Declaration Of War On The Mid-West

Coffee Brown, University of New Mexico, Talk Radio News

Republican Representatives emerged from a GOP conference with continuing criticism of the Democratic budget.

This Sunday will be National Debt Day, the day on which federal spending surpasses revenue, and it occurs three and a half months earlier this year than last, said John Boehner (R-Ohio). “I attended a taxpayer tea party in Bakersfield, California; people are angry and they’re scared,” he said, “because the kind of spending and borrowing that are going on here are imprisoning their children’s future.”

Eric Cantor (R-Va.) said, “As we come to the end of the first hundred days of this administration, the era of bipartisanship we’d hoped for could be improved. We do want to work together. Washington should be more thoughtful.”

Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) said that constituents are concerned about debt and the future of America and “The fact that we are facing $9 trillion worth of debt, and that’s going to be on the shoulders of our children and our grand-children.” She said that the Democratic budget lacks transparency and oversight. Constituents, she said, have to tighten their belts, while the federal government is “spending like crazy.”

Mary Fallin (R-Okla.) said the oil and gas producers in her fossil-fuel-rich state are very concerned about Obama’s policy of discouraging carbon-emitting energy. She said that jobs and production are already declining in anticipation of policy changes.
Fallin estimated the Cap-and-Trade taxes would hit $30 billion, working out to about $3,000 per year in increased energy costs for an average household, would fall most heavily on the poor and elderly and would cost seven million jobs.

Mike Pence (R-Ind.) said that hearings on Cap-and-Trade begin this week. He said the Democrats are not providing sufficient information about the costs, though Obama has acknowledged in the past that electricity prices would rise. “The reality is the Cap-and-Trade legislation offered by the Democrats amounts to an economic declaration of war on the Mid-West by liberals on Capitol Hill,” he said.

Pence said the $3,000 per household figure came from an M.I.T. study that estimated the total carbon fees and divided them by the total number of households in America. He acknowledged that the administration had promised ways of mitigating the economic impact for those hardest hit, but said that such promises are vague and “illusory.”

Boehner agreed that we must “get serious” about reducing carbon emissions and reducing the need to import oil, but he urged increased nuclear power as the only realistic way to do that.

G.R.E.E.N. Spells Jobs

Coffee Brown, University of New Mexico, Talk Radio News

When blue collar unions and green environmentalists discussed how alternative energy is a path to new, high quality jobs, the Blue Green Alliance was born, according to Dave Foster, the Executive Director.


Foster notes that Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) and former Sen. John Warner (R-VA) have sponsored separate Cap-and-Trade bills, and, along with Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins (R-ME), still support some form of carbon tax.

Europe and Japan have far lower per capita energy usage, he said, which means “through efficiency, we can pay for an awful lot of of these global warming reductions.”


Still, "I find it a little odd that a certain section of the Republican party has chosen to wave the banner of anti-science,” Foster said.

America is already feeling the economic effects of climate change, Foster said, and gave the example of the loss of 4,000 jobs in the aluminum industry as decreased amounts of snow pack formed in the Cascade Mountains of the Pacific Northwest over the past 20 years. Hydroelectric dams depend on snow melt for power. As that diminished, electricity became prohibitively expensive.


“The cost of doing nothing about global warming will far, far exceed the cost of doing something," Foster said, while praising the thousands of steel-working jobs gained in manufacturing clean-energy wind turbines.


Foster said that alternative energy jobs tend to put skilled people back to work in familiar jobs.


“We’re not engaging in massive re-training, we’re engaging in a massive recall to work... On exactly the kinds of projects that they’ve been trained to do before,” he said.

“The Blue Green Alliance is a strategic national partnership between labor unions (the “blue” in “blue-collar”) and environmental organizations (the “green”) “ (http://www.bluegreenalliance.org/site/c.enKIITNpEiG/b.3416603/k.DD10/About_BGA.htm)

Can The Eagle Learn From The Little Dragon?

Coffee Brown, University of New Mexico, Talk Radio News

Taiwan, a free-market, capitalist democracy like the U.S. and Britain, developed a national health plan 14 years ago that now covers 99 percent of the people in the country, citizens or not, and enjoys 70-80 percent approval ratings, according to Michael S. Chen, Ph.D., Vice President and CFO of the Bureau of National Health Insurance, here to share that experience with America.

As journalist T.R. Reid reported on Frontline in “Sick Around the World,” Taiwan was the last industrialized nation to adopt universal health care. Except us. As latecomers, they had plenty of precedent to consider. For several years, the Taiwanese government sent representatives to examine most of the world’s existing systems, then worked to consolidate best practices into a form appropriate to their own culture and economy. Dr. Chen was here to report on their system and results as the Obama administration tackles the myriad problems involved in reforming American healthcare.

“Cost is about 100 U.S. dollars, or about two percent of their income for an average family of four," Chen said. The service is mostly paid for by mandated premiums, with about 10 percent paid for by the individual, 60 percent by the employer, and the remaining 30 percent by the government. They achieve near 100 percent enrollment by sending agents out to enroll people who do not comply. Subsidies are available to ensure affordability. Union workers do not get an employer contribution, but pay 60 percent, with the remaining forty percent again from the government, according to Chen.

Any medically justifiable expense is covered, and patients may go to any doctor they choose, though doctors in high demand may have waiting lists. The system itself does not have any backup at all, he said. When individuals are flagged as having an unusually high rate of utilization, their care is examined, and their eligibility may become limited to “just two or three clinics,” Chen said.

Total spending on the National Health Service is about six percent of GDP, which is less than the budgeted seven-to-eight percent.

Publicly, doctors have complained about compensation. “Privately they like it," Chen says, "because they are guaranteed four to five percent rate increases per year. What other occupation can say that?”

As was the case for Taiwan, America would not have to re-invent the wheel, “There are so many wheels already,” Chen said, referring to the many existing systems and long experience in other industrialized democracies.

When the 20 to 30 percent of Taiwanese who disapprove do so, he said, “It’s usually because they think $100 a month is too much money. I tell them to visit America.”

GOP's Gay Candidate

Coffee Brown, University of New Mexico, Talk Radio News

Peter Hankwitz, Former GOP congressional candidate, member Republican Leadership Council, Log Cabin Republican talks about being an openly gay Republican candidate.

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Today at Talk Radio News

Talk Radio News reporters are covering the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Subcommittee hearing on "The Arts," the Energy Legislation/Strickland Nomination Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Full committee markup, Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee Economic Policy Subcommittee hearing on "Lessons from the New Deal," and the Steny Hoyer pen and pad session.

We also have correspondents at Victim Health/Compensation Services House Judiciary Committee, Economic Recovery Role House Education and Labor Committee Workforce Protections Subcommittee hearing on "Green Jobs and their Role in our Economic Recovery," Oversight of Government Management, the Federal Workforce, and the District of Columbia Subcommittee hearing on "Stability through Scandal: A Review of the Office of the Chief Financial Officer," Trent Franks, Pence, Fortenberry et al on Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act, and Senate Finance Committee Full committee hearing on "TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program) Oversight: A Six Month Update."