Under Record Spending, The Deficit Is Great Again

A popular meme from a few years ago was based around Heath Ledger’s portrayal of the Joker in the 2008 film, The Dark Knight. In the movie, the Joker contrasts the different reaction to threatening different people.  

“If, tomorrow, I tell the press that, like, a gang banger will get shot, or a truckload of soldiers will be blown up, nobody panics, because it's all 'part of the plan,'” Ledger’s Joker opined, “But when I say that one little old mayor will die, well then everyone loses their minds!”

These days the deficit is a lot like that.

Currently, it’s easy to imagine (as I memed on my Facebook page) the Joker saying, “A Democrat runs a trillion dollar deficit and everyone loses their minds; a Republican does it and no one cares.”

The Treasury Department announced yesterday that the federal budget deficit for the fiscal year to date was 23 percent higher than for the same period last year. The deficit for the current fiscal year, which began last October, stands at $747.1 billion and is forecast to top $1 trillion by the end of the fiscal year.

As some Republicans have noted, the 2017 tax reform bill was followed by record-high federal revenues, but this was not enough to prevent the massive deficit for two reasons. The first reason is that federal spending also reached a record high, $3.36 trillion for the period. Per the Office of Management and Budget, federal spending has increased dramatically under President Trump. In 2016, federal outlays were $3.852 trillion and this year the government is expected to spend $4.529 trillion.

Increased spending is only half the equation, however. While federal revenues are at a record high, they have grown at a slower rate than federal spending. This is due in large part to tax reform. While tax receipts did increase after tax reform, they fell far below the Congressional Budget Office projection. The OMB tables show flat revenues between 2017 and 2018 when tax reform took effect, followed by a modest increase projected for 2019.

In 2017, I saw corporate tax reform as necessary to keep American companies competitive in a world economy where the US corporate tax rate was among the highest in the world. However, President Trump’s decision to launch numerous tariff wars in the wake of tax reform has almost totally offset the benefit of the lower income tax rates, resulting in sluggish growth and flatter tax revenues. In any case, the dramatic increases in federal spending, including billions to aid farmers hurt by the unnecessary and ill-advised trade wars, was the wrong policy prescription after a tax cut.

Under President Obama, Republicans took a hard line on the deficit and the federal debt limit. Speaker John Boehner, much maligned by conservatives, used the sequester to cut federal spending in real dollars, not merely reducing the amount of increases. Increases to the debt ceiling were paired with cuts to spending. The OMB data shows that federal outlays declined in 2012 and 2013. One must look back to the Eisenhower Administration to find similar spending cuts in consecutive years.

Now, as the government approaches the debt ceiling yet again, there is no sign of fiscal restraint from the Trump Administration. Mr. Trump’s proposed budget for 2020 is the largest ever at $4.75 trillion. In March, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin asked Congress to pass a clean bill, one with no spending constraints, to increase the debt ceiling. Earlier this week, White House Economic Advisor Larry Kudlow said of the $22.5 trillion national debt, “I don't see this as a huge problem at all right now.”

But the debt and the deficit do represent a huge problem, even if the Trump Administration and Republicans now fail to recognize them as such. When the deficit tops $1 trillion this year, it will be in the midst of peacetime and a strong economy. The last time that the deficit exceeded $1 trillion it was in 2012, in the wake of President Obama’s stimulus spending after the Great Recession. With President Trump’s massive deficits in good times, there is absolutely no realistic plan to reduce the deficit at any point in the near future, especially if the economy sours.

While the debt limit must ultimately be increased to avoid the financial chaos of a default, it should be paired with spending cuts under the successful Boehner strategy. However, Speaker Nancy Pelosi is pushing in the opposite direction. Fortune reported that House Democrats were advocated for a vote that would pair the increase to the debt limit with a spending bill that would increase the deficit by as much as $300 billion.

Even the House Freedom Caucus has been silent about the looming increase to the debt limit. The group has instead focused on rebuking Rep. Justin Amash for his stance on impeachment. A search for recent comments about federal overspending and borrowing from caucus members yielded nothing.

It seems that if there are any fiscal hawks left in Washington that they are in full retreat.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Trump Refuses To Stay Down, Requests $8.6 Billion For Wall In 2020

In a move that exemplifies President Trump’s reputation as a fighter, the White House plans to ask Congress to approve $8.6 billion for a border wall in the 2020 budget. The move comes only weeks after a stinging defeat in which the president was forced to accept a spending package that reopened the government without funding for Mr. Trump’s signature project. It seems unlikely that the 2020 funding request will be any more successful, but, like a beaten and bloody boxer who just won’t quit, President Trump refuses to stay down for the count.

Reuters reports that the proposal is based on a 2017 Customs and Border Protection plan to build or replace 722 miles of barriers along the border. The cost for the entire project is $18 billion. So far, 111 miles of the project have been completed or are under construction after Congress approved $341 million in 2017 and $1.375 billion in 2018. The estimated cost of the barrier is about $25 million per mile.

After Congress rejected his 2018 request for $5.7 billion, Mr. Trump declared a national emergency and attempted to redirect $8.1 billion from other projects to the wall. The House has already voted to block the president’s emergency declaration and the Senate is likely to follow suit this week. There are already lawsuits challenging the national emergency declaration as well, leaving an uncertain future for these redirected funds.

“It gives the president the ability to say he has fulfilled his commitment to gain operational control of the southwest border,” an administration official said of the 2020 budget request. A second added, “It’s a question of, will Congress allow us to finish the job.”

The Trump Administration’s request for 2020 seems likely to be dead on arrival in Congress. With Democrats in control of the House of Representatives, where spending bills originate, the money is unlikely to be included in appropriations. Even in the Republican-controlled Senate, Democrats have enough votes to filibuster a bill that includes funding for the wall. The situation sets up a repeat of the budgetary showdown from last December that led to the government shutdown and ultimate Republican capitulation.

“Congress refused to fund his wall and he was forced to admit defeat and reopen the government. The same thing will repeat itself if he tries this again. We hope he learned his lesson,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a joint statement, in which they called the wall “expensive and ineffective.”

Indeed, there is evidence to suggest that the wall won’t be as effective as President Trump claims. Testing in 2017 showed that the wall prototypes built by the Trump Administration were easy to penetrate and many unfenced areas of the border are unsuitable for a defensive wall in the first place. Statistics from Customs and Border Patrol also call into question the effectiveness of the wall at stopping drug smugglers. The CBP found that about 90 percent of illegal drugs are smuggled through ports of entry rather than unfenced areas of the border. Other smuggling uses tunnels under existing border fences.

Border protection is one of the few parts of the government that is slated for an increase in the 2020 budget request. On Fox News Sunday, White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said, “The president is proposing roughly a five percent across-the-board reduction in domestic spending accounts.”

