Don’t Repeat the Shutdown

by Marc H. Morial
President and CEO
National Urban League
“Extremes to the right and to the left of any political dispute are always wrong.” Dwight D. Eisenhower
After 16 days of a costly and unnecessary government shutdown, America is open for business again. More than 800,000 furloughed federal workers are back on the job. Nutrition programs for low income women and children are back in service. The CDC’s flu program and the FDA’s food safety efforts are back on track. Head Start programs are reopening their doors. NIH is resuming clinical trials for children with cancer.  Our National Parks and Museums have reopened. And financing for thousands of small businesses is flowing again.
We join all Americans in applauding the compromise deal crafted by Senate Majority leader Harry Reid and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. But it is only a temporary fix. The bill passed by both chambers and signed by President Obama at 12:30 a.m. on October 17 only funds the government until January 15 and extends the debt ceiling until February 7. Congress now faces a “90-day sprint” to craft a balanced, responsible budget that works for the American people, maintains health care coverage for millions through the Affordable Care Act, and avoids another government shutdown. We urge our elected leaders to put aside partisan rancor and get this job done. They were sent to Washington to govern on behalf of all Americans and they have a special duty to prevent a repeat of a shutdown that cost our economy $24 billion and was especially damaging to middle class families, small businesses, the working poor and the unemployed.
A budget conference committee headed by Democrat Patty Murray in the Senate and Republican Paul Ryan in the House has now been formed to meet a December 13 deadline for a long-term budget agreement. This won’t be easy, with the House majority arguing for extending the onerous sequester cuts to important safety-net programs and resisting any new taxes, while the Senate majority wants to make smart investments to spur job growth, grow the economy and maintain support for vital programs that assist millions of Americans. Both sides say they share the goal of growing the economy and putting people back to work. The key to success will be finding common ground on the way to achieve those objectives.
We believe that any final agreement must put the needs of the American people first. We must protect programs that empower individuals and communities through good jobs, access to affordable housing and healthcare, and quality education. As President Obama said in his weekly address to the Nation, “We should sit down and pursue a balanced approach to a responsible budget, one that grows our economy faster and shrinks our long-term deficits further. There is no choice between growth and fiscal responsibility – we need both.”
We agree. And as we move forward, we must also avoid the kind of ideological rigidity that led to the shutdown. We are especially offended by the continued extremist comments of Representative Ted Cruz who has refused to rule out another government shutdown over his desire to dismantle the Affordable Care Act. We have a simple question for Mr. Cruz: How can you make the argument for spending cuts or rally against spending on a law that would actually reduce the deficit and ensure healthcare for all Americans and at the same time support a shutdown that cost the economy $24 billion…with nothing to show for it? Makes no sense.

By Steve Flowers

The greatest partisan change in American political history has occurred during my lifetime. The transformation of Alabama and our sister Deep South states from an all Democratic region to an all Republican territory has been remarkable and historic.

Exactly 50 years ago today Alabama’s entire delegation in Washington was Democratic. Democrats held all seven constitutional offices. Every member of the Supreme Court ran as a Democrat. Sixty-six out of 67 sheriffs were Democrats and 138 of 140 members of the legislature were Democrats.

Fast-forward 50 years to October of 2013. You see just the opposite picture. All seven executive constitutional offices including governor are held by Republicans. Every member of the Supreme Court and all ten appellate judges are Republican. Six of our seven congressmen are Republican and both U.S. Senators are stalwart members of the GOP. Both the State House of Representatives and our State Senate are overwhelmingly Republican. That is quite a change.

This titanic shift began in the Fall of 1964 when Republican Barry Goldwater carried the Heart of Dixie. He not only broke the ice, he shattered the Democratic hold on the South. When it comes to presidential politics, we are the most reliable Republican region of the country.

Since the Goldwater landslide of 1964, the GOP candidate for president has carried Alabama in every presidential election with the exception of 1968 when George Wallace won the state as an Independent and 1976 when Georgia Democrat peanut farmer Jimmy Carter carried the state. It has been 37 years since a Democrat carried Alabama. In the last 50 years the score is Republicans 11 and Democrats 1.

I am not saying the Democratic Party is dead. However, the odds of a Democrat winning a statewide race in Alabama would be analogous to and have the same odds as Tulane beating Alabama in football.

The Democrats failed to even field a single candidate in our Supreme Court races in 2012. It looks like the same thing will occur this year. Our sister southern state of Louisiana had no Democratic statewide candidates for their constitutional offices in 2012.

However, some of our southern neighbors are seeing some brave souls seek statewide offices as Democrats in the upcoming 2014 elections. In Georgia, the daughter of their last Democratic U.S. Senator is seeking her father’s former seat as a Democrat. Sam Nunn was a very popular long term Senator from Georgia, the last of his breed of conservative Democrats from the South. His daughter Michelle Nunn is running a serious campaign. She is working to portray herself as a moderate to conservative candidate to Georgia’s rural voters who are overwhelmingly Republican. She takes heart in the fact that Atlanta is now a cosmopolitan melting pot. It has one of the largest gay communities in American and its significant African American population makes it a Democratic target in future years. In fact, Obama only lost Georgia by five percentage points in 2012.

