Obama’s Lowlights (4/26/12)

Secret Service – At least 11 secret service members were placed on leave due to their involvement with prostitutes during the President’s trip to Columbia.

English Bounty - A Pakistan-born member of the British House of Lords (Nazir Ahmed) declared he was putting a £10 million bounty on for the "capture" of President Obama and George W. Bush.

GSA - The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform will hold a series of hearings investigating the Government Services Administration's (GSA) recent extravagant expenditures of taxpayer money on lavish conferences, trips and parties. Apparently the GSA has not only had a history of lavish spending but they bragged about wasting taxpayer dollars. GSA executives pleaded the Fifth Amendment and were uncooperative during the hearings.

Senate - In her latest report, Secretary of the Senate Nancy Erickson revealed a slew of data that put the first session of the 112th Senate at the bottom of Senates since 1992 in legislative productivity, an especially damning finding considering that it wasn’t an election year when congressional action is usually lower.

Edolfhus Towns - Fifteen-term Rep. Edolphus Towns (D-N.Y.) has decided not to seek reelection this year, but Democrats should have no problem retaining this seat in the fall.

Barney Frank – In a Fox News interview Frank admits that pushing through ObamaCare was the wrong thing to do.

Tax Code – How complicated is the tax code: The code is almost 4 million words long and in the past 10 years there have been 4,428 changes to the code (more than 1 per day). It is also interesting to note as more and more Americans turn to Turbo Tax, tax accountants, and other tax related services the tax code becomes that much more harder to change since these services lobby hard against tax reform. Think about it; if the tax system was simple then there would be no need for these services. For this reason I still file by paper through the mail – I know it ticks off the IRS because they continually ask me to stop. Finally, Americans spend 6.1 billion hours preparing taxes at a cost of over 25 billion dollars.

Hillary Clinton – The Secretary of State was seen “letting her hair down” and having fun on a business trip to Columbia. I wonder what the media reaction would have been if Colin Powell or Condoleezza Rice did this on taxpayer money?

Buffet Rule – The Senate rejected the Buffet rule which would increase taxes on millionaires 51-45 (needed 60 votes) mostly along party lines. Besides, cutting government programs is favored as the way to reduce the budget deficit by more than twice as many Americans as those who favor raising taxes, said a Reuters/Ipsos poll. And finally, let’s not forget that 36 executive members of the Obama administration owe over 800 thousand dollars in back taxes.

Federal Budget - The Senate Budget Committee moved to take up a budget for fiscal 2013 this past week, but it is unlikely Harry Reid will allow the measure to come to the Senate floor.

Afghanistan - Afghan President Hamid Karzai said he wanted "at least $2 billion" a year from the United States after it withdraws its troops in 2014.

Citizenship – A record numbers of Americans are renouncing their citizenship; many cite taxes as their motivating factor. 

Elizabeth Warren – Citizens of Massachusetts have the opportunity to pay a higher tax rate, but it is speculated that Warren does not (She is worth 15 million).

Dogs – What is the biggest thing Obama allies have against Romney? That the family dog rode in a crate on top of their car during a family vacation. Well, the Romney camp has pointed out that Obama ate dog as a youngster growing up in Indonesia.