In contrast, the Administration is asking for a five percent increase for the Department of Homeland Security. This figure includes a 22 percent increase in funding for Customs and Border Protection and a 16 percent increase for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. In addition to the wall funding, the proposal would authorize 2,800 more law enforcement agents and 100 immigration judge teams. In January, The Resurgent reported that despite an authorization from Congress to hire thousands of new Border Patrol agents, the agency had only been able to recruit 120 people.

If President Trump’s request to spend more money on the border is likely to go unheeded, his request to cut the budget of other domestic agencies will probably fare no better. Democrats have proven unwilling to cut programs that are not defense-related, even as the national debt climbs above $22 trillion. The budget deficit for the current fiscal year has already increased by 77 percent amid increased spending on the military and entitlements and flat revenues following the 2017 tax reform.

Congress won’t approve President Trump’s budget request for either the wall funding or the spending cuts, but the request will ensure that the debate over border security won’t go away before the 2020 election. The arguments next year may be similar to those heard ahead of the 2018 midterms. While Republican candidates reprise their base-pleasing call to “Build the wall,” Democrats are likely to use the skyrocketing deficit as part of their case against re-electing President Trump. 

Originally published on The Resurgent

White House Asks Congress To Rescind Spending

In March, Republicans were outraged that their party, with control of both houses of Congress and the presidency, would pass an omnibus spending bill that increased federal spending by $143 billion. In April, the Wall Street Journal’s Kimberly Strassel proposed using a little-known law to rescind some of the spending. Now it looks as though the Trump Administration is actually going to do it.

Politico reports that the White House plans to ask Congress to rescind $15 billion in spending. The figure is higher than the $11 billion originally proposed by the White House, but lower than the increase in spending over this year’s original discretionary spending caps.

“It's better than nothing,” Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio), a member of Freedom Caucus, told The Hill. Davidson added that the savings might be applied toward Trump’s infrastructure spending requests.

Rescinding congressionally authorized spending is allowed by the 1974 Impoundment Act. As The Resurgent described in April, the president can order the rescission of specific funds under the little-used act. Congress must then approve the rescission within 45 days. Unlike most bills, the Senate can approve the rescission request with a simple majority vote that is not subject to a filibuster. When the request is submitted, the money is frozen for 45 days or until Congress rejects the measure.

Politico notes that the $15 billion in proposed cuts will not come from the 2018 omnibus bill, but will consist of unspent money from previous years. Republican leaders resisted the temptation to target the omnibus, which was negotiated with Democrat leaders. Congressional leaders were concerned that breaking the deal with Democrats would endanger future negotiations. Instead, the funds will be cut from money that was authorized but never spent on programs such as the 2009 stimulus, Obamacare and the Ebola response.

The cuts represent a minute portion of the federal budget, but passage may still present a challenge for Republicans. The House overwhelmingly approves of the cuts, but margins are slimmer in the Senate. The 51-vote Republican majority can be stymied by only two senators crossing the aisle to vote with Democrats against the request.

“This is not a deficit reduction exercise, but more of a public relations exercise to soothe the base and convince them that the White House is fiscally responsible,” said G. William Hoagland, a senior vice president at the Bipartisan Policy Center. “If they are finding unused budget authority and putting that in a special package to Congress as appropriators are trying to put together the [fiscal] 2019 bill, it may have the effect of creating more spending for 2019 rather than less.”

The cuts will barely be a blip on the federal deficit, which is slated to increase to more than $1 trillion annually by the time Trump leaves office in 2020. The massive cuts needed to eliminate the deficit require reform to entitlement programs such Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Healthcare and Social Security alone make up 53 percent of the federal budget.

Nevertheless, any decrease in government spending is a positive step as well as a rare one. Republicans should be applauded if they can pull it off.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Why Federal Deficit Spending Will Never Be Fixed. Ever.

If there was any notion that the Trump Administration was fiscally conservative, those beliefs should be reconsidered in light of last week’s bipartisan spending deal and the president’s spending proposals from the State of the Union speech. Despite the Republican victory on tax reform, it seems that the party is veering toward massive spending increases rather than fiscal restraint and entitlement reform.

Rand Paul (R-Ky.) was one of the few congressional voices that spoke out against the spending bill. In a speech on the Senate floor, Paul described why Congress is unlikely to ever resolve the problem of deficit spending. Ever.

“The right cries out, 'Our military is hollowed out!' Even though military spending more than doubled since 2001,” Paul said. “The left is no better. Democrats don't oppose military money as long as they can get some for themselves... for their pet causes.”

“The dirty little secret is that, by and large, both parties don't care about the debt,” the senator charged.

The truth that Paul stumbled upon is that neither party can spend taxpayer money on its own. The Democrats want to spend on entitlements and social programs, but don’t have the votes by themselves. The Republicans have their own priorities, among them the military and up to $67 billion for President Trump’s border wall. Even though they have majorities in both houses, the Republicans don’t have the votes to pass a budget on their own either. On the other hand, when both parties come together in a bipartisan compromise, they have enough votes to spend like the proverbial drunken sailor.

Neither party sees their priorities as frivolous. Both see themselves as patriotic lawmakers looking out for the wellbeing of their constituents. They agree to each other’s priorities to secure their own and the deficit goes up and the national debt continues to mount.

There have been pauses in the trend. When Republicans won control of the House in the Tea Party wave of 2010, they kept a tight grip on the federal checkbook. Under Speaker John Boehner, the Republicans reduced spending in real dollar terms and reduced the deficit by 70 percent, thanks to the sequester’s spending caps. Nevertheless, the borrowing continued and the debt continued to grow, albeit at a slower rate. In the late 1990s, a booming economy paired with spending cuts actually led to federal surpluses for a few years.

By the end of Barack Obama’s second term, the federal debt had almost doubled. The US debt to GDP ratio reached 108 percent. This is far behind Japan with a 240 percent ratio and Greece at 180 percent, but the level of debt is generally acknowledged to be at a serious problem. The Keynesian ideal of deficit spending in times of crisis has given way to deficit spending to avoid a financial crisis.

Where Rand is incorrect is in his hostility to military spending, a constitutional mission of the federal government. Paul argues that “military spending more than doubled since 2001,” but fails to consider how much the world changed on Sept. 11, 2001. Two wars and numerous missions against Islamic terrorism are only the most obvious aspect of the problem. Chinese and Russian expansionism represent serious Cold War-like threats.

In 2016, under President Obama, military leaders said that sequestration was a serious threat to military readiness. Budget cuts have led to difficulties in replacing and upgrading equipment. Financial limitations have also impacted training and troop retention.

Military spending is costly, but it is not the largest share of the federal budget. Defense and security spending (including veterans programs) make up only 20 percent of federal outlays. Over half of the federal budget is made up of health care spending (28 percent) and Social Security (25 percent). It is entitlements that are breaking the federal budget.

