Live from Music Row Monday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed the original all-star panelist Crom Carmichael in studio to weigh in on the Senate parliamentarian’s decision not to allow immigration to pass through reconciliation and tax deductions for blue state billionaires.
Leahy: That is Senator Bernie Sanders, the Communist from Vermont. And he was hoping over the weekend that they would abuse the reconciliation process to put forth policy issues and get those approved without going through the filibuster.
Well, guess what the parliamentarian has ruled? Not going to let it happen. So that is a bit encouraging. We get into the weeds on this Crom But as it turns out, this reconciliation process is a way to avoid the filibuster in the Senate.
But you can only put content into those budget bills that are specifically budget and not policy. What the left wants to do and what Bernie Sanders wants to do is jam all these policy initiatives into the reconciliation. The parliamentarian we talked about this the other day, is the one who rules on whether or not they can do it.
Carmichael: In the Senate.
Leahy: In this instance, the parliamentarian ruled against what the left-wing wants to do. That’s a good thing. We’ll see how because they’re going to try this with everything to violate the typical regular order by which we actually make laws here in the country. So that’s a temporarily good thing. There are so many bad things going on Crom that we have to cheer those good things that happen.
Carmichael: That is certainly an important good thing. And I think there was that election bill HR1, and then the Senate bill one, and that didn’t go anywhere. And so then they did HR4. And I guess that passed the House.
And then in the Senate, they’re trying to stick that into the reconciliation process. And by the way, I’m surprised that the parliamentarian has said you can’t do immigration legislation in a reconciliation.
And I guess the historical nature of the way we’ve always handled immigration law has never been through the budget process. And so she’s saying, if I rule that you can do immigration, I’d have to rule that you can do anything.
Leahy: Exactly.
Carmichael: And so I’m guessing that the voting law, I would assume that under the same principle and all these other things that they’re trying to cram through in reconciliation if it turns out that the only the thing that is voted on is the amount of money we spend and the programs that we enact to spend all that money, and then the taxes.
And the tax rates that the House Budget Committee passed or the Finance Committee, whichever committee it is in the House, the taxes that they are trying to impose are not nearly as high as Biden has asked for. I’ve not seen whether or not the blue state billionaires are going to get their tax breaks back.
Leahy: The blue state billionaires. Now that Crom is a phrase that I rather like. Did you make that up? Blue State Billionaires.
Carmichael: If you think that’s creative, then thank you very much. You have a low bar.
Leahy: I do have a low bar.
Carmichael: That is alliteration. I call that alliteration.
Leahy: Because I’ve been writing headlines for stories now for well over a decade.
Carmichael: I would try to remember that rapidly. (Laughter)
Leahy: But anyway, I do have a low bar. I like the stuff you say, Crom. It’s interesting to me. (Laughs)
Carmichael: But under Trump, they took away the tax deduction on state income taxes from billionaires in the blue states and from every state. But it primarily affects the billionaires in the blue states. And Schumer was determined to get that back into the tax code.
Well, if you give the billionaires in the blue states, that tax break, the amount of money that you have to make up by raising taxes on non-billionaires is significant just to get back to even.
Apparently, I’ve not seen any reports but that doesn’t mean it’s not in there that the tax deduction Trump took away from the truly rich is being restored. And so getting back to the taxes, the top tax rate is going back to the Obama rate of almost 39.6 percent.
The corporate income tax is going up to I think it’s 26 or 28 percent. Capital gains taxes and taxes on interest and dividends are going up to about the 28 percent range.
Biden, on the other hand, wanted capital gains to go to ordinary income taxes and include the 3.8 percent Obamacare tax on capital gains. Which is rare but its still there.
Leahy: For those of you who only think of taxes in the days immediately preceding April 15th, capital gains are for investments. You make an investment in a company. And typically at some point, you may either sell it and make a profit or make a loss.
But if you make a profit, that is income that is different from ordinary income where you work at a job. Ordinary income that the highest tax rates can go up to a pretty high.
Carmichael: Under Biden, they want to raise the ordinary income tax rate to 39.6 percent.
Leahy: What’s the highest right now? 35 percent.
Carmichael: 35 percent.
Leahy: But capital gains tax on money you invest and then turns into a profit is 23 percent right now?
