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June
Don’t get caught flat-footed in front of the press! Below is a quick rundown of today’s “must reads.” – John T. Doolittle, House Republican Conference Secretary
The Morning Murmur – Thursday, June 22, 2006
1. Hundreds of chemical weapons found in Iraq: US intelligence - Associated Press
US-led coalition forces in Iraq have found some 500 chemical weapons since the
March 2003 invasion, Republican lawmakers said, citing an intelligence
report.
2. Doubting Thomas - Wall Street Journal Op-ed
After Senate Democrats torpedoed a bill to abolish the death tax, the danger
is that some Republicans may accept just about anything to claim the
"accomplishment," and that looks to be the case with the proposal offered by
House Ways and Means Chairman Bill Thomas.
3. Perpetual Gerrymandering - National Review
House Republican leadership is unhappy with the VRA for good reason.
4. Target: spending - Washington Times Op-ed
Setting up a series of regular floor votes sustained between now and the
election -- even on what liberals may call small spending items or simply
procedural tools -- will go a long way toward helping Republicans close the
perception gap and reclaim the mantle of fiscal responsibility.
5. It's Time to End Restrictions on Offshore Oil Drilling - Human Events
Restricting the growth of
offshore energy production is one of America's self-imposed energy problems,
and removing those restrictions should be a part of any long-term energy
solution.
For previous issues of the Morning Murmur, go to www.GOPsecretary.gov
FULL ARTICLES BELOW:
1. Hundreds of chemical weapons found in
Iraq: US intelligence - Associated Press
US-led coalition forces in Iraq have found some 500
chemical weapons since the March 2003 invasion, Republican lawmakers said,
citing an intelligence report.
"Since 2003, Coalition forces have recovered approximately 500 weapons
munitions which contain degraded mustard or sarin nerve agent," said an
overview of the report unveiled by Senator Rick Santorum and Peter Hoekstra,
head of the intelligence committee of the House of Representatives.
"Despite many efforts to locate and destroy Iraq's pre-Gulf war chemical
munitions, filled and unfilled pre-Gulf war chemical munitions are assessed
to still exist," it says.
The lawmakers cited the report as validation of the US rationale for the
war, and stressed the ongoing danger they pose.
"This is an incredibly -- in my mind -- significant finding. The idea that,
as my colleagues have repeatedly said in this debate on the other side of
the aisle, that there are no weapons of mass destruction, is in fact false,"
Santorum said.
A Pentagon official who confirmed the findings said that all the weapons
were pre-1991 vintage munitions "in such a degraded state they couldn't be
used for what they are designed for."
The official, who asked not to be identified, said most were 155 millimeter
artillery projectiles with mustard gas or sarin of varying degrees of
potency.
"We're destroying them where we find them in the normal manner," the
official said.
In 2004, the US army said it had found a shell containing sarin gas and
another shell containing mustard gas, and a Pentagon official said at the
time the discovery showed there were likely more.
The intelligence overview published Wednesday stressed that the pre-Gulf War
Iraqi chemical weapons could be sold on the black market.
"Use of these weapons by terrorists or insurgent groups would have
implications for coalition forces in Iraq. The possibility of use outside
Iraq cannot be ruled out," it said.
Santorum said the two-month-old report was prepared by the National Ground
Intelligence Center, a military intelligence agency that started looking for
weapons of mass destruction in Iraq when the Iraq Survey Group stopped doing
so in late 2004.
Last year the head of Iraq Survey Group, Charles Duelfer, said that
insurgents in Iraq had already used old chemical weapons in their attacks.
Nevertheless, "the impression that the Iraqi Survey Group left with the
American people was they didn't find anything," Hoekstra said.
"But this says: Weapons have been discovered; more weapons exist. And they
state that Iraq was not a WMD-free zone, that there are continuing threats
from the materials that are or may still be in Iraq," he said.
Asked just how dangerous the weapons are, Hoekstra said: "One or two of
these shells, the materials inside of these, transferred outside of the
country, can be very, very deadly."
The report said that the purity of the chemical agents -- and thus their
potency -- depends on "many factors, including the manufacturing process,
potential additives, and environmental storage conditions."
"While agents degrade over time, chemical warfare agents remain hazardous
and potentially lethal," it said.
Reporters questioned the lawmakers as to why the Bush administration had not
played up the report to boost their case for continued warfare in Iraq.
"The administration has been very clear that they want to look forward,"
Santorum said. "They felt it was not their role to go back and fight
previous discussions."
