Last week, a motion to proceed on a budget resolution introduced by Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) was decisively defeated in the Senate (7 in favor, 90 opposed). Paul’s proposal would have balanced the budget in five years (fiscal year 2016) through spending cuts and no tax increases. Social Security and Medicare would not have been altered. Instead, the proposal merely instructed relevant congressional committees to enact reforms that would achieve “solvency” over a 75-year window.

That’s hardly radical.

Paul’s proposed spending cuts were certainly bold by Washington’s standards, but they weren’t radical either. For example, military spending would have been cut, in part, by reducing the government’s bootprint abroad. From the Paul proposal:

The ability to utilize our immense air and sea power, to be anywhere in the world in a relatively short amount of time, no longer justifies our expanded presence in the world. This budget would require the Department of Defense to begin realigning the over 750 confirmed military installations around the world. It would also require the countries that we assist to begin providing more funding to their own defense. European, Asian, and Middle Eastern countries have little incentive to increase their own military budgets, or take control of regional security, when the U.S. has consistently subsidized their protection.

Over 750 confirmed military installations around the world. That’s enough to make a Roman emperor blush. Isn’t continuing to go deeper into debt to subsidize the defense of rich allies the more “radical” position? (See these Cato essays for more on downsizing the Department of Defense.)

Other cuts included eliminating the Department of Housing & Urban Development, the Department of Energy, and most of the Department of Education. But unlike most Republicans, Paul didn’t apologize for the cuts or use the debt dilemma as a cop out. Instead, he explains in his plan why these federal activities are counterproductive and should be devolved to the states or left to the private sector.

It’s disappointing that Paul could only get seven Republicans and no Democrats to support his budget. For all the bluster about needing to cut spending, not raise taxes, and stop the Obama administration’s big government agenda, most Republican senators said “no dice” when given the chance to vote in favor of a plan that would accomplish all three objectives and balance the budget in five years.

Senate Vote on Rand Paul’s Budget is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

This morning I outlined the stakes of today’s seminal cloture vote on Goodwin’s Liu’s nomination to the Ninth Circuit.  Well, now we have a result: cloture failed 52-43, with Senator Ben Nelson (D-NE) joining all voting Republicans except Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) against cloture. Three Republicans plus Max Baucus (D-MT) were absent, while Orrin Hatch (R-UT) voted present because of his previous strong position against filibusters.

This is the first judicial nominee filibustered since the Gang of 14 brokered an agreement on President Bush’s nominees in 2005, forestalling then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist’s use of the so-called nuclear option (changing Senate rules to eliminate the judicial filibuster).  That agreement, to the extent it’s even still valid given the changed composition of the Senate (and with five of the 14 Gang members no longer in the Senate), allowed filibusters only in “extraordinary circumstances,” leaving that term undefined.

And so we may have just have witnessed the re-ignition of the war over judicial nominees.  Stay tuned as to whether today’s vote will come to signify the “Water-Liu”—h/t Walter Olson—for one party or another, or for our judiciary.

UPDATE: Liu Cloture Fails is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) has released a detailed plan that would balance the federal budget in five years. Paul’s plan would achieve balance by halting and reversing the historic rise in federal spending. Taxes would not be increased, but revenues would steadily increase as the economy recovers.

The following charts compare Paul’s plan versus President Obama’s recent budget submission for fiscal 2012:

While Obama intends to continue spending at a historically high level, Paul would reduce spending as a share of the economy. Paul takes the scalpel to all areas of federal spending, including discretionary, defense, and mandatory. However, it is not a radical plan. In fact, it’s a practical, common sense budget that recognizes that the federal government’s growth has become unsustainable, and thus a threat to our economic well-being and future living standards.

Rand Paul’s Balanced Budget Plan is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

From today’s edition of Farmpolicy.com:

The American Farm Bureau Federation, the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, and the American Sugar Alliance all recently expressed delight that Kansas GOP Senator Pat Roberts will be the new Ranking Member of the Senate Agriculture Committee.

This Should Make You Nervous is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

It has not been a good week for Obamacare.  Another court ruled that the bill was unconstitutional, while it took a party-line vote in the U.S. Senate to avoid a legislative repeal.  Meanwhile, chipping away at the legislation began, with the Senate voting to repeal one of the bill’s most unpopular provisions, a requirement that businesses file 1099 tax forms on even small purchases.  Supporters of the bill are bailing as fast as they can, but the ship is sinking rapidly.