Carmichael: It’s 23 percent. But let me say this. I think that in revisiting the tax code, the unrealized gains on multi-billionaires need to be reexamined. (Leahy laughs) I’m just saying because they don’t pay any income tax.
Leahy: Yes. And so when you say unrealized gains, what you mean is if you make an investment in something…
Carmichael: These are the people who start the company. They don’t make an investment. They make a tiny investment. Bezos for example is worth a couple of hundred billion dollars. His investment would’ve been less than $100,000.
Leahy: Because of the way you set up a start-up company and the entrepreneurs get more.
Listen to the full second hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Live from Music Row Monday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed the original all-star panelist Crom Carmichael to the studio to discuss the changing definition of infrastructure and the intended destruction of the middle class.
(Joe Manchin clips plays)
Leahy: (Sighs) Joe Manchin, the Democrat Senator from West Virginia. Now, that clip to me, Crom, sounds like he’s cheerleading for this 2,700-page bill. The ‘infrastructure bill’ that was just released late last night by Chuck Schumer. Forced to release it, by the way, because Breitbart got an unauthorized leak of the bill that they released about an hour before.
That’s why it got released. It’s filled with all sorts of special deals and money going to special interest groups. And yet Manchin is presenting it as everybody’s bill. What’s your reaction to that?
Carmichael: Now we’re talking specifically about the so-called physical infrastructure bill, not the human infrastructure bill. We’re talking about the one that’s the $1.2 trillion dollar bill correct?
Leahy: (Chuckles) Well Crom, it says it’s physical infrastructure.
Carmichael: I’m just talking about the other one is ridiculous.
Leahy: This one is equally ridiculous.
Carmichael: I know, but is this the one that actually includes some money for roads and bridges?
Leahy: There is some money for roads and bridges. Some.
Carmichael: Manchin is incorrect when he says a D or an R because the people from New York and the people from California are getting the lion’s share of this money. It’s – not much is coming to the people of Tennessee or any city or state in the South, including West Virginia.
West Virginia will get a little bit. And I suppose Manchin thinks that if he brings home $100 million dollars worth of bacon for West Virginia out of $1.2 trillion, then the people of West Virginia will reward him.
Leahy: He may be thinking that – yes.
Carmichael: So this is the problem, by the way. Another thing I did over the weekend, Michael, was I carefully researched every road and bridge in the continental United States and Hawaii and Alaska.
Leahy: You were busy.
Carmichael: Is actually in one of our states.
Leahy: Amazing.
Carmichael: Except for Washington, D.C., except for that little tiny area. We have a great legislature, let me say that. But even back when Democrats were in charge, even back then, there’s no way that Democrats in the Tennessee legislature could have passed a Tennessee ‘infrastructure bill’ on the backs of the taxpayers of just Tennessee, that included this type of ridiculous stuff that’s in a federal infrastructure program.
This is why historically – and I only have to go back to the 1950s when our interstate highway system was passed with a defense appropriation – our Congress did not believe that under the Constitution it had the right to actually spend money on roads or bridges. Didn’t think it even had that right.
Leahy: Had to kind of invent a right.
Carmichael: They had to invent a right by claiming that in a case of a war, we need to be able to move troops and equipment quickly around the country so we needed to have an interstate highway system to move military equipment.
Leahy: That was clever and true, but a very small part of what it’s used for. You do occasionally see some troops going through.
Carmichael: Occasionally you do. But the point is, is that once that happened, then the dam broke, and then anything goes. Now you’ve got the Democrats claiming that infrastructure is infrastructure.
Leahy: Healthcare is infrastructure.
Carmichael: Everything is infrastructure.
Leahy: When everything is infrastructure, Crom, nothing is infrastructure.
Carmichael: That’s right. There’s nothing in the Constitution that gives Congress the authority to spend money on infrastructure. It all started where Congress did have the authority to spend money on the military. This is what happens when you start changing the definitions.
And then you get into this three-point-five or five-point-five or seven-point-five, and nobody really, really knows how much this so-called human infrastructure thing will amount to because it is an entitlement.
Leahy: That is exactly right. It’s not an infrastructure hard asset. It’s entitlement to a special privileged group.
Carmichael: No, it’s not. The group is so large that it will become impossible to sustain. Now, I want to be clear about this, because when Medicare was passed in 1960, that was an entitlement.