Fear that Saddam Hussein might use his alleged arsenal of chemical and
biological weapons was a reason US officials gave for launching the March
2003 invasion of Iraq.
http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/06/22/060622055545.07o4imol.html
2. Doubting Thomas - Wall Street Journal
Op-ed
June 22, 2006; Page A16
Two weeks ago Senate Democrats torpedoed a bill to abolish the death tax,
and now Republicans are scrambling for a compromise that would at least
reduce the burden on family businesses and legacies. The danger is that some
Republicans may accept just about anything to claim the "accomplishment,"
and that looks to be the case with the proposal offered by House Ways and
Means Chairman Bill Thomas.
First, some background: For months, Senator Jon Kyl (R., Ariz.) has been
gamely working to find enough Democrats to support a compromise if repeal
failed. His latest offer would exclude taxes on all estates below $5
million, with a 15% rate on estates up to $30 million and a 30% rate on
larger estates. The current death tax rate is 46% on estates above $2
million, and under current law if nothing is done the death tax falls to
zero in 2010 but then reverts to the punitive 60% top rate in 2011 and
beyond. America would then regain its position as one of the highest death
tax nations on the planet (see chart).
But now comes Mr. Thomas, the chief House tax writer, who has proposed a
compromise that could be voted on as early as today but is hardly an
improvement over current law. His proposal -- which he's offered with little
consultation either outside or inside Congress -- would link the top death
tax rate to twice the tax rate on capital gains.
The problem is that after 2010 the capital gains tax is scheduled to rise to
20% from its current 15%. This would mean an estate tax rate of 40%, barely
better than today's rate. And it gets worse. To accommodate the Joint
Committee on Taxation's wacky revenue estimates, Mr. Thomas would eliminate
the repeal now scheduled for 2010 and keep in place the high estate tax
rates until then. The Thomas bill also repeals the federal tax credit for
filers who pay state death taxes, so people living and dying in states with
high death taxes could see their estate tax liabilities rise to more than
under current law.
All of which has those who have labored the hardest for estate tax repeal
scratching their heads. "We flatly oppose the Thomas plan," says Dick Patten
of the American Family Business Institute. "The more our members hear about
it, the angrier they get." He and many others understand that some
compromise might be worthwhile, especially because a new Congress next year
might not have as much repeal support. But any deal ought to be at least a
big improvement on current law and promise substantial relief for the
non-rich who pay the bulk of this tax.
On both moral and economic grounds, the proper rate of tax at death should
be zero because most of this money has already been taxed once, twice, and
sometimes even three times. But the Kyl compromise at least delivers some
tax relief for all estates.
Politically, a vote on his proposal would also smoke out Senate Democrats
who've been trying to have it both ways on this issue. Two weeks ago, four
Senate Democrats voted against outright repeal even after supporting it
during their election campaigns. There are at least a dozen others who have
promised voters that they favor death tax relief, yet who voted to retain
the tax. More than one source has told us that Montana's Max Baucus has been
privately lobbying his fellow Democrats to keep the tax even as he
personally voted to repeal it.
If Senate Democrats scuttle even Mr. Kyl's proposal, then we'd suggest
leaving the issue in the hands of the 67% of voters who tell pollsters they
favor outright repeal. As things stand now, Senate Democrats are on record
in favor of returning in 2011 to a 60% top rate, and to a system that would
impose this rate on every American family estate with assets of more than $1
million. That doesn't sound like tax fairness to us -- or probably to most
voters.
http://online.wsj.com/article_print/SB115094267279687133.html
3. Perpetual Gerrymandering - National
Review
House Republican leadership is unhappy with the VRA for good reason.
By Roger Clegg
On Thursday, the House Republican leadership announced that, in light of
concerns expressed by several of its members about the proposed extension of
the Voting Rights Act, a vote on the bill would be postponed. This was the
right decision. The House Judiciary Committee thinks it has built a
sufficient record over the past months to justify extending Section 5 of the
Voting Rights Act for another 25 years. It hasn't.
Section 5 is the part of the VRA that requires certain "covered
jurisdictions" - mostly in the Deep South, but also including scattered
other areas, like the Bronx and Alaska - to get permission from the federal
government before they make any change in any procedure that has to do with
voting. A careful congressional record is necessary because the statute
raises two sets of constitutional problems: concerns about federalism (since
some states are singled out for treatment that would normally be beyond
federal authority) and concerns about Section 5's inclusion of changes that
are not tied to intentional racial discrimination (the usual scope of
Congress's power).