Democrats may get the lion’s share of the blame for entitlement spending, but the truth is that it is a bipartisan problem. Conservative voters claim to favor spending cuts, but quickly change their tune when the discussion moves to reforming Social Security. They have bought into the fiction that their “contributions” to Social Security are held into an account for when they retire. In reality, Social Security taxes are quickly spent on current retirees as soon as they are received. (If you think your payments to Social Security are a voluntary “contribution,” try not paying them.)

Speaker Paul Ryan is one of the few politicians of either party to dare to even mention entitlement reform. For his bravery, he is shown in Democrat ads pushing an old lady off a cliff. His own party was no better. When Ryan voted for the 2013 budget deal that included cuts in military retirement pay, he was skewered by Republicans even though the bill was supported by military leaders.  

In the end, Rand Paul is right. Neither party cares about the debt, at least not enough to allow cuts to their favorite programs, although they are more than willing to cut the other party’s pet projects. The minority party becomes a deficit hawk to use the deficit as a club to beat their opponents and roles reverse when the parties change control. The few politicians who want to make real spending reforms are opposed by both parties.

There will be no spending reform for the foreseeable future. The US government will continue to spend like a billionaire’s wife in Saks Fifth Avenue as long as it can borrow. With the dollar maintaining strength and few other bastions of stability for world investments, many assume that purchases of treasury bonds will never stop.

But one day, sooner or later, interest payments will combine with other budget items to exceed the government’s ability to borrow. The government will not be able to pay its bills. When that day comes, members of both parties will have to get serious about spending cuts regardless of what their voters think.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Rise of the Big Government Republicans

The Republican Party seems to have turned a corner in recent months. After a promising start to the Trump Administration that included regulatory reform and concluded with a long-awaited tax reform bill, the party seems to have taken an abrupt turn away from fiscal conservatism toward big government and big spending policies.

The most obvious sign of the shift is the new budget signed by President Trump this week. The new budget raises spending caps by $300 billion. The first Trump budget raises spending by about $500 billion over the 2017 budget signed by Barack Obama.

The new budget also includes increases to the debt ceiling through March 2019. Previously, Republicans tied spending cuts to increases in the debt ceiling, but no more. The new budget increases military spending by $165 billion and nonmilitary programs by $131 billion. The funds include $10 billion for infrastructure, $2.9 billion for childcare and $3 billion to fight opioid abuse.

Predictably, the massive spending increases will dramatically increase the deficit. Even before the deal became law, the Washington Post reported that borrowing for the 2018 fiscal year was expected to reach its highest level in the past six years, a date that coincides with the Republican takeover of Congress in the 2010 Tea Party wave.

The national debt has already reached crisis levels, as Vice President Mike Pence realized during the campaign. President Obama nearly doubled the debt in eight years, bringing it to more than 100 percent of GDP. The continued increases in deficit are bringing the US Treasury into Greek territory.

There are indications that more increases in spending are to come. President Trump has proposed a $1.5 trillion infrastructure spending plan. Perhaps coincidentally, the price tag for Trump’s plan is almost exactly double that of President Obama’s infrastructure stimulus bill from 2009. All that is lacking are promises jobs from shovel-ready projects.

Similarly, Republicans seem ready to embrace a new family leave entitlement that is championed by both Donald and Ivanka Trump. The plan includes paid time off for six weeks for new parents courtesy of the federal government.

Other Republican big government priorities are not new. Trade protectionism was growing in the party even before Donald Trump vaulted to its head. Under President Trump, free trade has taken a beating as tariffs have been imposed and trade deals renegotiated. One of Trump’s first acts was to withdraw the US from the TPP free trade agreement. In the end, trade restrictions hurt American businesses and consumers by increasing the cost of goods.

Immigration policy has long been a big government aspect of the Republican platform as well. Most Republicans support border security, but immigration hardliners favor a crackdown to deport illegal immigrants that would require an expanded federal police bureaucracy.

Deportation of illegal immigrant workers would be expensive and counterproductive. CNN reported in 2016 that it cost more than $10,000 to deport each illegal immigrant. At the same time, deportations can result in labor shortages than increase costs for employers and ultimately for consumers as well.

Perhaps it isn’t surprising that Republicans would jettison their promises of fiscal restraint. After all, the same pattern has been followed several times in the past few decades. What is surprising is the extent and the speed with which they have done so.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Trump Administration to propose balancing budget

The complete proposed budget for Donald Trump’s first fiscal year will not be released until next week, but advance word is that the president will propose a plan to balance the federal budget within 10 years. The budget will reportedly ask for cuts in federal entitlement programs in conjunction with an overhaul of the tax and regulatory system.

The Wall Street Journal reports that the plan will not include cuts to the two largest drivers of future spending, Medicare and Social Security, but will ask for trillions of dollars in cuts to discretionary spending such as education, housing, environment programs and foreign aid as well as nondiscretionary spending in programs such as food stamps, Medicaid and federal employee-benefit programs.

The budget will also include budget increases that were announced in the budget blueprint released in March. One of the largest increases in funding would go to the military, which was slated for an additional $54 billion to be split between the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security. There is also likely to be additional infrastructure spending, a new entitlement for paid parental leave and border security measures.

The Journal notes that the budget does not include the details of the tax reform, but is likely to estimate the Republican tax reform as revenue neutral. Rate cuts would be offset by the elimination of tax breaks so that a Congressional Budget Office estimate would show no loss of revenue.

Balancing the budget will require growth as well as spending cuts. “The way we balanced the budget in the 1990s is we had spending restraint and GDP growth caught up—government revenues caught up, as the GDP growth came in,” Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney said. “That’s what we’re trying to get back to.”

White House estimates of growth are much more optimistic than CBO estimates. The White House estimates three percent growth by 2021 while the CBO forecasts a 1.9 percent growth rate. Economists polled by the Journal estimate growth at 2.3 percent if Mr. Trump’s policies are enacted.

Conflicts over the growth rate may make it hard for the Trump Administration to find support among budget hawks for its spending increases. “I am extremely pessimistic that you can show a balanced budget unless you’re going to make the mother of all ‘rosy scenario’ type assumptions,” said William Hoagland, a former Republican budget aide who is now senior vice president at the Bipartisan Policy Center.

The spending cuts are also certain to draw fire from Democrats. Expect much weeping, gnashing of teeth and rending of garments over the proposed slashing of funds for safety net programs. Some moderate Republicans are also likely to object, making it extremely unlikely that the full measure of the cuts will become law.

House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said as much on Thursday, claiming, “It is an ideological document, not a document that will ever be utilized.”

The budget is slated to be released next Tuesday, while President Trump is touring Europe and the Middle East. Given Mr. Trump’s problems over the past two weeks, that may increase Republican chances of getting the budget passed. 

