washington, and without wanting to overstate the case, I think dumping John Boehner as speaker is not only the right thing to do, but could be crucial if there is to be a good chance of a conservative Republican elected to the White House in 2016, as failing to dump Speaker Boehner will make it very difficult to show the public clear differences between Republicans and Democrats at election time.
Samuel
January 7th, 2015 at 04:58am
The Sydney Morning Herald had an interesting story this morning about a federal government scheme which is designed to take over from insurance companies in the event of a terrorist incident.
Sydney retailers whose earnings were slashed by up to 70 per cent during the Martin Place siege face smaller insurance payouts if the siege is deemed a terrorism event, because a government body will step in to curb insurers’ losses.
[..]
Under legislation passed following the September 11 attacks in America, the federal Treasurer can declare certain events to be acts of terrorism for insurance purposes.
In those circumstances a federally funded body, the Australian Reinsurance Pool Corporation, can step in to assess the likely loss from the incident and, where necessary, reduce the scope of claim liability for insurers. The aim of the arrangement is to shield insurers from catastrophic losses and thus ensure they continue to offer the products.
(h/t Mathew Dunckley and Lisa Visentin, The Sydney Morning Herald)
The article goes on to quote a spokesperson from IAG who says the federal government’s decision, regardless of the decision, is unlikely to affect how IAG pays out claims for loss of trade, but completely ignores something which came up on 2GB this morning…the federal government scheme is designed to insure for loss of buildings and does not cover loss of trade, but is set up in such a way that it can effectively nullify any need for insurers to pay out any claims if the incident is declared to be an act of terrorism. This is currently delaying the processing of claims with some insurers as they wait to see if they will need to pay anything, and has the potential to leave some businesses seriously out of pocket despite paying for insurance for exactly this type of event.
It’s just another example of how governments interfering with private business arrangements often leads to all sorts of unintended consequences, partially because governments rarely understand the private sector well enough to write rules which work, partially because governments take time to process things which cause debilitating delays to the private sector which doesn’t have the benefit of ongoing funding from taxpayers, and also because such rules are so often filled with easily exploited loopholes which bureaucrats often can’t anticipate because they’re not familiar with life outside the public sector.
I wrote an email to 2GB’s Luke Grant (who is currently filling in for Ray Hadley and Chris Smith across the middle of the day) about this shortly after he conducted an interview (from memory I think it was with Russell Zimmerman from the Australian Retailers Association, Update: It was, and audio of the interview is on 2GB’s website End Update) on the topic.
Good morning Luke,
This terrorism insurance debacle is a perfect example of the unintended consequences which occur when a well-intentioned government interferes with private business dealings.
It’s amazing that with so many bureaucrats writing the rules, government terrorism insurance for building loss can somehow nullify private “loss of trade” insurance, and nobody in government sees the problem. Unfortunately it’s all too common that bureaucrats who live in government land rather than the real world cause such a mess, and of course the private insurers don’t oppose the measures when the government makes them because they can see just how much money they’ll save.
It’s a mess which would never occur if governments kept their noses out rather than interfering with every little thing.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra, Australia
In this case the good intention of the government was to ensure insurance companies don’t go under while trying to pay out terrorism-related claims. Unfortunately, as is usually the case with such bailout type programs, it ignores the simple economic fact that if a product can’t be offered viably at a price which people will pay, it probably shouldn’t exist, and certainly shouldn’t rely on some magical fallback position of a government bailout from finite taxpayer funds. Sadly it seems that far too many people and industries see the government as a magic pot of infinite money and forget that government money only exists because it is legally confiscated from people via taxation, and thus should be treated with more respect and not expected to be a magical fix for every ill.
Samuel
January 5th, 2015 at 12:49pm
Today’s New York Post
H/T Fox News’ breakfast show “Fox & Friends”.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 10:00pm
Counting is still going but the overall results are a certainty. Republicans now have control of the House and Senate, effectively stopping Obama’s awful agenda where it is. Some efforts might be made to wind back some of Obama’s policies but while he still has the power to veto legislation, there probably won’t be much progress on returning the US federal government to conservative governing principles…that might have to wait until after 2016. In fact, I think you will see the next two years on both sides being more about what they plan to do after 2016 rather than what they plan to do before the Presidential election.
