House Kills Amendments on Medical Marijuana, Gitmo Closure

Today, the House began the appropriations process, starting with military construction and the Department of Veterans Affairs. Only two amendments received roll call votes. The final bill passed almost unanimously.

Earl Blumenauer (OR-03) introduced an amendment to allow VA hospital doctors to discuss the use of medical marijuana with patients.

It failed 195 to 222.

173 Democrats and 22 Republicans voted for it. 204 Republicans and 18 Democrats voted against it.

Here are the 22 Republicans who voted for it:

Justin Amash (MI-03)
Kerry Bentivolio (MI-11)
Mo Brooks (AL-05)
Paul Broun (GA-10)
Chis Collins (NY-27)
Steve Daines (MT)
Richard Hanna (NY-22)
Joe Heck (NV-03)
Duncan Hunter (CA-50)
Walter Jones (NC-03)
Frank LoBiondo (NJ-02)
Tom Massie (KY-04)
Tom McClintock (CA-04)
Mick Mulvaney (SC-05)
Tom Reed (NY-23)
Scott Rigell (VA-02)
Dana Rohrabacher (CA-48)
Mark Sanford (SC-01)
David Schweikert (AZ-06)
Steve Stivers (OH-15)
Fred Upton (MI-06)
Don Young (AK)

Here are the 18 Democrats who voted against it:

Ron Barber (AZ-02)
John Barrow (GA-12)
Henry Cuellar (TX-28)
Pete Gallego (TX-23)
Bill Keating (MA-10)
Joe Kennedy (MA-04)
Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ-01)
Rick Larsen (WA-02)
Sandy Levin (MI-09)
Dan Lipinski (IL-03)
Jim Matheson (UT-04)
Mike McIntyre (NC-03)
Collin Peterson (MN-07)
Nick Rahall (WV-03)
David Scott (GA-13)
Terri Sewell (AL-07)
Filemon Vela (TX-34)
Debbie Wasserman Schultz (FL-23)

Jim Moran (VA-08) introduced an amendment to strike the language from the bill barring the use of funds for closing Guantanamo Bay prison. The language the amendment would strike is the following:

Sec. 411. (a) In General- None of the funds appropriated or otherwise made available to the Department of Defense in this Act may be used to construct, renovate, or expand any facility in the United States, its territories, or possessions to house any individual detained at United States Naval Station, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for the purposes of detention or imprisonment in the custody or under the control of the Department of Defense.
It failed 168 to 249. 164 Democrats and 4 Republicans voted for it. 221 Republicans and 28 Democrats voted against it.

The following 4 Republicans voted for it :

Justin Amash (MI-03)
Jimmy Duncan (TN-02)
Chris Gibson (NY-19)
Mark Sanford (SC-01)

The following 28 Democrats voted against it:

Ron Barber (AZ-02)
John Barrow (GA-12)
Julia Brownley (CA-26)
Henry Cuellar (TX-28)
Pete Gallego (TX-23)
Joe Garcia (FL-26)
Raul Grijalva (AZ-03)
Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ-01)
Dan Lipinski (IL-03)
Dan Maffei (NY-24)
Sean Maloney (NY-18)
Jim Matheson (UT-04)
Mike McIntyre (NC-03)
Jerry McNerney (CA-09)
Patrick Murphy (FL-18)
Gloria Negrete McLeod (CA-35)
Bill Owens (NY-21)
Gary Peters (MI-14)
Collin Peterson (MN-07)
Nick Rahall (WV-03)
Raul Ruiz (CA-36)
Dutch Ruppersberger (MD-02)
Loretta Sanchez (CA-46)
David Scott (GA-13)
Terri Sewell (AL-07)
Carol Shea-Porter (NH-01)
Kyrsten Sinema (AZ-09)
Filemon Vela (TX-34)

The vote was largely similar to that on an identical amendment last year. The bill gained three new Republican supporters since last year (the only Republican supporter then was Amash).

Last year, only 25 Democrats opposed the amendment, meaning a net increase of 3 opponents. Sanford Bishop (GA-02), Emmanuel Cleaver (MO-05), and Albio Sires (NJ-08) all went from NO to YES.

Raul Grijalva (AZ-03), Dan Maffei (NY-24), Gloria Negrete McLeod (CA-35), Collin Peterson (MN-07), David Scott (GA-13), and Terri Sewell (AL-07) all went from YES to NO.

I find Grijlava's flip strange, but there is not much surprising elsewhere.

A New Low for Big Green: Environmental Defense Fund PAC Fundraising for Lindsey Graham

Earlier this week, I criticized Big Green groups like NRDC and the Sierra Club for endorsing Keystone XL supporters. I don't think that environmental groups should be running ads and raising money for Democrats like Kay Hagan (D-NC) and Mark Begich (D-AK) because one should have far stronger dealbreakers when considering endorsements. (Running ads against their opponents, rather than for them, is another story, though.)

That, although problematic, wasn't as bad as when the Environmental Defense Fund and its subsidiary Moms Clean Air Force decided to back Republican Susan Collins against her progressive Democratic challenger, Shenna Bellows. Never mind that Susan Collins has only a D on the League of Conservation Voters scorecard, or that a vote for Susan Collins is a vote for Mitch McConnell as Majority Leader and Jim Inhofe as EPW chair.

However, EDF, commonly viewed as the corporatist wing of the environmental community, has hit a new low: fundraising for Lindsey Graham.

WASHINGTON -– Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) will attend a fundraiser co-hosted by one of the nation’s top environmental advocates on Thursday, according to an invitation of the event obtained by The Huffington Post.

Fred Krupp, president of the Environmental Defense Fund, is co-hosting the fundraiser for Graham in New York at the home of Julian Robertson, a retired hedge fund manager.
…
Graham’s Senate office did not return a request for comment. In a statement to The Huffington Post, Krupp called the senator a “friend of mine.”
"I don’t always agree with him on every issue,” Krupp said, “but the Senator cares deeply about South Carolina and the future of our country."

Krupp is one of 18 co-hosts of the Thursday event. Co-chairs are asked to donate $5,200, vice-chairs are asked to give $2,600, and attendees are asked for $1,000 donations. The Environmental Defense Fund said Krupp is representing the Environmental Defense Action Fund, the group's 501(c)(4) arm, in co-hosting the event.

Back in 2009 and 2010, Lindsey Graham pretended to care about climate change and dragged the Senate bill rightward by demanding numerous concessions before ultimately backing out. Last year, he voted to block the EPA from regulating greenhouse gas emissions. He is a co-sponsor of Mitch McConnell's Senate resolution disapproving of the EPA's recent rule regulating emissions from power plants.

His 2013 LCV score was 31%, his highest ever. His lifetime score is 12%. What an environmental champion that Graham is.

If the Senate Takes a Vote on Keystone XL, Whose Votes Have to Be Flipped?

Republicans and red state Democrats want to put a poison pill into the Energy Savings and Industrial Competitiveness Act (Shaheen-Portman): the Keystone XL pipeline:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is talking with Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) and other senators about voting on the Keystone XL pipeline next week.

Reid said Tuesday that he has had discussions with Republican Sens. John Hoeven (N.D.) and Rob Portman (Ohio) about linking a nonbinding amendment on Keystone to energy efficiency legislation that will come to the Senate floor next week.

But he is also coming under pressure from some members to consider a vote on legislation urging President Obama to greenlight the controversial pipeline, according to a Senate aide.
…
He also complained that the pipeline’s proponents keep changing their demands, with some senators now urging a vote on binding legislation.

“Now they can’t decide what they want to vote on, so I can’t agree to something that I don’t know what it is,” Reid said.

“Originally, it was supposed to be a sense of the Senate. Now, they say they want an up-or-down [vote] on a piece of legislation. They can’t decide what it is,” he said.

Hoeven said lawmakers are discussing a potential deal that would set up a separate vote on Keystone.