And they estimated that Medicare by 1988 would cost $8 billion dollars. By 1988, it was $80 billion dollars. It didn’t change the fact on whether or not it passed and whether or not it was there.
Leahy: Let me just interject you for a moment. We’re now in 2021. There are three particular things that happened between 1955 and 1965 that, in essence, have helped destroy the budget.
Number one, the highway spending bill that you just referenced under the Eisenhower administration. Number two, when John F. Kennedy allowed federal government employees to unionize,
Carmichael: He didn’t just allow it, he signed an executive order. And then, then, well, then it became legal. He legalized it with the executive order. And then Congress then passed a bill.
Leahy: And you had the Medicare. This all happened 1955 to 1965.
Carmichael: Well, 1968, because Medicare and Medicaid was great society stuff.
Leahy: No one at the time realized the import of all this.
Carmichael: That’s right. That’s right.
Leahy: And look what happened.
Carmichael: Now here’s what’s interesting. I’ll be very quick about this – in Britain, just on health care, they’re going to increase the payroll tax from 12 percent of employee pay to 13 percent of employee pay. The employer part, this is just for healthcare, is now 13.8 percent. I want to talk about the implications.
Leahy: More regulation, more crushing of small business.
Carmichael: And more taxes on the middle class.
Leahy: There you go. Crushing the middle class.
Listen to the full second hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Crom Carmichael” by Crom Carmichael.
Live from Music Row Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed U.S. Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN) to the newsmaker line to discuss China’s illicit global behavior, SEC regulations, the Biden family, and reconciliation.
Leahy: We are joined on our newsmaker line by our friend, the United States junior senator from Tennessee, Bill Hagerty. Good morning, Senator Hagerty.
Hagerty: Good morning. Great to be back with you.
Leahy: Senator Hagerty, China is on my mind this morning, and I’m thinking it’s on your mind as well. What’s going on with China? You’ve been making some news in that area of late.
Hagerty: China persists in its malign behavior all around the world. And if you think about what we’re dealing with now in any aspect of the news, whether it’s the coronavirus pandemic that they unquestionably unleashed on the planet, their reluctance to do anything, to cooperate, to help us deal with that.
Their actions in the Taiwan Strait, which threaten yet another free nation and one of our allies, where we are spending a great deal of time and effort right now. Certainly in my office contemplating our approach and our push back on that.
To what they’re doing in the realm of military diplomacy and every other aspect of global life to try to undercut and project themselves and very often at the expense of America.
Leahy: You were quoted in a story yesterday at CNBC. This is an area of great interest to me, and I learned something about your position in the Senate, where you are influential. You are a member of the Banking Committee, which is a very influential committee.
Here’s the headline of the story. SEC Officials Says US Listed Chinese Companies Must Disclose Government Interference Risk. And your quote on that topic was, I think on point. You said, “U.S. regulators must ensure that American investors and workers are protected from the sort of non-market behavior that is leaving American investors.” That’s what you said.
Hagerty: Yes.
Leahy: You said it on the Senate banking committee. How are the Chinese companies that are listed on American stock exchanges engaging in nonmarket behavior?
Hagerty: Several days ago, I made those remarks because I witnessed what happened with the listing of the major ride-hailing company. It’s a copycat of Uber here in America. It’s called DiDi. And they came and use the New York Stock Exchange to list their company.
I’ve spent a lot of time and a big portion of my life in the financial markets – a servant on the board of directors of New York Stock Exchange-listed companies. I know the rules. DiDi lists here in America raise billions of dollars.
And just a couple of days later, the Chinese Communist Party basically pulled down their data, pulls their app offline, and destroys the business model. This is after they’ve collected again billions of dollars of American investors’ hard-earned money.
Leahy: Where did that money go?
Hagerty: It’s in the hands of a Chinese company and perhaps in the hands of the Chinese Communist Party.
Leahy: How do we let that happen?
Hagerty: We allowed them to list. And again, I put a lot of pressure on the SEC. You cannot allow these Chinese companies to list and not follow precisely the same set of rules. The companies that I’ve worked with, that I’ve sat on the boards on, and that I’ve invested in – that you invest in, American companies have followed the rules.
If we had an American company that didn’t list a major risk like this, they would be delisted.
