Free Republic

If you are masochistic enough to read the “reporting” of the legacy media on Obamacare, you will have noticed a spate of recent stories with titles like the following from CNBC: “Health spending post-Obamacare seen $2.5 trillion lower.” This headline is not only awkwardly worded. It is, like the article over which it appears, misleading. It misrepresents a new study from the left-leaning Urban Institute concerning projected health care spending in a way that suggests the nation has saved enormous amounts of money thanks to the “Affordable Care Act.” This is absurd, of course, but it highlights an underappreciated element...

With new immigration proposals, state lawmakers hope to build By MELANIE MASON California lawmakers hope to keep momentum going with new immigration-related proposals Proposal would offer Medi-Cal to people who qualify regardless of immigration status. Democratic lawmakers will unveil a slew of new immigration-related proposals Tuesday, including measures that would extend state-paid health coverage to those in the country illegally and offer more protection against deportation. Legislators behind the 10-bill package aim to build on the landmark immigration laws passed in California in recent years, such as one that allows people without legal residency to obtain driver's licenses. By keeping...

Millions of dollars have disappeared from Afghanistan and the Special Inspector General for ..Reconstruction is placing the blame on the Pentagon’s mismanaged accounting practices for the problem. The SIGAR released the report Friday reporting that only 57% of the $795 million appropriated to CERP from 2002-2013 could be accounted for in terms of who was awarded contracts, and for how much money. The SIGAR report breaks down the $21 billion, by fund, into the highest-costing contracts & their recipients, from 2002 until May 2014. The CERP initiative “enables U.S. commanders in Afghanistan to respond to urgent humanitarian relief and reconstruction...

Remember when a disagreement between Republicans on the budget was “cataclysmic” for GOP claims to governance? Democrats last passed a normal budget resolution six years ago, but Republicans went all of seven days before both chambers finally passed budget resolutions. Our long national nightmare, at least as envisioned by Politico, is over: The Senate passed a Republican-authored budget plan early on Friday that seeks $5.1 trillion in domestic spending cuts over 10 years while boosting military funding.The 52-46 vote on the non-binding budget resolution put Congress on a path to complete its first full budget in six years. It...

Colorado taxpayers are very likely to get a break when they file their taxes next year as the state prepares to refund some tax revenues back to taxpayers for the first time in nearly 15 years. This is due to a provision in the state’s constitution, little known outside of Colorado, called the Taxpayer Bill of Rights, or TABOR. This provision is one of the most effective limits on both Colorado state spending and on state revenue collection. TABOR works by establishing a limit on how much tax revenue the state can collect in a given year. Generally, the cap...

A state legislative auditor’s report found that the Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS) failed to ensure the eligibility of participants in large public assistance programs and that it did not always perform timely inspections of child care centers. The findings mirror those of other recent auditor reports and could fuel calls to reform the way state administrators verify eligibility for programs that together cost nearly $7 billion a year in federal money. For more than a decade, the legislative auditor has reported flaws in the way the state determines who qualifies for Medical Assistance, which provides health insurance to...

Republican lawmakers on Monday proposed a $7 billion plan that they called an investment in transportation over the next decade. The proposal has some common ground with plans from leaders of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, but big divisions remain. The parties are far apart on how much money a transportation plan should include, how much of it should go to Twin Cities metro-area mass transit and -- above all -- whether the plan should be paid for by raising taxes or cutting spending. DFL Gov. Mark Dayton and the Senate DFL majority each proposed their own plans in January. Their approaches...

CLEVELAND — President Obama used this manufacturing hub — and important swing state — as the backdrop to draw a sharp distinction Wednesday with his Republican rivals over the economy, as both sides aim to frame the debate for the coming presidential race. The day after House Republicans unveiled their budget proposal — which would cut more than $5 trillion out of the federal budget over the next decade and balance the budget by cutting domestic programs — the president touted some of the very programs that would come under the GOP axe. Obama dismissed a House plan that “doubles...

Republican Sens. Mike Lee of Utah and Marco Rubio of Florida have released a blueprint for federal tax reform called “The Economic Growth and Family Fairness Tax Plan.” First, we should not embrace the language of progressive socialism in believing tax reform should have as a goal to advance “family fairness.” The plan should simply be entitled “The American Growth and Opportunity Plan.” That said, the Lee-Rubio plan is a great improvement over the current system. For the individual tax structure, the plan introduces a two-tier system to replace the current seven tax brackets. This plan moves America from a...

House Republicans, unveiling their first budget blueprint since the party took control of Congress, issued a sweeping spending plan Tuesday that calls for complete repeal of ObamaCare, major changes to Medicare and controversial moves to boost defense spending despite tight budget limits. GOP leaders say their budget would balance in less than 10 years, and in that time cut spending by $5.5 trillion compared with current projections. The spending plan stands little chance of ever being signed by President Obama, but makes clear that the party is not dialing back its ambitions despite a rocky start to the latest congressional...