“On Keystone, it may be an amendment, or we may negotiate for a stand-alone as part of the agreement,” he said.

If the vote is a stand-alone vote, it will not go anywhere because it would need 67 votes to pass the inevitable presidential veto. Obama may ultimately approve Keystone XL himself, but he (correctly) believes it is his prerogative, not the Senate's.

However, things get more dangerous if this is allowed to become a binding amendment to Shaheen-Portman, a middle-of-the-road energy efficiency bill.

Last year, during the budget "vote-o-rama," the Senate voted for an amendment by Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND) authorizing the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, 62 to 37. 17 Democrats joined the 45 Republicans in voting for it.

If the vote mirrored that from last year, the amendment would pass, corrupting an otherwise decent bill. The challenge then becomes to flip some votes, keeping the total below 60.

First, let's see who voted no in 2013. We have 37 such senators:

Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI)
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT)
Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA)
Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH)
Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA)
Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD)
Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL)
Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-CA)
Sen. Al Franken (D-MN)
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY)
Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA)
Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-NM)
Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-HI)
Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA)
Sen. Angus King (I-ME)
Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN)
Sen. Pat Leahy (D-VT)
Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI)
Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA)
Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ)
Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR)
Sen. Barb Mikulski (D-MD)
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT)
Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA)
Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI)
Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV)
Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV)
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT)
Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI)
Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY)
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH)
Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI)
Sen. Mark Udall (D-CO)
Sen. Tom Udall (D-NM)
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA)
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI)
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR)

Markey was not in the Senate for the 2013 Senate vote but voted against it in the House.

Those votes need to stay as is.

Frank Lautenberg was absent for the 2013 vote (because of illness) but would have voted no if present. I don't know where Cory Booker stands on the issue, but I would be somewhat surprised if he backed the pipeline.

Who needs to flip, then?

Let's look at the 17 Democrats who voted for Keystone XL last year:

Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT)
Sen. Mark Begich (D-AK)
Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO)
Sen. Tom Carper (D-DE)
Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA)
Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE)
Sen. Joe Donnelly (D-IN)
Sen. Kay Hagan (D-NC)
Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND)
Sen. Tim Johnson (D-SD)
Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA)
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV)
Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO)
Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL)
Sen. Mark Pryor (D-AR)
Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT)
Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA)

Max Baucus has since been replaced by John Walsh, but John Walsh also supports the Keystone XL pipeline.

Out of those 17 supporters, 11 recently sent a letter to Obama demanding that he approve the pipeline:

Mark Begich (D-AK)
Joe Donnelly (D-IN)
Kay Hagan (D-NC)
Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND)
Mary Landrieu (D-LA)
Joe Manchin (D-WV)
Claire McCaskill (D-MO)
Mark Pryor (D-AR)
Jon Tester (D-MT)
John Walsh (D-MT)
Mark Warner (D-VA)

I would call them all "lost causes."

The six Democrats who voted for Keystone XL but did not sign onto the letter are the following:

Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO)
Sen. Tom Carper (D-DE)
Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA)
Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE)
Sen. Tim Johnson (D-SD)

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL)

Five out of those six (all but Casey) voted against the Keystone XL pipeline back in 2012. In order for the amendment to be killed, at least three of them would have to flip their votes back and Booker would have to come through as an expected no.

If you live in one of those states, I'd recommend that you get in touch with your senator(s).

The Democrats Love to Campaign against the "Ryan Budget" But Leave Ryan Safe in His Purple Seat

Yesterday, Joe Biden gave a speech at The George Washington University attacking the vision put forth by the Ryan budget.

Congressional Democrats have also been centering much of their election strategy and messaging around the Ryan budget. DCCC chairman Steve Israel has said that the Ryan budget will "define" the campaigns this election cycle.

However, for all of the criticism heaped on Paul Ryan's budget by the DCCC, the DCCC doesn't seem that interested in challenging Ryan himself.

Paul Ryan is the representative of Wisconsin's 1st district. You might be surprised to learn that WI-01 is quite the purple district, when you look at presidential elections. In 2012, Romney beat Obama only by a few points: 51.6% to 47.4%. In 2008, Obama won the district 50.8% to 48.1%.

In both elections, however, Ryan did far better than the Republican presidential candidate. In 2008, even though Obama eked out a victory in WI-01, Ryan won re-election with 64% of the vote. In 2012, he won 55% to 43%, not racking up as large of a margin over the Republican presidential nominee but still with plenty of room for comfort.

A district that Obama won in 2008 and only lost by a few points in 2012 seems like a district worth contesting. And given that its representative is the focus of so many attacks by the party, it seems like a perfect choice for the DCCC's Red to Blue program. You would think so, wouldn't you? But Steve Israel hasn't paid any attention. It's nowhere to be found in either the Red to Blue or "Emerging Races" lists on the DCCC website.

And there's already a Democratic candidate in WI-01: Rob Zerban, who held Ryan to his smallest margin of victory ever back in 2012 and wants a rematch.

The DCCC spent very little in this race in 2012. If I read the FEC filings correctly, then the DCCC spent only $7500 in WI-01 during 2012, with all of that spending occurring between July and September. Nothing was spent in the month leading up to the election. That's not how you win an election.

The Problem with Big Green: When Your Deal Breakers are Weak, So is Your Leverage

The Hill has an article up today about how green groups are supporting a number of Senate candidates (or incumbents) who support the Keystone XL pipeline.

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) has raised funds for Sen. Mark Begich (D-AK), Senate candidate Rep. Bruce Braley (D-IA), and Sen. Kay Hagan (D-NC).

Here is what NRDC had to say:

“It’s public record that we’ve already supported candidates who have said that they are in support of the Keystone pipeline,” said Heather Taylor-Miesle, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council Action Fund. “The action fund has made the strategic conclusion in this cycle to focus on climate change, and specifically the president’s climate plan.” ....
“As long as they are not preventing the president from acting,” Taylor-Miesle said of those lawmakers.

Their deal breaker is "preventing the president from acting." They don't require anything proactive of their endorsees, just "not getting in the way too directly." 

If their focus is climate change, though, then they should not be supporting anyone who voted for the Keystone XL pipeline, which is not reconcilable with a goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Supporting Keystone XL might not be "preventing the president from acting," but it is certainly undermining professed goals.

The only Senate vote from this Congress that they apparently view as a deal breaker is Inhofe's budget amendment blocking the EPA from regulating greenhouse gases. That means that only Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Joe Manchin (D-WV), and Mark Pryor (D-AR) would be beyond the pale to them.
A vote for the Hoeven amendment (Keystone XL) in the Senate should be just as much of a deal breaker.

The Sierra Club made the following statement:

“When we consider supporting candidates, we look at their record as a whole from where they stand on protecting our lands and wildlife to stopping Keystone XL to advancing clean energy,” Melissa Williams, the Sierra Club’s national political director, said in a statement.

Williams cited Hagan as a candidate who Sierra Club supports because of her record on environmental issues, despite her support for Keystone XL.

But is she worth their time and money? 

If, as an interest group, you want to be effective, to have leverage, you need to employ both carrot and stick. You use the carrot when legislators vote well, and you use the stick when they don't. However, you can also employ neither--when someone is not good enough for a carrot but not bad enough for a stick. If you aren't willing to hold high standards and keep this option open, then the politicians have no reason to listen to you (especially against the louder voices coming from the polluters). They need to know that they have to win your support. They should not take it for granted.

The League of Conservation Voters (LCV) scorecard is not perfect, but it is a useful tool in evaluating the environmental record of members of Congress. Green groups should only be endorsing and fundraising for Senators or representatives with LCV scores with over 90%. I think that is a clear, simple, and strong benchmark. Hagan falls short with 84%, Braley with 88%, and Begich with 77%.
If these groups wanted to fund candidates in seats in which Democrats need to firm up their support, they could fund Al Franken (94%), Jeff Merkley (100%), and Jeanne Shaheen (95%).