For the record to persuade a reviewing court that Congress has not exceeded
its authority, it needs to do four things. It is doubtful that the House's
record does any of them.
First, the record should reassure the court that Congress considered this
issue with some semblance of evenhandedness, rather than a verdict first,
trial afterwards mentality.
But the latter was in fact the mentality, which is quite obvious. The record
is stunningly one-sided. For instance, in the 170 pages of hearings on
Justice O'Connor's opinion for the Supreme Court in Georgia v. Ashcroft,
there is not a single submission that defends Justice O'Connor's opinion. In
addition, there was not a single panel where more than one of the witnesses
opposed reauthorization. Nor was there a single government official who
testified or submitted a statement against reauthorization.
Second, the record must establish that, in 2006, the right of citizens to
vote in the covered jurisdictions is widely being "denied or abridged ... on
account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude" (to quote the
Fifteenth Amendment, the font of Congress's authority).
The record contains some evidence of purposeful racial discrimination in
voting, but it is almost all scattered and anecdotal rather than systematic
and statistical (the systematic and statistical evidence, as discussed
below, all points the other way). What's more, much of the record evidence
is not even about purposeful discrimination, which is what a court will be
looking for, but instead is, at best, about practices that may have a
disproportionate racial "effect."
Third, the record must establish that purposeful discrimination in the
covered jurisdictions is much worse than in the noncovered jurisdictions.
In fact, there is very little, if any, evidence in the record that compares
covered jurisdictions to noncovered jurisdictions, and what comparisons
there are undermine the bill. For example, one of the few discussions that
compares, even implicitly, covered and noncovered jurisdictions - the
statement by Charles D. Walton of the National Commission on the Voting
Rights Act (NCVRA) - concludes that "discrimination in voting and in
election processes in the northeastern states is a significant problem" and
that there would be "a great benefit to having more of the country covered
by the pre-clearance provisions of Section 5."
A law review article by Laughlin McDonald of the ACLU's Voting Rights
Project is entitled "The Need to Expand the Coverage of Section 5 of the
Voting Rights Act in Indian Country," and proposes to do so "throughout the
West." Other submissions in the record complain about jurisdictions that are
wholly uncovered or only partly covered: the states of Ohio, Florida,
Missouri, and Indiana, for instance, and the cities of Milwaukee, Chicago,
and Detroit. In general, the NCVRA held hearings all over the country, and
all over the country it found problems - sometimes in covered jurisdictions,
but often not.
Unsurprisingly, then, many of the House Republican leadership members from
the South are particularly unhappy that their states are singled out for the
penalty box.
Fourth, there should be careful discussion of why the extraordinary
preclearance mechanism - and the use of an effects test - is still essential
for addressing the intentional discrimination that does arise.
In fact, there is very little evidence in the record on this point.
The problem is not that Congress could have fulfilled these four
requirements if it had been more careful. The problem is that, the more
careful it is, the clearer it will be that, in fact, the extension of
Section 5 simply cannot be constitutionally justified.
The House hearings included testimony from Professor Ronald Keith Gaddie and
from my colleague Edward Blum, and the record included a series of
exhaustive, and unrebutted, studies published by the American Enterprise
Institute. All made quite clear that (a) there is no crisis in voting rights
in 2006, and nothing even remotely comparable to what there was in 1965, and
(b) there is no appreciable difference in the voting rights enjoyed in
jurisdictions covered by Section 5 versus noncovered jurisdictions. So why,
in 2006, are Texas and Arizona covered, while New Mexico, Oklahoma, and
Arkansas are not? Why some counties in Florida and North Carolina, and not
others? Why some boroughs in New York City, and not others? Why Alaska?
If the covered jurisdictions looked in 1965 like they look now, no one then
would have given any consideration to a bill like Section 5. And yet many in
Congress appear to think they can renew Section 5 in perpetuity.
Even putting aside constitutional requirements, there is an overwhelming
reason why Congress should not want to reauthorize Section 5, even if it
could: Its interpretation by the courts and the federal bureaucracy over the
years has turned it into a powerful force for dragging jurisdictions into
racial gerrymandering and racially segregated redistricting. That is bad for
all Americans.
One last thing: The current bill also requires many jurisdictions to print
ballots in foreign languages. This balkanizes the country, wastes taxpayers'
money, facilitates voter fraud, and is - again - unconstitutional.
Unsurprisingly, then, it's another provision in the current bill that many
in the House Republican leadership are unhappy about, and it needs to come
out, too. This is not a bill to be blithely passed along.