Originally published on The Resurgent

Federal Hiring Freeze Ends But Restructuring Continues

It was good while it lasted.

President Trump is ending the federal hiring freeze that he put into place in January as one of his first acts as president. The freeze excluded military personnel and key posts in the Departments of Defense, State and the Veteran’s Administration.

Under the exemptions, the Department of Labor estimates that the federal government hired about 4,000 people in January and 2,000 in February. These include staffers to help reduce the backlog of claims at the VA, which recently topped 100,000.

The upside is that even though federal agencies can resume hiring, it will be at a slower pace. Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney said that some positions would be permanently unfilled. The elimination of the freeze “does not mean that the agencies will be free to hire willy-nilly,” he told the NBC. “What we're doing tomorrow [Wednesday] is replacing the across-the-board hiring freeze that we put into place on Day One in office and replacing it with a smarter plan, a more strategic plan, a more surgical plan.”

Mulvaney said that federal agencies will be required to submit plans to make themselves leaner and more cost-effective. Even agencies that are slated to receive increased funding under the proposed Trump budget will be required to eliminate redundant and inefficient activities and positions.

“The government reorg is probably the biggest story nobody is talking about,” Mulvaney told the Wall Street Journal. “We’re trying to do something that’s never been done.”

The Trump Administration had ordered agencies to start from scratch in their planning. Mulvaney admits that many of the proposed changes will need congressional approval and said that he was confident that a bipartisan agreement could be reached on improving the government. Under Senate rules, at least eight Democrats need to vote for cloture before the Senate can vote on proposed bills.

“We're not trying to ram it down their throats,” he said.

“This is a big part of draining the swamp,” Mulvaney said. “What you’re talking about doing is restructuring Washington, D.C. and that is how you drain the swamp… This is a centerpiece of his campaign and a centerpiece of his administration.”

Originally published on the Resurgent

Elmo Gets Fired in Liberal Video Attacking Trump Budget

A new parody video from WhatsTrending.com purports to show what might happen behind the scenes at PBS and the Children’s Television Workshop due to President Trump’s proposed budget. Most of the claims made by the video are off target. Nevertheless, the parody does expose the liberal mindset on the arts, jobs, healthcare and government funding.

In the sketch, Elmo is being laid off because, as his boss says, “the Trump Administration is cutting all arts and education funding from the new congressional budget.” There is truth to this statement. The Trump budget calls for elimination of the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Institute of Museum and Library Services, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Defunding the federal subsidies of the arts would not kill art, Sesame Street or PBS, however. PBS funding was an issue in the 2012 election when Mitt Romney said, “I love Big Bird… but I’m not going to keep on spending money on things that we have to borrow money from China to pay for.”

At the time, PBS CEO Paula Kerger discussed PBS funding on “The Fix.” “Communities treasure their public stations, and it’s individual philanthropy in those communities that actually makes public television work,” Kerger said. “We get about 15 percent — that’s one-five percent — of our funding, in aggregate, from the federal government. That actually goes to our stations, not to me, and that really enables public broadcasting to be seen in communities that may not have the economic means to sustain it. States like Alaska for example, where 50 percent of the funding to maintain that infrastructure comes from the federal government.”

That’s right. Eighty-five percent of PBS funding comes from sources other than the federal government. According to recent figures from Fortune, the federal government spends only $450 million on PBS and NPR combined. That amount could be easily made up by corporate donations, especially if corporations could improve their bottom lines in other ways, for instance a cut in the corporate tax rate.

The threat of firing Elmo was even too outlandish for the Huffington Post. The liberal site pointed out a recent tweet by Sesame Street that confirms that the show does not receive any funding from PBS or the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

So how does Sesame Street get its funding? It is already funded by an (evil?) corporation. Since 2015, HBO has financed the classic children’s show. The partnership with HBO still allows PBS to broadcast Sesame Street episodes at no charge and even allows the show to produce more episodes than while it was funded by PBS. HBO’s partnership with Sesame Street is an example of free markets at work.

Elmo also worries about his insurance and pre-existing conditions in the video. This reflects the liberal belief that jobs are vehicles to provide workers with insurance, a core tenet of Obamacare.

In reality, jobs exist to provide economic benefits to the employer. If a job is not producing benefits for the person or company paying the worker’s salary, then the job is not sustainable. A company cannot pay more in salaries and benefits than it earns in revenues. Jobs that are not producing wealth (or aiding others in producing wealth) should probably be cut for the good of the company.

This is why Obamacare and increases in minimum wage adversely affect the job market. By making it more expensive to hire workers, the workers must produce more to justify their employment. All too often the result is fewer jobs, especially for unskilled, entry level workers.

“Elmo, you’re going to land on your feet,” the boss says. “Don’t worry.”

We know this is true. Elmo is a celebrity who could easily find a job on another children’s show. Elmo could make a lucrative deal licensing himself for toys and other merchandise. Who can forget the Tickle Me Elmo craze of 1996?

If PBS has a product that people want to buy, then it will survive. Elmo and Sesame Street will thrive in the private marketplace. It’s the shows that no one wants to watch -or pay for - that should be worried.

Originally published on The Resurgent

OMB Director: Trump budget rebuilds military, cuts waste

A big concern for many conservatives has been President Trump’s promises of increased spending in many areas. Trump’s promises of more money for the military and infrastructure have many worried that the increased spending will explode the deficit. However, the director of the Office of Management and Budget pointed out in a new budget blueprint that Trump’s spending increases will be offset by cuts in other areas.

In the Washington Free Beacon, OMB Director Mick Mulvaney said, “This is the ‘America First' budget. In fact, we wrote it using the president's own words—we went through his speeches, articles that have been written about his policies, we talked to him, and we wanted to know what his policies were, and we turned those policies into numbers.”

A big winner in the first Trump budget is defense, which is slated for a $54 billion increase split between the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security. The Defense Department budget would be increased by nine percent and Homeland Security by seven percent.

“We've worked very closely with the Defense Department to make sure, a couple of things, that this funds their needs but does so in a responsible fashion in terms of what they can actually spend this year,” Mulvaney said. “The Defense Department has told us this is the amount of money they need and can spend effectively this year. We are not throwing money after a problem and claiming that we have fixed it.”

The budget also allocates $4.1 billion over two years for Mr. Trump’s border wall. The figures for the first two years include tests to determine the efficiency and safety of different types of barriers. Mulvaney noted that a 10-year cost projection would accompany the full budget when it is released in May.

Mulvaney pointed out that these spending increases would be offset by cuts in other parts of the budget. “You will see reductions exactly where you would expect it from a president who just ran on an ‘America First’ campaign,” Mulvaney said. “You’ll see reductions in many agencies as he tries to shrink the role of government, drive efficiencies, go after waste, duplicative programs, those types of things.”