They could also support Shenna Bellows's candidacy in Maine against Susan Collins. Collins has the highest LCV score of any Republican at 67%, but that's still only a D. Bellows, who has already been endorsed by local environmental leaders in Maine, would be a far more dependable vote for the environmental community, and she has come out against the Keystone XL pipeline (which Collins, of course, supports).

They could also use that money in House races or gubernatorial races.

Big Green groups are basically willing to donate to any Democrat whose "ear" they can get, who invites them to the table (even if it's just the kiddie table), who allows them to get their foot in the door. That's fine as a way to make voting decisions in close races. But for time and money? You should expect more.

This Chart Provides a Good Picture of Inequality in the US...But Here's How to Make It Better

Yesterday, I came across this chart on income in the US:

It's 2010 data from the 2011 Annual Social and Economic Supplement to the US Census. A few years have passed, so the numbers will have changed slightly. The median wage (individual rather than household, nominal rather than real) has only gone up about 2% a year between 2010 and 2012, so the changes would be minor, especially with regard to the shape of the curve.

80% of households have an income under $100,000. About half of all households have an income under $50,000. The chart, as is obvious, is bunched up on the left. It is not a pretty bell curve with minimal poverty and minimal extreme wealth and a vast middle.

Note also that this is household income rather than individual income. More than one person is probably working.

However, there's a major weakness in this chart. Each increment is $5,000 until the end, where it's $50,000 to encompass the range from $200,000 to $250,000. This distorts the graph and, thus, fails to provide a fully accurate picture.

The chart lumps together $250,000 with $250,000,000 in a broad category of "over $250,000." $250,000 is certainly different (quantitatively and qualitatively) from $500,000 and from $1 million and from $10 million and from $100 million. Those differences mean a lot in terms of purchasing power and, perhaps more importantly, political power.

In 2010, according to the Social Security Administration, 81 individuals received compensation (reported on W-2 forms) over $50 million. This is individual income, rather than household income (which would likely be higher). However, let's use that $50 million for a quick exercise.
What would this chart look like if we went all the way out to those top 81 people? It would need to go out 9,950 increments past $250,000 to get to $50 million. But let's not forget that the $50 million is just the baseline for these top 81. Certainly, our increments would well pass 10,000 to reach the very top. Just imagine how long that chart would have to be.

The number of people receiving more than $50 million in compensation doubled between 2010 and 2012. I'd guess we'd probably need even more increments for a full chart in 2012.

Tomorrow's Oligarchs, Today's White House Guests

As an article in the New York Times clearly demonstrated the other day, aristocracy is alive and well in the US of A:

On a crisp morning in late March, an elite group of 100 young philanthropists and heirs to billionaire family fortunes filed into a cozy auditorium at the White House.

Their name tags read like a catalog of the country’s wealthiest and most influential clans: Rockefeller, Pritzker, Marriott. They were there for a discreet, invitation-only summit hosted by the Obama administration to find common ground between the public sector and the so-called next-generation philanthropists, many of whom stand to inherit billions in private wealth.

“Moon shots!” one administration official said, kicking off the day on an inspirational note to embrace the White House as a partner and catalyst for putting their personal idealism into practice.

The well-heeled group seemed receptive. “I think it’s fantastic,” said Patrick Gage, a 19-year-old heir to the multibillion-dollar Carlson hotel and hospitality fortune. “I’ve never seen anything like this before.” Mr. Gage, physically boyish with naturally swooping Bieber bangs, wore a conservative pinstripe suit and a white oxford shirt. His family’s Carlson company, which owns Radisson hotels, Country Inns and Suites, T.G.I. Friday’s and other brands, is an industry leader in enforcing measures to combat trafficking and involuntary prostitution.

A freshman at Georgetown University, Mr. Gage was among the presenters at a breakout session, titled “Combating Human Trafficking,” that attracted a notable group of his peers. “The person two seats away from me was a Marriott,“ he said. “And when I told her about trafficking, right away she was like, ‘Uh, yeah, I want to do that."

Justin McAuliffe, a 24-year-old heir to the Hilton hotel fortune, was similarly impressed by the crowd. “Hilton, Marriott and Carlson,” he said. “That is cool.”

Thomas Kalil, a deputy director for technology and innovation in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and one the event's main organizers, described the intent of the event: "A lot of this is not just, you know, collaborations between the administration and philanthropists...but philanthropists finding each other, finding other philanthropists with shared interests." In other words, networking for the 0.01 percent.

The article is quite timely. In light of Thomas Piketty's recent tome Capital in the Twenty-First Century, we have seen a lot of discussion of the resurgence of "patrimonial capitalism", as vast inequality reproduces the character of Old World aristocracy (despite the continued use of democratic rhetoric and mythology).

A forthcoming article by political scientists Martin Gilens and Benjamin Page has also received a fair amount of attention. By analyzing 1,779 policy outcomes during a period of over two decades, they conclude that "economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence."

Campaign finance reform that helps counteract the effects of Supreme Court decisions like Citizens United and McCutcheon vs. FEC is important; however, as events like the one above show, incessant fundraising isn't the only way in which money corrupts democracy. Politicians still value the opinions of the rich more, and we can see this in countries that have far stricter campaign finance laws than the US. (See Europe, austerity.) With money, comes access the power and the ability to help shape the national agenda. Money might not be speech, but it makes your speech worth listening to, in the eyes of politicians (many of whom, themselves, are of the same class).

UMass Poll Reaches New Frontiers in Useless Polling Questions

On Thursday, UMass came out with a poll about Massachusetts voters' thoughts about their two senators, Ed Markey and Elizabeth Warren. The poll found that Elizabeth Warren was far better-known and more popular and viewed as more empathetic and effective than her colleague.

However, I would like to highlight a different part of the poll. The UMass poll also asked voters what they thought about Ed Markey's "present" vote on the September 2013 resolution in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee authorizing Obama to launch a military strike in Syria. 56% of those surveyed opposed this vote, with one-third strongly opposed. Only 31% supported Markey's vote.
What do we learn from this? Absolutely nothing.

Did the people who opposed Markey's "present" vote want Markey to vote "NO"? UMass didn't ask.

Did the people who opposed Markey's "present" vote want Markey to vote "YES"? UMass didn't ask.

Did the people who supported Markey's "present" vote prefer a "present" over a "NO," or did they want a "NO" but were fine with a "present" as a second best? UMass didn't ask.

Never mind that, the pollsters feel confident in the deep insights:

“Male voters appear to have been particularly frustrated by Markey’s non-vote on the Syria resolution, perhaps indicating a preference for a senator who takes a strong stand one way or another,” said Schaffner.

Said Nteta: “In responding to criticism emanating from his ‘present’ vote, Senator Markey has said that he ‘wanted to make sure what we vote for on the Senate floor is something that reflects the values of the people of Massachusetts.’ The opposition to Markey’s vote expressed by the state’s residents indicates that he may not have his finger on the pulse of the Commonwealth.”

Which 31 Democrats Just Voted against their Caucus's Own Budget?

Yesterday, I reported on the House votes on the Progressive Caucus's "Better Off Budget" and the Black Caucus's alternative budget. Only 89 Democrats voted for the CPC budget (with 103 opposing it). Only 116 Democrats voted for the CBC budget (with 76 opposing it).

The House then voted on the Democratic caucus's alternative budget.

Obviously, it did not pass. And 31 Democrats joined the GOP in voting against it.

