Cigarette and Coffee Breakfast, 2/26/2014

– Terrible news out of the Senate for those in favor of raising the minimum wage- Majority Leader Harry Reid is stalling a vote on the measure in the Senate because he is unsure if he has the votes. With Democrats basing their election year message on populist themes such as raising the minimum wage and extending unemployment benefits, it will difficult to get much traction with that message if they are unwilling to even vote on it themselves. Voters would see the Democrats as frauds if they tried to make that argument, and they would be right. The current wavering Senators include mostly the usual suspects: Landrieu (La), Pryor (Ark), Warner (Va), and Hagan (NC), but one interesting addition to the list, Tom Carper of Deleware, is neither up for re-election, or in a conservative state.

– Rand Paul must really consider himself the Republican frontrunner in ’16 at this point, he’s acting as if the primary is already over and he is about to meet Hillary Clinton in the general election. Here goes Paul again, telling reporters, “I think the Democrats mistake Bill Clinton’s popularity,” Paul told Fox News host Sean Hannity. “We have a lot of conservative Democrats in our state who go to church each week and really don’t approve of his behavior, what he’s done with women, with sexual harassment in the workplace. A lot of Democrats in our state don’t approve of that kind of behavior.”

I don’t know, maybe Rand Paul is mistaking his own obsession with the former first family? This is what, the third week in a row now that Paul has made headlines trashing the Clinton’s, who currently hold no public offices between them. If they’re so unpopular, Rand, why are you already trying to trash Hillary Clinton by talking about her husband’s sex life every week?

– Republicans are throwing in the towel on tax reform. Many may be surprised by this, because they never realized Republicans had ever actually been trying to pass anything this congress, but here’s Mitch McConnell, regretfully informing us that he doesn’t think it’s going to get done:

“I think we will not be able to finish the job, regretfully,” McConnell told reporters after Senate Republicans regular Tuesday lunch. “I don’t see how we can.” McConnell blamed his pessimism on the refusal by Democrats to consider any tax reform plan that doesn’t raise significant new cash for deficit reduction.

Yea, Republicans don’t want to do tax reform, because they’re afraid it would lower the deficit too much, and Democrats demand that it lower the deficit more.

– The mud has started flying in the Georgia Republican Primary for U.S. Senate, and the guy Democrats should be rooting for, Paul Broun, is up with his first ad. In the spot, from a seated position in the back of a pickup truck (obviously), Broun states that he’s the choice Democrats fear most, and that’s why Republican voters should pick him over his conservative rivals. Democrats will be excused for finding this hilarious, because Broun is actually in the number one spot on the list of candidates Democrats would MOST like to face, in the entire nation:

“[t]he Democratic Party is attacking me for one reason: I’m the strongest conservative running for the U.S. Senate. Liberals fear a genuine conservative candidate.”

Unfortunately, the spot is only backed by a paltry $50k, which won’t go very far in the Georgia market. You see, Broun is crazy, and, unfortunately for Democrats, he has trouble convincing people to give him large sums of money to say crazy things, at least so far.

– The Republican tax plan, which Mitch McConnell says is dead, actually does some really interesting thing that makes me wonder if Republican Dave Camp was paying attention when he made it, or just throwing darts at a board filled with policies because he knew Mitch McConnell would kill it as part of his “let’s see what happens if we don’t govern at all” strategy.

For example, under the Michigan Republican’s plan, many argue that he would establish a new top tax bracket paying marginal rates as high as 44.6% and large banking institutions like Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Chase, Citi, Goldman, and Morgan Stanley would all have to pay a 3.5 basis point tax on assets over $500 billion, raising an estimated $86.4 billion for the Federal Government over the next decade. It’s hard to imagine Camp meant to include those taxes in his plan. At the same time,though, Camp’s plan eliminates the long term 20% tax rate on capital gains and dividends, effectively a massive tax break for America’s wealthiest citizens, which is just the type of pro-rich people only policy Republicans love.

– Despite the millions being poured into North Carolina by Koch Brother associated PAC’s, Democratic Senator Kay Hagan seems to be holding up all right. According to David Nir, Hagan has a lead over all Republican challengers, “38-35… over Thom Tillis; 39-35 over Mark Harris; and 38-36 over Greg Brannon.”

– Wendy Davis (D) is behind in the money race for the Texas Governorship. Davis took in $2.85 million last month between her campaign and her related PAC’s, whereas Republican candidate Greg Abbott took in $2.45 million. Looks good right? Except Abbot already had $30 million in his account, versus only $11.3 million for Davis.