Republicans have increased their Senate stake, taking up to nine of the seats which belonged to Democrats. It’s not a filibuster-proof majority, but (detestable) Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (Democrat-Nevada) got around not having a filibuster-proof majority by perverting the rules of the Senate. It will be interesting to see if Republicans follow his lead (I hope not) or uphold the rules even if it slows them down.
The Republican majority in the House has increased by more than anyone realistically expected.
Currently the Senate has Republicans 52 to Democrats 45. An easy locked-in majority for the Republicans with three seats still to decide.
Currently the House has Republicans 233 to Democrats 159. A locked-in majority with 43 seats left to decide.
Republicans have gained multiple Governorships, including two states which are traditionally hostile territory for them: Massachusetts and Illinois. On the subject of Governorships, Jan Brewer was not able to run for Arizona Governor again due to a term limit. Her successor Doug Ducey easily defeated the Democrat challenger Fred DuVal, currently 54% to 41%. Keep an eye out for Jan Brewer on the national stage.
Maryland is another difficult state for Republicans, but they have taken out the Governorship, with the “rain tax” imposed by Democrats being one of the major issues there. Larry Hogan is currently leading Anthony Brown 52% to 46% late in the count.
The one incumbent Republican (of the eight House seats in Maryland) Andy Harris utterly obliterated his Democrat opponent 71% to 29%, while six of the other seats have stayed with Democrats easily (showing how hard this area is for Republicans to win) while in Maryland’s 6th Congressional District, Dan Bongino is maintaining a 2% lead over Democrat incumbent John Delaney with 14% of the count to go. It will be tight, but Dan is putting up a very good fight.
Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin, one of the great examples of good conservative leadership, won easily as well, currently leading 53% to 46% very late in the count.
Before I bring up a race in Virginia, I have to bring up the fact that I made the mistake of turning on ABC News 24 for a few minutes earlier when they were discussing the US midterm elections. Their analyst made the odd statement that ‘the Tea Party has really been sidelined in this election’, and then went on to talk about how Republicans have won so much because of their conservative, small-government, constitutional message. Given that is the definition of the Tea Party, one wonders what he thinks the Tea Party is?
I bring this up because in Virginia back in the Primaries, Dave Brat managed to oust then-House Majority Leader Eric Cantor as the Republican candidate for Virginia’s 7th House District. Dave Brat today defeated Democrat challenger Jack Trammell in a landslide, 61% to 37%.
Elsewhere there is mixed news out of California. Democrat Governor Jerry “Moonbeam” Brown (who has helped to create a man-made drought across the rural parts of that state) has defeated his Republican challenger Neel Kashkari, currently leading 57% to 43% with 29% counted.
There is some good news from California though. Sandra Fluke, the peculiar woman who made headlines a couple years ago when she effectively demanded that society as a whole should pay for her birth control measures and was subsequently called a “slut” by Rush Limbaugh, has lost her bid to get in to the state Senate…the bad news though is that she was one of two Democrat candidates without any other challengers, so the victor was another Democrat. Currently Ben Allan is leading Sandra Fluke 63.3% to 36.7%.
There were a heap of ballot initiatives around as well. I’ll have a look through some of them and point out some of the more interesting ones in a future post.
Overall it looks like a fantastic day for Republicans and conservatives…but more importantly for the American people and the world. At long last, after six years of Obama, Congress is finally in a position where there is a willingness to keep the executive branch in check. It is probably safe to say that the days of Obama’s executive overreach are over. Unfortunately it will take longer to undo the effects of his disastrous policies, but at least he won’t be able to get many more (if any) of his wishes through the Congress. Alas it might take until 2016 to get some real momentum on fixing the country.
Still, a very good day with a very good outcome. I’ll have more on this tomorrow.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 05:24pm
Massachusetts, a fairly left-leaning state, has gone to the Republicans. Charlie Baker has defeated Democrat Martha Coakley. Currently leading 48% to 47% with 82% counted and most of the rest of the count being fairly safe Republican ground. Safe enough for media outlets to be willing to call it.