Ron Barber (AZ-02)
John Barrow (GA-12)
Ami Bera (CA-07)
Julia Brownley (CA-26)
Cheri Bustos (IL-17)
Jim Cooper (TN-05)
Jim Costa (CA-16)
Suzan DelBene (WA-01)
Tammy Duckworth (IL-08)
Bill Enyart (IL-12)
Bill Foster (IL-11)
Pete Gallego (TX-23)
Joe Garcia (FL-26)
Jim Himes (CT-04)
Ron Kind (WI-03)
Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ-01)
Annie Kuster (NH-02)
Dan Lipinski (IL-03)
Dave Loebsack (IA-02)
Dan Maffei (NY-24)
Sean Maloney (NY-18)
Jim Matheson (UT-04)
Mike McIntyre (NC-07)
Patrick Murphy (FL-18)
Scott Peters (CA-52)
Collin Peterson (MN-07)
Nick Rahall (WV-03)
Raul Ruiz (CA-36)
Loretta Sanchez (CA-46)
Bradley Schneider (IL-10)
Kyrsten Sinema (AZ-09)

Last year, 28 Democrats voted against the caucus's own budget.

Last year, Dan Lipinski was not there for the vote. This year, he voted no.

Tammy Duckworth, Nick Rahall, and Loretta Sanchez all voted for last year's budget but now oppose their own caucus.

Bill Owens (NY-21) voted against last year's budget but voted for it this time.

The House Just Voted on the Progressive Caucus and Black Caucus's Budgets. How Did Your Rep Vote?

Yesterday, the House voted on two budgets from within the Democratic caucus: the Congressional Progressive Caucus's “Better Off Budget” and the Congressional Black Caucus's budget. Both are more progressive than the House Democratic caucus's budget.

The Congressional Progressive Caucus’s budget received only 89 votes. A majority (103 to 89) of the Democratic caucus voted against it.

Here are the 89 supporters:

Joyce Beatty (OH-03)
Xavier Becerra (CA-34)
Earl Blumenauer (OR-03)
Bob Brady (PA-01)
Corinne Brown (FL-05)
G. K. Butterfield (NC-01)
Mike Capuano (MA-07)
Tony Cárdenas (CA-29)
Andre Carson (IN-07)
Matt Cartwright (PA-17)
Kathy Castor (FL-14)
Judy Chu (CA-27)
David Cicilline (RI-01)
Katherine Clark (MA-05)
Yvette Clarke (NY-09)
Lacy Clay (MO-01)
Emanuel Cleaver (MO-05)
James Clyburn (SC-06)
Steve Cohen (TN-09)
John Conyers (MI-13)
Elijah Cummings (MD-07)
Danny Davis (IL-07)
Mike Doyle (PA-14)
Donna Edwards (MD-04)
Keith Ellison (MN-05)
Sam Farr (CA-20)
Chaka Fattah (PA-02)
Marcia Fudge (OH-11)
Alan Grayson (FL-09)
Raul Grijalva (AZ-03)
Luis Gutiérrez (IL-04)
Janice Hahn (CA-44)
Alcee Hastings (FL-20)
Brian Higgins (NY-26)
Rubén Hinojosa (TX-15)
Rush Holt (NJ-12)
Mike Honda (CA-17)
Jared Huffman (CA-02)
Hakeem Jeffries (NY-08)
Hank Johnson (GA-04)
Eddie Johnson (TX-30)
Marcy Kaptur (OH-09)
Robin Kelly (IL-02)
Barbara Lee (CA-13)
Alan Lowenthal (CA-47)
Ben Luján (NM-03)
Doris Matsui (CA-06)
Betty McCollum (MN-04)
Jim McDermott (WA-07)
Jim McGovern (MA-02)
Grace Meng (NY-06)
Gregory Meeks (NY-05)
George Miller (CA-11)
Gwen Moore (WI-04)
Jim Moran (VA-08)
Jerry Nadler (NY-10)
Grace Napolitano (CA-32)
Gloria Negrete McLeod (CA-35)
Rick Nolan (MN-08)
Frank Pallone (NJ-06)
Donald Payne (NJ-10)
Chellie Pingree (ME-01)
Mark Pocan (WI-02)
David Price (NC-04)
Charlie Rangel (NY-13)
Cedric Richmond (LA-02)
Lucille Roybal-Allard (CA-40)
Bobby Rush (IL-01)
Tim Ryan (OH-13)
Linda Sánchez (CA-38)
John Sarbanes (MD-03)
Jan Schakowsky (IL-09)
David Scott (GA-13)
Jose Serrano (NY-15)
Terri Sewell (AL-07)
Albio Sires (NJ-08)
Louise Slaughter (NY-25)
Jackie Speier (CA-14)
Mark Takano (CA-41)
Bennie Thompson (MS-02)
Juan Vargas (CA-51)
Marc Veasey (TX-33)
Nydia Velázquez (NY-07)
Debbie Wasserman-Schultz (FL-23)
Maxine Waters (CA-43)
Henry Waxman (CA-33)
Pete Welch (VT-AL)
Frederica Wilson (FL-24)
John Yarmuth (KY-03)

Last year, only 84 Democrats voted for the CPC’s “Back to Work Budget". That consisted of a loss of 13 votes and a gain of 18 for a net gain of 5.

3 of those lost votes are members who are no longer in the House: Rob Andrews, Ed Markey, and Mel Watt.

4 more of those lost votes came from members who did not attend today’s vote: Karen Bass (CA-37), Al Green (TX-09), and Sheila Jackson Lee (TX-18), and John Lewis (GA-05).

6 Democrats, however, flipped their vote to now oppose the Congressional Progressive Caucus budget: Stephen Lynch (MA-08), Carolyn Maloney (NY-12), Ed Pastor (AZ-07), Nick Rahall (WV-03), John Tierney (MA-06), and Paul Tonko (NY-20).

Of the 18 newly gained voters, six were not in attendance for last year’s vote (and thus had not voted against it): Ruben Hinojosa (TX-15), Grace Meng (NY-09), George Miller (CA-11), Debbie Wasserman Schultz (FL-23), Henry Waxman (CA-33), and Frederica Wilson (FL-24).
Two, Katherine Clark (MA-05) and Robin Kelly (IL-02), had not yet been elected.

Gloria Negrete McLeod (CA-35) had voted “present” last year.

That leaves 9 Democrats who went from opposing the CPC budget to supporting it: David Cicilline (RI-01), Marcy Kaptur (OH-09), Doris Matsui (CA-06), Gregory Meeks (NY-05), Cedric Richmond (LA-02), David Scott (GA-13), Terri Sewell (AL-07), Jackie Speier (CA-14), and Bennie Thompson (MS-02).

9 members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus voted against the CPC’s own budget: Suzanne Bonamici (OR-01), Pete DeFazio (OR-04), Rosa DeLauro (CT-03),  Lois Frankel (FL-22), Steven Horsford (NV-04), Joseph Kennedy (MA-04), David Loebsack (IA-02), Carolyn Maloney (NY-12), and Jared Polis (CO-02).

---
The Congressional Black Caucus's budget received a total of 116 votes. 116 Democrats supported it, and 76 opposed it.

All of the Democrats who voted for the CPC budget also voted for the CBC budget. 27 Democratic opponents of the Better Off Budget voted for the Black Caucus's budget.

They were the following:

Sanford Bishop (GA-02)
Joaquin Castro (TX-20)
Gerald Connolly (VA-11)
Joseph Crowley (NY-14)
Rosa DeLauro (CT-03)
Lloyd Doggett (TX-35)
Eliot Engel (NY-16)
Anna Eshoo (CA-18)
Lois Frankel (FL-22)
Steven Horsford (NV-04)
Steny Hoyer (MD-05)
Steve Israel (NY-03)
John Larson (CT-01)
Zoe Lofgren (CA-19)
Stephen Lynch (MA-08)
Richard Neal (MA-01)
Beto O’Rourke (TX-16)
Bill Pascrell (NJ-09)
Ed Pastor (AZ-07)
Adam Schiff (CA-28)
Bobby Scott (VA-03)
Brad Sherman (CA-30)
Adam Smith (WA-09)
Paul Tonko (NY-20)
Niki Tsongas (MA-03)
Chris Van Hollen (MD-08)
Filemon Vela (TX-34)

Last year, only 105 Democrats voted for the CBC budget. There was a net gain, therefore, of 11 votes. This consisted of a loss of 11 and a gain of 22.

