Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Cao Slams "So-Called Stimulus"

At this point, just looking at this blog should tell you what I think of Rep. Anh "Joseph" Cao of Louisiana. He showed great courage by voting against the Democratic "stimulus" package last week, and he's been getting SLAMMED for it in the media and left wing blogosphere. However, he proved he is more than capable of firing back with a strongly worded letter in this morning's New Orleans Times-Picayune (re-posted below). He may be the single shyest man in Congress, but he certainly doesn't seem to pull any punches when it comes to writing.

According to many in the media, Congressman Cao ended his political career by voting on conscience rather politics - and I last personally would love nothing more than to shove those comments back in their faces. As far as I'm concerned, Rep. Cao proved this week that he is the guy we thought he was when he took down William Jefferson in last year's election. So, for my two cents, it's time for us to circle that wagons around Joseph Cao and do everything we can to make sure that, instead of getting bounced in 2010, he gets a promotion to the U.S. Senate.

This past Friday, I voted against the so-called stimulus bill. I wanted a bill that would stimulate the economy without wasteful spending and that would answer the needs of my district. Unfortunately, this wasn't it. Voting no was a tough decision -- my most difficult yet in Congress -- but I believe it was the right decision.

President Barack Obama's intentions with this bill were good, but the result is loaded with big government spending and dubious initiatives that will do little to help the average American. The costs of the stimulus bill far outweigh the benefits. Even the White House's own analysis ranked the 2nd District dead last in terms of the number of jobs created yet the bill will increase 2nd District citizens' share of our national debt to more than $38,000 per person.

The passage of the stimulus bill was neither fair nor transparent. The entire process was characterized by traditional Washington back-room dealing and was intended to ram through a trillion-dollar spending frenzy with as little debate and scrutiny as possible.

Some will say I bowed to political pressure to "fall in line" with the Republican Party. This could not be further from the truth. My first and only responsibility is to the people of the 2nd District; I am committed to working with Republicans and Democrats alike to pass important legislation, such as the critically needed children's health insurance program we passed earlier this year.

As your representative, I have worked tirelessly to bring jobs back home, securing $129 million to assist local hospitals and moving forward the backlog of local FEMA projects to restore basic services like firehouses, health clinics and schools. If we can get even a fraction of these projects off the ground, it will do far more for the 2nd District than the stimulus bill.

U.S. Rep. Anh "Joseph" Cao

Washington

18 comments:

  1. He is right to slam the so-called stimulus. This is Obama's first step towards turning the USA into a European Socialist state. He has this country now close to what Europe is doing. Has this country has continued to drift further away from Capitalism the economy has worsened. Bush started the massive spending that Obami has continued. How much has this country spent since last May on 2 stimulus packages and on bailouts? It has to be atleast 2.5 trillion dollars. There are rumors that Obama is going to do another bailout and another stimulus. Keep righting your congressmen and Senators to stop all this excessive spending. We got to stop Socialism.

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  2. Thankyou Rep. Cao and all the House Republicans for voting against this bill.

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  3. Rep. Cao, you said you secured $129M for a backlog of "local FEMA projects"? F(ederal) E(mergency) M(anagement) A(gency) -- isn't that Federal government spending??

    And you REJECTED the stimulus package, for what reason? Because it wouldn't help YOU further your political career if you voted to help people in Michigan, Florida, California, Maine?

    I'll bet if your state legislature bypasses Gov. Jindal and accepts some of the stimulus money and it goes towards rebuilding Katrina damage, you and he'll take the credit.

    And you don't deserve it.

    I guess it's OK if you slip in the word "local", eh?

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  4. Hi KaJo,
    The stimulus package should have been rejected. The bi-partisan Cngressional Budget Office says that over the long run the stimulus package will hurt the economy. The stimulus will not help people in Maine,Florida,California or Michigan. It will help all of the Liberal special interest groups. Both Democrats and Republicans are both to blame for this. In the last year we have had bailouts and 2 stimulus packages. 2 of which cost over $750 billion. The economy has not gotten better. That is a fact. It is also a fact that you can't spend your way out of a recession. Obama is talking about another stimulus and another bailout. Where will we get this money?

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  5. What a load, KaJo. The "stimulus" package will HURT Americans in "Michigan, Florida, California, and Maine"----as well as the rest of the USA----because you can't pay off a debt by incurring more debt.
    DUH!
    It's also a load when people say (parrots!): "Well, the package was needed because we needed to do SOMEthing." CROCK CITY!

    The best thing to do is put money in our pockets NOW: our OWN money, that is, via a tax break which would show up immediately in our paychecks. THAT would foster real "stimulus."

    Yes, that would also help the poor, by creating more jobs for them. WORK: what a concept!

