BuckeyeBlog

We may not be in Boston but that didn’t stop more than 7,000 people from crowding the Statehouse steps April 15, 2009 for a “Columbus Tea Party.”  Tea Party protests popped up all over the country on tax day and the one here in Columbus was not that different.  What was different here though was the reasoning behind the protest.  Traditionally Tea Party protests on tax day are used to protest just that, taxes.  Here in Columbus people were less concerned about taxes and more concerned about government spending.  The crowd was angry, scared, and most of all passionate.  Most expressed their anger over the various stimulus bills passed by both President Bush and President Obama.  Others were angry about other issues including the bailout and an Obama Presidency.

No matter which side you are on, the left, the right, or in the middle, seeing a crowd that size is democracy at its best.  See the Columbus Tea Party for yourself by clicking on the link above.

I’m sure you’ve noticed, but Obama has been getting some pretty bad press lately. From his bloated stimulus plan to his 60 Minutes appearance to his patently offensive Special Olympics comment on late night television.

But bad news for Barack – the press isn’t going to get any better, especially with his new cap and trade plan now on the table.

The plan entails selling permits to emit carbon, which businesses may pay for at the outset, but the cost of which will quickly be passed on to consumers.  What Ohioans need to take note of is how deeply unequal these costs will be distributed across regions and income groups.

Ohioans receive roughly 86% of their electricity from coal. Our neighbors Indiana (94%), Pennsylvania (56%), and West Virginia (98%) are in similar situations. This means we’ll get hit especially hard, and during a time when we’re already feeling the pain.

To put it in real terms, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that the average household in the bottom income quintile will spend $680 more every year to pay for Obama’s plan.

As you’ve hopefully seen, The Buckeye Institute now has a database online of state employees’ salaries. This is a step forward on the private front but something like this really should have been compiled by Governor Strickland’s administration a while ago. Simply put, it’s not the job of outside organizations to make government more transparent. A post at the Sunshine Review Blog touts the database and a statement by Mike Maurer of the Institute which makes the same point I make above.

Don’t think this is simply a state-level problem. As a Canadian website which promotes “visible government” notes in a new article, the Obama administration has also promised a more transparent government, specifically on the technology front. During the campaign, Obama’s website promised the following:

Making government data available online in universally accessible formats to allow citizens to make use of that data to comment, derive value, and take action in their own communities. Greater access to environmental data, for example, will help citizens learn about pollution in their communities, provide information about local conditions back to government and empower people to protect themselves.

While we all hope that President Obama takes the steps forward necessary to increase government transparency, you wouldn’t get a sense of progress by looking at the new White House website, which is actually less transparent than the website of his predecessor. Many of the media briefings we expected from day one are just now surfacing online. Transparency needs emphasized, on all levels of government.

Question: Shouldn’t President Obama’s order limiting CEO pay for companies that receive federal dollars apply to all who sit atop institutions getting fat federal checks?  Such as OSU President Gordon Gee, who is reported to be receiving some $2 million in pay this year?     

Afterall, it looks like OSU is getting at least $2 billion in federal tax dollars each year. See here. 

TOPIC FOR ANOTHER DAY: I spent some 30 minutes this morning googling and digging around OSU’s site looking in vain for the amount of federal dollars received by the University.  A pretty simple question that any taxpayer deserves to be able to answer with less effort than this.  Then I googled “US Government spending” and found an answer within 30 seconds.  Maybe it was me that just stumbled on the right search.  Or maybe it’s more systematic. My grades: Fed spending transparency gets an ‘A’, OSU transparency gets an ‘F’ (or whatever it is they give for a failing grade today).

Jonah Goldberg’s book detailing the secret (or better, ‘ignored’) history of the American Left, “Liberal Fascism” is a facinating read.

Goldberg’s analysis puts into context the effort by the Obama campaign to intimidate people like John McCain and George Voinovich into silence over the First Amendment right to a vote undiminished by fraudulent and inelibile voting.

As Heritage’s Hans von Spakovsky notes:

The Obama campaign’s Stalinist-style demand that a special prosecutor at the Department of Justice criminally prosecute any candidates, party officials or congressmen who discussed their concerns over voter fraud is an outrageous attempt to use the power of the federal government to intimidate and persecute political opponents. It is almost as if Senator Obama wants to reinstitute the Alien and Sedition Acts and it brings into sharp focus the issue of whether he understands the protections of the First Amendment and the importance of fair and secure elections.

We stopped by the Marine Museum of the Great Lakes at Kingston yesterday and I picked up a $5 memento, an old library print of “All the World’s Fighting Ships, by Fred T. Jane (1898) (partial print of England’s ships). Apparently it’s the first one in the series that continues today.

What I want to know is, how did they get that past Homeland Security?

Meanwhile, I see that Bush is giving up on negotiating a long term arrangement with Iraq, leaving it to the next president. That marks the substantive close of the Bush presidency, I think.

The next phase will be negotiating a status of forces agreement between the American people and the Obama administration. Good luck to all concerned.

The Goldwater Institute points out, it is Obama, not McCain, who acted conservatively when it comes to campaign finance: Three Cheers for Obama’s Rejection of Government Money for Campaign.

A friend likes to observe that today’s youth are excited about Barack Obama because such a politician has never come along before, and as far as his young fan base is concerned, that’s true. Such a politician comes along only once a generation (or once a half generation, or maybe every election cycle, but let’s go with it).

The Champion’s John Bivers, along with the Wall Street Journal, notes that focus groups and polling show that people don’t know what Barack stands for, and don’t care. They just know that he’s going to “move past political business as usual.”

We’ve never heard that before, at least not since Ross Perot promised to just get under the hood and fix it.

Thanks, Ross, er, Barack. Let us know when you’re done, and don’t forget to send us all a bill, ya hear?

UPDATE: See ThisWeek News video of Barack visiting a Columbus senior center. Gov. Strickland is pleased and proud.

So Obama wants to tax payrolls above $250,000 . We’re already taxing payrolls up to $102,000. The folks between $102,000 and $250,000 get a small respite.

Guess that means he endorses George W’s Big O. Why not? Medicare Part D’s donut hole was a good start. Let’s get to Medicare parts E through Z as quick as possible. And if there’s still a problem that needs solved after government gets done with all that, I’m sure some forward thinking elected official will be creative enough to think of Medicare Part AA.