Instead, we had this happen with the Chinese company and we’ve got to step up. No more looking the other way. The Biden administration seems too often willing to appease and not step up and stand up for the rights of Americans.
Leahy: What sort of concrete, specific actions can be undertaken by the United States government to make sure that these kinds of market irregularities, this disruption, this perversion of our American financial markets by the Chinese, to their benefit, don’t occur again?
Hagerty: We need to make certain that they fully comply with all of the accounting standards that American companies have to comply with.
I think it’s a shock to many American investors to learn that Chinese companies have been given waivers on the American stock exchanges when they don’t comply with the same sort of accounting requirements, the same accounting standards that we do. That’s got to come to an end.
Leahy: But didn’t the Biden administration just double down on granting those waivers? Or do I have that wrong?
Hagerty: They have got to come back and look at the law and enforce it as written. And they’re not doing this time and time again. They’re looking the other way. They’re not enforcing the laws that are on the books against companies that don’t and countries –
And certainly, the Chinese Communist Party doesn’t have our best interests at heart. Yet they’re willing to double down on American companies all day long. We are the enemy. The economy here in America is under attack on a daily basis by the Biden administration.
Yet, if you look at their appeasement around the world and it’s not just China, they’re trying to appease Iran. They killed the Keystone XL pipeline. What a gift to China and Iran. They are collapsing our southern border. That’s a gift to the cartels down in Mexico.
And Vladimir Putin is laughing all the way to the bank now that they granted him a license to go ahead and complete Nord Stream too. Again, great for the old business over there in Russia while they’re trying to kill the old gas business here in America.
Leahy: There’s a principle of philosophy called Ockham’s razor and that is basically the most likely explanation for an occurrence – is probably the correct one. So I look at this, Senator Hagerty and I look at the Biden Justice Department refusing to prosecute a couple of Chinese spies and military members who lied about their resumes to get influential jobs with American universities.
They’ve decided they’re not going to prosecute them. To me that says this is an example of how compromised Joe Biden and the Biden administration are on the issue of China. What have I got wrong there?
Hagerty: I think you’ve got it right. And if you think about the close financial ties that the Biden family has with China. We don’t have to go back very far to remember who the big guy is and Hunter’s activities in China bringing – what was it?
A billion and a half dollars back from a trip that Hunter took when his father was the vice president. There is obviously something going on here, and we’ve got to continue to press to get to the bottom of it.
Leahy: What are the odds that an anonymous Chinese Communist Party member is going to spend half a million dollars to buy the supposed artwork of Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden? (Chuckles)
Hagerty: This is yet another example of the Biden regime and the Biden family operation cashing in on the father’s position. And this is wholly un-American and something I think the world should be very concerned about.
I should say America should be very concerned about it. The world is looking at this and perhaps a low-cost entry point to influence here in America. And it’s un-American as it can be.
Leahy: You’ve got a very busy schedule yourself, and we really appreciate you coming to the program to tell us what you’re up to. What are your priorities for the next week? What are some of the most important things you’ll be doing?
Hagerty: We are trying to make it clear to the public the inflationary implications of what Biden and the Democrats are talking about with this massive spending spree that they have in the tank. They’re saying it’s a $3.5 trillion package to go alongside this “bipartisan” infrastructure deal.
All the projections that I’ve seen say that the $3.5 trillion partisan package, and again, they’re planning to pass this on a 50 vote margin in the Senate. We have a 50/50 Senate and the only way they can break the ties is by bringing the vice president to do it.
That’s their plan. The $3.5 trillion actually maps out to be more than $5 trillion. This is at a time when inflation has taken off. If you look at the numbers between May and June of this year and you annualize the inflation just between those last two months, it annualizes to a 12 percent annual inflation rate. The target for the Fed is two percent.
They’ve talked about maybe slightly overshooting that. This isn’t a slight overshoot. This is a massive overshoot. And we’ve got to step back and say, do we want to introduce this type of inflation throughout the economy?
Those of us that are old enough to remember the Jimmy Carter years know where this will lead. And we are pushing back as hard as we possibly can on this.
Leahy: Here’s a question for you. The Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer asked for advice from the parliamentarian on the capability of using reconciliation to jam through all sorts of bills – illegal immigration, et cetera – under the guise of reconciliation.
