Forgive me for making a separate post, but I wanted to take issue at length with Congressman Himes' vote against the new jobs bill (HR 2847, December 16) that Congress barely passed. His office issued this explanation (as Jonathan Kantrowitz posted):
The Congressman voted against a $75 billion Democratic spending plan which largely expanded programs in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. While the Congressman shares many of the priorities contained in the legislation, he was unwilling to authorize additional spending when over $545 billion, or more than two thirds, of Recovery Act funds are still being spent. This bill uses remaining funds from the Troubled Asset Relief Program to pay for this expansion. The Congressman believes that TARP funding, which was regrettably requested by President Bush, Treasury Secretary Paulsen, and Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke as critical to averting financial meltdown, should not be used for anything other than debt reduction unless the money is distributed through the full appropriations process.
"As many sectors of the economy begin to show clear signs of recovery, we need to get our fiscal house in order," said Congressman Himes. "The simple facts are that we have to pay our bills, and the only long-term path to continued improvement is to replace public spending with private-sector job growth."
I have to point out that Nobel laureate economist Paul Krugman takes the opposite point of view, and has for months. He has steadfastly pointed out, and I agree with him, that the initial stimulus bill was far too small. Though Congressman Himes suggests that the economy is "showing clear signs of recovery", I would suggest he focus on the nearly half a million new jobless claims that were made this week, and the double-digit unemployment rate. As Krugman has pointed out, we are in for years of subpar growth and unemployment and underemployment rates that are painfully high. Krugman put it starkly just a week ago:
I don't think many people grasp just how much job creation we need to climb out of the hole we're in. You can't just look at the eight million jobs that America has lost since the recession began, because the nation needs to keep adding jobs - more than 100,000 a month - to keep up with a growing population. And that means that we need really big job gains, month after month, if we want to see America return to anything that feels like full employment.
How big? My back of the envelope calculation says that we need to add around 18 million jobs over the next five years, or 300,000 jobs a month. This puts last week's employment report, which showed job losses of "only" 11,000 in November, in perspective. It was basically a terrible report, which was reported as good news only because we've been down so long that it looks like up to the financial press.
Unless, that is, our Democratic congress joins with Barack Obama and passes substantially greater job stimulus. Congressman Himes has taken the very disappointing position of the minority Republicans that the key economic problem is the deficit, while Krugman, whom I respect above all economists, has pointed out that the deficit is not the problem; the dismal job situation is.
Congressman Himes gave the following statement yesterday announcing his intention to vote in favor of the Affordable Health Care for America Act and urged his colleagues to support the legislation as well.
Full disclosure: I am Congressman Himes' Communications Director
Revised health care legislation was introduced in Congress Thursday. The legislation is still changing some, but we should have a good idea of what the final bill will look like soon.
Over the coming week, Congressman Himes will be sending out updates via email as more information about the improved legislation becomes available. Click here to sign up for the Congressman's email list. If you receive the Congressman's campaign email newsletters (The Himes Times), you need to register separately for this list that operates out of his official office. Sorry about the multiple lists; laws require we keep campaign and official communication separate.
Also, please let me apologize for not noting my affiliation with the Congressman's office in my last post--total oversight. FYI: I am Congressman Jim Himes' Communications Director.
Following is a comment I posted at Connecticut Local Politics, which, as usual, is being "held for moderation". Of course, the original posting that quoted a highly distorted and dishonest report by Teri Puhl was published right away. I think it's important to get the truth out, so here it is:
This report is a pack of lies. First, Teri Buhl did not attend Lawrenceville Prep with Jim Himes, because Jim Himes never went to Lawrenceville Prep. He attended and graduated from a public school, Hopewell Valley Central High School in New Jersey. Second, the strong majority of the audience was in favor of health reform and the public option. I was there, sitting half way up on the middle isle on the right side. No one who attended that meeting could suggest that the anti-reform people were in the majority. It was a clear lie. And the audience inside was closer to three hundred people counting all those standing in the back. It was also not true that anyone packed the venue. Lots of people showed up early enough to get in. The person at the front of the line to get in was against reform. That woman, who had a nametag with "Ann" on it, started out by defacing an entire sheet of stickers that said "I support the public option". Real class act! And according to Greenwich Post reporter Ken Borsuk whom I spoke with as we were leaving the meeting hall at the end, the crowd outside numbered about a hundred and were evenly split between supporters of reform and those against. So most of the people who wanted to get in did get in.