Alison Lundergan Grimes, Kentucky’s Secretary of State, is taking a similar approach in her attempt to knock off U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

In Arkansas, former Rep. Mike Ross is running for Governor of Arkansas as a Democrat and is given an outside chance since popular Republican Governor Mike Beebe is retiring.

South Carolina boasts of being the most Republican state in the country. However, Vincent Sheehan is running against incumbent GOP Governor Nikki Haley. He ran against Haley four years ago and lost by 60,000 votes or about 5%. South Carolina voters fall almost exactly along racial lines with most whites voting Republican and most blacks voting Democratic.

All of these southern Democratic candidates are striving to distance themselves from President Barrack Obama and the national Democratic Party. They are stressing their lifelong roots in their respective states and portraying themselves as real southerners. They are also focusing on bread and butter issues and trying to sell themselves as problem solvers. These folks are facing an uphill battle in the Deep South. We will see.

See you next week.

Steve Flowers is Alabama’s leading political columnist. His column appears weekly in more than 70 Alabama newspapers. Steve served 16 years in the state legislature. He may be reached at www.steveflowers.us.

By Darryl Sanders

During the recent government shutdown, I learned that Congress had one key duty in the Constitution, which was to pass spending bills that fund the government. The failure to fund the government as appropriate, resulted in non-funding for most functions of the agencies, such as paying out small businesses and processing request for passports. In the midst of the government coming to a halt, Congress was still being paid while thousands were off from work during the shutdown.
So we ask the question “what was the hold up?” The reply to that question was, the House of Representatives insisted on a new spending bill that included the provisions to either, chip away, derail, or just defund the Obamacare Heath Plan. With deeper investigation, it shows the health care law is not directly tied into the funding of the government. I believe it’s just selfishness at an all time high.
Recently, President Obama signed a bill into law that allowed the shutdown to come to an end. As demonstrated by the Republicans over the last several weeks, it would appear they are against the Obamacare Health Plan and wants nothing to do with it.

by William Thomas

There was a time not so long ago when Americans, regardless of their political stripes, rallied around their president. Once elected, the man who won the White House was no longer viewed as a Republican or Democrat, but the President of the United States. The oath of office was taken, the wagons were circled around the country, and its borders and it was America versus the rest of the world with the president of all the people at the helm.
Suddenly, President Barack Obama, with the potential to become an exceptional president, has become the glaring exception to that unwritten patriotic rule.
Four days before President Obama’s inauguration, before he officially took charge of the American government, Rush Limbaugh boasted publicly that he hoped the president would fail. Of course, when the president fails the country flounders.
Wishing harm upon your country in order to further your own narrow political views is selfish, sinister and a tad treasonous as well.
Subsequently, during his State of the Union address, which is pretty much a pep rally for America, an unknown congressional representative from South Carolina, later identified as Joe Wilson, stopped the show when he called the President of the United States a liar. The President showed great restraint in ignoring this unprecedented insult and carried on with his speech. Speaker Nancy Pelosi was so stunned by the slur, she forgot to jump to her feet while clapping wildly, 30 to 40 times after that.
Last spring, President Obama took his wife Michelle to see a play in New York City and Republicans attacked him over the cost of security for the excursion. The president cannot take his wife out to dinner and a show without being scrutinized by the political opposition? As history has proven, a president in a theatre without adequate security is a tragically bad idea. Remember: Apart from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?
At some point, the treatment of President Obama went from offensive to ugly and then to downright dangerous.
The health-care debate, which looked more like extreme fighting in a mud pit than a national dialogue, revealed a very vulgar side of America. President Obama’s face appeared on protest signs white-faced and blood-mouthed in a satanic clown image. In other tasteless portrayals, people who disagreed with his politics distorted his face to look like Hitler complete with mustache and swastika.
Odd, that burning the flag makes Americans crazy, but depicting the president as a clown and a maniacal fascist is accepted as part of the new rude America.
Maligning the image of the leader of the free world is one thing; putting the president’s life in peril is quite another. More than once, men with guns were videotaped at the health-care rallies where the president spoke. Again, history shows that letting men with guns get within range of a president has not served America well in the past.
And still the birthers are out there claiming Barack Obama was not born in the United States, although public documentation proves otherwise. Hawaii is definitely part of the United States, but the Panama Canal Zone where his electoral opponent Senator John McCain was born? Nobody cares.
Last month, a 44-year-old woman in Buffalo was quite taken by President Obama when she met him in a chicken wing restaurant called Duff’s. Did she say something about a pleasure and an honor to meet the man or utter encouraging words for the difficult job he is doing? No Quote: You’re a hottie with a smoking little body.
Lady, that was the President of the United States you were addressing, not one of the Jonas Brothers! He’s your president for goodness sake, not the guy driving the Zamboni at Monster Trucks On Ice. Maybe next it’ll be Take Your President to a Topless Bar Day.
In President Obama, Americans have the real deal, the whole package and a leader that citizens of almost every country around the world look to with great envy. Given the opportunity, Canadians would trade our leader, hell most of our leaders, for Obama in a heartbeat.
What America has in Obama is a head of state with vitality and insight and youth. Think about it: Barack Obama is a young Nelson Mandela. Mandela was the face of change and charity for all of Africa, but he was too old to make it happen. The great things Obama might do for America and the world could go on for decades after he’s out of office. America, you know not what you have.
The man is being challenged unfairly, characterized with vulgarity, and treated with the kind of deep disrespect to which no previous president was subjected, it’s like the day after electing the first Black man to be president, thereby electrifying the world with hope and joy, Americans sobered up and decided the bad old days were better.
President Obama may fail, but it will not be a Richard Nixon default fraught with larceny and lies. President Obama, given a fair chance, will surely succeed, but his triumph will never come with a caveat as with President Clinton, “If only he’d gotten control of that zipper.”
Please. Give the man a fair, fighting chance. This incivility toward the leader who won over Americans and gave hope to billions of people around world that their lives could be enhanced by his example just naturally has to stop.
Believe me, when Americans drive by the White House and see a sign on the lawn that reads: “No shirt. No shoes. No service,” they’ll realize this new national rudeness has gone way, way too far.