The parliamentarian said, well, maybe once you can do it, maybe twice. Do you think the parliamentarian is going to rule on these attempts that will constrain the use of reconciliation? Or will it be a free for all?
Hagerty: We’ll see what they put in. But my guess is that even though Chuck Schumer may know things will not pass the test to be included in this reconciliation bill. And again, I want to clarify the word reconciliation.
What you would think and what I would think is reconciliation is some sort of coming together, some meeting of minds to address or fix something. This is not reconciliation. This is a 100-percent partisan, reckless spending spree that they’re on. Will they use this process to message, will they put things in that won’t fit and rely on the parliamentarian to take them out? I wouldn’t put it past them at all.
They’ll probably use anything that the parliamentarian takes out yet again as their argument to do away with the filibuster and turn this Senate process that over the years has been historically a bipartisan organization into something that is completely partisan again. And if they destroy the filibuster they’ll be able to fulfill the rest of their socialist wishlist.
Leahy: Senator Bill Hagerty, thanks so much for taking the time out of your busy schedule to talk to our listeners here. I really appreciate it. I hope you have a great week. Thanks for joining us.
Hagerty: Thank you. Good to be with you.
Listen to the second hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Live from Music Row Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed The Tennessee Star National Correspondent Neil McCabe to the newsmaker line to talk about Schumer’s rush to pass a blank infrastructure bill while coaxing Republicans to get on board.
Leahy: We are joined on our newsmaker line by the very best Washington correspondent in the country. He represents The Star News Network, covering Washington, Neil McCabe. Neil, good morning.
McCabe: Good morning, Michael. Very good to be with you.
Leahy: So I think you called it. Now, Chuck Schumer has a bill. He’s calling it the infrastructure bill. Apparently, it is a blank sheet of paper.
And it’s $3.5 trillion of spending, something like that. What are the chances of that moving through the United States Senate or the rest of Congress?
McCabe: Well, it’s a very interesting gambit. Schumer is forcing senators to be working in Washington when they don’t want to be in Washington during the summer.
Frankly, no one wants to be in Washington during the summer. It was practically designed by the founders who knew when they put Washington in a swamp, the point was to keep people away because nobody would want to be there.
Roy Blunt, who is one of the 10 most rebellious of the senators working with Democrats on this infrastructure bill from Missouri, basically said that he doubts that this thing is going to move forward because the bill hasn’t been written, as you said.
Schumer is trying to get these Republicans who are negotiating with Democrats on an infrastructure bill to be on the record, moving it forward as a way of showing their good faith.
So why should we negotiate with you if you won’t move the bill forward? So McConnell at the luncheon that the Republicans have every week urged his colleagues to vote against it. And we’re going to set to see, I doubt that the Republicans are going to go against McConnell on this.
There’s a lot of pressure – both Republicans and Democrats – to basically hold the party line. If it’s a procedural vote. When it comes down to issues of agenda or policy, there’s a little bit more play there.
But you’re really supposed to maintain party discipline on a procedural vote, and that’s what the filibuster is. And I would also say that President Donald J. Trump has been really negative about McConnell lately.
And I think that actually strengthens McConnell’s hand inside the Republican Senate conference because the Republicans are going to want to show some unity and sort of support McConnell. McConnell’s name might be trash outside of Capitol Hill, but among senators, they’re routing to him.
Leahy: That’s a very interesting point. Now, these 10 I don’t know. You call them the weak-kneed Republicans who are trying to, “negotiate with a blank piece of paper” that had been presented to them by Chuck Schumer.
I know Blunt is not up for reelection. He said he’s retiring. Are any of the others going to face primary challenges on the Republican side if they partner with the Democrats?
McCabe: Well, that’s going to be a problem. It will also hurt their turnout – will also hurt their fundraising. So even if they don’t get a primary challenge, it’s not going to be the same enthusiasm.
But a guy like Blunt retiring, Portman’s retiring, Toomey’s retiring. Bird is retiring from North Carolina. When these guys are retiring, that’s almost when they’re the most dangerous, because not only are they trying to set themselves up for retirement, but now they’ve got dozens of aides and a lot of their senior aides.
And they got to set these guys up with lobbying gigs and whatnot. So there are different provisions hitting in these bills that their staffers are the experts on lobbying on.
