Americanly Yours

“However well-intended, government officials are not positioned to make better commercial decisions than lenders in our communities.”

This quote was not said by a conservative congressman, Rush Limbaugh, Thomas Sowell, or a libertarian blogger like myself. This quote was made by Neel Kashkari, the man who is the overseer in charge of the TARP program.

The TARP program is of course attempting to do exactly what Mr. Kashkari says that it shouldnt be doing.

Americanly Yours,

Phred Barnet

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In my post on March 10th, I passed on a request that yall write to your Congressional representatives and ask them to remember the 10th Amendment to our Constitution. I dont know how many of yall did this, but I sent my Representative, Hank Johnson an email.

I wrote him a simple email:

Dear Representative Johnson,

This is a friendly reminder that I still believe in the 10th Amendment. Please represent me.

Thank you,
Phred Barnet

Almost immediately, I received an automated response from him:

Thank you for contacting the office of Congressman Hank Johnson.  We will respond to your e-mail as soon as possible.  Please do not hesitate to contact us in the future.  We are eager to hear your concerns!

I was curious to see whether or not I would receive a response.  I did not have to wait long to get one. Less than an hour later I received this response:

Dear Mr. Barnet,

Thank you for contacting my office. I am always eager to hear from my constituents and appreciate your interest. I hope that my office can be a useful resource to you.

As your congressman, I have had the opportunity to help bring about some substantial reforms and support important initiatives – such as improving conditions for homeownership, expanding access to health care for our children, and bringing increased safety and security to our homeland.

I have also introduced a number of bills that I hope will help to make the lives of all our citizens a little better. One of them will help prosecutors combat public corruption and another preserves your right to a jury trial in consumer disputes. I am also working on expansive legislation to address the predatory lending crisis affecting a number of people in the Fourth District.

I want to reiterate that I depend on people like you to help me as I continue my work for the American people. Please visit my office on-line at www.hankjohnson.house.gov and continue to contact me with your concerns.

Sincerely,
Hank Johnson

This looked like another automated form letter to me.

And yes, I am sure that the above email was intinded to be a response to my question because the subject of the email was:  “Responding to your message.”  I think this response from Representative Johnson was rude.  I took the time to send him a message, a message which he obviously didnt read, and received only an automated response which didnt even address my concerns.  I would have been less offended if I had received no response.

Shame on you, representative Johnson.

Americanly Yours,

Phred Barnet

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I mentioned yesterday that President Obama signed a massive $410,000,000,000 [$410 billion] spending bill loaded with over 8,500 earmarks.

In last year’s campaign, Senator McCain pledged that he would not sign a bill with a single earmark.  Whether or not he would have abided by this pledge is of course unknown to us.  What is known, however, is that President Obama just signed a bill with over 8,500 earmarks which will cost tax payers billions of dollars.

A presidential veto of this bill would have earned Mr. Obama credit with fiscal hawks like myself.

Predictably and pathetically, President Obama blamed the earmarks in the bill on President Bush.  When will this president finally step forward and take responsibility for his own administration?  This has become almost a gut reaction from this President–any criticism of him gets deflected by blaming President Bush.  The earmarks that were in the bill are the responsibility of the Congressmen who placed them into the bill, the Congressmen who voted for the bill, and the President who signed the bill into law.  President Bush is nowhere to be found in this process.

Even more disturbing than the 8,500 earmarks in this bill is the fact that our President has broken a campaign promise by signing this bill.  Check out this CNN clip.

Americanly Yours,

Phred Barnet

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Last night, Congress passed a $410,000,000,000 [$410 billion] spending bill. This bill contained over 8,500 earmarks.

The bill passed in the Senate with 62 votes, 8 of them coming from Republicans.  More interestingly, however, 3 prominent Democrats voted against the bill.  Claire McCaskill voted against the bill, citing her opposition to the earmarks.  Liberal Senator Russ Feingold also voted against the bill for similar reasons, and even released this statement calling on President Obama to veto the bill.

But in my opinion, the most interesting Democratic vote against the spending bill came from Indiana Senator Evan Bayh.  Senator Bayh is a very moderate democrat who is very popular in his state.  He is a fiscal conservative who previously served 8 years as Indiana’s governor, balancing the budget all 8 years without ever raising taxes.  Senator Bayh was so opposed to the bill that he wrote this op-ed in the Wall Street Journal last week calling for Congress to vote against it.  My opinion is that Senator Bayh is positioning himself for a possible insurgent campaign against President Obama in 2012.  If President Obama continues to waste the people’s money on wasteful and counterproductive “stimulus” and bailouts, Senator Bayh may be able to unseat him.  Lets keep a close eye on this one.

Americanly Yours,

Phred Barnet

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Today is March 10th.

http://www.reteaparty.com/2009/03/march-10th-send-washington-dc-a-friendly-reminder/

The organizers of the National Tea Party have requested that we all send an email to our Congressional representatives reminding them about the 10th amendment to our Constitution. The 10th Amendment reads as follows:

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

I urge you to send a message to your representative today to remind them that the Constitution is the “supreme law of the land” and that it shouldnt be ignored.

Americanly Yours,

Phred Barnet

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