-Roger Clegg is president and general counsel of the Center for Equal
Opportunity in Sterling, Virginia. He testified last month in the House
against the extension of the Voting Rights Act.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MTIwMWRmZmNkMTEzY2Y5OTBkNzlhMDhlNTNhZTVlODk=
4. Target: spending - Washington Times
Op-ed
By Gary J. Andres
Published June 22, 2006
Public-policy wonks often lament the notion of twin deficits -- one for the
federal budget and another in the international trade arena. But recent
trends in public perception suggest we add a third deficit to our lexicon.
Unlike the budget and trade gaps, which impact politics unpredictably, this
third deficit, if not addressed quickly, could result in electoral harm to
Republicans. Call it the "spending perception deficit" -- a view that
Democrats would do more than Republicans to curb the size of government.
It's an imbalance that GOP leaders need to rectify before the November
election. This perception gap has never existed before. Democrats usually
wore the spendthrift moniker -- and their "tax and spend liberal" label was
well-deserved. For example, a July 1994 Pew survey found that Americans, by
an eight-point margin, trusted Republicans more than Democrats to reduce the
federal deficit. By 2005, that number flipped to an 18-point Democratic
advantage.
Spending remains a major issue among voters. In a Dutko Worldwide poll
conducted two weeks ago, voters' top four economic concerns were federal
spending, gas prices, saving for retirement and paying for health care.
Large majorities also think the government wastes a lot of money -- 53 cents
of every federal dollar, according to the same poll.
Some spending is almost out of the GOP's control. Outlays for disasters like
hurricanes and the war are the obvious areas. These expenses certainly
contribute to the perception of Republicans as big spenders. Yet a unified
government over the past five-and-a-half years has also contributed -- in a
subtler way. Republicans have struggled in figuring out how to investigate
and root out waste, fraud and abuse when their own party controls Congress
and the executive branch. They have also not re-established the kinds of
procedural tools usually in place during mixed party control, like the
Gramm-Rudman-Hollings law first passed in 1985 or the spending caps put in
place in 1990 under the first President Bush.
That's changing, though. As outlined in our "Idea Lab" column on this page
yesterday, Senate Budget Committee Chairman Judd Gregg of New Hampshire
detailed the Stop Over-Spending Act -- a series of proposals to rein in
discretionary and mandatory spending, including a new version of the
line-item veto.
Last week, House Majority Leader John Boehner of Ohio released a 61-page
report called "Target: Waste, Fraud & Abuse." It provides a series of case
studies highlighting the oversight accomplishments of the 109th Congress to
date.
Both Mr. Gregg's and Mr. Boehner's initiatives are noteworthy. For starters,
they remind voters that Republicans are vigilant in looking for fiscal
abuses and adopting new tools to curb spending.
For example, the Boehner report outlines the efforts of 14 separate
committees in Congress to find examples of wasteful spending under each
panel's jurisdiction. Highlighting a federal law that costs $77 million to
save 20 fish or federal Head Start funds meant for children's education
being used to lease a Mercedes SUV for a local executive are just some of
the examples.
The report also underscores the Appropriations Committee's efforts in the
past year. Despite the ongoing debate about earmarks, the study demonstrates
that the panel eliminated 53 wasteful federal programs in the past year,
with more on the chopping block as this year's appropriations process
unfolds.
But in order to reduce the "spending perception deficit," GOP lawmakers
should continue to emphasize the Democrats' record as well. In last year's
appropriations process, for example, Republicans were successful in
defeating a series of Democratic amendments that would have exceeded
budgetary limits by nearly $21 billion. So far this year Democrats have
proposed -- and Republicans rejected -- amendments totaling $45.2 billion in
additional spending. Republicans now need to translate Mr. Gregg's and Mr.
Boehner's initiatives into regular and sustained legislative action,
bringing these spending-restraint items up for weekly floor votes. House
action this week on the line-item veto and legislation to address fraud in
emergency disaster spending and the Senate's efforts on the Stop
Over-Spending Act are great starts.
The GOP's spending habit has produced a strong media headwind -- when a
party that has emphasized spending less starts spending more, the negative
news stories by the self-appointed hypocrisy police will surely follow.
Setting up a series of regular floor votes sustained between now and the
election -- even on what liberals may call small spending items or simply
procedural tools -- will go a long way toward helping Republicans close this
perception gap and reclaim the mantle of fiscal responsibility.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20060621-085649-2346r.htm
5. It's Time to End Restrictions on
Offshore Oil Drilling - Human Events
by Ben Lieberman
Posted Jun 22, 2006
The United States is the only nation in the world that has placed a
substantial amount of its oil and natural gas potential off-limits. This
includes restrictions on drilling in most of the nation's offshore areas.
