Archives for June 2010

June 30th, 2010, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson today issued the following statement against a House Democrat proposal to attach $10 billion state education funding to the pending war supplemental:

“The $33 billion war supplemental to fund ongoing operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, including the surge in Afghanistan, is still being held up by House Democrats who want to attach $10 billion for bankrupt states like New York and California that refuse to cut their unsustainable budgets.

“This is simply unacceptable to our fighting men and women. Critical resources are being held back, and Defense Secretary Bob Gates warns that if the supplemental is not passed by July 4th, the Defense Department may be forced to begin furloughing civilians and being unable to pay active-duty military. General Petraeus has called the supplemental ‘essential for the conduct of this mission.’

“And yet the war funding is being held hostage to public sector union politics who want another bailout. Enough is enough.

“Congress has a constitutional responsibility to give our troops everything they need to win on the field of battle, and absolutely no role in balancing state budgets and handing out tens of billions of dollars to public employee unions. Now is the time to stop playing politics with our troops in harm’s way and pass a clean war supplemental.”

Attachments:

“Troops’ Funding Held Hostage by Public Sector Union Politics”, by ALG President Bill Wilson, June 28th, 2010.

ALG Urges Congress to Reject $100 Billion Handout to Public Employee Unions, June 22nd, 2010.

“Driving Right Off the Cliff,” by ALG President Bill Wilson, June 16th, 2010.

ALG Letter to Congress Against States Bailout, May 27th, 2010.

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June 30th, 2010, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government (ALG) President Bill Wilson today urged Senator Scott Brown to reject the Dodd-Frank conference legislation “which still contains an unlimited bank tax.”

“Right on pages 356 through 364 of the latest Dodd-Frank conference report, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation can still levy unlimited assessments — which are taxes — on banks, insurance companies and other financial institutions to pay for the so-called ‘orderly liquidation fund’, which is just a limitless fund for government to take over and bail out companies,” Wilson said.

“Senator Brown withheld support for the Dodd-Frank financial takeover conference because of the $19 billion bank tax. Well, what about the unlimited bank tax that’s still in the bill?” Wilson asked.

In a statement issued today, Brown said, “I appreciate the conference committee revisiting the Wall Street reform bill and removing the $19 billion bank tax. Over the July recess, I will continue to review this important bill.”

Wilson said, “In between eating hot dogs, Senator Brown should really check out pages 356 through 364 of the bill, where the real bank tax is. He should be familiar with it. The bank tax was in the bill the last time he voted for it, too.”

Wilson noted that as a candidate, Brown ran against a bank tax on the premise that it would simply be passed on to the American people via higher financial transaction costs. Brown said at the time, “With all due respect, that money is going to be transferred down to the individuals through ATM fees, increased fees. I thought banks were supposed to lend. So now they’re going to take the money that they would be lending to the small businesses in this state and the men and women who want to buy homes … and there’s less of a pool there.”

The “orderly liquidation fund” would be financed by “risk-based” assessments levied by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) on institutions totaling $50 billion or more in assets, proceeds from securities issued by the FDIC of seized firms, interest and other earnings from investments owned by the fund, and “repayments to the Corporation by covered financial companies.”

According to a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis of a similar bank tax proposal by the Obama Administration, “the ultimate cost of a tax or fee is not necessarily borne by the entity that writes the check to the government. The cost of the proposed fee would ultimately be borne to varying degrees by an institution’s customers, employees, and investors, but the precise incidence among those groups is uncertain.”

“Senator Scott Brown may think he is playing savvy politics by negotiating the removal of the $19 billion bank tax, but he’s really nothing more than a bait fish to help the real bank tax get across the finish line. Brown is being played. He’s being used,” Wilson declared.

“Everyone is familiar with the three-card monte game. While everyone is reporting on the removal of the $19 billion bank tax from the conference legislation, nobody is paying attention to the unlimited bank tax that’s still in the legislation and has been since the very beginning,” Wilson explained.

“Senator Scott Brown is no longer a babe in the woods. Will he fall for Dodd and Frank’s shell game?” Wilson concluded.

Attachments:

“Down a Rabbit Hole:’ The Threat Posed by the Dodd Bill to the Private Sector,” Updated June 28th, 2010, Americans for Limited Government.

“Big Brother is Watching You: The Threat Posed by the Dodd Bill to Privacy,” Updated June 28th, 2010.

Letter to the U.S. Senate, ALG President Bill Wilson, April 26th, 2010.

Interview Availability: Please contact Rebekah Rast at (703) 383-0880 or at rrast@getliberty.org to arrange an interview with ALG President Bill Wilson.