Of the 11 lost votes, three are from representatives who are no longer in Congress: Rob Andrews, Ed Markey, and Mel Watt.

Four were just not in attendance for todays’ vote: Karen Bass (CA-37), Al Green (TX-09), and Sheila Jackson Lee (TX-18), and John Lewis (GA-05).

Only four, then, flipped their vote to now oppose the CBC’s budget: Pete DeFazio (OR-04), Ted Deutch (FL-21), Joe Kennedy (MA-04), and John Tierney (MA-06).

Of the 22 newly gained votes, 9 had just not attended last year: Rosa DeLauro, Eliot Engel, Anna Eshoo, Ruben Hinojosa, Grace Meng, George Miller, Terri Sewell, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, and Henry Waxman.

Two, Katherine Clark (MA-05) and Robin Kelly (IL-02), had not yet been elected.
That means 11 flipped votes. One of those was Gloria Negrete McLeod, who had voted “present” last year.

The other 10 were Gerry Connolly, Lloyd Doggett, Lois Frankel, Zoe Lofgren, Beto O’Rourke, Adam Schiff, Brad Sherman, Adam Smith, Jackie Speier, and Filemon Vela.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi did not vote on either the CPC budget or the CBC budget.

House GOP, with ConservaDem Friends, Kick Off Budget Week By Passing Two Budget Tricks

This week is Budget Week. And to start the week off, the House Republicans, with the help of some of the worst members of the Democratic caucus, passed two bills designed to make it easier for them to slash spending in the future.

Let’s take a look.

On Monday, the House passed the Budget and Accounting Transparency Act by 230 to 165.

16 Democrats joined Republicans in voting for it:

Ron Barber (AZ-02)
John Barrow (GA-12)
Jim Cooper (TN-05)
Jim Costa (CA-16)
Henry Cuellar (TX-28)
Pete Gallego (TX-23)
Alan Grayson (FL-09)
Dan Lipinski (IL-03)
Dan Maffei (NY-24)
Mike McIntyre (NC-07)
Patrick Murphy (FL-18)
Bill Owens (NY-21)
Scott Peters (CA-52)
Mike Quigley (IL-05)
Kurt Schrader (OR-05)
Kyrsten Sinema (AZ-09)

This bill would require the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to use "fair value" estimates for the cost of all government loan programs as opposed to the direct costs themselves. "Fair value" estimates apply the same risk factors that a private business might apply to making a loan. Considering that the government is not a private business, such estimates end up overstating the cost of the programs and, thus, the size of the federal deficit.

Here is the analysis from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities that the Democrats on the Budget Committee included in their minority view on the committee report:

The House Budget Committee may consider legislation in the near future that would change the federal accounting of direct loans and loan guarantees in ways that would overstate the federal costs of those programs. As a result, the legislation also would overstate total federal spending and deficits.

The Federal Credit Reform Act of 1990 changed the budgetary accounting of federal credit programs. Previously, the budget displayed the costs of credit programs in the years those costs actually occurred; that is, it showed federal expenditures from loans or guarantees in any particular year, offset by loan repayments in that year. Since the 1990 law, the budget displays the same total net costs of loans or guarantees but shows them up front—when the government issues the loans and loan guarantees—rather than year by year over the course of their lifetimes.

The legislation—H.R. 1872, introduced by Rep. Scott Garrett (R-NJ) and co-sponsored by House Budget Committee chair Paul Ryan (R-WI)—would significantly change the rules in place since the 1990 law. It would require the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to add an extra amount to the budgetary cost that they show for loan and guarantee programs, based on the additional amount that private lenders would charge borrowers if they, rather than the federal government, issued the loans and loan guarantees. By overstating the federal costs of credit programs, the proposal would overstate federal deficits and force budget documents to offset these phantom costs with phantom offsets to avoid overstating the debt as well.

Overstating the federal deficit then provides Republicans a wonderful opportunity to shout about how we need to slash social spending. 

 

Today, the House passed the Baseline Reform Act by 230 to 185.

7 Democrats joined the GOP in voting for it:

Ron Barber (AZ-02)
John Barrow (GA-12)
Jim Matheson (UT-04)
Mike McIntyre (NC-07)
Patrick Murphy (FL-18)
Collin Peterson (MN-07)
Kyrsten Sinema (AZ-09)

The Baseline Reform Act removes the assumption that discretionary spending will increase by inflation in each year of the baseline.

What this ultimately does is allow Republicans to cut the spending on programs they don't like by stealth (aka by letting their real value erode):

This is complicated, but important. You see, when the CBO estimates future spending it must necessarily make certain assumptions. One is that when Congress creates a spending program that its intent is to maintain spending in real terms, adding spending as necessary to compensate for inflation.

Obviously, if inflation is not taken into account then real spending will fall by the rate of inflation. Every worker understands that if she doesn’t get a cost-of-living adjustment for inflation or an increase less than the rate of inflation then she is worse off. It’s the same for government programs.

Republicans have long railed against the assumption that spending should keep pace with inflation, believing that it fuels unjustified government spending. They often assert that if a program gets any increase at all, even if it’s not enough to keep pace with inflation, that this is per se an unjustified spending increase.

Republicans also argue that the only meaningful spending cut is one that reduces the literal dollar amount of spending from one year to the next. But of course, in a period of inflation that means that no nominal spending increase is in fact a cut in real terms, which is what Republicans want.

The only purpose of this legislation is to obfuscate the effect of inflation on spending so that it will be easier for Republicans to slash it without appearing to do so. They can hold constant spending for programs they don’t like, but are afraid to cut openly, and simply let inflation do their dirty work, while claiming that they haven’t cut spending at all.

Budget Week will continue as the House debates and votes on five budget proposals: 

(1) The Ryan Budget
(2) The Congressional Progressive Caucus's Better Off Budget
(3) The Congressional Black Caucus Alternative Budget
(4) The Democratic Alternative Budget (that of the House Democratic caucus)
(5) The Republican Study Committee Budget

Maryland and Minnesota Democrats Undercut the National Party on the Minimum Wage

Yesterday, the Maryland Senate passed legislation to increase the minimum wage, which the Assembly had already passed last year. Governor Martin O'Malley will soon sign it.

The New York Times framed this as "pressing Obama's Agenda".

Maryland embraced President Obama’s call to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour on Monday, the second state to do since Connecticut acted last month.

The Maryland General Assembly voted for the pay raise on the last day of its 2014 regular session, giving Gov. Martin O’Malley a victory on his top priority this year. The governor, in his last year in office, has staked out a consistently liberal record as he weighs running for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination.

But is it the same agenda? If you look at the bills, the answer is a clear NO. If anything, Maryland is undercutting Obama and national Democrats. 

 

The plan being pushed by Congressional Democrats (with the backing of the president) has three parts:

(1) Raising the minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 in three steps: $8.20 three months after passage, $9.15 one year to the day thereafter, and $10.10 1 year to the day thereafter

(2) Indexing the minimum wage so that it rises with inflation starting the following year

(3) Raising the tipped wage to 70% of the minimum wage in a series of gradual steps (to $3.000 1 year and 90 days after passage and $0.95 each year thereafter until this proportion is achieved)

(This isn't an exact quote--nor is that below, but I found blocking the text to make it easier to read.) Now, what are the parts to the Maryland legislation?

(1) Raising the minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 in five steps: $8.00 in January 2015, $8.25 in July 2015, $8.75 in July 2016, $9.25 in July 2017, and $10.10 in July 2018.

(2) No indexing

(3) Freezing the tipped wage at $3.63 an hour

(4)  Allowing employers to pay employees who are 19 or younger 85% of the minimum wage for the first six months of employment

(5) Exempting some businesses, including restaurants with income below $400,000

The Maryland Senate has 35 Democrats and 12 Republicans. The House of Delegates has 97 Democrats and 43 Republicans. The governor is a Democrat. 