The great Achilles heel in the House Republican budget Tuesday can be found in a blue-and-white chart, tucked away on page 40 and mapping out a 10-year path for the annual appropriations bills that keep the government operating. On the surface, it appears to keep faith with the spirit of the discretionary spending caps under the 2011 Budget Control Act, a major priority for many fiscal conservatives. But to get the votes of party hawks, the budget makes a sweeping end-run around the caps by declaring an additional $94 billion as emergency spending for the war against terrorism.

Fiscal Policy: When the president released his budget in February, he said it was full of new ideas for the 21st century. But now we know it's just good old tax-and-spend liberalism.

Emboldened by winning the shutdown showdown over homeland security, and poised to triumph on raising the debt limit, Senate Democrats set their sights Thursday on the budget sequesters, demanding that Republicans hike taxes and raise spending. It was a shot across the bow for Republican budget writers, who are set to unveil their proposals next week, which are expected to further slash spending and balance the budget in 10 years — slowing the growth of runaway national debt that currently tops $18 trillion. Senate Democrats insisted that keeping the automatic spending cuts would jeopardize the economic recovery, hurt the middle...

The Minnesota Republican Party answered a complex Capitol budget question with a simple solution: Give it all back. With a print, television and online ad campaign, the party is proposing that lawmakers and the governor return all of the projected $1.9 billion surplus to taxpayers. 'The Republican Party of Minnesota says send it back -- send it all back," Party Chairman Keith Downey says in the ad. Downey, who is running for re-election to the party post this spring, said Tuesday he did not have a prescription for how he thought the nearly $1.9 billion should be returned. He declined...

Today the Republican Party of Minnesota held a press conference calling for Democrats to give back the nearly $2 billion state budget surplus to hardworking Minnesotans! That surplus belongs to Minnesotans and the Democrats should give it back, not spend it. That's roughly $350 per every Minnesotan. The Democrats raised taxes by an unnecessary $2 billion, and now state government has a nearly $2 billion surplus, which they are proposing to spend! On top of that, Democrats are actually proposing to raise taxes another $6 billion on top of the $2 billion surplus!

Ferguson has allowed its focus on revenue generation to fundamentally compromise the role of Ferguson’s municipal court. The municipal court does not act as a neutral arbiter of the law or a check on unlawful police conduct. … Our investigation has found overwhelming evidence of minor municipal code violations resulting in multiple arrests, jail time, and payments that exceed the cost of the original ticket many times over. One woman, discussed above, received two parking tickets for a single violation in 2007 that then totaled $151 plus fees. Over seven years later, she still owed Ferguson $541—after already paying $550...

If you picked up a Star Tribune last weekend, you might have read two seemingly unrelated stories. On Saturday, news of a $1.9 billion surplus, with the state budget growing to $42.5 billion for the next two years (“Surging surplus raises the stakes, Feb. 28). On Sunday, a solid piece of investigative journalism about political cronyism on the Iron Range (“Range agency deep into DFL politics, pockets,” March 1). What if these two stories were related? Researchers at Indiana University published a study last year that explored the impact of public officials’ corruption on the size and allocation of state...

New numbers show that Northstar Commuter Rail Line ridership is down and, after five years of operation, an important goal has not yet been met. Metro Transit numbers show ridership in 2014 was down 8 percent for weekday rides. In 2008, Metro Transit had a goal of removing 5,000 cars from the road by encouraging commuting on Northstar. However, only about 2,500 commuters ride during the week, which is well below the goal set seven years ago. Taxpayers paid $315 million to build the Northstar system. Approximately $15 million each of the five years it's been running for operations and...

Before the panicked phone calls and the embarrassing state audit, Ganesh Kumar knew the BrEZe computer program would flop. For seven years, Kumar has worked at the Board of Registered Nursing’s call center where he uses computer data to answer questions when nurses, nurse practitioners and nursing school graduates want to know the status of their license applications or renewals. So Kumar was all for it when Department of Consumer Affairs officials six years ago announced a new $28 million, off-the-shelf computer program, BrEZe, would replace obsolete, narrow systems used by the board and most of the other 39 regulatory...

President Obama would veto the House Republican plan to overhaul the controversial No Child Left Behind law, his administration said Wednesday. The GOP plan, known as the Student Success Act, “represents a significant step backwards in the efforts to help all of the nation's children and their families prepare for their futures,” said the Office of Management and Budget in a statement of administration policy. The bill “abdicates the historic federal role in elementary and secondary education of ensuring the educational progress of all of America's students, including students from low-income families, students with disabilities, English learners and students of...