Furthermore, I went outside afterwards to the front of Town Hall where Congressman Jim Himes came out to address the crowd. There were not eight police officers out there. I could see the gathering clearly, as I stood to the left of the main entrance about ten feet away from the steps. There were about fifty people remaining, most of whom were against reform. There were three police officers: two who were stationed at the front door of Town Hall, and had been stationed there since before the meeting began, and one additional officer who stood at the back of the crowd. The suggestion that Jim Himes was somehow protected by a phalanx of cops is a lie, although that sort of dishonest reporting is the hallmark of Greenwich Time's Neil Vigdor, who reported that. There certainly was a need for police officers, however, because the people in the crowd were ugly and bent on trying to harass and intimidate anyone who disagreed with them. When Congressman Himes came out to talk with them, they yelled insults, shouted him down, and generally acted like the low-life thugs they were. They frequently refused to permit him to answer their questions, and shouted him down when he tried to. It was a thoroughly disgraceful display by people whose behavior treaded the line that could have had the cops putting them in handcuffs.
Norwalk townhall on the left, Greenwich from Monday night on the right.
Here's a couple of typical news reports on the level of debate seen thus far. Because these things are just a collection of soundbites you get these type of mixed messages:
Congressman Jim Himes hosted the second of three meetings this week to discuss his stance on the highly controversial "public option" issue and answer questions from his constituents.
"My vision of the public option is an additional competitor providing more choices in what is largely an uncompetitive market right now," he said.
A packed auditorium was split on this debate; many questioning if the government should tackle individual problems within the health care system rather than enact a sweeping change.
"To monkey around with such a portion of our economy, in such a wholesale fashion, just doesn't make economic sense," said Winthrop Baum of Fairfield.
"If we get this wrong, the damage is really catastrophic and irreversible," said Rep. Himes. "This economy, this country, this government, this private sector can not sustain another two or three years of 10-11 percent increases in health care costs."
I attended the just-completed health care town hall meeting at Greenwich Town Hall attended by roughly 300 people. To summarize Congressman Himes did a very admirable job of explaining the problems with our health care system, explaining what health care reform is necessary, what Congress is debating, and what he intends to vote for. I'd estimate that about 40% of the people in the meeting room tonight were anti-health care reform. They started out interrupting, throwing out catcalls, and being rather disruptive. But Congressman Himes answered questions thoroughly, he used data, he explained his positions clearly, and by eight o'clock at the end of the hour and a half session, all participants were much more subdued, and it appeared that many of the anti folks in the audience had their fears calmed. Of course, you never know with these tin hat types, but the mood in the room certainly became more calmed as the meeting went on and I will have to credit Jim Himes for soothing the fears of many in attendance.
Himes made the following points:
In his introduction he pointed out that the average American family now pays nearly $15,000 either directly or indirectly for health care coverage, and in ten years it is estimated to rise to #30,000.
He stated that we cannot reform Medicare or get our fiscal balance under control without reforming our nation's health care system.
He stated that reforming our health care system and giving every child the opportunity to see a doctor is a matter of morality.
Disturbingly, however, Congressman Himes repeatedly referred to Medicare having $30 tn in unfunded liabilities in terms of the present value of promised care over the next 75 years. He also stated repeatedly that reforming Medicare will be difficult, involve difficult choices, and demand that services to Medicare beneficiaries be reduced in the future.
(Op-ed edited to meet Fair Use requirements. Use link provided to read the entire piece. - promoted by Jon Kantrowitz)
Jim Himes has gone on record with his views regarding health care reform. Here is his oped that was carried in Greenwich Time today:
Health plan good start but must control costs more
By Jim Himes
...Health care reform must have two primary goals: provide Americans with stable access to high-quality care, and substantially reduce the costs in the system. Fail in the first goal, and we will continue to live with the moral and economic costs of a broken system. Fail in the second, and we will simply accelerate the unsustainable trajectory of this system.
The reform proposal being discussed in the U.S. House of Representatives does well on the first goal. It would cover almost all Americans, and provide subsidies to those households unable to afford it...
The public option has been the subject of much debate. Properly structured to assure a level playing field, a public option will provide much needed competition for the insurance companies and help bring down costs nationally..