 

Look at those bills side-by-side. Is the Maryland bill "pressing" or "advancing" the agenda put forth by Congressional Democrats backed by Obama? No, it is clearly not. It is stupidly and cruelly undercutting it by weakening the demands in the state right next door to DC of all places.

Minnesota Democrats are also undercutting national Democrats, as we can see from the same New York Times article (although it does not frame the situation as such). The Democrats of the Minnesota State Legislature reached a deal yesterday to raise the minimum wage for large employers to $9.50 an hour by 2016 from its current $6.15. Their goal wage is lower than the national goal even though both houses of the Minnesota legislature and governorship are all under Democratic control (39 to 28 in the Senate, 73 to 61 in the House).

Here are the details of that deal:

For large businesses with gross sales over $500,000, the minimum wage would rise to $8 in 2014, $8.50 in 2015 and $9.50 by 2016.

For small businesses with gross sales below $500,000, the minimum wage would rise to $6.50 in 2014, $7.25 in 2015 and $7.75 by 2016.

Starting in 2018, the wage would go up with inflation, capped at 2.5 percent.

Minnesota apparently allows businesses (large ones currently, small ones now and into the future) to pay their employees below minimum wage. Is that even legal? 

 

Although the bill includes indexing, it allows the Department of Labor and Industry to block such increases in the time of an economic downturn. The Minnesota Democrats must have forgotten that preventing the collapse of wages in the time of a downturn is one of the basic reasons for having a minimum wage in the first place.

Anyway, that bill, too, undercuts the efforts of national Democrats. Your Mark Pryor-Democrats or Susan Collins-Republicans can point to Minnesota as an example of a "compromise" legislation and weaken the bill.

If you want to get $10.10 on the national level, the blue states should be pushing for more, not less.

This Graph is Key to Understanding the Rightward Political Shift of the Past 3.5 Decades

According to the following graph from economists Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman, the share of the nation's wealth held by the 0.1% is now back to pre-Great Depression/New Deal levels, on par with what it was before World War I or in the 1920s.


However, something else stands out in that graph: not just the peaks, but the nadir. The lowest point on that graph looks to be at the last quarter of 1977. The initiatives of the New Deal and the Great Society--as well as the largely Keynesian macroeconomic policies of the post-war era--had helped to reduce inequality. And events in the 1970s like the oil crisis and the Iranian Revolution shook things up for the investor class. The inflation of that decade, moreover, would have devalued their assets. And as Paul Krugman mentioned in a post earlier today, the investor class hates inflation for precisely that reason. And they will not stand for it.

And when the investor class feels that they have had enough, politicians listen.

In their book Right Turn: The Decline of the Democrats and the Future of American Politics, Thomas Ferguson and Joel Rogers look at the collapse of the New Deal consensus and analyze the roots of the right turn of the Democratic Party in the late 1970s and into the 1980s. This moment marked a key point in the shift:

In late 1978, however, the bottom at last fell out of the Carter coalition. Anxious about both the pace of economic growth in the United States and the potential for a major downturn abroad, the Administration had for two years maintained a relatively easy monetary policy and allowed the exchange rate to fall. With the rate of unemployment dropping, however, imports rose, and in 1978 wage gains again briefly pulled ahead of productivity gains.

Hoping to continue its expansionary policies, the Administration reviewed various methods of wage restraint....[T]he Administration sought international agreement for a multinationally coordinated expansion ("joint reflation") of the economies of Britain, Germany, and the United States. At the Bonn summit of the major industrial powers, however, the allies balked....With the U.S. rate of inflation racing ahead of that of its allies, anxiety about the dollar grew. In October 1978, the effects of the Administration's earlier reluctance to rein in the money supply became dramatically visible. A giant run on the dollar developed.

Forced at last to choose between his constituencies, Carter did not hesitate. To restore confidence in the dollar, Carter promised in late October to reduce the growing budget deficit, cut government hiring, and eliminate additional regulations. He also announced a new series of wage-price standards, in another bid to get control of inflation.

…

By then, however, the Shah of Iran had been driven from his throne, announcing a major disaster for many of America’s largest industrial and service firms—including major banks, oil companies, construction firms, weapons suppliers, and any number of other exporters and service enterprises—that had been deeply involved in the Shah’s regime. Stunned by its real and prospective losses, the business community’s demands for increased military spending were reaching a crescendo. Compounding these problems was the oil shortage of early 1979, rising inflation, and another run in the dollar. In July, Carter acted, in a complex rearrangement of his Cabinet and other positions in the Administration. In the most important moves, Carter dismissed liberal HEW Secretary Joseph Califano and Treasury Secretary Michael Blumenthal; he then moved Fed Chairman G. William Miller to Blumenthal’s old spot. Then, after David Rockefeller, Democratic investment banker Robert Rosa, and Bank of America chairman A. W. Clausen refused the post, he appointed Paul Volcker, a former Chase employee, to be Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board. Volcker immediately raised interest rates.
From that point, everything went from bad to worse. Another dollar crisis led the Fed to pursue even more Draconian monetary policies, and interest rates approached lunar levels. Real growth in the economy collapsed altogether, and for a couple of quarters was even negative.

…

But the economic collapse gave Carter little room to maneuver. By early 1980, with Democratic investment bankers holding late-night meetings with the party’s congressional leadership to demand budget cuts, the leader of the party of Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy, and Johnson was forced to do the unthinkable. Only months before an oncoming election, he was forced to make massive cuts in funds for the poor, blacks, and the cities, and to further tighten the money supply. At the same time, Carter made clear his commitment to massive (5 percent in real terms) annual increases in military outlays.

(emphases added) 

As alluded to above, Paul Volcker was up for the challenge of saving the beleaguered billionaires:

Volcker Asserts U.S. Must Trim Living Standard
Warns of Inflation if Oil Spending is Not Cut
By Steven Rattner
Special to the New York Times

Washington, Oct. 17 [1979]—Paul A. Volcker, the chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, asserted today that Americans must accept a reduction in their living standards, if inflation is to be reduced.

In Congressional testimony before the Joint Economic Committee, Mr. Volcker maintained that, because of the drain of American wealth to the oil-producing countries, Americans would have to accept less. If they try to keep up, he warned, the result would be a new burst of inflation.

“The standard of living of the average American has to decline,” he said. “I don’t think you can escape that.”

And he continued to try to push down such living standards during his tenure under Reagan:

By the fourth quarter of 1981, the inflation rate had fallen by double digits, but compensation for employees was still increasing at a rate of more than 10 percent….

When White House officials congratulated themselves on how swiftly inflation was declining, Volcker pulled out his card on union wages and warned them not to be too optimistic. Until labor got the message and surrendered on its wage demands, the underlying rate of inflation would continue to push prices upward—and collide with the stringent reality imposed by the Fed’s money policy.

“Volcker wanted to break the back of wage trends just as he wanted to break commodity price speculation,” David Stockman said. “Kudlow and I were telling him that inflation would come down fast. He said, “Nope, it can’t happen. Wages are about two-thirds of GNP, and inflation can’t come down faster until labor unit costs come down faster.”

(emphases added) -----

\The research from Saez and Zucman also reveals the growing disparity within the rich as well.
As you can see below, the share of wealth held by the top 1-0.5% fell gradually during the 1970s and early 1980s and has since remained relatively constant, tipping only slightly upwards. Since 1960, the peak share here was about 7.9% and the nadir was about 6.3%.

The top 0.5-0.1% saw a similar pattern, but with slightly steeper rises and falls. Here, the peak share since 1960 was about 11.5% and the nadir about 9.5%. The peak today, however, is only slightly higher than the share in 1960.

