Last week, eight Dems joined with 80 percent of the GOP in the House and stopped NanPo, handmaiden of Gaea and Hades, from jamming through a controversy-stuffed omnibus public lands bill.  Congressmen had been granted a leisurely 40 minutes to reach the 1,000-page bill, which was crammed full o’ crapola (here, here).

Well, it’s back, and Obamarx’s and Pelostalin’s promises to run the most ethical, transparent government ever notwithstanding, the Dems are still trying to avoid any public scrutiny of the bill. Check this out – it’s a gushing LA Times blog item about a massive federal land grab in the bill, with highlights by me:

A sweeping conservation bill that would designate more than 700,000 acres of California public land as wilderness passed the Senate — again.

Today’s 77-20 vote cleared the way for House approval, perhaps next week.

The Senate approved a similar version of the lands bill in January. But it took the measure up again after it narrowly fell short of the two-thirds approval required in the House for noncontroversial matters. Democratic leaders brought the bill back before the Senate in a procedural move designed to set up a House vote that would allow it to be approved on a majority vote while preventing opponents from attempting to amend it.

Opponents complained that the bill would infringe on private property rights and close off areas to energy production.

Non-controversial?  If opponents say it’ll do little itty bitty things like crush private property rights and keep us dependent on Mohammed’s oil pumpers, how exactly is it non-controversial?  And if it is in fact non-controversial, why the need to prevent opponents from amending it?  What do they want to attach, an amendment about how non-controversial it is?

The Dems are continuing to shred the constitution and suppress freedom.  Sound vaguely familiar?

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merica, meet your new Commerce Sec., former Washington gov Gary Locke.  On the surface, he looks great for the job, having done that whole Pacific Rim trading thing while governor, but under the surface there’s illegal contributions from poor Buddhist monks, oily bundling, suspicious contracts and hefty lobbying fees from Chinese firms.

Says Michelle Malkin, who’s got over 10 years invested incovering this guy:

Washington has been warned — not just by me, but by many other close observers of the former Washington state governor who have followed his career marked by sloppy adherence to campaign finance laws and corporate cronyism.

She goes on to rightly chide Republicans, quoting this piece from The Olympian:

None of the Republicans on the committee indicated he or she would vote against Locke.

Rockefeller said he and Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, the panel’s top Republican, had reviewed Locke’s background check done by the FBI and his financial statements.

“They were clean,” Rockefeller said.

“Boring would be a better word,” Hutchison said.

What part of “Did you do your homework?” would you like to yell into the faces of those two?  When the nearly inevitable scandal takes down Locke remember these two saying he was “clean” and “boring.”

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ere’s an interesting little preface to this story, courtesy of the University of Wisconsin/Milwaukee:

The climate is known to be variable and, in recent years, more scientific thought and research has been focused on the global temperature and how humanity might be influencing it.

However, a new study by the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee could turn the climate change world upside down.Scientists at the university used a math application known as synchronized chaos and applied it to climate data taken over the past 100 years.

And what did synchronized chaos – an oxymoron if ever I heard one – tell them about Al Gore and his prostelytes?

“The research team has found the warming trend of the past 30 years has stopped and in fact global temperatures have leveled off since 2001.”

The most recent climate shift probably occurred at about the year 2000. …

[Dr. Anastasios] Tsonis said he thinks the current trend of steady or even cooling earth temps may last a couple of decades or until the next climate shift occurs.

Just another brick in the wall, buttered with mud and slapped into place at a particularly interesting time, given this:

Eight Senate Democrats are opposing speedy action on President Barack Obama’s bill to combat global warming, complicating prospects for the legislation and creating problems for their party’s leaders.

The eight Democrats disapprove of using the annual budget debate to pass Obama’s “cap and trade” bill to fight greenhouse gas emissions, a measure that divides lawmakers, environmentalists and businesses. The lawmakers’ opposition makes it more difficult for Democratic leaders to move the bill without a threat of a Republican filibuster.

The budget debate is the only way to circumvent Senate rules that allow a unified GOP to stop a bill through filibusters.

“Enactment of a cap-and-trade regime is likely to influence nearly every feature of the U.S. economy,” wrote the Democratic senators, mostly moderates. They were joined by 25 Republicans. “Legislation so far-reaching should be fully vetted and given appropriate time for debate.”

Eight dems would probably give the GOP a filibuster, even if the usual GOP defections to the dark side occur.