And so that’s why the lame-duck session is so dangerous. So these guys are on their way out the door and they’re plotting their retirement and the retirement of their aides. So that’s their incentive.
Carmichael: Neil, let me ask you a question, though. In order for Schumer to be successful in the vote, he needs to get to 60 total, which means that 10 Republicans would have to side with the Democrats against the wishes of McConnell. And I think the likelihood of that is one in a billion.
McCabe: Well, the other problem is that everyone understands that this is both. After the filibuster, Schumer doesn’t need the Republicans anymore, because then the bill just needs a simple majority.
And then, of course, it goes to reconciliation. The Republicans will only have leverage before the filibuster. And that’s why Schumer is trying to get it out of the way.
And Schumer is racing against time. It’s like the legislative season is over, and he’s trying to get something done when everybody wants to be back home and time is running out. As time goes on, the Democrats are losing their grip on Capitol Hill because everyone knows the midterm is coming, and they know that Biden isn’t going to be able to bail them out.
I mean, you see what’s going on with inflation? There’s going to possibly be a six percent increase in Social Security. Forget the budget ramifications of that.
But that is confirmation that there is serious inflation out there. That’s the highest increase, I think, since like, 1975 or something. It’s crazy.
And people are talking about lumber and gas prices. But when you see a Social Security hike of six percent, that gets people’s attention, and people are going to start saying, wow, what’s going on with this Biden administration?
Certainly, he’s losing on crime. He’s losing on the border. And he’s kind of bouncing around. People are trying to say, well, what’s going on with this guy?
Carmichael: What time frame do we look at here? In other words, you’re going to have this vote or you’re not going to have this vote. What’s the drop-dead date for Schumer?
McCabe: Schumer votes today.
Carmichael: The vote is today?
McCabe: Schumer votes today.
Carmichael: If Schumer doesn’t get to 60 today, then it’s dead the water. Is that right?
McCabe: No. What the 60 votes means, he ends the debate. And that means they can have a vote on the floor for a simple majority.
So if they don’t end the debate now, they can end the debate tomorrow. You can keep trying to break the filibuster forever. And so Schumer is just trying to do it now because he wants to get people on the record.
And he’s trying to goose the process and basically say to the Republicans who are negotiating, there are a lot of Republicans that want high-speed rail.
They want 5G. They want bridges. They want highways. They want ports dredged. So there’s a lot of Republicans who want some of these goodies.
But if they want it, they got to go ahead with the filibuster. That’s what Schumer is trying to say. Why should we negotiate with you?
Because if you don’t want to negotiate with us, we’ll just go through the reconciliation process and we don’t need you. It’ll be a smaller bill, but you won’t get anything.
Carmichael: But if they vote to do away with the filibuster without knowing what’s in the bill, then they’ve lost their leverage anyway. Is that correct?
McCabe: If they end the filibuster, they have lost all of their leverage.
Leahy: So it just makes common sense not to cooperate with Schumer if you’re one of these retiring RHINO Republicans who, as you say, are very dangerous at that time.
Of course, sometimes common sense and some Republican senators are two things that don’t always go together.
McCabe: Schumer is not in a position of strength. The reason why he’s pushing it now is that he knows that there’s atrophy to his ability to get things done. And he needs action on things.
Pelosi doesn’t have a care in the world. She’s going up against Kevin McCarthy, and she just runs circles around him. But Schumer and McConnell is a “Clash of the Titans.”
Leahy: A clash of the Senate Titans. And on that note, Neil McCabe, thanks so much for joining us.
Listen to the full third hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Live from Music Row Tuesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Grassroots Engagement Director of Americans for Prosperity-Tennessee Grant Henry and Maury County Mayor Andy Ogles in studio to discuss the irresponsible and cyclical spending of Democrats in Washington.
(Joe Biden clip plays)
Leahy: We hear that from Sleepy Joe, the legal but not legitimate current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. We are here with Grant Henry of the Americans from Prosperity-Tennessee and Maury County Mayor Andy Ogles.
Andy, I saw the eyebrows raised just a bit (Ogles chuckles) on that claim by the somnambulant Joe Biden that, oh yeah, this was expected and temporary. Really?
Ogles: As an economist, I’ll tell you that he’s full of … Do you have a bleep button?