The top 0.1-0.01% have seen a much steeper growth in share of national wealth. From a nadir of about 5.3% in the late 1970s, it is now at about 10.2%. It has effectively doubled.
And the growth in the share of national wealth held by the 0.01% has been even steeper. From a low point of about 2.3% in the late 1970s, their share is now about 11.3%.


Looking outside the top 1%, the wealth share of those in the top 10-1% has actually fallen since the late 1970s. From a peak of about 46% in the mid-1950s (and a 43/44% throughout the 1970s), this share has fallen to 35%.


And back to the 0.01%, the Supreme Court's recent decision in McCucheon vs. FEC has freed them to spend up to $2.43 million per election cycle. And if they take up that new opportunity, I'd expect to see the red line in that penultimate graph keep on rising.

Remembering Who Was Responsible for the "Personal Responsibility and Work Oppportunity Act

In July/August of 1996, Congress passed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act (PRWORA), commonly known as "welfare reform." President Clinton signed it into law a few weeks later. And the law was as bad as its acronym was awkward.

I was discussing this briefly with some people this morning, so I decided to look up the roll call from back in 1996 to see who that voted aye and nay are still in Congress.

PRWORA a great example of Clinton's proclivity to passing bills despite near-majority opposition from his own caucus.

PRWORA passed the House 328 to 101.

The Democratic caucus split almost evenly in two: 101 in favor, 99 opposed.

12 Democratic YEA votes are still in the House:

Pete DeFazio (OR-04)
John Dingell (MI-12)
Lloyd Doggett (TX-35)
Mike Doyle (PA-14)
Steny Hoyer (MD-05)
Marcy Kaptur (OH-09)
Sandy Levin (MI-09)
Nita Lowey (NY-17)
Jim Moran (VA-08)
Frank Pallone (NJ-06)
Collin Peterson (MN-07)
Pete Visclosky (IN-01)

31 Democratic NAY votes are still in the House:

Xavier Becerra (CA-34)
Earl Blumenauer (OR-03)
Corrine Brown (FL-05)
Jim Clyburn (SC-06)
John Conyers (MI-13)
Elijah Cummings (MD-07)
Eliot Engel (NY-16)
Anna Eshoo (CA-18)
Sam Farr (CA-20)
Chaka Fattah (PA-02)
Gene Green (TX-29)
Alcee Hastings (FL-20)
Sheila Jackson Lee (TX-18)
John Lewis (GA-05)
Zoe Lofgren (CA-19)
Carolyn Maloney (NY-12)
Jim McDermott (WA-07)
George Miller (CA-11)
Jerry Nadler (NY-10)
Ed Pastor (AZ-07)
Nancy Pelosi (CA-12)
Nick Rahall (WV-03)
Charlie Rangel (NY-13)
Bobby Rush (IL-01)
Bobby Scott (VA-03)
Jose Serrano (NY-15)
Louise Slaughter (NY-25)
Bennie Thompson (MS-02)
Nydia Velazquez (NY-07)
Maxine Waters (CA-43)
Henry Waxman (CA-33)

3 Democratic YEA votes are now in the Senate: Ben Cardin (D-MD), Dick Durbin (D-IL), and Tim Johnson (D-SD).

6 NAY votes from the Democratic caucus are now in the Senate: Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Ed Markey (D-MA), Bob Menendez (D-NJ), Jack Reed (D-RI), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), and Chuck Schumer (D-NY).

6 of the Democrats who voted for it are still in the Senate.

Tom Harkin (D-IA)
Carl Levin (D-MI)
Barbara Mikulski (D-MD)
Harry Reid (D-NV)
Jay Rockefeller (D-WV)
Ron Wyden (D-OR)

One is our VP, and another our Secretary of State.

4 of the Democrats who voted against it are still in the Senate:

Barbara Boxer (D-CA)
Diane Feinstein (D-CA)
Pat Leahy (D-VT)
Patty Murray (D-WA)

4 Democrats Join House GOP to Vote for Magic....I Mean Dynamic Scoring

How Paul Ryan Scores a Tax Plan

Today, the House passed the Pro-Growth Budgeting Act 224 to 182.

The bill would require the Congressional Budget Office to adopt "dynamic" scoring in its analysis of major legislation.

The problem with dynamic scoring is that it just isn't that accurate:

Dynamic scoring of tax cuts lets policymakers account for the greater economic activity potentially spurred by these cuts, thereby reducing the cuts’ overall costs. In theory, there is nothing wrong with dynamic scoring. But in practice, empirical estimates of the macroeconomic impact of tax reforms have proven nowhere near precise enough to use to make informed policy. The results critically depend on the value chosen for parameters, and assumptions on future monetary and fiscal policies—different parameters values and assumptions can produce a very wide range of results for the economic effects of policy changes.

The legislation would also require the CBO to analyze the effects of legislation over a 40-year time horizon, rather than the 10 years it currently uses. As we all know, 40-year predictions are wonderfully accurate. 

 

It would exempt appropriations bills from the dynamic scoring requirement. In other words, the macroeconomic impact of tax cuts would get scored, but not that of education and infrastructure spending. Funny that.

House Democrats criticized the GOP for just trying to fix the process to justify their tax cuts:

Democrats argued that the bill is an attempt to create a process at the CBO that lets Republicans point to the economic benefits of tax cuts as a way to justify those tax cuts. "What this bill is after is simply to do the analysis primarily on the tax policy," Budget Committee ranking member Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) said.

"It's motivated primarily by this idea that if you provide big tax breaks to people at the very high end of the income ladder, it will trickle down and lift up all the boats," he added. "We saw how well that worked in the 2000s."

………

One Democrat used the debate to argue that tax cuts for the wealthy don't have any significant impact on job creation, because the wealthy already spend "as much as they feel like spending." Rep. Bill Foster (D-Ill.) said that means tax breaks for the wealthy don't create any new economic activity.

"The very wealthy have already spent everything they can to send their children to the finest schools, they already have seven Cadillacs in their garages," he said. "So the marginal investments of the wealthy are intrinsically less productive due to the basic principle of economics known as the law of diminishing returns."

Van Hollen added that while the bill requires the CBO to run dynamic analyses on major bills, it specifically excludes appropriations bills. He said that exemption shows that Republicans want to downplay how federal spending on education, infrastructure and other areas can also help the economy.

4 Democrats joined the House GOP to vote for the bill: John Barrow (GA-12), Alan Grayson (FL-09), Jim Matheson (UT-04), and Mike McIntyre (NC-07). 

 

Gerry Connolly (VA-11) offered an amendment to require appropriations bills to receive such scoring as well. It failed 182 to 214.

Six Republicans voted for it:
Chris Gibson (NY-19)
Louie Gohmert (TX-01)
Walter Jones (NC-03)
Mark Meadows (NC-11)
Mark Sanford (SC-01)
Steve Stockman (TX-09)

Five Democrats voted against it:

Ron Barber (AZ-02)
Dan Maffei (NY-24)
Jim Matheson (UT-04)
Mike McIntyre (NC-07)
Pete Visclosky (IN-01)

Steve Israel (NY-03) offered an amendment to require the CBO to look at a bill's impact on state and local governments as well. It failed 189 to 211.

8 Republicans supported it:

Lou Barletta (PA-11)
Chris Gibson (NY-19)
Walter Jones (NC-03)
Richard Hanna (NY-22)
Tom Massie (KY-04)
Steve Stockman (TX-09)
Tom Reed (NY-23)
Steve Stockman (TX-09)

Two Democrats opposed it: Dan Maffei (NY-24) and Collin Peterson (MN-07).

Sheila Jackson Lee (TX-18) offered an amendment to require the CBO to include as part of their macroeconomic analysis estimates of the potential impact on HUB ZONE areas as defined by the Small Business Act. It failed 185 to 222.