Not a Good Week for Obamacare is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

The Jack Conway for Senator campaign has run an attack ad on The New Republic website disguised as an article about Rand Paul by one of the magazine’s interns.  The tipoff is the word “radical” which appears five times in a short article along with “eccentric,” “unconventional” and similar words. (Doesn’t TNR bother to edit the web-only stuff?) Yeah, yeah, you’re saying by the end of the article, I get it: Paul is a radical, weirdo libertarian.

The evidence so far suggests that the Conway for Senate campaign seeks to paint Paul as an extremist while Jack, of course, is a moderate who will provide plenty of pork and don’t worry about the debt. Like most Democrats, Conway is facing a tough electorate this year, and he is responding by the party’s political playbook: demonize, mobilize, and spend. He will have adequate funds to pursue that strategy along with more than a little help from affiliated outside groups like TNR.

Parts of the article provide a useful political analysis of Kentucky’s different regions, presumably provided by the Conway campaign. So the article does offer a look into how Conway thinks he can win this.

Our intern concludes that the Conway-Paul race “is suddenly a close race.” It is true that a survey at the end of June, cited by TNR, indicated an even division. But the article appeared on August 4, and three polls in July showed Paul up by 3 to 9 points, the last one having Paul over fifty percent for the first time. That most recent poll also indicated that Paul had the support of one-quarter of Democrats and two-thirds of independents in the state.

With TNR flailing around like this, the Conway campaign seems pretty desperate pretty early.

New Attack Ad Provides an Early Look at the Fall Campaign is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

Drawing on a New Yorker article by George Packer, Politico Arena today asks:

Is the Senate broken?
Should the upper chamber operate more like the House, where majority rules?

My response:

Some people believe that the Senate is “broken” when it doesn’t pass new government programs promptly and without extended debate. But we have two houses of Congress for a reason. The Founders expected the House to be subject to momentary passions, and they intended the Senate to be more cautious, prudent, and resistant to “rushing to judgment.” As George Washington supposedly said, “we pour legislation into the senatorial saucer to cool it.” When the Senate deliberates at length, when it resists the pressure of the White House, the House, and even public opinion, it isn’t “broken”; it is fulfilling its intended function.

Of course, it should be noted that when senators in the past two years have had doubts about the health care overhaul and energy taxes, they weren’t resisting public opinion; they were actually reflecting public opinion, while the House acted as a partisan body in defiance of polls.

Of course there are double standards in talking about filibusters and the like, as I pointed out back in 2005:

Both Democrats and Republicans have flip-flopped on the use of the filibuster because the once solidly Democratic Senate now looks to be firmly Republican.

Republicans who once extolled the virtues of divided power and the Senate’s role in slowing down the rush to judgment now demand an end to delays in approving President Bush’s judicial nominees. President Bush says the Democrats’ “obstructionist tactics are unprecedented, unfair, and unfaithful to the Senate’s constitutional responsibility to vote on judicial nominees.”

Democrats who now wax eloquent about a “rubber stamp of dictatorship” replacing “the rights to dissent, to unlimited debate and to freedom of speech” in the Senate not too long ago sought to eliminate the filibuster altogether.

Now Democrats are back in the majority, and both parties have tended to shift their view of the filibuster yet again. In the long run, though, establishmentarians like the New Yorker’s George Packer think that the purpose of government is to pass new laws, regulations, and programs; and they complain when the Senate or any other institution stands in the way of such putative progress. Those of us who prefer liberty, limited government, and federalism appreciate the constitutional and traditional mechanisms that slow down the rush to legislation.

Is the Senate Broken? is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

The good people at the Stimson Center’s Budget Insight blog invited me to contribute a guest post discussing the Sustainable Defense Task Force report  Debt, Deficits, & Defense: A Way Forward. Here’s an excerpt:

The most common response [to the report] has been some sympathy for our argument that military spending should be subjected to the same scrutiny that should be applied to other government spending. There are still a fair number of people, however, who share our concern about the deficit, but who counter “But I want a strong defense.”

Who doesn’t?

