List: The Obama Shutdown (file)

“Generally, dereliction of duty refers to failure through negligence or obstinacy to perform one’s legal or moral duty to a reasonable expectation. In other words, it means willful or negligent failure to perform assigned duties or performing them in a culpably inefficient manner. Dereliction of duty is a specific offense in military law. “ (Quote from USLegal.com).

Dereliction of duty is an Impeachable Offense, as stipulated in the US Constitution. Dereliction of duty is also a US Military offense subject to a Courts Martial.

Will our sorry Congressional RINOs do their usual kid gloves, “boys will be boys” approach to Obama’s numerous violations of the US Constitution, or will they FINALLY draw up The Articles of Impeachment for B. Hussein Obama?

http://michellemalkin.com/2013/10/08/death-benefits-outrage-camp-bastion-widow-has-challenge-for-congress/

Send to everyone.

Is there any MUSLIM prayer services continuing????

Great list. But missing is Harry Reid's contempt for poor kids dying of cancer.

Good job.
Thanks.

Good idea. I have added it.

Thank you for your efforts.

America!

bkmk

The Wall Street Journal editorial titled "Kevin Hassett and Abby McCloskey: Obama Rewrites Debt-Limit History" mentioned above has serious flaws. It states:

Congressional Republicans who want legislative conditions in exchange for a debt-limit increase are following a strategy that has been pursued by both parties the majority of the time. Of the 53 increases in the debt limit, 26 were "clean"—that is, stand-alone, no strings-attached statutes. The remaining debt-limit increases were part of an omnibus package of other legislative bills or a continuing resolution. Other times, the limit was paired with reforms, only some of which were related to the budget.

I've posted an analysis of this at this link. Following is the key portion and conclusion:

So let's look at the Congressional Research Service study from which this statistic comes. It appears to have come from a study titled "Votes on Measures to Adjust the Statutory Debt Limit, 1978 to Present, released February 15, 2013. In its Summary, the study does state the following:

Since 1978, the statutory federal debt limit has been changed 53 times by Congress through the enactment of legislation adjusting the federal debt limit, either as stand-alone legislation or as part of legislation dealing with other matters.

The study contains three tables. Table 1 lists information on all 53 debt limit measures since 1978. Table 2 identifies 26 stand-alone measures from these 53. Table 3 then lists the other 27 bills considered as other than stand-alone measures and provides brief background information on the nature of each measure and by what means it was considered. The following table gives some of the key items from Table 1 for the 27 non-stand-alone measures:

               OTHER THAN STAND-ALONE DEBT LIMIT MEASURES

                       House Vote       Senate Vote     Public Law    Debt
                    ----------------  ----------------     Date of   Limit
Year  Bill Number   Tally     Margin  Tally     Margin   Enactment ($ bil)
----  ------------  --------  ------  --------  ------  ----------  ------
1979  H.R. 2534     209-165       44  62-33         29    4/2/1979     830*
      H.R. 5369     219-198       21  49-29         20   9/29/1979     879*
1980  H.R. 7428     335-34       301  68-10         58    6/6/1980    n.c.
1983  H.R. 2990     Voice Vote        51-41         10   5/26/1983    1389*
1984  H.R. 5692     211-198       13  Voice Vote         5/25/1984    1520*
1985  H.R. 3721     300-121      179  Voice Vote        11/14/1985  1903.8
      H.J.Res. 372  271-154      117  61-31         30  12/12/1985  2078.7
1986  H.R. 5300     305-70       235  61-25         36  10/21/1986    2300
1987  H.J.Res. 324  230-176       54  64-34         30   9/29/1987    2800*
1989  H.R. 3024     231-185       46  Voice Vote          8/7/1989    2870*
      H.J.Res. 280  269-99       170  Voice Vote         11/8/1989  3122.7
1990  H.J.Res. 666  362-3        359  Voice Vote         10/9/1990    n.c.
      H.J.Res. 677  379-37       342  Voice Vote        10/19/1990    n.c.
      H.J.Res. 681  380-45       335  Unanimous Consent 10/25/1990    n.c.
      H.J.Res. 687  283-49       234  Voice Vote        10/28/1990    3230
      H.R. 5835     228-200       28  54-45          9   11/5/1990    4145*
1993  H.R. 2264     218-216        2  51-50          1   8/10/1993    4900*
1996  H.R. 2924     396-0        396  Unanimous Consent   2/8/1996
      H.R. 3021     362-51       311  Voice Vote         3/12/1996
      H.R. 3136     328-91       237  Unanimous Consent  3/29/1996    5500
1997  H.R. 2015     346-85       261  85-15         70    8/5/1997    5950
2008  H.R. 3221     272-152      120  72-13         59   7/30/2008   10615
      H.R. 1424     263-171       92  74-25         49   10/3/2008   11315*
2009  H.R. 1        246-183-1     63  60-38         22   2/17/2009   12104*
2010  H.J.Res. 45   233-187       46  60-39         21   2/12/2010   14294*
2011  S. 365        269-161      108  74-26         48    8/2/2011   16394
2013  H.R. 325      285-144      141  64-34         30    2/4/2013