4 Republicans voted for it: Chris Gibson (NY-19), Walter Jones (NC-03), Tim Murphy (PA-18), and Steve Stockman (TX-09).

6 Democrats voted against it:
Alan Grayson (FL-09)
Dan Maffei (NY-24)
Jim Matheson (UT-04)
Ed Perlmutter (CO-07)
Scott Peters (CA-52)
Collin Peterson (MN-07)

18 Democrats Join House Republicans in Taking Another Swing at the Affordable Care Act

Earlier today, the House passed the deceptively titled Save American Workers Act. From whom or what is Congress claiming to save American workers? The Affordable Care Act, of course!

The bill would eliminate language in PPACA that defines a full-time employee as anyone working 30 or more hours a week, and replace it with a 40-hour requirement instead. Under PPACA, companies with 50 or more full-time workers, have to provide health insurance to their workers.

The retail industry, unsurprisingly, had been a large supporter of the bill because it would enable many retailers to get out of providing health insurance.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, the bill would leave 1 million people without employer-based coverage and increase the total number of uninsured to up to 500,000. It would also cost about $100 billion over the next decade.

Most Democrats opposed the bill:

Democrats argued the 30-hour threshold is appropriate, and that changing it to 40 hours would let companies deny people health insurance when they work 39 hours a week. "Now, they will only be forced to reduce hours from 40 to 39, as opposed to 30 to 29," said Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.). "In other words, if you work 39 hours a week, you won't have to be covered."

Most Democrats cited a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis that said the bill would leave 1 million people without employer-based coverage, force most of them onto Medicaid or the ObamaCare exchanges, and leave the rest without insurance.

The CBO also said it would cost $74 billion over 10 years, and most of that is due to reduced penalties collected from employers.

"Essentially, what you are doing here today is saying to many, many people who are working hard and who need insurance that this bill will knock you off your employer-based insurance and increase the number of uninsured by half a million, while increasing the deficit by $74 billion," said Ways and Means Committee ranking member Sandy Levin (D-Mich.). "Ideology is indeed blind when this kind of a proposition is put forth."

However, 18 Democrats still joined the House Republican caucus in voting for the bill: 

Ron Barber (AZ-01)
John Barrow (GA-12)
Ami Bera (CA-07)
Sanford Bishop (GA-02)
Jim Costa (CA-16)
Henry Cuellar (TX-28)
John Delaney (MD-06)
Pete Gallego (TX-23)
Dan Lipinski (IL-03)
Jim Matheson (UT-04)
Mike McIntyre (NC-07)
Patrick Murphy (FL-18)
Scott Peters (CA-52)
Collin Peterson (MN-07)
Nick Rahall (WV-03)
Bradley Schneider (IL-10)
Kurt Schrader (OR-05)
Kyrsten Sinema (AZ-09)

No, Obama, Henry Ford is Not a Good Example for Other Business Owners

Today, in a speech in Ann Arbor, Michigan, President Barack Obama praised Henry Ford as a model for other business owners:

But raising wages is not just a job for organizers, it’s not just a job for elected officials, it’s also a job for business.  It was here in Michigan 100 years ago that Henry Ford announced he was doubling his workers’ wages.  And at the time, some of his fellow business leaders thought he had lost his mind.  But Henry Ford understood it was going to be good for business.  Not only did it boost productivity, not only did it reduce turnover, not only did it make employees more loyal to the company, but it meant that the workers could afford to buy the cars that they were building.  (Applause.)  So you were building -- so by paying your workers more, you were building your own market for your products.

Obama has cited Henry Ford before as well in such a context. 

 

Yes, Henry Ford did raise the wages of his workers. Whether he raised them enough given how much money he himself made is another story. But, more importantly, citing Henry Ford as a positive example of a business owner conveniently avoids how the man was a tyrant and an enemy of labor.
Back in November, I highlighted this in connection to a piece by Robert Reich contrasting Henry Ford (positively) with the Waltons. (Spoiler: They're actually both awful).

I'm excerpting some of what I wrote back then because it remains relevant.

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Let's learn some more about how Henry Ford ran his business. I've extracted some passages from Greg Grandin's excellent book Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford's Forgotten Jungle City. The book itself focuses on Ford's eccentric (and fairly creepy) attempt to recreate an American industrial town in the heart of the Amazon. However, for context, Grandin discusses Ford's history in the States.

Yes, Henry Ford raised his workers' wages, but he did not do so without conditions:

…So Ford conditioned his Five Dollar Day plan with the obligation that workers live a wholesome life.

And to make sure they did, the carmaker dispatched inspectors from his Sociological Department to probe into the most intimate corners of Ford workers’ lives, including their sex lives. Denounced as a system of paternal surveillance as often as it was lauded as a program of civic reform, by 1919 the Sociological Department employed hundreds of agents who spread out over Dearborn and Detroit asking questions, taking notes, and writing up personnel reports. They wanted to know if workers had insurance and how they spent their money and free time. Did they have a bank account? How much debt did they carry? How many times were they married? Did they send money home to the old country? Sociological men came around not just once but two, three, or four times interviewing family members, friends, and landlords to make sure previous reports of probity were accurate (Grandin 38).

By the mid-1920s, the authoritarianism always inherent to such “liberal paternalism” had grown as Ford created a regime based on two primary tactics: the "speedup" and fear. 

 

The first, the speedup, entailed working his employees so hard that they became little different from the machines on which they worked:

The first tactic was the speedup, which pushed the idea of synchronized assembly lines to the limits of human endurance and made working for Ford, as one employee put it, a ‘form of hell on earth that turned human beings into driven robots.’ ‘The chain system you have is a slave driver,’ wrote the wife of one worker to Ford…..Every day it seemed like the belt moved a little faster, as performance technicians, armed with stopwatches, shadowed workers, figuring out ways to shave off seconds here and there from their motions. Intellectuals and social critics began to draw attention to the dehumanization of the line. ‘Never before,’ wrote a contemporary observer, ‘had human beings been fitted so closely into the machines, like minor parts, with no independence or chance to retain their individual self-respect.’ Ford’s factory turned workers into ‘mere containers of labor, like gondola cars of coal. They arrived full; they left in the evening as empty of human vitality as the cars were empty of coal. The trolleys which crawled away from Highland Park at closing time were hearses of the living dead.’ (Grandin 69)

If destroying the will of workers didn't succeed that way, well, there was always outright terror:

Fear was the second tactic, needed to forestall the discontent that such a system inevitably generated. It was instilled largely by Harry Bennett, a former pugilist but inveterate brawler who presided over the company’s so-called Service Department, nominally the employment office but in reality a three-thousand-member goon squad—described by the New York Times as the ‘largest private quasi-military organization in existence’—made up of spies and thugs armed with guns, whips, pipes, blackjacks, and rubber hoses otherwise known as ‘persuaders.’ … The terror spread out from Dearborn to encompass Ford’s dispersed assembly plants as Bennett cobbled together an interstate consortium of antiunion toughs. In Dallas, Texas, for instance, Bennett converted the Ford plant’s champion tug-of-war-war team into a security unit, headed by one ‘Fats’ Perry, who by his own estimation handed out scores of savage beatings. ‘If it takes bloodshed,’ the plant management told its workers during a forced mass meeting, ‘we’ll shed blood right down to the last drop’ to keep the plant union free (70).

Fear, of course, does not just stem from physical violence. Ford had his own mini surveillance state operation.

Bennett claimed that one in three line workers was an informer. ‘The whole city,’ recalled one union organizer, ‘was a network of spies that reported every whisper back to Bennett,’ allowing him to stalk workers not just within the Rouge’s gates but in their ‘private life as well.’ He carried out Ford’s edict that workers stop drinking, even in their own homes, and forced workers, at the pain of losing their jobs, to buy a Ford car.” (70-71)

I'm sorry, but Henry Ford's vision of the economy is not one that I (or any reasonable person should) share. And if liberals want to talk up the value of raising wages, they should find a better example.