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“The Dodd-Frank financial takeover bill will not address the real causes of the financial crisis that government caused, and instead creates new, radical powers for the government to seize disfavored firms, bail out favored ones, monitor finances, and levy unlimited taxes on the American people, all without any vote in Congress or the opportunity to object in court,” Wilson said.

ALG has updated two of its key summaries on the legislation, the first detailing the bailout and government takeover powers in the bill, and the second outlining the threat posed to individual privacy through the Office of Financial Research.

Wilson warned that under the bill any company could be seized, pointing to the government seizure of GM and Chrysler under the Troubled Asset Relief Program. “Even though those were auto companies that posed no systemic risk to the financial system, and even though there were private sector alternatives to the government takeover, they were considered to be economically important enough to apply to TARP,” Wilson explained.

“Just as GM and Chrysler were seized by the government, it will happen again to other non-financial companies under the Dodd-Frank financial takeover bill. Nor will the government will be limited to a $700 billion fund, since the so-called ‘orderly liquidation fund’ is unlimited,” Wilson said.

“There is no meaningful provision to limit bailouts, either, despite the well-meaning efforts of Congressional Republicans,” Wilson added.

The “orderly liquidation fund” would be financed by “risk-based” assessments levied by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) on institutions totaling $50 billion or more in assets, proceeds from securities issued by the FDIC of seized firms, interest and other earnings from investments owned by the fund, and “repayments to the Corporation by covered financial companies.”

According to a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis of a similar bank tax proposal by the Obama Administration, “the ultimate cost of a tax or fee is not necessarily borne by the entity that writes the check to the government. The cost of the proposed fee would ultimately be borne to varying degrees by an institution’s customers, employees, and investors, but the precise incidence among those groups is uncertain.”

The legislation also provides for a $19 billion “financial crisis” fund funded by more assessments on banks, a provision that was added in the conference report.

Wilson noted that the bill still includes a controversial Office of Financial Research that empowers the office, according to the legislation, to “collect, validate, and maintain all data necessary” to maintain financial stability “obtained from member agencies, commercial data providers, publicly available data sources, and financial entities.”

“The Office of Financial Research will have the ability to know about every transaction in the country, large and small, if it deems it necessary for the sake of financial stability,” Wilson said.

According to the bill, the OFR would “require the submission of periodic and other reports from any financial company for the purpose of assessing the extent to which a financial activity or financial market in which the financial company participates, or the financial company itself, poses a threat to the financial stability of the United States.”

The legislation also outlines that the Director of the OFR would be given subpoena power to require “the production of the data requested … upon a written finding by the Director that such data is required” to maintain financial stability.

Wilson also condemned the Dodd-Frank conference bill for what he said was “its inherent failure to address the root, government causes of the crisis. For example, the bill does not audit the Federal Reserve, whose easy money, low interest lending policies fueled the housing bubble,” citing research by Stanford economic professor John Taylor stating that “the Fed’s target for the federal-funds interest rate was well below what the Taylor rule would call for in 2002-2005. By this measure the interest rate was too low for too long, reducing borrowing costs and accelerating the housing boom.”

Wilson also cited research by former chief credit officer of Fannie Mae, Ed Pinto, demonstrating that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac weakened mortgage underwriting standards and mislabeled high-risk mortgage-backed securities, defrauding investors; that the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) lowered down payments on mortgages; and that the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) Community Reinvestment Act regulations and “affordable housing goals” reduced lending standards and forced banks to give loans to lower-income Americans that could not be repaid. “None of these root causes are addressed, either,” Wilson said.

“The Dodd-Frank bill even prohibits the liquidation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac under the ‘orderly liquidation’ authority, a provision that was only added in conference,” Wilson noted.

Wilson concluded, “The Dodd-Frank financial takeover still contains an unlimited bailout-takeover authority, unconstrained bank taxes, financial privacy violations, and still does not address the root, government causes of the financial crisis. Congress has one last chance to reject it.”

Attachments:

“’Down a Rabbit Hole:’ The Threat Posed by the Dodd Bill to the Private Sector,” Updated June 28th, 2010, Americans for Limited Government.

“Big Brother is Watching You: The Threat Posed by the Dodd Bill to Privacy,” Updated June 28th, 2010.

Letter to the U.S. Senate, ALG President Bill Wilson, April 26th, 2010.

Interview Availability: Please contact Rebekah Rast at (703) 383-0880 or at rrast@getliberty.org to arrange an interview with ALG President Bill Wilson.

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View at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gaVh-RGYuE

Download at http://www.algnews.org/videos/VNR_Judge/Judge_Ad.mov

June 29th, 2010, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government (ALG) President Bill Wilson today announced that his organization would be running a 60-second commercial in Nevada urging Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to reject the nomination of Judge Robert Chatigny to the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals.