“The president ran saying he would spend less money overseas and more money back home,” Mulvaney said. “So when you go to implement that policy you go to things like foreign aid, and those get reduced. If those had been in the Department of Education you'd see a dramatic decrease in education.”

In fact, the Department of Education’s budget was cut overall, but charter school funding and school choice programs saw an increase. Some of the other notable items in the budget blueprint include:

• ·         Cuts Homeland Security grants to local and state agencies
• ·         Raises TSA security fees for airline passengers
• ·         Eliminates funding for 49 National Historic Sites
• ·         Cuts funding to reimburse state and local governments for detaining illegal immigrants
• ·         Increases funding and lawyers for illegal immigrant removal
• ·         Eliminates climate change prevention programs
• ·         Reduces funding for UN peacekeeping
• ·         Privatizes the air traffic control system
• ·         Eliminates funding for many transportation projects
• ·         Cuts NASA budget by one percent

According to the Washington Post, the big losers in the new budget are the Environmental Protection Agency and the State Department, which lose almost a third of their budgets. The Department of Agriculture and the Labor Department also received cuts greater than 20 percent. Other departments on the chopping block with cuts of more than 10 percent included Health and Human Services, Commerce, Education, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, and Interior.

The full budget will be released in May and will include more detail on the cuts and a 10-year projection for entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicaid. Entitlement and safety net programs make up more than half of the federal budget according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. The full budget is subject to approval and amendment by Congress.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Cromnibus compromise shows GOP is ready for primetime

Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Cromnibus

While some conservatives have denounced the passage of the “cromnibus,” a combination of the abbreviation for “continuing resolution” and omnibus, the passage of the annual appropriations bill is a good thing for the Republican Party and the country. It shows that most Republicans are serious about governing, and that they can work with Democrats to find common ground for the good of the country. Since the new Republican congressional class has not yet taken office, the cromnibus compromise should be viewed as the last hurrah of Harry Reid’s (D-NV) Democratic Senate rather than a bill that sets the tone on policy for the incoming Republican majority.

Déjà vu all over again

Many conservatives opposed the cromnibus because they saw it as an opportunity to defund President Obama’s executive amnesty. Others wanted to begin the process of cutting government spending after the huge success in this year’s elections. The problem with these strategies is the same problem that led to the defeat of the Obamacare defunding attempt; Harry Reid’s Senate will not pass such a bill.

A showdown over the cromnibus would have had the same result as the disastrous attempt to defund Obamacare last year. The government shutdown that resulted from the defunding attempt was overwhelmingly blamed on Republicans and it cost the party dearly in terms of approval ratings. The Republican success in November was not due to their role in the shutdown; it was in spite of it. The Democratic collapse on issues ranging from Obamacare to the economy to foreign policy was the driver for the midterm elections.

The fact that another government shutdown would have been a bad idea for Republicans is underscored by two facts. First, the combative Republican candidates who challenged GOP incumbents in primaries lost. In several cases, they lost by slim margins, but Republican voters clearly rejected the shut-it-down, take-no-prisoners mentality of the Senate Conservatives Fund. Second, a Gallup poll from just before the election confirms that American voters want their congressional representatives to get things done, not stand in the way. A McClatchy-Marist poll released December 16 found that 70 percent of voters want the parties to compromise. Only 26 percent favor a stand that might lead to a government shutdown.

Bitter pills for Democrats

The cromnibus may not have been popular with conservatives, but that doesn’t mean that the Republicans didn’t gain from it. The American Spectator noted that “Republicans came out on top” in the negotiations. Provisions in the bill that conservatives should applaud include:

· Higher limits on political donations, a roll back of campaign finance reform laws

· Repeal of some Dodd-Frank restrictions on banks

· Exemption of farm ponds and irrigation ditches from EPA regulation under the Clean Water Act

· Repeal of EPA regulations that count cattle farts as greenhouse gases

· Extension of the federal moratorium on internet taxes

· Delay of enforcement of federal light bulb restrictions

· Ban on use of tax money to bail out insurance companies for Obamacare losses

· A $346 million dollar cut to the IRS budget

· Relaxation of the school lunch standards favored by Michelle Obama

Laying groundwork for the amnesty battle

Some conservatives have complained about the fact that the cromnibus extends most of the government funding through the end of the fiscal year in September, but this criticism is misplaced as well. Federal budgets, normally an annual matter, have rarely been passed in the Obama era. Funding the government through the end of the year will give lawmakers time to properly address and negotiate the 2016 budget, rather than spending their first few months dealing with matters that should have been handled last year.
The budget for the Department of Homeland Security is the exception. The budget for the DHS, the agency tasked with implementing President Obama’s executive amnesty, is only funded through February according to Forbes’ analysis of the bill. The DHS budget will be where the battle over Obama’s actions takes place early next year. Republicans will have the advantage of a majority in both houses of Congress at that point.

No Cruz control

The cromnibus vote gives an indication of the ability of John Boehner and Mitch McConnell to assemble a working bipartisan majority on at least some issues. This will allow some of the more independent Republicans to defect on certain issues - perhaps immigration, for instance – without killing the entire bill.

Cobbling together a majority will be even easier in the next term because the incoming GOP freshmen are unlikely to join the rogue faction led by Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Mike Lee (R-UT). The Washington Examiner reported in November that the new senators had broad support from the various factions of the Republican Party and called them “political hybrids,” while Mitch McConnell (R-KY), the incoming majority leader, said, “The vast majority of them don’t feel they were sent to Washington to just fight all the time.” The Tea Party conservatives, most of who lost in the primaries, would have been much more likely to follow Cruz’s lead.

The cromnibus has also shown that when Cruz and company split from the rest of the Republicans, Democrats may be willing to cross the aisle. As Obama’s agenda becomes less popular, more and more Democrats may be willing to go their separate ways from the president. This was evident in the cromnibus votes as Elizabeth Warren, the progressive left’s new standard bearer, led a faction to oppose the compromise supported by President Obama.

Meeting in the middle

Even if Cruz and his allies stand with the rest of the GOP, it will be necessary to court disaffected and vulnerable Democrats. As the Republicans advance their agenda, it is likely that President Obama will veto much of their legislation. The new Republican caucus can pass bills, but falls short of the 67 votes needed to override a presidential veto. Compromise with Democrats will be necessary to enact many major reforms, including but not limited to repealing and replacing Obamacare.

The biggest boon to the Republican Party may be that the cromnibus shows that the party is mature enough to build a bipartisan majority that can get things done. In the House, a majority of Democrats opposed the bill although a many voted in favor. In the Senate, the bill passed with a majority of both parties. This was in spite of strong opposition from both the Cruz and Warren wings of their respective parties. In essence, the two parties met in the middle to form a workable consensus.