Illinois, home state of Barack Obama, has gone to the Republicans. Bruce Rauner is leading incumbent Democrat Governor Pat Quinn 51% to 46% with 85% counted.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 03:54pm
Fox News has called Iowa for Joni Ernst. Associated Press has called North Carolina for Thom Tillis, dispatching the deplorable Kay Hagan.
It’s a majority. It looks like there are more seats to come for the Republicans.
Great news.
*Once the new Congress sits, which is not immediately.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 03:30pm
The early calls for a Republican victory in South Dakota were accurate. Mike Rounds is leading Democrat Rick Weiland 51% to 28% with 47% counted. The nearest independent candidate is on 17%.
Virginia is in play. Democrat incumbent Mark Warner is leading Republican Ed Gillespie by about 10,000 votes (less than 1%) with 93% counted.
North Carolina is looking good for the Republicans and could give them the +6 they need to take a majority in the Senate. Republican Thom Tillis is leading the reprehensible Democrat incumbent Kay Hagan 49% to 47% with 96% counted.
In Iowa, Republican Joni Ernst is leading her Democrat opponent 49% to 47% with 53% counted.
Republicans Cory Gardner and Tom Cotton are winning easily in Colorado and Arkansas respectively.
The projections from many media outlets are now suggesting the Republicans will retain their House majority (there’s no doubt on that one) and pick up as many as nine Senate seats (much more than the six they need). At this time, no Republican incumbent Governor has lost, and there are incumbent Democrat Governors who look set to lose to a Republican.
It’s looking like a big victory, and should stop the Obama agenda quite convincingly. I expect the next two years will be more about the platform each party will take to 2016 than anything else, as it’s unlikely that Barack Obama will acquiesce to the wishes of the people and sign much of the legislation passed by the Republicans or adhere to their attempts to make him stick within his constitutionally mandated powers (something which he has so far proven incapable of doing).
A very good election so far…and lots of work to do once the new Congress sits.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 03:23pm
There’s another Senate seat which all the news outlets are calling based on opinion polls rather than a vote count, which gives the Republicans +5…one more and they have a majority.
Some other races of interest.
Gubernatorial races:
Scott Walker, the Republican Governor of Wisconsin is being re-elected easily. 17% counted, he leads 60% to 39%.
Texas is also an easy victory for Republicans with Greg Abbott leading by a similar margin to Scott Walker. Greg Abbott replaces outgoing Republican Rick Perry.
South Carolina Republican Governor Nikki Hayley is also being re-elected by a similar margin.
Unfortunately in Pennsylvania, Republican Governor Tom Corbett has been ousted by Democrat Tom Wolf, currently 57% to 43% with 56% counted.
Maryland is a very tight race. Democrat Governor Anthony Brown (one of the people responsible for Maryland’s rain tax) is leading Republican Larry Hogan by 1%, or about 8,000 votes, with 30% of the vote counted.
Illinois could change hands to the Republicans. 51% counted and Republican Bruce Rauner leads incumbent Democrat Pat Quinn by 1%.
And there are a couple of other states which look like changing hands, mostly from Democrat to Republican, but all of those races are far too close to call at the moment.
In House seats.
One of the great shames of the 2012 election was that Mia Love did not win a seat in Utah. This time around she is running for Utah’s fourth district and the opinion polling looks good for her. No votes counted as yet.
In Indiana, none of the seats are changing hands. Seven Republicans and two Democrats.
In Maryland’s 6th district, Dan Bongino is currently leading incumbent Democrat John Delaney, 50% to 48% with 33% counted. This is a big comeback from the early stages of the count where Dan Bongino was down by a long way. We won’t have a result here for a while, but it’s good to see Dan is in the lead.
Lots happening around the traps. It is looking like a good night for the Republicans overall at this stage. In fact, as an example of how good things are looking for the Republicans, TheHill.com just sent out an alert about the Democrats picking up their first Republican House seat of the night…four and a half hours in to the count! I’m not sure which seat they’re referring to though as they didn’t specify and there are far too many house seats for me to scroll through them quickly.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 02:34pm
Remembering they need to gain six senate seats to form a majority in the Senate, and keeping in mind my earlier note that all the news outlets are calling South Dakota based on opinion polling without any of the count having been reported, another Senate seat has changed hands to the Republicans.