“Robert Chatigny is a man who thought that a confessed rapist, serial killer of eight young women aged 14 to 25, Michael Ross, ‘never should have been convicted, and yet, Harry Reid is pushing him to be confirmed,” Wilson said.

Wilson said the ad was to alert Nevadans of Chatigny’s controversial actions defending convicted rapist and serial murderer, Michael Ross, and to urge them to contact Reid to help defeat the nomination.

Chatigny’s contentious remarks were made at a last-minute hearing in 2005 he had convened wherein he granted a stay of execution for Ross. In that hearing, Chatigny chastised Ross’ attorney, T.R. Paulding, and threatened to have his law license pulled for not more vigorously pursuing Ross’ defense.

Although the hearing was supposed to be examining Ross’ competence to waive his right to appeal, Chatigny opined, “looking at the record in a light most favorable to Mr. Ross, he never should have been convicted. Or if convicted, he never should have been sentenced to death because his sexual sadism, which was found by every single person who looked at him, is clearly a mitigating factor.”

In a letter to the U.S. Senate, Wilson wrote, “Ross had confessed to all eight rape-murders. Of course he should have been convicted. There was no question of his malice and cruelty, either, and yet for Chatigny, this was a mitigating factor that should have blocked the death penalty sentence. That is outrageous enough.”

Wilson’s letter continued, “But if there was any doubt as to Chatigny’s bias and personal interest in this case, the hearing Chatigny was presiding over had nothing to do with sentencing. It had to do with forcing Ross’ attorney to pursue a claim that Ross was not competent to waive his right to appeal the sentence.”

The letter closed, “Chatigny clearly wanted to keep Ross in the system. His bias exhibited in this case calls into question his temperament and impartiality as a judge, and should disqualify him. This nomination should be withdrawn.”

Wilson also cited that Chatigny’s “long history of acting sympathetically toward sex offenders.” As reported by the Washington Times, “[i]n 12 child-pornography cases, Judge Chatigny imposed a sentence either at or more lenient than the recommended minimum – with most downward departures involving sentences less than half as long.”

“In 2000, Chatigny even overturned Connecticut’s sex offender registry law,” Wilson noted.

The Senate Judiciary Committee voted to report Judge Chatigny to floor on June 10th for a full Senate vote.

Wilson concluded, “As the Senate’s leader, Harry Reid has the power to put the brakes on the Chatigny nomination. Chatigny is nothing more than an apologist for sex offenders. It’s his claim to fame, and is why he is being promoted. Chatigny’s conduct is so deeply disturbing to the American people that Reid has an obligation to defeat this offensive nomination.”

Attachments:

ALG Ad Urging Reid to Oppose Chatigny, June 29th, 2010.

Video: Oppose Confirmation of Serial Killer Apologist for Court of Appeals, June 22nd, 2010.

ALG Letter to U.S. Senate Against Judge Chatigny, June 21st, 2010.

“Editorial: Democrat Senate to Promote Rapist, Serial Killer Apologist to 2nd Circuit Court,” ALG News, June 21st, 2010.

ALG Nominee Alert, Robert Chatigny, March 2010.

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“Kennedy’s many personal failings and moral transgressions are well-documented in the 2,352 pages the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) compiled on the late senator that were released earlier this month. But they only tell part of the story. There is long history of correspondence between Kennedy and high level Soviet officials during the height of the Cold War that deserves greater media exposure,” said Kevin Mooney, TimesCheck.com editor.

“The same newspapers and television stations that apologized for Kennedy’s pursuit of disarmament and a nuclear freeze in the face of Soviet aggression have a special obligation to fill out the historical record,” Mooney explained. “Kennedy also sought support from a compliant liberal news media that was severely critical of policies that eventually brought down the Soviet empire.”

Mooney said the “key ingredient” was a 1983 KGB document that includes a memo written to then General Secretary Yuri Andropov. The KGB letter to Andropov first came to light in a Feb. 2, 1992 report published in the London Times entitled “Teddy, the KGB and the Top Secret File.” Paul Kengor, a Grove City College political science professor, included the document in his 2006 book: The Crusader: Ronald Reagan and The Fall of Communism.

Kennedy offered to have “representatives of the largest television companies in the U.S. contact Y.V. Andropov for an invitation to Moscow for the interview,” KGB head Viktor Chebrikov explained in a letter to the general secretary dated May 14, 1983, the file shows. The idea was for the Soviet leader to make an end run around Reagan and make a direct appeal to the American people.

Kennedy suggested that Walter Cronkite, Barbara Walters and Elton Raul, the president of the board of directors for ABC, be considered for the interviews with Andropov in Moscow. He also asked the KGB to consider having “lower level Soviet officials, particularly the military” take part in television interviews inside the U.S. where they could convey peaceful intentions.