Despite current high oil and natural gas prices, these longstanding offshore
drilling bans remain in place. Congress should revise this policy, for the
benefit of the American consumer and American economy. The Deep Ocean Energy
Resources Act of 2006 (H.R. 4761) seeks to do just that.
The Evolution of America's Offshore Anti-Energy Policy
Domestic oil and natural gas production has failed to keep pace with growing
demand, but this is not because the nation is running out of energy. In the
1990s, the federal government placed severe restrictions on new energy
development, especially in many promising offshore areas.
At the time, oil and natural gas were cheap, and the need for additional
energy was not seen as significant. In addition, the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil
tanker spill led to heightened environmental concerns about offshore energy
production. The political path of least resistance was to give environmental
concerns precedence over future economic considerations.
As a result, access to 85% of federally controlled offshore areas has been
restricted, including the Pacific and Atlantic coasts, portions of the areas
off the shores of Alaska, and the eastern Gulf of Mexico. Estimates vary
regarding the amount of energy in these areas, but it is likely enough to
add stability to energy markets and make a real difference in oil and
natural gas prices for years to come. According to a recent Department of
the Interior study, restricted offshore areas contain an estimated 19
billion barrels of oil and 84 trillion cubic feet of gas. This would be
several years' worth of total U.S. consumption. These estimates are highly
uncertain because the off-limits areas have not been thoroughly explored.
The central and western Gulf of Mexico is the only offshore area where
drilling is allowed, and that area was dealt a severe blow last year by
Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. At the peak of damage, one-quarter of domestic
oil and gas production was unavailable. Politics, not geology, is the reason
that America has put so many energy eggs in this one hurricane-prone basket.
A key lesson from the hurricanes is that if America were to allow offshore
drilling (and related refining and pipeline infrastructure) elsewhere,
Americans would not only have greater supplies and lower prices overall, but
also less vulnerability should a natural disaster strike any one particular
area.
Changing Needs, Unchanging Policy
Much has changed since the restrictions on offshore drilling were first
imposed. Oil and natural gas prices are currently three times higher than
the 1990s average. Imports have increased, and political uncertainty in many
oil exporting nations has added to supply risks. Domestic production has
been flat in recent years, as many older oil and gas fields produce less
each year and opportunities to add new fields are limited. At the same time,
American energy demand continues to grow by more than 1% annually.
While the need for more domestic energy has increased, the risks of
accessing it have decreased. Thanks to technological advances, offshore
energy production has become very safe, as is witnessed by the excellent
record of recent years. Offshore oil spills have been minimized. Oil from
domestic offshore wells accounts for only 1% of the oil in North American
waters, while much of the rest is due to natural seepage from the sea floor
and spills from petroleum usage. Any new drilling would have to comply with
strict environmental safeguards. Further, new drilling equipment won't even
cause aesthetic harm because it will be too far offshore to be visible from
land.
Nonetheless, legislators from several coastal states, especially Florida and
California, have opposed most new drilling measures. They have expressed
concerns about environmental harm from oil spills, as well as economic
impacts on tourism and waterfront property values.
While large areas of offshore America are restricted, Canada allows offshore
drilling in the Pacific, Atlantic, and Great Lakes, and in some cases allows
drilling closer to U.S. shores than American-regulated drilling is allowed.
Cuba may also expand drilling, which could occur as close as 45 miles from
parts of Florida and with technology that is far less safe than that used by
American companies.
H.R. 4761 was designed to overcome state opposition to offshore energy
production. It would empower each coastal state government to decide whether
or not to allow offshore oil and natural gas production. States that want to
keep the federal restrictions in place would be free to do so, while those
that wish to allow drilling could. Only drilling in waters more than 100
miles from the coast would be outside state control.
As an inducement, states that allow drilling would receive a share of the
leasing and royalty revenues. Currently, revenues from these offshore areas
go to the federal government, in contrast to onshore energy production on
federal lands where the federal/state split is 50-50. The bill would offer
coastal states a substantial source of new revenues without having to raise
taxes.
Conclusion
America's energy problems are partially self-imposed, and for this reason
Congress has an obligation to undo its own energy mistakes that are
contributing to today's high prices. Restricting the growth of offshore
energy production was one of those mistakes, and removing those restrictions
should be a part of any long-term energy solution.
http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=15702
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