But here’s a better question for you: Why only eight Dems?  Why aren’t more seeing the dubiousness and danger of piling on fundamental change after fundamental change without meaningful debate?  When the first madcap Obama scheme fails, the lack of debate will haunt the Dems.

Gore tells us the global warming debate is over, and it’s not.  Obama tells us Congressional debate is a thing of the past, and it’d better not be.

A rare double hat-tip to Jim.

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anPo, handmaiden to Gaea and Hades, has her surgically enhanced butt firmly planted on a bill that would put an end to automatic Congressional pay raises.

Pelosi refused to commit to allowing a House bill putting an end to the practice – which would then force the oh-so-public roll call votes on pay raises.

Given that the Senate had earlier rejected a similar notion on a 52-45 vote, the Dems have struck another bold blow for transparency opaqueness.

Pinkie Reid, facing a tough re-election campaign, says he’s committed to the idea of ending automatic congressional pay raises.  So is there any money where your mouth is, Pinkie?

“I will bring it up some other time.”

That’s a terrif promise, Pinkie. (source)

Up until 1989, Congress stuck with the Constitution, which requires Congress to set its own pay, then go home and face the voters when they run for re-election.  The 1989 fix established automatic cost of living increases unless Congress voted not to take one.  They get a big, fat public vote when they decline a raise, and total stealth when they’re feathering their nest.

Current Congressional paycheck:  $174,000.  I’m surprised it’s not $249,999, so they can milk us for the max, while staying south of PrezO’s Transfer of Wealth Tax.

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wrote yesterday about how the Dems lost in an effort to shove the Omnibus Land Bill through the House, using their tried and true “transparent” tactic of shoving a 1,000+ page bill through with minimal debate.  Today, we learn more about what was in the bundle of 170 bills with a price tag of $10 billion. (And c’mon people, remember!  $10 billion is a lot of money!)

Here’s an example of how bad – and little understood – the bill was.  There was a provision to protect fossiles from those who would gather them up willy-nilly. Great.  But what lurked beneath?

First, the bill did just envision a slap on the wrist here – it gave the government the authority to sieze the vehicles and equipment of those found pilfering fossiles.  Imagine the Girl Scout troop losing its bus, tents and camp stoves because a federal agent saw little Sasha picking up a fossilized shark’s tooth!

But wait, there’s more!

… the Association of Applied Paleontological Sciences believes the language actually gives the federal government the authority to seize private lands as well.  So if you had some pretty pieces of petrified wood or a few trilobites or a tiny fish skeleton on your fireplace mantle — the federal government might be able to seize your ranch or farm or home.

That’s from a news release from the National Center for Public Policy Research, as is the rest of the stuff quoted here.

Fossils are the minutia of this mess. Wait ’til you get to energy.

This massive omnibus bill would lock up millions of acres of land at the height of an economic recession and at a time the U.S. is struggling to improve energy security.  Instead of creating jobs and increasing resources, energy supplies and wealth, it would destroy them.  It will shut down cattle grazing, mining, timber harvest, energy exploration and production and recreation.

And it would add another $10-12 billion of federal spending.

Hundreds of millions of barrels of recoverable oil and trillions of cubic feet of natural gas would be locked up.  It would kill a vital new liquefied natural gas terminal/port in Massachusetts so that Congressman Barney Frank — who frequently rails against oil companies for pushing energy prices higher — won’t have it spoil his view.

I doubt if Frank trumpeted that in a fit of newfound Dem transparency.

The bill goes on to federalize just about anything that can’t move out of its way:  National Parks, National Trails, National Heritage Areas, National Monuments, National Conservation Areas, National Preserves, National Historical Parks, National Historic Sites, and probably National Spots Where Obama Once Blew His Nose.

It would create 82 National Scenic Rivers. Sounds nice, eh?  It’s not.  Once a river is designated as “scenic,” and they don’t have to be particularly scenic to be so decreed, they’re put off limits to all sorts of societally useful uses, like having neighborhoods built near them, or sand and gravel extracted from them. (The picture shows the sort of folks who support this kind of thing.)

And, without so much as a public hearing, it would have given 26 million acres of land managed by the BLM near-wilderness status.  People who make their living by running grazing and timber operations on that land would be booted and deprived of their income – again without as much as an opportunity to let their voices be heard.