* measures with a final vote margin of less than 100 in the House or less
  than 30 in the Senate
Note: n.c. = no change
Source: "Votes on Measures to Adjust the Statutory Debt Limit, 1978 to Present

A number of interesting facts are evident from this table. First of all, it doesn't appear that all of these 27 cases are independent. For example, there are 5 cases in less than a month, from 10/9/1990 through 11/5/1990. The first 3 of these cases involve no raise in the debt limit. Perhaps more interesting, the majority of these votes do not appear to be heavily contentious. Only 11 of the 27 measures resulted in a final vote margin of less than 100 in the House or less than 30 in the Senate.

The following table contains notes from Table 3 on the 27 non-stand-alone measures:

               OTHER THAN STAND-ALONE DEBT LIMIT MEASURES

Year  Notes on the Measure
----  --------------------
1979  required Congress & President present balanced budgets for 81 and 82
      made increase in debt limit part of budget process (in the House)
1980  included a repeal of the Presidentially imposed oil import fee
1983  included making the whole debt limit permanent
1984  included some miscellaneous admin authority to Treasury Secretary
1985  extended for a month some expiring acts, including a cigarette tax
      required report on legislation for alternative minimum corporate tax
1986  required the restoration of lost interest to certain trust funds
1987  used as legislative vehicle for the Balanced Budget ... Act of 1987
1989  included change in method of accounting for federal debt instruments
      repealed nondiscrimination rules that deal w/ employee benefit plans
1990  change in Debt Limit included in a continuing appropriations measure
      change in Debt Limit included in a continuing resolution
      change in Debt Limit included in a continuing resolution
      change in Debt Limit included in a continuing resolution
      change in Debt Limit included in Omnibus Budget Recon. Act of 1990
1993  change in Debt Limit included in Omnibus Budget Recon. Act of 1993
1996  temporarily exempted from limit monthly insurance benefits to SSA
      temporarily exempted from limit monthly insurance benefits to SSA
      included an increase in the debt limit in Title III
1997  included a debt limit increase in Title V, Subtitle G
2008  included an increase to the debt limit
      included an increase to the debt limit
2009  included an increase to the debt limit
2010  included provisions for “Statutory PAYGO” and “wasteful spending”
2011  included provisions aimed at deficit reduction
2013  required hold on Member salary if no budget resolution by April 15

Source: "Votes on Measures to Adjust the Statutory Debt Limit, 1978 to Present

These are of course very abbreviated notes on the measures. Still, they suggest that most of the additional items in the measure were not very major. I saw no mention of the issues that Wallace mentioned above (campaign finance reform, school prayer and busing and a nuclear freeze). Also, it appears that some of the debt limit increases may have been included with other bills (such as continuing resolutions) simply for convenience. At the very least, more study would be required for these cases. Simply treating all non-stand-alone measures the same does not make sense. Hence, it may be correct that, as Secretary Lew suggested above, "the question of threatening to cause a default of the United States, not until 2011 did it become a positive agenda".

On Friday, Warren Buffett was quoted as saying the following about the debt ceiling:

It ought to be banned as a weapon. It should be like nuclear bombs, I mean, basically too horrible to use.”

In fact, according to this article, only only one democratic country, besides America, has a debt ceiling. That country is Denmark but the article states that they "set the ceiling high enough so that it never slows the process of borrowing money and they can avoid political conflicts like the one currently gripping the U.S.". The article continues:

Barry Bosworth, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute, said the U.S. debt ceiling “has no logical basis.”

Congress, through budget and appropriations bills, has sole authority to decide how much the government will spend, so he said “it makes no sense to have a secondary rule to then object to the deficit that emerges from the other decisions.”

At the very least, we could legislate that the debt ceiling must always be addressed in a stand-alone measure. Meanwhile, those who distort history to defend such threats, as do the authors of the Journal editorial, should be challenged.

Note: On a related issue, this article explains why government shutdowns only seem to occur in America.

I appreciate your thoughtful commentary and have added some to the shut down file I am keeping.

I would only argue that there is a very good reason why we have a debt ceiling and that Congress has control over it. It is because it gives the power of the purse to Congress and provides for a true separation of powers. I am not sad that we have had shut downs in the past or that we may have them in the future, but I would be very sad if the presidency gained even more power than it has and left the people of our country with violence as the only recourse to effectual negotiations in the seats of government.