As long as the Republicans are able to work with moderate Democrats to find a consensus, they will be able to advance at least part of their agenda. While repealing Obamacare is probably not in the cards, repealing particularly odious part of it, such as the medical device tax and the individual mandate, might be. There are many examples of such low-hanging fruit where Republicans and Democrats can find common ground for the good of the country. Showing that Congress can function again will, in turn, help Republicans in 2016.

 

Read it on Examiner.com

Jefferson Davis capture site park threatened by funding catch-22

In early May 1865, the Confederacy was in its last throes. Robert E. Lee had surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia a month earlier. According to the History of Irwin County, Confederate president Jefferson Davis, along with his family and a party of escorts, held the Confederacy’s last cabinet meeting at the home of Robert Toombs in Washington, Ga. It was decided that Davis and his family should make for a port where they could sail for safety in England. From Washington, the group moved southwest, eventually making camp just north of Irwinville, Ga.

Unbeknownst to the Davis and his party, the group was being trailed by members of the First Wisconsin and Fourth Michigan cavalry regiments of the Union army. The Yankees split into two groups, one reaching Irwinville ahead of Davis and doubling back while the other followed the Confederates.

According to the New Georgia Encylopedia, the Union soldiers found Davis’ camp in the early morning hours of May 10, 1865. In the darkness, the two groups of Yankees fought a brief battle with themselves in which two soldiers were killed. In the end, Jefferson Davis was captured after throwing on the cape to man’s overcoat, which later led to rumors that he was disguised in women’s clothing.

The site of the skirmish and Davis’ capture was purchased by Reuben Clements in 1865 and his son, Honorable J.B. Clements deeded the land to the State of Georgia in 1920 for the creation of a park. In 1939, a monument was erected to mark the spot where Davis was captured and a museum was built by FDR’s Works Progress Administration. According to GPB, the site was officially established as a state park in 1997, which eventually included a walking trail, picnic tables and shelters, a playground and a gift shop.

After the onset of the Great Recession in 2008, state budget cuts threatened the closure of a number of parks around the state. Several of these parks were transferred from the state to local governments according to a report from Yahoo at the time. In June 2009, the Jefferson Davis Memorial Historic Site was transferred to Irwin County.

John Hughes, the site manager for Irwin County, says that a catch-22 in the transfer was that the state owed money on several bonds that used the Davis park as collateral. Hughes told Examiner that the deed could not be transferred to Irwin County until the liens were removed from the property. Due to the fact that Irwin County does not own the park, county bylaws prohibit the local government from spending money on the park’s structures.

Hughes said that the park and its facilities were in good condition when the park’s operations were transferred from the state, but, almost immediately, problems started to mount. One of the first problems was a lightning strike to the park’s well. After five years, normal wear and tear has led to the need for costly repairs to the park’s septic system and the museum’s roof needs to be replaced.

Cuts have already deeply impacted the park. When the state operated the park, there were four employees and an annual budget of $139,000 according to Hughes, who has worked at the park for ten years. After Irwin County assumed control, three employees were laid off, leaving only Hughes. The park’s budget is now $36,000. Hughes was told that the state had signed a five year contract with the county that will be up in June 2014. Hughes said that he was told that the bonds originally had a balance of $200,000 in 2009, but that the balance to be paid was now at $400,000, making it seem that Irwin County was further than ever from taking full possession of the land that makes up the park.

Kim Hatcher, Public Affairs Coordinator of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, confirmed that the park property is still owned by the DNR and that there is agreement with Irwin County to operate the park. Hatcher stated that there are three bonds that are tied to the Jefferson Davis Memorial Site with a total of $400,000 owed, but says that the amount due has not increased. The bonds will mature in 2020 at which point the title to the park can be transferred from the state to Irwin County.

In December 2013, the funding problems almost led to the closure of the park. Albany’s WALB reported that the park cost about $50,000 annually to operate, but was only generating about $10,000 in revenues.

Supporters rallied to save the park a few days later. Private contributors donated money and the Sons of Confederate Veterans pledged $25,000 per year according to WALB. Supporters also restarted the Friends of the Park group and planned to seek state grants for further repairs.

For the time being the crisis at the Jefferson Davis Memorial Historic site has been averted, by volunteer groups and charitable donations, but the underlying problem of ownership has not been resolved. It will be years before Irwin County is able to take full ownership of the park. Until the Georgia state bonds are paid, a permanent solution and funding will not be available.

 

Originally published on Atlanta Conservative Examiner

The good, the bad and the ugly: A balanced look at Chris Christie

 

When Examiner published an article last week detailing how Chris Christie was the current Republican frontrunner for the 2016 elections as well as the only Republican who currently beats the likely Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, it set off a firestorm of indignation among some conservatives. Many deride Christie as a “RINO” who would be almost as bad as Clinton. Others go further and claim that Christie is a Democrat in disguise. A number of angry conservatives say that Christie is dead to them.

A good place to start when trying to determine whether a Republican is a RINO is the American Conservative Union. The ACU rates members of Congress and state legislatures by their votes and determines whether they are “true conservatives” or not. In a previous article, Examiner found that most Republicans who are commonly labeled RINOs easily pass Ronald Reagan’s 80 percent rule. The ACU does not rate governors, however, so one must examine Gov. Christie’s record in New Jersey.

The Good

There are many aspects of Christie’s career that conservatives can cheer. The governor seems to be an authentic fiscal conservative. John Nichols of The Nation, a liberal site, says that Christie is in the mold of Scott Walker of Wisconsin. Nichols cites a long list of complaints that include raising the retirement age for state employees and increasing their required contribution for insurance and retirement plans, opposing tax increases on the wealthy, vetoing minimum wage hikes and pay equity bills, and trimming state budgets. Christie has taken on New Jersey’s public employee unions and won. One teacher’s union leader even publicly wished him dead in a tasteless joke in 2009.

Christie has not raised taxes during his time as governor. Politifact does note that he cut several tax credits such as the state’s Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and Homestead Benefit, which provides a credit on property insurance. The EITC is a refundable credit that can be paid out to individual filers even if they have no tax liability. Politifact also confirmed that Christie balanced New Jersey’s budget as its constitution requires. Christie has also taken steps to fix New Jersey’s underfunded pension program according to the Trentonian. New Jersey’s pension problems are not resolved, but underfunded pensions are a national crisis that many states and cities have not even begun to address according to CNBC.

Christie is pro-life. In 2011, New Jersey News described Christie’s remarks before a pro-life rally at the statehouse in which he said that “every life is precious and a gift from God” and noted that he had cut funding for Planned Parenthood. Christie urged the activists “to speak calmly and clearly and forthrightly for the idea that this is an issue whose time has come.” Salon describes Christie’s conversion from a “non-thinking pro-choice person, kind of the default position” when he heard his unborn daughter’s heartbeat as seemingly much more genuine than Mitt Romney’s.