Unfortunately, the proposal before the House is weak on the second key goal: cost reduction...
We must revisit our current fee-for-service, volume-based model, in which every provider at every step has powerful incentives to order test after test, procedure after procedure, with little regard for what is actually effective.
Instead we should reward hospitals and doctors who deliver higher quality health care. Doctors and patients need access to the best information and evidence on effectiveness. True health care reform must encourage proven best practices...
Ending months of speculation over whether he'd seek the congressional seat once held by his father, state Senate Minority Leader John McKinney on Wednesday said he will not challenge U.S. Rep. Jim Himes next year....
But he wouldn't rule out a possible campaign for statewide office next year.
"I think our state is run incredibly well by Gov. [M. Jodi] Rell and I support her tremendously, but if I have an opportunity to stay at home, be the father I want to be with my kids and help people out in Connecticut in public office, that's something I'll look at," he said.
McKinney had been heavily courted by national Republicans, and his potential run was supported by Chris Shays. The bench for the GOP in CT-04 now looks like it includes names like New Canaan resident Will Gregory (who mentions his Eagle Scout award in his website bio), conservative State Sen. Dan Debicella from Shelton, and first-term Greenwich State Sen. and George W. Bush fundraiser L. Scott Frantz.
Any challenger will need to come out of the box strong, because they will face a huge fundraising challenge.
Update: Other potential Republican names include State Sen. Toni Boucher from Wilton and former Bridgeport State Sen. Rob Russo.
When Rep. Jim Himes (CT-04) posts his 2nd quarter numbers with the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) next week, he'll reach a significant milestone nearly 16 months in advance of the 2010 election.
A couple of clips from Jim Himes' (CT-04) first week in office. In the first, Rep. Jim Himes before House Financial Services Committee questioning Fed Vice Chair Donald Kohn. On the floor yesterday, Himes remarks on the draft recovery bill. A welcome change, no doubt, to have a representative who actually understands the issues involved, rather than simply the politics.
Jim Himes and the rest of the Connecticut House contingent get sworn in today. Himes was also notified that he won a spot on the financial services committee. Also a big day for "Rep. John Larson, the new chairman of the Democratic caucus, and Rep. Rosa DeLauro, co-chair of the steering and policy committee (in addition to her spot on appropriations.)"
[Himes] lands in Congress with an advantage over some other freshmen: His state's delegation includes Rep. John Larson, the newly elected chairman of the Democratic caucus, and Rep. Rosa DeLauro, co-chairwoman of the group that gives committee assignments.
On Wednesday, the all-Democrat Connecticut delegation formally welcomed him at the Capitol. "We're a small delegation," said Sen. Chris Dodd. "We need to work closely together." Sen. Joe Lieberman added, "There's a lot of power in this small delegation." And Larson joked about Himes looking to DeLauro for a committee assignment: "Jim, appropriately suck up at the right time." [...]
By December, he'll have at least one committee assignment. He's hoping to be on the Financial Services Committee and the Transportation Committee. He wants to use his 12-year Goldman Sachs finance background to weigh in immediately on the nation's economic crisis.
His family - wife, Mary, and two daughters, aged 9 and 6 - will still live in Cos Cob, though Himes said he hopes to be back home as much as he can. [...]
There's one piece of advice he's already received. His new colleagues have warned him about any notion he'll immediately fix the country's problems. He said they told him, "Shift your priorities to really serve your constituents directly."
The first clip is from election night when Brian Williams announced that the last republican congressman has just been defeated in New England.
The second clip is from 11.07.08 and features Shays jobhunting in the Obama administration.
This is going to be a very exciting administration,'' Shays said in an interview on MSNBC that was quoted by politco.com. "I think obviously I'd be interested in doing something that the president was interested in.''
Shays added, "They have so many important positions to fill, and I think they're going to focus on that. But I have a lot of friends who have asked me would I like to work in this administration, and I said, you know, I would.''
Chuck Todd on NBC's Today Show just gave as one of the things to look for in tonight's elections is a loss for Chris Shays in CT-04 and the subsequent loss of New England for the Republicans. This would in effect turn them into a regional party of narrow interests, rather than a national party. It remains to be seen if that would be enough of a shock to rouse the republicans from their nearly thirty year descent into the narrow extremism of the radical right, or whether they embrace this fatalism even further in 2012 by nominating someone like a Sarah Palin.