– Obamacare has reached 4 million. Through state level and Federal exchanges, now more than 4 million people have gained access to health insurance under the Affordable Care Act. To have reached the number, 700,000 new enrolees joined the program so far in February nationally. Additionally, another 3 million Americans have been able to remain on their parent’s employer provided plans, thanks to the provision in Obamacare allowing dependents to stay on a plan until they are 26 years old. Add on top of those the the millions of people who have gained access through the Federal Medicaid expansion, and you’ve got nearly 10 million people that have gained access to health insurance since January first of this year.

 

Cigarette and Coffee Breakfast, 2/24/2014

– The Democrats seem to have set their election year message, and it’s about the same as every other election season in recent memory: helping poor and middle class citizens. This time, in an attempt to help vulnerable Senate Democrats in Louisiana and Montana, Democrats will try to force Obamacare’s popular Medicaid Expansion onto the ballot in November. The expansion, which has been rejected by every state in the South except wavering Arkansas, would bring million of no-strings attached Federal dollars that would go strait to indigent citizens in those states.

“Turnout is the biggest challenge that Democrats face,” one Democratic operative told TPM. “There are a variety of ways that you can meet your turnout goals, and one of them is certainly ballot initiatives. Medicaid expansion really could be a powerful tool to turn voters out.” In Montana, activists only need to gather 24,000 signatures, which should be easy enough, even in sparse Montana. In Louisiana, though, Democrats in the legislature must convince majority Republicans to allow the ballot initiative to proceed.

– Kanasas seems to be getting heavily polled this year, possibly because the voters are showing so much disdain for the latest batch of Republican incumbents in the state. First, it was Senator Pat Roberts not living in the state, and paying constituents $300 a week to let him crash on their couch.

Now, Kansas Governor Sam Brownback (R) seems to be in it just as deep as the Senator. PPP has the Governor trailing his Democratic challenger, state House Minority Leader Paul Davis 42-40. In KANSAS! At the same time, Brownback sports a dismal 33-51 approval rating, which is down from the 37-52 PPP got one year ago. As David Nir helpfully adds, though, “undecided voters in PPP’s survey lean heavily Republican—60 percent say they supported Mitt Romney versus just 27 percent who voted for Barack Obama,” but you can’t just assume all of those voters will be going strait to Brownback- even Republicans in Kansas are massively unhappy with the arch-conservative Governor.

– U.S. House Representative John Dingell, the longest current serving member in congress at 58 years, will announce today that he will not seek re-election. Dingell, who turns 88 later this year, told reporters, “I find serving in the House to be obnoxious. It’s become very hard because of the acrimony and bitterness, both in Congress and in the streets”. If that’s not a ringing endorsement of our democracy from the nations’s longest serving Congressman, I don’t know what is! The Michigan congressman added that he was “not sure” if his health would hold up throughout a two-year term.

– The League of Conservative Voters of New Hampshire, which earlier aired adds aimed at “dissuading” former Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown from running for Senate one state to the north, has released another PPP poll that has Brown trailing Democratic incumbent Jeanne Shaheen 47-39. With one candidate currently serving in the United States Senate, and the other gaining national celebrity after being elected in liberal Massachusetts, both Shaheen and Brown are very well known at this point. To be trailing by eight points with almost universal name recognition for both candidates will be tough for Brown to overcome.

– The Hill leads this morning with a headline that must have conservatives’ panties in a bunch. “Obama’s Rush to Regulate” reminds us that, even though the President has vowed to do all that he can without this obstinate Congress, making rules and regulations is an exceedingly slow process. “Three years may look like a long time, but when it comes to the rulemaking process it’s a blink of the eye,” said Amit Narang, a regulatory policy advocate at the nonprofit group Public Citizen. “I think they’re realizing they’re up against tight deadlines”. First on the Administration’s list will be tougher emissions standards for power plants and vehicles. Last week, the Administration began working to implement new standards for big-rig and semi-trucks that it believes will help keep the country’s CO2 emissions down.

– I guess now we’re seeing why some Republicans freaked out and tried to torpedo the nomination of one of their own, former Nebraska Republican Senator Chuck Hagel. The New York Times reported over the weekend that the Secretary of Defense will propose to reduce the size of the United States Armed Forces to its smallest since prior to World War II, and will also look to eliminate two classes of fighter jets.

The Pentagon, which is notorious for hanging on to programs long after they have lost relevance or been proven to be ineffective, is pulling a serious about-face with this move. Of course, now we will all be lucky enough to witness the spectacle of Washington, where politicians of both parties, normally willing to speak of nothing but fiscal responsibility, throw their principles out the window in order to defend useless defense programs that just happen to provide good, middle class jobs in their district.