Bipartisanship of a sort killed this bill. The Republicans in the House voted overwhelmingly against it and three … count ’em, three! … Dems crossed over to stop the madness:  Dan Boren (OK), Jim Marshall (GA) and Colin Peterson (MN).  And such is the sorry state of the GOP that nearly 20 percent of our elected representatives actually voted for this mess, 34 in all.

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ow committed are the Dems to transparent government? You heard NanPo, handmaiden of Gaea and Hades, promise the most transparent Congress in history when she became Speaker. You heard what the PrezO said just this morning when he signed the pork-laden, corrupt Omnibus Spending Bill:

“But the fact is that on occasion, earmarks have been used as a vehicle for waste, and fraud and abuse. Projects have been inserted at the 11th hour, without review, and sometimes without merit, in order to satisfy the political or personal agendas of a given legislator, rather than the public interest.”

He said today’s omnibus bill was a “departure point” for this practice. And maybe you believe him, because he is our president after all, and he’s the leader of the Dem party, which owns the Hill. Then what about this, from MN Rep. Michele Bachmann:

Today, the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 failed to pass in the U.S. House – but only by a very small margin. Its defeat today is a rare, fiscally responsible action in a Congress that has been gung-ho on spending since being sworn into office in January. The Democrat majority had hoped to sneak this 1,200-page, $10-billion package through with no more than 40-minutes of debate.

This omnibus bill today cobbled together over 170 different bills, including 75 measures that we never even reviewed in the House.

Forty minutes of debate? On $10 billion? Let’s see, that’s a minute of debate for every $250 million.  Hmmm – I wonder what were they trying to hide. Glad I asked myself that:

Hidden amongst its pages are 19 provisions to restrict American-made energy production and jobs by withdrawing federal land from mineral leasing – such as oil, gas, and coal exploration. It withdraws 3 million acres from energy leasing and recreation use. And, it eliminates 331 million barrels of recoverable oil and 8.8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas resulting from energy exploration in Wyoming.

The bill did not pass, but the process by which it was handled was Dem-dreamed up and Dem-run. They either are not listening to Obama, or they know he was just blowing smoke when he was giving us all that talk about transparency and bipartisanship. Or as Bachman put it:

[T]he bipartisanship that the Democrats promised on the campaign trail continues to remain nonexistent. Their procedural maneuvers and failure to require proper vetting continue to show a level of disrespect not only to the Congressional minority – but the American taxpayer.

But what did you expect? Bipartisanship only interests those who aren’t in power.

hat-tip: Jenfidel

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tand back, folks, it’s an accident scene here.  This is the very spot where “If you’re in a hole, rule #1 is stop digging” crashed into “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.”  But don’t worry – it’s only the U.S. economy and your livelihood that’s smashed up into a steaming mess.

Accident witness #1:  Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody’s Economy.com, one of a group of economists the Dems called on to give them guidance regarding how to set expectations for the second stimulus.  Zandi, according to George Stephanapolus, told them the first stimulus will fall “far short” of Obama’s job-generation goal.  Like somewhere about 1.5 million jobs short, based on Obama’s specious promise that the stimulus would create 4 million jobs.

Accident witness #2:  The Hill:

House Democrats are looking at yet another economic stimulus bill beyond the $787 billion one just enacted as investors and consumers continue to show little faith in the economy.

At a special meeting of the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee on Tuesday morning, Democrats heard again from their trusted band of economists and came away reinforced that Congress would need to spend billions of additional taxpayer dollars in the coming months to help pull the economy out its severe recession.

So the $2.3 trillion we’ve stimulated the economy with so far is leaving the body pretty much flatlined.  The Dems, greasing up their de-fib paddles, want to shock the sucker again, and again if need be, paying no attention to the tab, as if they were rich Canadians fleeing managed health care to get good treatment here in the U.S.

But don’t worry.  No, be inspired!  Be confident !  NanPo, the economy’s nurse practitioner, handmaiden to both Gaea and Hades, says:

“The word of the day is confidence. Confidence in our markets, confidence in lending, confidence in our financial institutions.”

And the word for tomorrow?  “Dig! Dig, slaves! Keep digging!”

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rom Flopping Aces, this little 8-minute film shows what we’re up against:  A well-documented record proving the Dems were at the wheel and in complete control of the economic collapse … while the GOP lies defeated and we live in Obamaland, where media complicitcy and Dem lies combine to keep the people duped.