Rep. Shays greeted early morning commuters at the Stamford train station, taking time again to observe the passing of John McCain's presidential ambitions. And then he hurried over to get some early morning training as a Wal-Mart greeter.
This is not good news for Shays as Sabato will be all over the television until the election. The big one is he has Obama winning in a landslide, and that will garner most of the attention, naturally. But for anyone on the bubble like Shays they do not want this meme getting out there that they will lose.
In 2004, Larry Sabato's Crystal Ball website correctly predicted the outcome of 525 of the 530 political races, missing only one House race, one Senate race, one governor's race, and two states in the Electoral College.[6]
In August 2006, Sabato's Crystal Ball predicted that the Democrats would gain 29 seats in the House of Representatives and 6 seats in the Senate, which would provide them with a majority in both houses. Sabato's prediction that the Democrats would win back both houses proved correct; his Senate predictions were exactly correct and in the House, Democrats gained 29 seats on election night, the precise total predicted by the Crystal Ball (Democrats would go on to pick up a 30th seat in the December 12, 2006 run-off in Texas' 23rd district).[7]
Edit: Chris Matthews also picked up on this later today on "Hardball".
Virtually certain now of McCain's imminent defeat Chris Shays effectively tosses McCain under the bus. In an interview with the Yale Daily News:
NEW CANAAN, Conn. - The first ballot has yet to be tallied, but some Republicans are already hammering nails into the McCain-Palin campaign's coffin.
Locked in a tight congressional race, Rep. Chris Shays of Connecticut's 4th district is the latest in a slew of Republican incumbents, including Sen. Elizabeth Dole of North Carolina, to concede a near-certain victory to the Obama camp.
"I just don't see how [McCain] can win," Shays said in an interview here on Sunday.
Shays, the Connecticut co-chair of McCain's campaign, said he was disappointed by the standards of McCain's race, which has increasingly relied on mudslinging.
"He has lost his brand as a maverick; he did not live up to his pledge to fight a clean campaign," Shays said.
"He's taken the thing that is most valuable, his (maverick) brand, and he's not staying true to it," Shays said. "I admire John McCain more than you can imagine. He would make a great president."
But, Shays added, "I don't see how he wins if he isn't true to who he is ... a straight shooter talking about the issues."
I suppose this would be surprising coming from the co-chair McCain's Connecticut campaign if it were anyone else but Chris Shays. But right now survival is the name of the game and it's every man for himself.
The NY Post has a scathing article about Chris Shays and his efforts to deal with the mortgage crisis.
The riskiest type of government-backed mortgages could soon return to haunt the country.
Rep. Christopher Shays, the embattled lawmaker in a close race for his seat in tony Fairfield County, Conn., is quietly pushing to overturn a recently implemented White House ban on Federal Housing Administration mortgages made with seller-financed down payments to buyers who don't have the cash for a down payment.
The Bush Administration, which barred these no-money-down mortgages as of Oct. 1 because they go to foreclosure three times as often as FHA mortgages in which the buyer puts a down payment on the house, said most of the $4.6 billion lost on FHA loans came from the seller-financed down payment assistance, or SFDPA, loans.
Connecting the dots paints a damning picture against Shays:
However, Shays' support of 6694 has raised a few eyebrows in his district.
For starters, the National Association of Realtors, whose members stand to benefit greatly from the commissions they will earn on the SFDPA mortgages, had its political action committee pump a staggering $804,371.69 into Shays' campaign so far this year for direct mailings, TV time and other items, federal filings show.
The first NAR-PAC pro-Shays TV spot aired the same week he helped get his Financial Services Committee to approve 6694.
At the same time, Shays' brother, Tony, is a real-estate broker whose Stamford firm stands to benefit from the reintroduction of the SFDPA program, as it caters to low-income buyers.
While not conclusive this certainly looks bad. And for Chris Shays, coming little more than a week from the election, it could be the final stake in his heart.
Chris Shays sat down with the editorial board of the Danbury News-Times this afternoon to cover a wide variety of subjects, one of which was his infamous kiss of George Bush at this year's State of the Union Address.
I've included both a long and shorter remixed version for your viewing pleasure.
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