Former Sen. John Tunney (D-Calif.) operated as an intermediary for Kennedy and even traveled to Moscow to meet with Soviet contacts. In his book, Kengor points out that Tunney acknowledged making 15 separate trips to the Soviet Union where he acted as a conduit not only for Kennedy but for other U.S. senators.

“There is a case to be made that Kennedy’s Soviet overtures were in violation of the Logan Act, a federal law that has been in effect going back to 1799,” Bill Wilson, president of Americans for Limited Government, noted. “The law prohibits American citizens from engaging in private diplomacy with a foreign government with the intention of influencing public policy, but it is rarely enforced. This foreign policy freelancing undermines clearly constitutional directives that empower the executive with responsibility in the realm of international affairs.”

Mooney suggested that a good starting point for the Times to launch a new investigation could begin with Sen. Tunney. “Is Senator Tunney willing to disclose the other U.S. senators who also had contact with the KGB? Who did Tunney have contact with in Moscow?” Mooney asked.

Mooney noted that Kennedy’s perfidy was not limited to the Reagan years. Vasiliy Mitrokhin, a former KGB agent, defected to great Britain in the early 1990s and reported on contact Kennedy with Soviet officials while was challenging President Jimmy Carter for the Democratic nomination in 1980.

The Mitrokhin papers highlight a meeting that took place at the behest of Kennedy between former Sen. John Tunney (D-Calif.) and KGB agents in Moscow on March 5, 1980. The information exchanged during this encounter is included as part of a report Mitrokhin filed with the Cold War International History Project of the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington D.C. The former KGB man continued to work with British intelligence until the time of his death.

“Senator Kennedy undermined the Cold War policies of Presidents Carter and Reagan on an equal opportunity basis. This is a part of history that the Times can and should cover,” Mooney concluded.

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June 24th, 2010, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson today issued the following statement against a House Democrat proposal to attach $10 billion state education funding to the pending war supplemental:

“Now is not the time to play politics with the war supplemental. House Democrats are holding back critical resources for our fighting men and women on the front lines in Afghanistan and Iraq so they can finagle another $10 billion for bankrupt states that refuse to cut unsustainable education funding in these troubled economic times.

“House Republican Leader John Boehner and the House Republican Conference are to be praised for standing on principle against this move by Nancy Pelosi, who only care about keeping the flow of dues money going to the public sector unions. The relentless drive for this money is a union bailout pure and simple to keep them in the game for the elections.

“This is nothing more than a cynical ploy to have taxpayers fund Democrat political operations, and the nation’s servicemen and women are being held hostage until the unions get what they want.”

Attachments:

ALG Urges Congress to Reject $100 Billion Handout to Public Employee Unions, June 22nd, 2010.

“Driving Right Off the Cliff,” by ALG President Bill Wilson, June 16th, 2010.

ALG Letter to Congress Against States Bailout, May 27th, 2010.

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Bill Wilson, President of Americans for Limited Government remembers, “Pelosi and Hoyer should be held accountable for the words of their own Budget Committee Chairman John Spratt who infamously stated in 2006, ‘if you cannot budget, you cannot govern’.”

The decision by House Democrats to leave the nation without a budget comes as some of the nation’s pre-eminent economists and businessmen are warning about our nation faces an unsustainable debt burden.

Billionaire Warren Buffett places the debt burden directly in the lap of Pelosi and Hoyer in a May 1, 2010 Reuters story, where he worries that, “it won’t work forever to run huge budget deficits and easy money,’ Buffett warned. He said if this causes problems, “Congress rather than the Federal Reserve should get the blame.”

In a startling admission that re-election politics rather than the needs of the nation were the primary reasons behind the failure, Hoyer revealed weeks ago that it was unlikely that Democrats would produce a budget complaining, “It’s difficult to pass budgets in election years because they reflect what the [fiscal] status is.”

According to Wilson, “Hoyer’s statement makes it clear that House Democrats are hoping to hide the financial hole caused by their wasting billions upon billions on stimulus after stimulus leading our nation to near financial ruin. Their failure to produce a budget due to political concerns is a dereliction of duty at a time when our nation needs heroes to step up to meet this crisis, not wannabe leaders who cower in fear and hope it goes away.”

In the three and a half years since Pelosi became Speaker in 2007, the nation’s debt has climbed by $4 trillion dollars to more than $13 trillion. It is little wonder that House Democrats don’t want the people to see what the nation’s “fiscal status is.”

Interview Availability: Please contact Rebekah Rast at (703) 383-0880 or at rrast@getliberty.org to arrange an interview with ALG President Bill Wilson.

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