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  6. Thanks Mountain Mama,
    We are in agreement. Also that Pork Package with all the new liberal programs will end up costing us 3.1 trillion over a 10 year period after the initial payout. Obam used the stimulus as an excuse to expand government.

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  7. I think Rush might be right (sigh.... again!), that Obama's Masters (China?) might be purposely tanking the economy, so it collapses and it's easier to move in on the USA.

    Yeah, I used to think thoughts like that were crazy-sounding. But then, I also used to think it was nuts to think anyone could turn the USA into a socialist state.
    Hmm-mmm-mmm?????

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  8. It is both parties though Mountain Mama. Bush brought the first bailout. Lindsey Graham and Kay Bailey Hutchinson among others want to now nationalize banks. The Repubicans were against the Porkulus though. Did you also hear that Rush predicts Obama will go for another stimulus. Stop Socialism. This country is supposed to have capitalism. Putin told Obama that socialism does not work.

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  9. That means that Putin is laughing at Obama.

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  10. TBone: of course both parties are involved in this economic mess. The parties are made up of people, some of whom are corrupt, just as in unions and churches.
    (ack)
    If only the American public knew about the benefits of the APT tax reform method ( www.apttax.com ), so they could force politicians to enact it, and make the lobbyists all go away......
    This method provides the ONLY hope America really has to create enough tax revenue fairly, without burdening anyone, so we can pull out of this mess.
    But how to get the news out about this True Silver Bullet?

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  11. Hey KaJo were you the one that outed Adam (pushing Cao for Senate) over at the Alaska SubStandard?

    Seriously, you sound like just another O-bot in pushing this C.R.A.P. You all do realize that you (O-bots) have to align yourselves with Bush's stimulus/bailouts, essentially most of his economic policies as well, by doing this. After all, every good liberal from John Kerry (who served in Vietnam) the Barney Frank (the Banking Queen) is full-on-board with the idea of spending to help jolt the economy.

    You can't POSSIBLY be against excessive domestic spending on one side (Bush) and be for it on the other (Obama) and maintain any pretense of objectivity. And if your argument is "Well we're in this because of his spending" take a look at two lost decades: us (1930s) and Japan (1990s). But don't take it from me,

    "We are spending more money than we have ever spent before and it does not work. I want to see this country prosperous. I want to see people get a job. We have never made good on our promises. I say after eight years of this administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started and an enormous debt to boot."

    Henry Morgenthau, Jr., U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, May 1939. Now before Tim Geithner makes the same testimony in 2015 (fat chance there) you think we might wanna look at this again?

    Of course, Our Dear Leader Messiah Most Merciful's on record as saying that FDR didn't spend ENOUGH, so that should not only give you an idea of where he is on the grand scale of fiscal conservatism but once again hammer home the point that you can't have it both ways. Did you support last year's stimulus? You HAD to have.

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  12. Oh speak of the devil,

    http://www.newsmax.com/us/congressman_recall/2009/02/20/183880.html

    La. Recall Try Likely Doomed, Still Significant

    NEW ORLEANS -- Legal roadblocks will likely doom an effort launched this week to recall U.S. Rep. Ahn "Joseph" Cao, the Vietnamese Republican who scored a surprise December victory in a predominantly black, mostly Democratic New Orleans congressional district.

    Still, the petition drive, started by two black ministers only weeks after Cao took office, demonstrates the challenges he'll face if he seeks a second term in 2010.

    "At this point it's going to be more symbolic than substantive," pollster and political consultant Silas Lee said Friday of the recall effort, ostensibly launched to protest Cao's vote against the federal stimulus package. "But symbolism carries a powerful message."

    Legal experts say a sitting congressman cannot be removed by voters before his term ends. A report last year by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service said it can't be done and Louisiana Secretary of State Jay Dardenne asked Friday for an opinion from the state attorney general.

    Cao's December election was a stunner. It dislodged once-powerful 18-year incumbent William Jefferson, a Democrat who was the state's first African-American congressman since Reconstruction.

    Cao was helped by unusual circumstances in a district where voter registration is almost two-thirds black and more than two-thirds Democratic.

    Jefferson was weakened by a federal indictment accusing him of taking bribes. And because Louisiana's election cycle was delayed by two hurricanes, the general election was held Dec. 6, when there was no Barack Obama at the top of the ballot to help generate black voter enthusiasm. In a low-turnout election, Cao won with just under 50 percent over Jefferson, who had 47 percent, and two minor party candidates.

    Cao, 41, rose to prominence in the 2nd Congressional District as an attorney, community activist and a leader in the recovery effort of a small but thriving Vietnamese community hit hard by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

    After the election he promised to work across racial and party lines to continue the recovery, and he broke with his party with an early vote to expand a children's health insurance program.

    But his two votes against President Barack Obama's stimulus package prompted the recall effort, said Rev. Aubry Wallace, chairman of the petition drive, and Rev. Toris Young, president of the Louisiana Ministerial Alliance of Churches for All People.

    Young predicts a huge public outcry if the requirements for a recall are met and Cao remains in office.

    "How can they elect on official and then they can't recall him?" he said.

    He noted that the Congressional Research Service report says the Supreme Court has never ruled directly on the question of a congressional recall and said if a successful recall is thwarted by a legal challenge he would fight it to the Supreme Court level.

    Perhaps as daunting as the legal questions is the logistical challenge. To recall a state official in Louisiana requires the gathering of verifiable signatures from a third of the district's active voters in six months _ more than 101,000 signatures.

    Young expressed confidence, however. He said his alliance has 165 churches, 20,000 members and 480 ministers. The recall effort has 300 volunteers and had already gathered 13,000 signatures by midweek.

    Even if Cao isn't recalled, such an organization could provide a formidable base for anyone who wants to oppose him in 2010.

    The effort sends a powerful signal, Lee said.

    "He's only been in office a little more than a month and this does send a strong symbolic message, depending on how many signatures they get, that the voters in the 2nd district will closely watch his voting record and how effective he is," Lee said.

    Cao and his aides defend the anti-stimulus vote, saying the package added too much to the national debt and a White House analysis indicate the plan would create few jobs in Cao's district.

    "Our goal is to work with every body in the district," said Cao aide Murray Nelson. "We invite the ministers to join us."

    So apparently these weasels' only problem with the aptly-named sleazeball William Jefferson was that he was 'holdin out on dem'. Corruption, who cares?

    At the risk of saying anything racist, I'll respond to Kanye West's much publicized complaint with "And?"

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  13. Hi all Palinista's,
    Obama said today that he will have 1 trillion dollar deficits in 2010 and 2011 and by 2013 he will have a deficit of 553 billion. He also you can't have big deficits and have a good economy. Than why did you pass a 1.2 trillion dollar with interest spending bill? So we can see what his idea of spending is. That is with what will be close to a 2 trillion dollar deficit in 2009. Obama is funny. He talks about fiscal restraint but than signs a the biggest spending in the history of the world.

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  14. Did anyone hear about the protests staged against Obama's porkulus package in both Colorado and Arizona this week. If GWB was President they would have shown it.

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  15. Well, alleluia! It's about time Americans got going with some protests about this C.R.A.P.---although politicians seem oblivious to such old-fashioned "pressure." I'm still puzzling over how to hit them where it hurts----but evidently that's only in their wallets. How can we take the wealth away from the corrupt politicians or capitalists, without wounding the nation at large? That's what it will take.... (I think the APT tax would be a great start....)

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  16. Tbone he's all over the place. Even Bonnie Erbe (U.S. News-Obama) is all over him about it, especially this quote:

    "by 2013 he will have a deficit of 553 billion."

    Note he clings (I thought we were the bitter clingers) to the notion that the Iraq War is the biggest chunk of the budget (not even close) and that will be the major reduction. Well 1)Iraq will be well in the rearview mirror by that point, and 2)If we're preparing for a full-on brawl (round two) with the Taliban over the next few years that will DWARF Iraq's spending. He's just pulling things out of the air.

    I hope Bobby just hammers him BIG Tuesday.

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  17. Well, what did you think of Bobby Jindal's response last night to Obama's speech? The pundits pretty much trashed Jindal's "delivery," but considering how Jindal usually speaks, I think he did a terrific job!

    For once, Jindal varied his volume and tone, smiled very frequently, and kept his forehead from being furrowed at all----which is a miracle; usually it's deeply knit as he hammers point after point during interviews.

    Most importantly, Jindal made excellent points in sensitive ways about why the Republican Party is very concerned about this Porkulus Package.

    Jindal does come off as a kind, but extremely brainy wonk. Obama and Jindal are both Rhodes Scholars, too, so Jindal might wind up in the vice-presidential slot in the next election, with Gov. Palin as president----or vice versa.

    Or Jeb Bush might run, and since HE, too, is a brain, and was an excellent governor, he might get the presidential slot. However, Jeb would NEVER accept the VP slot, with Gov. Palin at the top of the ticket.

    I wonder if Hillary will be running in the next election----at least in the VP slot (I just can't imagine that they'd actually keep Biden).

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  18. Mama, I believe Bobby when he says he won't run for president because it's almost impossible (remember, LA's the state where Huey Long stayed as gov for two more years despite having won election to the Senate in 1930, thus LA being one of the states with the odd "third year" election). But as a VP he'll have no such constraints.

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