The clip shows a Fannie and Freddy regulatory hearing where Dems are whistling “all is well” and blaming the regulators for politicizing the issue or for incompetence, while Republicans are calling for more regulation, becuase Freddie and Fannie are in danger of collapse, are mismanaged, and need needs to fixed.  This is not ancient history; it’s 2004, when Congress till had time to acknowledge the writing on the wall and take action that might have spared us the banking/mortgage meltdown.

You’ll particularly like Maxine Waters saying, “Under the leadership of Mr. Franklin Raines, everything … is working just fine,” and Barney Franks adding smugly, “I have seen nothing in this hearing that raises the safeness and soundness issue” at Fannie or Freddy.

That is the record.  We all know it is the record.  Yet the national media have so entirely given up on ethics that a substantial portion of the population firmly believes that it was Republican under-regulation that killed the economy, and the Dems, to continue the media-endorsed cover-up of their blame, continue adopting policies that further weaken America.

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s the economy crashes around them and families across America are cutting back on expenses, the Democratic congress is behaving like a Gatsby in mid-1929. The new Duesenberg is sure pretty, but is this really the time to buy it?

While the president spoke of no earmarks in the stimulus bill – a mere technicality, since the pots of earmark money are in it – Congress readies an omnibus spending bill that has more earmarks than a dairy herd: $7.7 billion of ‘em, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense.  And that’s on top of $6.6 billion in earmarks in the spending bill that passed in the fall of ’09.  Here’s some of what TCS found:

$713,625 Woody Biomass at SUNY-ESF. Walsh and Schumer sponsors<

$951,500 Sustainable Las Vegas. Berkeley and Reid sponsors.

$24,000 A+ for Abstinence. Specter is sponsor.

$300,000 Montana World Trade Center. Rehberg sponsor.

$950,000 Myrtle Beach International Trade and Convention Center. Graham sponsor.

$200,000 Oil Region Alliance. Peterson sponsor.

$190,000 Buffalo Bill Historical Center, Cody, WY for digitizing and editing the Cody collection. Barbara Cubin is the sponsor

$143,000 Las Vegas Natural History Museum, Las Vegas, NV, to expand natural history education programs. Sponsored by Harry Reid

$238,000 for the Polynesian Voyaging Society, Honolulu, HI, for educational programs. Sen. Daniel Inouye is the sponsor.

$381,000 for Jazz at Lincoln Center, New York, NY for music education programs. Jerrold Nadler is the sponsor.

Don’t you think Pinkie Reid might have pitched in to the deficit-fighting and delayed the new programs at the Vegas Natural History Museum for a few years?  I mean, folks don’t go to Vegas to see stuffed critters in dioramas.  And if Buffalo Bill’s documents have made it this far without digitizing, couldn’t they go a few more years?

All in all, Federal agencies will get eight percent more money under this bill than they received last year. I don’t know about you, but the Pearce budget is definitely not eight percent higher than it was last year.  But there is the Ag Dept. with an eight percent increase and money-losing Amtrak with a 10 percent increase … and, in the ultimate slap in our face, Congress itself, with a hefty 10 percent budget increase.

Couldn’t they re-use their paper clips?

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he Cerritos Auto Square, self-billed as the world’s largest auto square – 26 brands in 15 dealerships – is a festival of capitalism, and traditionally a huge generator of sales tax revenues for the SoCal city of Cerritos, which sports a spiffy arts center as a result.  So what’s it doing in the stimulus package?

But there it is:

Replacement of Auto Square Signage: upgrade of existing Cerritos Auto Square full-color display signage with LED technology; estimated 60% reduction in energy usage

Project Cost: $500,000.00 – 4 jobs – Energy Program

Huh?  I thought this was some sort of private business that was responsible for its own signs.  Will the auto square reimburse the Feds (and us) out of its energy savings?  What do you suppose the next “auto square” down the freeway thinks of having Uncle Sambama buying a new sign for the competitor up the road?

Beloved readers in Iowa, Pennsylvania and 47 other states: How excited are you that part of your income tax will go towards putting up a half-million dollar sign on what’s already supposedly the world’s largest auto square?  Beloved readers in California:  How about you?  Do you feel like I do that the existing sign is just fine with us taxpayers and that four short-term, part-time jobs installing a new sign shouldn’t count towards the four million jobs Obama promises?

Let’s see here … I wonder who represents Cerritos?  Could it be a Dem?  You betcha! But remember – it’s a stimulus bill, not a pork bill.

For lists of stimulus abominations in your own back yard, check out Stimulus Watch.

Hat-tip:  Jim

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