Christie’s appeal to minorities is also a very good thing for conservatives. As reported by Examiner after his re-election victory, exit polls from New Jersey show that Gov. Christie made deep inroads into Barack Obama’s core constituencies. Christie won female voters by 15 percent even though the Democratic candidate, Barbara Buono, was a woman. He also won Hispanic voters outright with 51 percent (compared to Buono’s 45 percent). Although Christie did not win the black vote, at 21 percent his percentage of the black vote was three times greater than Romney’s. A successful Republican presidential candidate will have to appeal to minority voters.

With respect to global warming and climate change, the Huffington Post noted that when Christie ran for governor in 2009, he had “an impressive green agenda” on his website according to the New Jersey Environmental Federation, but that it has remained only on the website. Since then, he told a town hall meeting in 2010 that he was “a little skeptical” that humans are responsible for climate change. The Post story goes on to say that Christie withdrew New Jersey from the Northeast’s regional cap-and-trade plan, weakened the state’s renewable energy standard and used $210 million from the state’s clean energy fund to balance the budget. On the other hand, Christie opposed oil drilling and liquefied natural gas (LNG) facilities off the New Jersey coast.

The Bad

The news about Christie isn’t all good for conservatives, however. For example, Christie accepted the Medicaid expansion of the Affordable Care Act. He justified approving the expansion by noting that New Jersey’s Medicaid program was already so large that the potential expansion of the program under Obamacare was minimal, a claim confirmed by Politifact. Christie did veto a bill making the expansion permanent, telling N.J. Spotlight that if the terms of the expansion change “because of adverse actions by the Obama administration, I will end it as quickly as it started.” Republican governors John Kasich of Ohio and Mike Pence of Indiana also accepted the Obamacare Medicaid money according to the N.Y. Times.

Many conservatives also do not like Christie’s position on gun control. In 2009, Christie told Sean Hannity that he supported “common sense laws that will allow people to protect themselves” but also favored some gun control measures that would protect police. He noted that the state’s Democratic legislature would not allow easing restrictions on guns.

In the aftermath of the Newtown massacre, Christie established a task force to “responsibly expand New Jersey’s strict gun control measures” according to the Washington Times’ Emily Miller. Christie signed 10 gun control bills into law, including a measure that required the state to submit mental health records to the FBI for instant background checks, but vetoed three others, including a ban a .50 caliber rifles. The NRA hailed the vetoes even though the group rated Christie as a “C.”

On same sex marriage, Christie is also at odds with many conservatives. In October 2013, he dropped the state’s appeal of a court decision striking down New Jersey’s marriage law in spite of the fact that he had previously vetoed a bill that would have allowed same sex marriages. The decision can likely be explained by the fact that previous court decisions made it very unlikely that Christie would have prevailed in court. Additionally, it is clear that the people of New Jersey supported the redefinition of marriage. A Rutgers Eagleton poll at the time showed that 61 percent of New Jersey voters favored marriage for same-sex couples compared to only 27 percent who were opposed. Sixty-seven percent opposed continuing the appeal. Even the state’s Republicans were almost evenly split on the court decision and whether to appeal although slight majorities of Republicans opposed both. Coming right before the election, pursuing the unpopular appeal could have sunk Christie’s campaign.

Christie’s decision to sign a bipartisan bill banning gay reparative therapy is harder to justify. Politico reported that Christie’s note accompanying the bill said that he believed that people were born gay and denied that homosexuality is a sin, a position inconsistent with his Catholic faith. A similar ban in California was challenged on First Amendment grounds and upheld by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in August 2013. At least two lawsuits have been filed against New Jersey’s ban according to NJ.com.

Christie’s appointment of Sohail Mohammed to the New Jersey Superior Court was also controversial. Mohammed is a native of India who immigrated to the U.S. as a teenager. As an attorney, he specialized in immigration law and represented dozens of immigrants who were detained in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks. Mohammed’s career is profiled on Superlawyers.com.

The criticism of Mohammed seems to stem mostly from the fact that he is a Muslim and the fear that he might help to institute sharia law in New Jersey. Some critics also point to his ties with the American Muslim Union which some believe is tied to Islamic terrorists. Of the controversy, Christie said in the Wall St. Journal, “It's just crazy, and I'm tired of dealing with the crazies.”

Speaking of immigration, Republican hardliners won’t like the governor’s history on illegal immigration. In 2008 when he was a federal prosecutor, Christie told a gathering of Latinos that illegal immigration was a civil, not criminal, matter and that, technically speaking, illegal immigrants are not committing a crime by being in the country illegally according to NJ.com. Although he is correct, “illegal [unlawful] presence” is a civil violation, not a misdemeanor or felony, Christie drew criticism from conservatives for the remark. New York Magazine noted that Christie only prosecuted 13 illegal immigration cases between 2002 and 2007, a very low number considering New Jersey’s status as a port of entry the state’s large immigrant population. In December 2013, Politico reported that Christie had announced that he planned to sign New Jersey’s DREAM Act.

The Ugly

One of the hardest things for conservatives to get past may be Christie’s “bro-mance” with President Obama. When Hurricane Sandy struck New Jersey and New York a week before the 2012 election, the two executives toured storm damaged areas and traded compliments. A famous photo shows the two men shaking hands, Obama resting his hand on Christie’s shoulder, in Atlantic City on Oct. 31, 2012. Many conservatives, such as pollster and pundit Dick Morris, blame Christie for making Obama look like a bipartisan leader, an appraisal that had eluded him for the previous four years.

An Examiner analysis of 2012 exit polls found that 64 percent of voters said that the president’s response to the hurricane was a factor in their vote and 62 percent of these voters chose Obama. Both Rasmussen and Gallup polling showed an uptick in Obama’s approval ratings in the days after Hurricane Sandy struck New York.

There are several theories as to why Christie, who actively supported Mitt Romney, became a cheerleader for Barack Obama less than a week before a very close election. The most likely answer is that Christie was doing what he thought was best for his state. It probably did not hurt that the move was also good for Chris Christie. The governor’s approval rating jumped to 70 percent after the storm according to Philly.com.

In the end, Chris Christie can’t be accurately termed a RINO, but neither is he a hardcore conservative. If he were, he would be unelectable in a state as blue as New Jersey. In reality, Christie seems to be a fiscal conservative who is moderate on most social issues. Christie’s views might play well with moderate voters in a general election, but the recent shift towards libertarianism by many in the Republican Party makes it unlikely that he will get past the primary unless other candidates split the votes of social conservatives and Tea Partiers.

Read this on Examiner.com:

The Good - The Bad - The Ugly

Canada to the rescue at Salute America Air Show

As the 2013 air show season draws to a close, it was set to go out with a bang at the Salute America Air Show near Atlanta. The show, held on Oct. 5-6 at the Paulding Northwest Atlanta airport in Dallas, Ga. (airport details can be found on GlobalAir.com) featured a variety of aviation acts. Saturday night’s show included rare twilight aerobatic acts.