Make no mistake, this administration would thumb their noses at Congress if it were not for the power of the purse. I would also argue that the parliaments of Europe are a complete mess and have absolutely desire to emulate them.

I would only argue that there is a very good reason why we have a debt ceiling and that Congress has control over it. It is because it gives the power of the purse to Congress and provides for a true separation of powers.

But Congress already has the power of the purse. The debt ceiling simply gives the majority of either house a hostage for extracting their demands from the other house and/or President. To repeat the quote from my prior post:

Congress, through budget and appropriations bills, has sole authority to decide how much the government will spend, so he said “it makes no sense to have a secondary rule to then object to the deficit that emerges from the other decisions.”

Make no mistake, this administration would thumb their noses at Congress if it were not for the power of the purse. I would also argue that the parliaments of Europe are a complete mess and have absolutely desire to emulate them.

I am not an expert on the parliaments of Europe. However, I reject the notion that America is better than every other country in the world in every way. I find it ironic that we are using the debt limit, a questionable construct that no other democratic country except Denmark has, to ensure that we remain the only developed country without any universal medical safety net. I am also not an expert on Obamacare and would not be surprised if there are many things about it that will need to change over time. However, I think our current medical system is insane. We have a system where, if you should lose your job and insurance when you're 64, you're on your own. But as soon as you turn 65, you become a part of a special club with most all of your medical expenses paid. I know someone who was just a few months over 65 when they had a massive heart attack. Had they had it a few months earlier, their entire life would be different. They were fortunate enough to win the Medicare lottery. Then under George W. Bush, we piled yet another entitlement on them. Seniors are the ones most in need of medical care. But a rational society would phase those benefits in or share some of them with their entire population. Instead, we just keep piling more benefits on our seniors.

In any case, I think we need a little more humility in America. Yes, we are exceptional in certain areas but, when every other country seems to be doing better in other areas using another system, we need to be more little more open to giving those systems a try. Instead, we are wasting our time and effort holding hostages and demonizing those in the opposing party.

I am not an expert on the parliaments of Europe. However, I reject the notion that America is better than every other country in the world in every way

I am not suggesting that. I do suggest that the American governmental system IS better than ALL the parliamentary systems of Europe. As Benjamin Franklin opined, we have a Republic- if we can keep it.

My family ran from Europe. You can keep it. You can keep the bias, war, and hatred of Europe. Piss on them- with all due respect.

As for being 'humble', we saved Europe twice. We fought, bled and died for them. Our sons are buried in their cemeteries. We spent untold fortunes rebuilding them, defending them, and letting them lecture US on how they are superior. People ran from them, my family included.

Screw humble.

<I do suggest that the American governmental system IS better than ALL the parliamentary systems of Europe. As Benjamin Franklin opined, we have a Republic- if we can keep it.

Once again, I think it's simplistic to just say our government is better than every European government in every way. There are likely ways in which both have advantages. It reminds me of the simplistic approach that many people take to political parties. Many seem to feel that their party is better than the other in every way. I suspect that many people find it comforting to think that, however badly their life may be going, they are still morally and intellectually superior to half of the country! It creates a Lake Wobegon effect where all the citizens are morally and intellectually above average! In fact, I think that to a large degree, the two parties just focus on different things. Neither is inherently superior to the other.

My family ran from Europe. You can keep it. You can keep the bias, war, and hatred of Europe. Piss on them- with all due respect.

Which country did your family run from?

As for being 'humble', we saved Europe twice. We fought, bled and died for them. Our sons are buried in their cemeteries. We spent untold fortunes rebuilding them, defending them, and letting them lecture US on how they are superior. People ran from them, my family included.

Screw humble.

Perhaps "humility" was a poor choice of words on my part. Sure, we can screw "humble". But I would suggest that we also screw "arrogance". Arrogance blinds and absolute arrogance blinds absolutely. That arrogance may help lead to one of the things that attracted me to politics. Politics is the only area that I know of where a lay person can sit down for an afternoon and find serious flaws in an editorial published in an esteemed national publication. That's all the time it took me to find the serious flaws in the Wall Street Journal editorial that I mentioned above. And I did that by simply reading the very sources on which the editorial claimed that it was based! I can't think of any other area in which a person could do that. I obviously couldn't do that in a hard science like nuclear physics. I could likely not even do that in my main area of expertise... computers. Only in the political arena could I do that.

I suspect that there is so much sloppy research in the political arena because it's judged to work. The true believers read the editorial, quote its numbers to promote their beliefs, and then move on to the next supportive editorial. Those people don't care that there are a few inconvenient flaws in the article. Why should they? They have found the one true party and any supporting facts are secondary.