Senate

LibertyWeek 31: What in Dodd’s Name?

by Richard Morrison on February 23, 2009

in CEI Projects, Podcast

This week, host Cord Blomquist and co-host William Yeatman, along with guest commentator Ryan Young (Richard Morrison is off this week) take a whiff of the bank nationalizations floating through the air, and say they stink. Sen. Chris Dodd’s dodgy dealings in real estate come under scrutiny. Rep. John Murtha has a few multi-million dollar skeletons hiding in his own, heavily gilded, closet. Climate czar Carol Browner declares war on the economy. While favoring immigration in general, our hosts question the wisdom of “eco-migration.” Finally, we wish double-amputee Olympic hopeful Oscar Pistorius a speedy recovery.

Listen to Episode 31 of the LibertyWeek podcast here.

Senate Broad Stimulus & Avoiding Federal “Strings”

by Nick Brown on February 6, 2009 · 1 comment

in Deregulate to Stimulate, Regulation, Tech & Telecom

Aside from the fact that the Senate lacks the necessary votes to pass its version of the stimulus, the bill does actually have a much more in-depth plan for broadband expansion into unserved and underserved areas of the country.  In stark contrast, the House version has no concrete plan.

The Senate version of the stimulus raises the amount of money spent on broadband up to $9 billion, much more than $2.825 billion in the House version.  But either amount is a dangerous giveaway to broadband providers.  Already we’ve seen banks that have been similarly “stimulated” subject to strings attached to federal dollars.  CEO pay is being limited, and more micromanagement by the administration and regulators is sure to follow.  The same will be true for broadband providers should they choose to accept federal funds.

The Senate bill also providers tax credits for companies that receive grants to build these networks in rural areas.  This is determined by the grantee adding 10% of the expenditures for current generation broadband (this is adjusted to 20% of the expenditures if the network is being introduced to an unserved area) to 20% of the expenditures for next generation broadband.  The resulting total is the tax credit that the grantee can apply for.  In the bill, current generation broadband has been defined as a 5 Mbps up and 1 Mbps down, and next generation broadband as 95 Mbps up and 20 Mbps down.

All of this amounts to a convoluted way of subsidizing the broadband industry, risking the “strings-attached”  trap that has already been set for other industries.

However, the Senate version of broadband stimulus does not make grantees abide by the FCC’s net neutrality policy statement.  Should a stimulus bill pass, it should be the bill that best benefits consumers and maintains a free market in the long run.  Even though the Senate version funnels more federal money at broadband subsidies, it at least makes an attempt to avoid the “strings-attached” problem by prohibiting this ill-conceived FCC policy from being enforced as if it were actual law or a proper rule, which it isn’t.

Again, the contrast between this bill and the House version is significant.  The House bill gives grantees little money, asks them to bear most of the burden of build-out, and then regulates and taxes these new networks as a reward for the companies’ efforts.  This strategy is doomed to fail .

The Senate version would encourage rural expansion of broadband and reward companies for taking risks.  If such a stimulus must pass, at the very least it should contain this sort of policy approach.

Land Grab Bill: Senators Check Principles at the Door

by Myron Ebell on January 17, 2009 · 1 comment

in Energy, Environment, Politics as Usual

I have heard several Republican congressional leaders say that the party has learned its lesson from their disastrous losses in the past two elections. From now on, it’s back to being the party of limited government, fiscal discipline, lower taxes, and against pork barrel spending.

Sounds good, but Senate Republicans have blown their first opportunity to demonstrate that they mean what they say. The first bill that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) brought to a vote in the 111th Congress is the omnibus land grab bill that was blocked in the waning days of the last Congress by Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla.). It was re-introduced by Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-NM), Chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, as S. 22. It contains around 160 titles. Lots of new National Parks, Wilderness Areas, Wild and Scenic Rivers, National Trails, and National Heritage Areas. Plus making official a whole new designation of public land lockups for the Bureau of Land Management called Areas of Critical Environmental Concern. And withdrawing 1.2 million acres from the Bridger-Teton National Forest in Wyoming from future oil and gas production–an area with high gas potential.

The Senate voted on Thursday 73 to 21 to pass this monstrosity. Twenty-one Republicans voted against it, but nineteen Republicans (and all 54 Democrats who voted) voted for it. This first vote suggests that it’s going to be business as usual for many Republican Senators in the 111th Congress. Talk about shrinking government and reducing federal spending. Talk about increasing domestic energy production. Talk about stopping pork barrel spending. And then vote the other way.

The twenty-one Senators who voted against S. 22 were:
Brownback (Ks.), Burr (NC), Chambliss (Ga.), Coburn (Okla.), Cornyn (Tex.), DeMint (SC), Ensign (Nev.), Graham (NC), Grassley (Ia.), Hutchison (Tex.), Inhofe (Okla.), Isakson (Ga.), Johanns (Neb.), Kyl (Az.), McCain (Az.), McConnell (Ky.), Roberts (Ks.), Sessions (Ala.), Shelby (Ala.), Thune (SD), and Vitter (La.). They should be congratulated.