Many 2013 air shows were canceled due to the sequester budget cuts enacted earlier this year. The military jets and helicopters often featured at local air shows were in short supply due to the cuts in the defense budget. For the first half of the summer, the Air Force Thunderbirds and the Navy Blue Angels were grounded, prompting the cancellation of many air shows. The Thunderbirds resumed flying in July when the Air Force found money to fund the unit. At Wisconsin’s Oshkosh air show, the FAA charged the Experimental Aircraft Association to operate a temporary control tower at the field.

It is ironic then that the only active duty military aircraft featured at the Salute America Air Show were a pair of Canadian Air Force CF-18 Hornets. A star attraction was the Royal Canadian Air Force Hornet Demonstration Team which performed daylight and twilight routines. A second CF-18 was on hand as a static display.

Although no U.S. military aircraft were present at the Salute America Air Show, the pilot of the Canadian CF-18 unfurled an American flag from his cockpit in a show of friendship as he taxied in from his first performance on Saturday. In a return salute, a Lucas Oil skydiver in an American flag parachute streamed a Canadian Maple Leaf flag from his back later in the day.

Aficionados of World War II aircraft thrilled to a North American P-51 Mustang and Chance Vought F4U Corsair. Both warbirds performed separately and then joined for a formation flight in front of the crowd. The P-51, flown by Stan Musak, is a veteran of both WWII and Korea. Although Corsairs are also famous for their service in WWII, this particular airplane was built in 1945 and served primarily in Korea. The Corsair was flown by Jim Tobul.

The Aeroshell Aerobatic Team also performed in both the daylight and twilight shows. The team, sponsored by Aeroshell, a division of the Shell oil company that produces aviation lubricants and fuels, flies vintage North American T-6 Texans that were used to train military pilots in WWII. The four airplanes wowed the crowd with their coordinated formation aerobatics.

A second aerobatic team to perform was Team Aerostar. The team uses Yakovlev Yak-52s, Soviet-era Russian military trainers. After watching the three Russian airplanes perform, airshow fans could go to the vendor area to get a firsthand look at what it is like to fly formation aerobatics at the AOPA/Redbird Simulator trailer.

There were several solo performers as well. Lucas Oil sponsored Mike Wiskus and his Pitts biplane as well as a team of skydivers. “Skipper” Hyle performed in another AT-6 Harvard, the British version of the Texan trainer. Chuck Coleman flew an Extra 300L and Gary Rower demonstrated another WWII trainer, the Super Stearman biplane. Gary Ward performed in the ultramodern, carbon fiber MX-2.

Another popular performer was Bill Braack in the Smoke-n-Thunder jet car. The car is powered by a Westinghouse J34-48 jet engine that was originally used to power a North American T-2 Buckeye trainer jet used by the U.S. Navy. The 26 foot long car can be driven to almost 400 miles per hour by the engine’s 6,000 pounds of thrust.

During the day show, Braack in the jet car raced Mike Wiskus in the Lucas Oil Pitts. In the evening show, Braack thrilled the crowd with bursts of afterburner in a nighttime speed run down the runway.

The final act of the show was aerobatic pilot and musician Elgin Wells flying his one-of-kind Starjammer. The Starjammer is an aerobatic airplane that is equipped with lights and speakers for a unique after-dark performance that must be seen to be appreciated. A fireworks display followed Saturday’s show.

There were also many static displays for airshow patrons to enjoy. In addition to the Canadian Air Force CF-18, there were two vintage DC-3s. One was in the livery of a classic airliner while the other was a restored U.S. Air Force AC-47 gunship owned by the American Flight Museum. Phoenix Air, a local Georgia company that contracts with the military, also had one of its Learjets on display. Civil Air Patrol recruiters were on hand and a variety of general aviation aircraft that included a Pilatus PC-12, a classic Stinson 108, and Hughes 600N helicopter.

In a normal year, airshows are one of the largest spectator sports in the United States with tens of millions in attendance. Airshow fans can only hope that by next year, the federal budget crisis will have been averted and the 2014 season will see a return of the U.S. military demonstration teams and aircraft that are so popular.

If you would like to see more pictures as well as videos from both the day and night performances at the Salute America Air Show, please visit and like the Aviation Examiner Facebook page.

 

Originally published on Aviation Examiner

FAA announces list of sequester control tower closings

Today the Federal Aviation Administration announced the list of air traffic control towers to be closed as the agency implements its sequestration budget cuts. The March 22 press release notes that the FAA originally planned to close 189 towers, but reduced the number to 149 in the final plan.

The reduction in the number of towers to close was due in part to the decision that keeping some towers open was in the national interest. Twenty-four federal contract towers that are staffed by private contractors that were slated to close will remain open. Additionally, 16 contract towers that are part of a cost sharing program will remain open because Congress appropriates their operating funds directly. These towers will have their funds reduced by five percent, but this will not force their closure.

The list of tower closures (which can be viewed here) is made up primarily of general aviation reliever airports so airline travel will be minimally affected by the closures. There are several towers in secondary airline markets that slated to be closed, however. Among these are Columbia, S.C, Concord, N.H., Santa Fe, N.M., and Pocatello, Idaho.

Several towers at Georgia airports are among those on the closure list as well. Two Atlanta-area airports, Cobb County-McCollum Field and Gwinnett County – Briscoe Field, will lose their control towers. Additionally, three other towers around the state, Southwest Georgia Regional in Albany, Middle Georgia Regional in Macon, and Athens – Ben Epps will close. The tower at Fulton County – Brown Field in Atlanta was slated to close, but will remain open.

The fact that control towers are being closed does not mean that airline flights will cease or that the airport itself will close. Instead, it means that the airport will become a “nontowered” airport where pilots revert to “see-and-avoid” procedures and enter the flow of traffic themselves rather than having an air traffic controller regulate the flow of takeoffs and landings.

While pilots fly from nontowered airports, there might be slight delays to obtain a clearance to take off and enter the enroute system. Tower closures might result in radar gaps around these airports that require controllers to leave more space between aircraft. The absence of tower controllers might also mean that weather minimums for instrument approaches at some airports increase due to the lack of weather observers. This could mean delays or diversion of flights during periods of bad weather.

Many of the towers that will be closed were already operating on a part time basis. Control towers at smaller airports are often open only during the day or at peak hours.

In addition to the list of towers that will be closed, the FAA also published a list of contract towers that will remain open as well as list of contract cost share towers that will remain open.

Originally published on Examiner.com:
http://www.examiner.com/article/faa-announces-list-of-control-towers-to-be-closed?cid=db_articles&no_cache=1364055688