OBAMA GETS HIS RINO CHUCK HAGEL; AMERICANS LOSE Allahpundit explains the crazy votes:
The final vote: 58-41, which is a bit closer than the 71-27 margin on cloture earlier today. There are 15 Republicans who think voters are too dumb to realize that the cloture vote is the one that assured Hagel’s confirmation and that, by voting yes on that and no on the meaningless final vote, they can pretend that they “opposed” Hagel. And in fairness, they’re probably right; most voters likely are that dumb. But let’s name those 15 anyway:
Alexander
Ayotte
Blunt
Burr
Chambliss
Coburn
Collins
Corker
Flake
Graham
Hatch
McCain
Murkowski
Sessions
Thune
[…]
I can’t believe a single one of those 15, let alone the scores of Democrats who voted for this guy, seriously believes he’s prepared to run the Defense Department…The next time McCain and Graham pound the table about defense cuts or O’s foreign policy, remember that they both voted to send Chuck Hagel on to the final vote. That’s how serious they are.
As for Republicans voting yes, there were four: Cochran, Johanns, Shelby, and … Rand Paul, who voted no twice on cloture. That’s the most bizarre vote array on a nominee I could imagine.
Liberatarian Rand Paul Voted for Chuck Hagel
Allahpundit writes:
Here’s Paul’s reasoning:
“I voted no because I wanted more information and I think that part of what the Senate does is try to get information about the nominees,” Paul told reporters …“There are many things I disagree with Chuck Hagel on…but the president gets to choose political appointees,” Paul said. […]
If “the president gets to choose political appointees” is sufficient reason to vote yes, then (a) we should get rid of the Senate’s advise-and-consent responsibility and (b) at the very least we should not be filibustering nominees, as Rand Paul voted to do twice. Even if he did that purely to squeeze the White House for more information, why would he vote yes on the final vote when they never gave him that information? And if the president’s entitled to his nominee of choice, why would Paul demand more info about Hagel in the first place? Just rubber-stamp him. Vote yes on every vote, no questions asked.
Even as the Hollywood glitterati ruminate about social responsibility and the need for the wealthy “one percent” to pay their “fair share,” Hollywood millionaires and moguls are bagging an estimated $1.51 billion in tax revenues annually through something called “film tax credits.”
Consider a few of this year’s Oscar nominated films. According to a new report by the Government Accountability Institute, Quentin Tarantino’s controversial spaghetti Western, Django Unchained, featuring Jamie Foxx and Leonardo DiCaprio has applied to receive an estimated $8.4 million in film tax credits from the State of Louisiana. Actor-director Ben Affleck and producer George Clooney’s film, Argo, received $6.21 million in tax credits from the California Film Commission. Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln, featuring Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field, and Tommy Lee Jones, hauled in $3.5 million in tax-free film credits. Silver Linings Playbook bagged a cool $5.6 million.
Indeed, 40 states now have some form of subsidy or incentive that allow filmmakers to defray income and/or sales taxes incurred during filming. Thirteen states even offer so-called “transferrable film tax credits” that allow filmmakers to convert unused credits into cash—at taxpayer expense, of course.
[…]
[T]ax and policy analysts who have studied film tax credit programs say industry claims of job creation are vastly overstated. Worse, say critics, they drain vital state resources from things like education and healthcare.
[…]
What’s more, the Tax Foundation says “that states lose money by offering tax credits for film production” and that “movie production incentives are costly and fail to live up to their promises” because “they create mostly temporary positions with limited options for upward mobility.”
2011 Obama defends automatic spending cuts(Nov. 21, 2011):
“Already some in Congress are trying to undo these automatic spending cuts. My message to them is simple: No.” “I will veto any effort to get rid of those automatic spending cuts to domestic and defense spending.”
2013 Obama predicts Armageddon if sequester cuts go through(Feb. 19, 2013):
“So these cuts are not smart. They are not fair. They will hurt our economy. They will add hundreds of thousands of Americans to the unemployment rolls. This is not an abstraction — people will lose their jobs.”