By Derryck Green

Dear Mr. President:
With all due respect, your economic stewardship has been a nightmare.
Whether our nation’s lingering peril comes from your misunderstanding of basic economic principles, your rigid and religious-like devotion to political progressivism or because the economy simply isn’t your priority, credit and fault, nonetheless begins and ends with you.
As such, I’m writing to you in an appeal to the one thing that didn’t contract during your presidency: your ego.
No matter how you attempt to spin the news, clear-thinking Americans know — many from personal experience — that the economy isn’t improving.
The federal Bureau of Labor Statistics says the national unemployment rate dropped to 7.3 percent in August. But the rate for Latinos only dropped to 9.3 percent. The rate for Blacks increased to 13 percent, with Black teens at 38.2 percent.
America is still millions of jobs short compared with before you took office, and many of the jobs created during your “recovery” do not pay as well.
The labor force participation rate is at a 34-year low of 63.4 percent, and has been under 64 percent for 19 straight months. Ninety million Americans are no longer in the labor force. Teen employment is tragically low. Almost a million people have given up hope of finding a job in this job market.
More than 250 companies reportedly reduced employee hours and cut jobs altogether in attempts to survive under your signature legislation, ObamaCare.
As captain of this rudderless ship, Mr. President, you are responsible for the fact that more Americans are on disability insurance than people living in New York City. Reinforcing the truth of this sad and unfortunate reality, the Cato Institute notes welfare programs in 35 states provide more of a financial incentive to not work. In 13 states, the welfare equivalent is above the $15 per hour “living wage” promoted by so many of your supporters.
Since your 2008 election, the median family income has dropped for most Americans. For whites, it was a 3.6 percent decline. For Hispanics, there’s been a 4.5 percent decline. For Blacks, your most loyal constituency, it’s a much larger 10.9 percent decline.
But that’s not all. Your economic policies resulted in a spike in poverty, particularly distressing for Blacks at almost 26 percent. This is in combination with Black labor force participation at a rate of 61.4 percent and an unemployment rate continually at or near 13 percent during your presidency.
According to the National Urban League’s 2012 State of Black America, the Black economic gains over the past 30 years were wiped out in the recession and your so-called “recovery” that followed.
These statistics aren’t abstract numbers, Mr. President. These numbers represent real people who continue to press on despite losing hope and faith in you as our leader.
Many may excuse your lack of leadership, preferring to instead blame the economy on everything from obstinate conservatives to lingering pains of slavery.  You blamed “phony scandals.”
Sir, these excuses do you no favors. Actually, these excuses further expose your inability on the job and your reluctance to accept responsibility.
It’s precisely why the American public no longer trusts what you say or do. It’s also why you have been found wanting as a leader in the international community.
These critiques aren’t because of your Blackness, but because of your ineffectiveness. The frustration is palpable. In the spirit of Dr. King, whom we all just celebrated for his leadership, you’re rightly being judged on the content of your character — along with the actions brought forth from it — and not by the color of your skin.
History may not be as kind to you as it seems in the bubble in which you currently reside. Becoming the first Black president of the United States may seem to be a historic achievement right now, but being “the first Black” simply isn’t enough in the long-term.
Your novelty has worn off.  It’s time you actually do something of substance to warrant the reverence in which you see yourself and which American posterity will remember you. You have three years left. The clock is ticking.

Respectfully yours,

America

Derryck Green is a member of the national advisory council of the Project 21 Black leadership network. Comments may be sent to Project21@nationalcenter.org.