The task force report was written with a single consideration in mind: in what ways, and where, could we make cuts in military spending that would not undermine U.S. security?

[...]

A leading conservative in the Senate, Tom Coburn (R-OK) wrote that the deficit reduction commission “affords us an opportunity to start some very late due diligence on national defense spending… [as well as] reduce wasteful, unnecessary, and duplicative defense spending that does nothing to make our nation safe.”

Read the rest here.

What Is a ‘Strong’ Defense? is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

I agree with Jillian Bandes’s characterization of the Democrats’ “bottom of the order” questioning (the committee being stacked 12-7, the day began with the junior Dems) and indeed was dreading having to sit through all sorts of parochial bloviations.  Even Al Franken wasn’t too exciting, just making the point Justice Kennedy was wrong not to consider in legislative history in arbitration cases and expounding at length on the theme that money in politics is bad and so therefore was Citizens United.  Kagan responded that “Congress’s intent is the only thing that matters [to statutory interpretation]”—a position sure to infuriate her future would-be colleague Justice Scalia—but also that the Court “should not re-write the law,” instead allowing Congress to correct unsatisfying judgments based on flawed legislative draftsmanship.  From this exchange I didn’t learn much about Kagan but did conclude that I wouldn’t ever vote for Franken for anything, except maybe the People’s Choice Awards should he ever return to show business.

The most memorable part of today’s first session of questioning (9am till after 1pm) was undoubtedly Arlen Specter pressing the nominee to answer questions about various lawsuits of special concern to him and which he detailed in several letters to Kagan about the questions he would ask.  One was a Holocaust survivors’ suit, one was by families of the victims of 9/11, and one regarded the Bush-era Terrorist Surveillance Program.  The first is at the cert petition stage before the Supreme Court, in the second Kagan as SG recommended that the Court deny review, and the third eventually will be seeking review of the lower court’s dismissal on standing grounds.  Kagan agreed that standing and other jurisdictional doctrines are important but would not discuss whether she would vote that the Court hear the cases or reverse the lower-court decisions.  Kagan pushed back repeatedly, saying “you wouldn’t want a judge who says she will reverse a decision without reading the briefs and hearing argument.”  Specter was extremely dissatisfied, to the point where his vote is legitimately in doubt.  Indeed, I would say now that Lindsey Graham is much more likely to vote for Kagan than Specter is.  Of course, Specter had voted against Kagan when she was nominated to be solicitor general last year—but he was a Republican at the time.

CP at Townhall

Will Specter Vote Against Kagan? is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

When it comes to banking policy, there are few people I respect more than Jonathan Macey and Arnold Kling; so when these two, independently, argue that we should be breaking up the largest banks, it is idea that merits consideration.  Yet I still have my doubts.

First, lets start with what we are fairly certain of.  There is a large empirical literature that suggest most US mega-banks are beyond their efficient size.  There is a good survey of the literature by former Fed Economist Allen Berger .  So, at a minimum, the academic literature suggests the largest banks are beyond a size that is justified by the social benefits.

However, there is also a small literature that suggests more concentrated banking systems are more stable, and less prone to crisis.  Some of this literature has grown out of research efforts by the World Bank.  While this literature is largely cross-country comparisons, recalling our own banking history gives several examples - the savings & loan crisis, the mass of small banks failures in the 1920s and 1930s, and current day Georgia – where lots of small bank failures have been associated with significant economic damage.  So, at minimum, there is some question of whether breaking up the largest banks would give us a more stable, less crisis-prone system.  In fact, there is considerable evidence to suggest that breaking up the banks would make our financial system more fragile.

To some extent, the debate over breaking up the large banks is about reducing political power.  The argument is that, because of their vast resources, these large banks unduly influence and capture our political system.  Undoubtedly, I believe the largest banks have substantial influence over both our legislative and regulatory systems.  However, so do smaller banks.  From my seven years as staff on the Senate Banking Committee, I would definitely argue that the Independent Community Banks Association (ICBA), as a group, has far more pull than does say Bank of America, as a single company.  One need only witness the various exemptions for small banks in the Dodd bill, for instance from the consumer protection bureau, to illustrate the lobbying power of small bankers.  One could also argue that the economic history of progressive era legislation, like the Sherman Act, is one of smaller, organized interests winning against larger sized firms.  Despite its appeal, the assertion that bigger is always better in politics is just an assertion.  Yet this is at heart an empirical argument, and perhaps one that can be tested.  Until then, I still have my doubts.