Colorado has voted for Republican Cory Gardner over incumbent Democrat Mark Udall. 63% counted…it’s 50% to 44%.
More polls close in moments from now. I’ll put together a quick rundown of some non-Senate races of interest shortly.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 02:00pm
Louisiana has a different system than most other states. Instead of a Primary system which allows people to elect one candidate per party for election day, a whole heap of candidates can run on election day. Today for example there are four Democrats, three Republicans and one Libertarian.
If no candidate receives at least 50% of the vote, then the two candidates who receive the most votes will face each other again in a runoff election. It looks pretty certain now that Louisiana’s Senate race will go to a runoff election on December 6.
Right now, with 10% counted, Republican Bill Cassidy is leading incumbent Democrat Mary Landrieu 43% to 42% (61,953 to 61,584). Bill’s a good candidate…hopefully he goes on to win the runoff.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 01:53pm
This is odd. NBC, CNN, Fox, and pretty much everyone else is awarding South Dakota to Republican Mike Rounds, making it the third of six Senate seat pickups which Republicans require for a Senate majority. The odd things is that they are all making this pronouncement without any votes having been counted…they are going on opinion polling which gave Mike Rounds a strong lead.
I’m going to wait until I see some actual numbers. Calling a race before any votes are counted is just silly.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 01:29pm
It looks like Republicans have now picked up two of the six Senate seats they require in order to form a majority.
In Arkansas, Tom Cotton looks likely to defeat incumbent Democrat Mark Pryor.
Republicans have picked up two of the six seats needed to gain the Senate majority, with Fox News projecting GOP Rep. Tom Cotton will unseat two-term Democratic Sen. Mark Pryor in Arkansas and Shelley Moore Capito will beat Democrat Natalie Tennant for an open Senate seat in West Virginia.
(h/t FoxNews.com)
As I write this, with 16% counted, Tom Cotton leads Mark Pryor 52% to 45% (73,904 to 63,692). In West Virginia with 35% counted, Shelley Moore Capito is leading Natalie Tennant 61% to 35% (113,822 to 66,093).
Good start, but early days still.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 12:57pm
It’s early in the night, and the Republicans need to pick up six Democratic senate seats in order to gain a majority. The good news is Republicans have picked up one of these seats. The even better news is that the next time someone tries to claim Republicans are engaged in a “war on women” you should point them to this as an example of how silly that argument is.
Republican candidate Shelley Moore Capito defeated Democratic challenger Natalie Tennant in Tuesday’s election for West Virginia’s seat in the United States Senate, reports said. Capito is the first female senator in the state’s history.
Capito’s victory marks the first time since 1956 that a Republican will represent West Virginia in the U.S. Senate.
(H/t Thomas Barrabi, International Business Times)
Meanwhile, claims that Republicans are against black people (or vice versa), which have always been patently absurd, have been proven once again to be patently absurd.
South Carolina has elected the first black senator from the South since Reconstruction, with Republican Tim Scott winning his race to complete a term to the Senate after having been appointed to the seat in 2013. Scott is the first African American popularly elected to the Senate in the old Confederacy.
(H/t Michael Warren, The Weekly Standard)
It’s a good start for Republicans, and a bad start for the nutty people who try to portray (and are often taken seriously for no good reason) Republicans as being some modern-day version of the KKK.
Some good people elected so far. Much more to come.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 11:59am
Polls are just starting to close in a few places in the US where 6pm has just passed in the Eastern timezone, but only a very small number of polls have closed as many places have closing times which are later than 6pm in their local timezone.
