‘Change direction’: Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback (Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images) His state doesn’t have pass-through taxes, so owners of small businesses don’t pay taxes on profits as part of their individual tax returns. In little over three years, his state cut income, sales and property taxes; consolidated agencies; and ended legally mandated teacher tenure. Gov. […]
Cruz: ‘Concern in Israel’ (Photo: Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call) He walked Independence Square in Kiev, the site of months of turmoil, and spoke with leaders of the protest movement, many of them college-aged. He visited a hospital in Tzfat, Israel, where he saw Israeli doctors provide free medical care to Syrians gravely wounded in the civil […]
(Photo: Stephen McGee/Detroit Free Press/MCT) “Well, who you gonna believe, me or your own eyes?” This Marx Brothers quote from “Duck Soup” is effectively the mantra of the Obama Administration when it comes to the USDA’s new School Lunch and Breakfast Program requirements implementing the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 — requirements that likely […]
(Photo: Newscom) Vladimir Putin is the father of the most significant energy mix shift in Europe. Ukraine may be the straw that broke the back of the energy camel. As a result, Russia is about to lose a lot of revenue. Talk about the unintended consequences. Even before Putin occupied the Crimea and supported separatist […]
(Photo: Newscom) In the recent makeshift referenda in Donetsk and Luhansk unrecognized by the West, a small minority of eligible voters voted in favor of secession from Ukraine. Now, some Western politicians and analysts are wondering: If those people came out to vote for “independence,” aren’t we obligated to consider their opinion when pondering the […]
(Photo: Marcin Wichary) Ten years from now, electric (EV), hybrid and natural-gas powered cars will make some, albeit not yet decisive, inroads in our lives. There are economic, lifestyle and technological reasons for this. First, it is the technology of hydraulic fracturing, and improved 3-D seismic and imaging techniques, which provides us with the ability […]
Sen. David Vitter, R-La. (Photo: Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call/Newscom) Sen. David Vitter, an ardent opponent of Obamacare, readily concedes that his proposal to end health care subsidies to members of Congress and their staffs isn’t popular on Capitol Hill. But the Louisiana Republican won’t give up anytime soon, he vows. “I won’t let my amendment fall […]
(Photo: St Petersburg Times/ZUMAPRESS.com/Newscom) A veterans advocacy group hailed House passage of a measure making it easier for the secretary of Veterans Affairs to dismiss managers for poor performance and called for Senate action that appears much less likely just days before Memorial Day. By a vote of 390-33, the Republican-controlled House last night passed […]
For a guy who isn’t eyeing House Speaker John Boehner’s job, the gentleman from Texas sure took his time saying so. And he used the word “Shermanesque” three times in a minute and a half. House Financial Services Chairman Jeb Hensarling fielded three questions from the audience after his speech on the Export-Import Bank yesterday […]
Until conservatives undo a system that grants favors to well-connected business interests, they will lack the “moral authority” to reform a social welfare state that traps too many Americans in poverty and dependence, Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) said this afternoon in a speech he bluntly acknowledged as “a call to action.” In a half-hour address […]