Should We Break Up the Banks? is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

Today in Washington: actress Sigourney Weaver testifies before the  Subcommittee on Oceans, Atmosphere, Fisheries, and Coast Guard of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee on the topic of ocean acidification. Because, you know, she played an environmental scientist in Avatar. It’s the best fit since Jane Fonda, Jessica Lange, and Sissy Spacek — all of whom had played farm women — testified on America’s agricultural crisis.

Congress doesn’t have time to vote on presidential nominations. It doesn’t bother engaging in serious oversight of presidential power and civil liberties abuses. It looks at the ceiling and whistles as the national debt approaches Greek levels. But members of Congress have time to listen to an actress discuss the topic of ocean acidification.

This seems like a topic for “Really!?! with Seth and Amy” on Saturday Night Live. Really, Senate Commerce Committee? You think Sigourney Weaver has important information that you need to know? Really? And you’re not just doing this to get yourselves on television? Really!?! And you think the most important thing members of Congress could be doing today is getting their pictures taken with Sigourney Weaver? Really!?!

Of course, this is not just a one-day thing for Sigourney Weaver. She also traveled this month to Brazil to try to stop the construction of a dam. Because who would know better than a Hollywood-Manhattan actress how to make tradeoffs between energy needs and environmental risks in Brazil?

Now let me just say that I’m not arguing that ocean acidification isn’t an important topic. And I’m not criticizing Avatar or its defense of property rights. I’m just questioning whether Sigourney Weaver, Sissy Spacek, Jeff Daniels, Nick Jonas, and the Backstreet Boys have the kind of expertise that Congress ought to draw on in deciding how to run my life. Or then again, maybe planning the economy and running other people’s lives is farce at best, and Congress should just hold hearings with Will Ferrell and John Cleese.

Ms. Weaver Goes to Washington is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

From the invaluable Tim Carney:

The Obama team regularly dismisses opponents as industry lackeys. The Democratic National Committee blasted out e-mails this week warning that “for every member of Congress, there are eight anti-reform lobbyists swarming Capitol Hill” and “Congress is under attack from insurance lobbyists.”

But drug industry lobbyists, according to Politico, spent the weekend “huddled with Democratic staffers” who needed the drug lobby to “sign off” on proposals before moving ahead. Meanwhile, we learn that the drug lobby is buying millions of dollars of ads in 43 districts where a Democratic candidate stands to suffer for supporting the bill. The doctors’ lobby and the hospitals’ lobby are also on board with the Senate bill.

So the battle at this point is not reformers versus industry, as Obama would have you believe. Rather, it is a battle between most of the health care industry and the insurance companies.

(And the insurers are not opposed to the whole package. On the bill’s central planks — limits on price discrimination, outlawing exclusions for pre-existing conditions, a mandate that employers insure their workers and a mandate that everyone hold insurance — insurers are on board. They object mostly that the penalty is too small for violating the individual mandate.)

Read the whole thing.

Obama’s Populism a Hoax: ObamaCare Is a Sop to Big PhRMA is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

From my op-ed in The Daily Caller:

ObamaCare would dramatically expand government control over health care.

Each new power ObamaCare creates would be targeted by special interests looking for special favors, and held for ransom by politicians seeking a slice of the pie.

ObamaCare would guarantee that crucial decisions affecting your medical care would be made by the same people, through the same process that created the Cornhusker Kickback, for as far as the eye can see.

When ObamaCare supporters, like Kaiser Family Foundation president Drew Altman, claim that “voters are rejecting the process more than the substance” of the legislation, they’re missing the point.

When government grows, corruption grows.  When voters reject these corrupt side deals, they are rejecting the substance of ObamaCare.

If Obama is serious about fighting corruption, he should invite C-SPAN to into every meeting he holds with members of Congress.

Then we’ll see whether he’s lobbying House members based on the Senate bill’s merits, or promising House members judgeships or ambassadorships in exchange for their votes.

What’s going on behind those closed doors, anyway?  Aren’t you just a little bit curious?

Or does corruption only happen when Billy Tauzin is in the room?