The indications are good that after six painful years of the most awful US President in recent history (and probably of all time, but let’s not dwell on this right now), the Republicans should be able to retain the House and form a majority in the Senate, which will put serious road blocks in the way of Obama’s awful and disastrous agenda. The midterm election of 2010 gave Republicans the House, but more importantly did so on the back of a conservative agenda…this slowed down the progress of Obama’s policies as his friends only had control of the Senate and thus could not just push things through Congress with minimal resistance as they did during the first two years. Unfortunately not all Republicans are conservatives, and the mixed messages which came out of this combined with a lacklustre candidate (Mitt Romney) for President in 2012 seriously hampered efforts to save America from Obama. As the terrible legacy of Obamacare and other Obama policies has become apparent, conservatives have found it easier to show people why conservative policies are the better choice, and so this election is looking good.
All of that said, it’s not a certainty. The Republicans should not have any trouble holding the House, but the Senate (roughly a third of which is up for election…it can’t be an exact third when there are 100 Senate seats) will be a close battle. Republicans require only an extra six seats which should not be a hard ask, but with a few close races it could go down to the wire, and may even have to wait for a runoff election in December if things are really close.
Of course if Republicans hold a majority in the House and the Senate, one problem to deal with is the fact that Mitch McConnell will almost certainly be Senate Majority Leader. Senator McConnell has repeatedly proved himself to not be an ally of the handful of Republican senators who have been consistently advocating for conservative principles, and so it will be interesting to see if he changes his tune for the better, or if he will need to be replaced before 2016.
There are also a heap of Gubernatorial races today, state legislature elections, and a heap of ballot initiatives. A few of them are of interest to me, and I’ll update you on some of them later in the day. I hope that the number of conservative Republican governors grows (20 of the 36 Republicans running in a Gubernatorial race are the incumbent), as most have been proving themselves to be great models of good and successful governing, and it would be wonderful to see this grow before 2016 and help to influence the way people vote for President next time around.
In particular I would like to single out Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin who has, in conjunction with the legislature, turned a basket case economy around in to a good strong economy, brought the budget back to surplus and and paid off a lot of the debt which the state government held before he took office. Things are much better in Wisconsin now, and I hope Governor Walker is re-elected, and serves as a model for future people in government at all levels.
Dan Bongino is another candidate of interest. He is running for a Congressional seat in Maryland. He previously worked as a Secret Service agent protecting both President George W. Bush and President Barack Obama, and claims this gave him an insight in to the problems with the way power is exercised. He is running on conservative principles and I think would make an excellent Congressman. I wish him all the best of luck.
My best wishes go out to all conservative candidates in all races across the country. It is my sincere hope that as many win as possible, Obama’s destructive policies are stopped in their tracks as a result, and this election serves as a good start for a return to government by conservative principles, limited in size and interference in private matters, and consequently working almost exclusively on core functions, and in so doing making it easier for people to make their own choices without needing approval from government to run their own lives and businesses.
It is an exciting day.
Currently I am listening to Mark Levin’s radio show (there are a gazillion stations taking his show if you want to search for one and join me…I won’t link to the one I’m listening via because it’s supposed to be geoblocked and I shouldn’t be able to hear it here, but there are plenty of stations which aren’t geoblocked). Mark will be covering many of the results as they come in, and after 1pm Canberra time when his show finishes, I plan on jumping across to Salem Radio Network’s election night coverage anchored by Hugh Hewitt (probably via WNYM AM 970 The Answer in New York), and possibly I might listen to a bit of Glenn Beck’s coverage or even Fox News Radio’s coverage. All are good options.
Samuel
November 5th, 2014 at 10:50am
Former Prime Minister Gough Whitlam passed away this morning at the age of 98.
I was sad to hear of Mr. Whitlam’s passing.
I respect greatly the fact that he was an effective agent for change as it is hard to cause societal change, especially on the scale he did, and he reinvigorated interest in the political and legislative processes to the point of inspiring people to enter the political fray on all sides, not just that of Labor.
I respect Mr. Whitlam for these reasons even though I disagree with almost everything he did politically, and while I would gladly undo much of what he did if I had the opportunity, it is worthy of respect and a testament to his impact on the nation that most of his changes live on in some form many decades after he left political office.
Mr. Whitlam’s place in Australian history will not be forgotten. May he rest in peace, and his family grieve in peace and dignity.
Samuel
October 21st, 2014 at 10:06am
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