If you hear any of the nineteen Republicans who voted for the land grab bill talk about getting back to the basic conservative principles of less government, lower spending, and protecting property rights, have a good laugh.

S. 22 now moves to the House of Representatives.

The Shock of the Not New

by Richard Morrison on January 12, 2009 · 2 comments

in Politics as Usual, Zeitgeist

It was, of course, inevitable that after a general election, political observers would be talking about everything in Washington suddenly being new. A new president(-elect), a new administration, a new New Mexico corruption scandal; none of this comes as a surprise. What is interesting, however, is that some people are also referring to the “new leadership” in Congress.

Now, as we all know, leadership positions in Congress are often based on seniority, especially in that plush assisted living community known as the U.S. Senate. This means that in order to climb your way to the top of the mountain and become a committee chair, it takes time. The faces you’ll see presiding over hearings during the 111th Congress will generally be the same ones that have been frightening small children in our nation’s capital for decades.

So, just for the record, lets take a look at some of the dewy-eyed youngsters who will be running things in the 111th and how long they’ve been avoiding getting real jobs:

Judiciary – Patrick Leahy (VT) 34 years
Foreign Relations – John Kerry (MA) 24 years
Appropriations – Daniel Inouye (HI) 46 years [+4 years in the House]
Budget – Kent Conrad (ND) 22 years
Homeland Security – Joe Lieberman (CT) 20 years
Environment & Public Works – Barbara Boxer (CA) 16 years [+10 years in the House]
Energy & Natural Resources – Jeff Bingaman (NM) 26 years
Health, Education, Labor & Pensions – Ted Kennedy (MA) 47 years
Armed Forces – Carl Levin (MI) 30 years
Intelligence Select – Dianne Feinstein (CA) 17 years
Banking, Housing & Urban Affairs – Chris Dodd (CT) 28 years [+6 years in the House]
Rules & Administration – Chuck Schumer (NY) 10 years [+18 years in the House]
Agriculture – Tom Harkin (IA) 24 years [+10 years in the House]
Veterans Affairs – Daniel Akaka (HI) 19 years [+13 years in the House]
Small Business & Entrepreneurship – Mary Landrieu (LA) 12 years
Commerce, Science & Transportation – Jay Rockefeller (WV) 24 years
Finance – Max Baucus (MT) 31 years [+3 years in the House]
Indian Affairs – Byron Dorgan (ND) 17 years [+11 years in the House]
Ethics Select – Tim Johnson (SD) 12 years [+10 years in the House]
Aging Select – Herb Kohl (WI) 20 years

According to my rough calculations, that makes 479 years worth of, um, experience among the current Senate committee chairs. If we expand that to include total Congressional tenure, we bump the total up to 564 years. This is, of course, not counting years spent as Lieutenant Governor, State Tax Commissioner or Municipal Animal Control Supervisor.

If you’re one of those sentimental people who thinks institutional memory is important, then you may very well be happy with this state of affairs. Whatever else it is, though, “new” it most definitely is not.

Democrats Poised for Yet Another Land Grab

by Richard Morrison on January 9, 2009

in Energy

In these troubled times, Congress’ plate is piled high with vital legislative priorities. Naturally, upon getting to work this week, the Senate is zeroing in on the most important of all: taking millions of acres of land that may yield a vast amount of natural gas and other mineral resources and locking them away from development forever. Take that, energy crisis!

Our very own Myron Ebell had something to say about this move in a press release today:

The Bingaman-Reid bill is full of bad provisions, but the worst are the ones that would prohibit oil and natural gas production on more than a million acres of federal land. Tens of millions of acres of federal lands in the West have already been withdrawn from mineral and energy production. The new Congress should be opening some of these areas, which would help increase domestic energy production and lower prices. Instead, faced with declining natural gas production and potential shortages in the near future, the first bill that Majority Leader Harry Reid wants the Senate to consider would take 1.2 million acres in Wyoming with high natural gas potential out of production.

I should also point out that property rights advocates like the Competitive Enterprise Institute have long opposed expanding federal land ownership, in part because of the federal government’s poor track record in managing the lands it already controls. Management strategies adopted by the U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, and National Park Service have led to destructive wildfires, habitat loss, and the spread of pests and disease in large swaths of forest and range land throughout the Western United States. Over one hundred non-profit groups last November sent a letter to the Senate raising concerns about an earlier incarnation of the current legislation.

ADDENDUM: CEI adjunct fellow Bob Nelson has been writing about the deficiencies of federal land management for quite some time – his Forbes column from 2000 is an excellent introduction to the topic. In depth researchers will want to get a hold of a copy of his book, A Burning Issue: A Case for Abolishing the U.S. Forest Service (Rowman & Littlefield).

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