Open All of Obama’s Health Care Meetings to C-SPAN is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

There seems to be a real trend in Washington to declare support for a bill now, but actually have the bill exist later. It’s been most obvious in the health care marathon, where often purely notional pieces of legislation have been boisterously celebrated or bemoaned for months. It’s also the case with the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act, which may or may not be tacked on to health-care reconcilation because supporters don’t, you know, want to actually debate the thing. Currently, there is no Senate version of SAFRA, and it’s unclear what changes would need to be made to the House version to make it reconcilable.

So why are so many people willing to take big chances on legislation that only exists in the fertile minds of congresspeople? As this Inside Higher Ed article on community colleges illustrates, it’s often because they want taxpayer money — $12 billion is the community colleges’ hoped for windfall – no matter what:

Sensing the urgency of the moment on Capitol Hill, many community college advocates believe that budget reconciliation is the most likely route for passage of the AGI this year. They argue that time is of the essence for those community college trustees and presidents visiting town for the summit to lobby their representatives and senators without focusing on quibbles over the bill.

“I know there’s a lot of discussion for many of you [about] what’s in the program,” said Jee Hang Lee, ACCT director of public policy. “‘What’s in the final program for SAFRA? What’s in the final program for AGI? What is it going to look like?’ What we’ve heard is that, for the most part, the House and Senate staffs and the White House have something in place. I don’t know what it looks like. I don’t know many people who do know what it looks like. But they have a broad agreement on the structure of these programs, so that’s nice to know that they have because that means it’ll likely get funded.”

Still, he advised visiting trustees and presidents to be direct in their support for the bill and wait until later to work out potential kinks in its specific provisions.

“My point is that you just need to press hard to get this money and get it passed, and we can work out some of the details, I guess, later, I guess through the negotiated rule-making period,” Lee said.

Hmm. And I guess money grabs like these explain a good bit of why the national debt is now approaching $12.6 trillion.

If There’s Money, We Want It! (Whatever “It” Is.) is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

What does it say that the American polity has consistently rejected a wholesale government takeover of health care for 100 years?

What does it say that public opinion has been consistently against the Democrats’ health care takeover since July 2009?

What does it say that Democrats are having this much difficulty enacting their health care legislation despite unified Democratic rule?  Despite large supermajorities in both chambers of Congress, including a once-filibuster-proof Senate majority (see more below)?  Despite an opportunistic change in Massachusetts law that provided that crucial 60th vote at a crucial moment?  Despite a popular and charismatic president?

What does it say that 38 House Democrats voted against the president’s health plan?

What does it say that Massachusetts voters elected, to fill the term of Ted Kennedy, a Republican who ran against the health care legislation that Kennedy helped to shape?

What does it say that the only thing bipartisan about that legislation is the opposition to it?

What does it say that 39 senators voted to declare that legislation’s centerpiece unconstitutional?

What does it say that health care researchers — a fairly left-wing lot — think the Senate bill is unconstitutional?

What does it say that the demands of pro-life and pro-choice House Democrats, each of which hold enough votes to determine the fate of this legislation, are irreconcilable?

What does it say that House Democrats are actually contemplating a legislative strategy that would deem the Senate bill to have passed the House — without the House ever actually voting on it?

Given that ours is a system of government where ambition is made to counteract ambition, what does it mean that the only way to pass this legislation is for the House to trust that the Senate will keep the House’s interests at heart?

Questions for Thoughtful ObamaCare Supporters is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

When Rep. Collin Peterson (D- Minn. and Chairman of the House Agriculture Committee) pronounces that a farm program is too generous, you know you’ve crossed a line.

But that’s what happened recently after Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark), Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman and — oh, hey, how about that? — facing a tough re-election battle in November proposed an extra $1.1 billion in emergency farm aid be added to a jobs/tax/unemployment/kitchen sink bill going through the Senate this week. These extra handouts would flow despite the fact that the 2008 farm bill contained ”reforms” (the so-called ”permanent disaster” program) ostensibly to put an end to politically-motivated ad hoc emergency aid of just the type that Senator Lincoln is pushing now.

For those who can stomach it, this excellent article by Dan Morgan, one of the nation’s best agriculture journalists, contains plenty of background information.

A $1.1 Billion Re-Election Campaign. For the Senate. is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

I testified to the Senate Finance Committee today regarding taxes and small business. My testimony is posted here.