Leahy: He’s full of bleep! Scooter is now saying, oh, no, we can’t do that. (Laughs)
Ogles: You tell me that these home builders that pre-sold lumber packages a year ago who are now building homes at a loss – it was anticipated?
You tell me that these car manufacturers who now have tens of thousands of cars sitting on the lot without chips, that that was expected?
And again, just go through all your commodities, and your base commodities that go into everything else are more expensive today. And to say that it was expected or predictable, it’s almost criminal. I’ll be honest with you.
Leahy: It’s so dishonest. Grant Henry, we were talking a little bit about Fiat economies. Fiat standards. in other words, where there is no actual valuable item for which currency can be converted.
The gold standard, long gone. There were – for many years conservatives were railing about the budget deficit and the increasing debt.
And that’s not been as much on the forefront of late because there have been other battles. But the reality is, if the government just prints money, what is inevitably going to happen is inflation.
Henry: Yes.
Leahy: That’s the bottom line, right?
Henry: I don’t think you need a degree in economics to understand that either. I think even a baseline understanding, I mean, look at what’s happening in world history any time that any country prints money, especially to the extent that we are right now, you see a coupling inflation rate.
Look what our Founding Fathers told us, too. To preserve their independence, we must not let our rules load us with perpetual debt. One of the worst things we can do for future generations is shackle them to the debt of the current generations.
Leahy: It’s reckless and irresponsible. But that is exactly what Chuck Schumer and the Democrats are doing. And, Andy Ogles, not a lot of Republicans have been what you might call budget responsible in Washington.
Ogles: I think you look back to what set up a situation or an environment where someone like Obama could get elected. That was because you had reckless spending. From the “right,” the Republicans, as they controlled three branches of government.
And so the pendulum shifted. And hopefully, there’s a lesson learned.
We’ve got to get this debt and our spending under control because there is a point of no return.
And we’ve labored and we’ve toiled and we’ve done these things and created all this spending with this assumption that, well, our currency is the supreme currency for the world. But that could change and it could change quickly.
Leahy: China wants to change as soon as possible.
Ogles: That’s right. Absolutely.
Leahy: They’re undermining us at every level. Meanwhile, Chuck Schumer has a bill that has no content in it yet. And we’ll come up with all sorts of crazy spending ideas and reckless spending.
That – really that’s all the Democrats can do is spend, spend, spend. There’s no indication that they have any desire to cut the national federal debt. Grant Henry?
Henry: Here’s a headline from Reason, by the way. Magical Thinking of Bounds in New Budget Deal Proposal. Here is the quote from the article:
“Democrats insist that whatever that spending is about, it will be paid for in full.”
That’s dubious at best. The big idea is that the spending itself will generate economic activity which can then be taxed to pay for the already spent or budgeted programs.
Do you understand how circular this logic is? And it’s inherently self-refuting, right?
Leahy: Inherently self-refuting. That’s a great phrase Grant.
Henry: I bring the best here.
Leahy: That’s a very good phrase. We appreciate clever and accurate phrasing. Andy Ogles, so when I’m listening to what Grant says about the fantastic concepts, shall we say, these anti factual ideas of economics from the Democratic political leaders, I think of the exact opposite of this, which is Art Laffer and the Laffer curve and his ideas.
If we were to have him in here how would he respond to these things? Because, you know, you used to work for him.
Ogles: Yeah, I can’t speak for Doctor Laffer. But I think there’s this. If you have a certain rate of growth, you can sustain greater levels of spending or borrowing and spending.
But the flip side of that or how the only way that can be successful is you have policies that are stimulating business growth and stimulating an economy.
Now, I’m not for exuberant spending. But that being said, so you now have Democrats kind of acting under that same premise.
However, they’re anti-business and they’re doing things that restrict business.
Leahy: Here’s my view on that. I think they’re in particular, anti-small business. When you say anti-business, there’s a business that they like and businesses that work with them.
Like, I don’t know, Facebook and Google and that crowd that is the high Fortune 500 companies that have big lobbyists and they have all these compliance of people, and they follow the rules and regulations. They set the rules and regulations.
Ogles: And those large businesses, and because they are so big, because they have so many resources, they can skirt most taxation.
Leahy: Absolutely.
Listen to the third hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