President Obama plans to raise the top two individual income tax rates. That will not be good for business or the economy. A little more than half of all business income in the United States is reported on individual returns, not corporate returns. Of the business income reported on individual returns, 44 percent is in the top two income tax brackets.

My testimony pointed out that while Congress cut the top individual rate by 5 percentage points this past decade, the average top rate in the 30 OECD countries also fell by 5 percentage points, as shown in the chart below.

If the top federal rate rises to 40 percent next year, the United States will have the ninth highest top individual rate in the OECD, including state-level taxes. We’ve already got the second-highest corporate tax rate in the OECD.

A nation that has been a relative bastion of market capitalism and individual achievement has a tax code that is becoming very hostile to high-earners, entrepreneurs, and businesses of all types.

Taxes and Small Business is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

Steve Poizner, the California insurance commissioner who is seeking the Republican nomination for governor, created a stir this week by charging opponent Meg Whitman’s campaign with attempting to coerce him out of the race. He said he had reported her campaign to state and federal law enforcement authorities.

What did Whitman actually do? Well, Poizner said that Whitman consultant Mike Murphy had contacted a Poizner staffer by phone and email to urge him to withdraw from the race. The email, released by Poizner, said: “I hate the idea of each of us spending $20 million beating on the other in the primary, only to have a badly damaged nominee. And we can spend $40 million tearing up Steve if we must; bad for him, bad for us, and a crazy waste to tear up a guy with great future statewide potential.” In the email, Murphy went on to suggest that if Poizner dropped out of the race before the June 8 vote, Whitman and her team would immediately get behind him for a 2012 challenge to Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

Poizner says that’s not only “strong-arm tactics” but possibly an illegal inducement to get him to withdraw. But isn’t this really just politics as usual? Don’t candidates as a matter of course say “support me this time, and I’ll support you next time” or “run for a different office and I’ll endorse you”? Presidential candidates, or their campaign managers, are often said to have promised the vice presidency to more than one rival to clear the field.

The point about spending $40 million of Republican money tearing up fellow Republicans is a pretty common complaint about party primaries. In fact, National Review correspondent John J. Miller raised just that concern about the Rick Perry-Kay Bailey Hutchison showdown in Texas.

Even during the Rod Blagojevich flap over “selling” a Senate seat, the always-provocative Jack Shafer and Jim Harper both asked, Isn’t this what politicians do? They make deals — including deals like “I’ll support your campaign if you’ll make my buddy (or me) a Cabinet secretary.” No doubt the promises are often worthless, but they still get made. Blagojevich and Murphy have reminded pols all over the country that such deals are better made in person, not via email or telephone.

Politics ain’t beanbag, Mr. Poizner. Accept the deal or reject it. But “let’s clear the field and spend our money fighting the other party” is pretty standard politics. And a darn sight better than another standard political practice, using the taxpayers’ money to bribe the voters to support you.

Criminalizing Politics is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

"Father of the Individual Mandate" Mitt Romney

The former nickname came from National Journal or The Wall Street Journal, I’m not sure which.  The latter nickname comes from Institute for Health Freedom president Sue Blevins.

See here for details on an upcoming event in Dallas where Goodman’s National Center for Policy Analysis will play host to Romney.

It should be an interesting event.  With all 40 Republican members of the U.S. Senate, including moderates like Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME), voting to declare an individual mandate unconstitutional…with 35 states moving legislation to block an individual mandate…with the Heritage Foundation rebuking an individual mandate…and with Virginia’s Democratically controlled Senate approving legislation to block an individual mandate…well, Romney may have a tough road to hoe with the conservatives who typically attend NPCA events.

‘Father of HSAs’ John Goodman Plays Host to ‘Father of the Individual Mandate’ Mitt Romney is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

• The massive impact government spending has on job creation.

• Why climate change spurs whining about cold snaps.

• Beware the “Crusader Temptation”: “Afghanistan has become a target of aggressive pro-war activists in America, including feminists who believe in waging war to improve the status of women.”

• What happens when the only self-identified socialist in the U.S. Senate starts to look moderate when compared to his colleagues?

• Podcast: “Bush’s Budget-Busting Binge,” featuring Chris Edwards.

Monday Links is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog