(Reuters) President Barack Obama will call for cutting the top 35 percent corporate tax rate as early as this month, according to two sources close to the administration.

The president is likely to propose a rate closer to an average of that seen in peer nations, the sources said.

That would put the rate at about 20%. But, why not announce it now? Because this isn’t about passing a corporate tax rate cut, but, about politics

Facing a potentially tough presidential re-election challenge this November, Obama will propose cutting the rate following the release of his 2013 budget plan on Monday, February 13, according to the sources, who were not authorized to speak on the record.

While he spent a big part of his January speech to Congress criticizing businesses for moving jobs overseas, Obama said that “companies that choose to stay in America get hit with one of the highest tax rates in the world.”

If he does announce a plan, the details will probably end up helping just a few companies, probably ones led by people who vote Democrat and donate to Democrats, much like with Obama’s Stimulus. And much like Obama’s vaunted bank settlement, which seems to help the big bank owners.

An overhaul of the corporate tax system is extremely unlikely in an election year, but the president’s proposal could be an olive branch to the business community to show that he agrees with them on one key aspect of tax reform.

And there you go, this is about campaign optics, not about actually Doing Something. He’ll probably offer up something which looks great on the outside, but has poison pills on the inside, which are objectionable to the GOP. The media will avoid mention of the poison pills, and make the GOP look bad. If the GOP has any brains, they should pass a clean corporate tax rate quickly, forcing Obama’s hand. They should do the same with the payroll tax cut, extending it for one year, get ahead of the curve. Obama whined about this in this week’s weakly address (yes, I meant to spell it that way). Obama plans to offer the cut in his budget. Now we know why Democrats wanted a 2 month extension: to attempt to make Obama look magnanimous by pushing a year long extension, which is what Republicans wanted in the first place.

Crossed at Pirate’s Cove. Follow me on Twitter @WilliamTeach.

(MSNBC) As libertarian Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul looks for a state he can win, some of his supporters have turned to a new theme: voting fraud.

A Super PAC supporting Paul has pledged to monitor the vote in all the remaining states, using an army of exit pollsters to fight what it calls results that are “outrageous, unacceptable and patently un-American.” The group, called Revolution PAC, has spent half a million dollars supporting Paul with videos, webcasts, online ads, direct mail, billboards and radio ads in primary and caucus states.

The leader of the group, its founder, chairman and treasurer, is Gary Franchi, a promoter of conspiracy theories and sophisticated social-media entrepreneur in the resurgent movement known as the Patriots.

Some of what MSNBC writes about is

Franchi has supported the 9/11 Truth Movement, which supports the idea that the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, werean inside job to create a pretext for a reduction in American liberty, or at least involved a cover-up, with the World Trade Center brought down by a planned U.S. demolition, instead of terrorist-controlled airplanes. Franchi founded the Lone Lantern Society (a reference to Paul Revere indicating that foreign enemies are on American soil). The group supports “the birth of freedom and the death of the New World Order,” a secretive elite that is supposedly trying to set up a world government. Lone Lantern has held street demonstrations on the 11th of every month in Chicago and elsewhere, demanding an investigation of 9/11. In New Hampshire in 2008, a video shows Franchi asking Tom Ridge, the former secretary of Homeland Security, who was campaigning for Sen. John McCain, whether Ridge would support an investigation of the “controlled demolition” of the World Trade Center. Ridge was having none of it, saying, “I just don’t buy into that. That’s a conspiracy theory that has no basis in fact. It’s almost out of the Twilight Zone.”

Obviously, Revolution PAC is an outside group which can support who they want. But, Paul could finally come out and say “I do not support the 9/11 Truth movement, they’re out of their minds. He won’t. He seems to enjoy hanging with Truthers/conspiracy nuts like Alex Jones, and going on their radio programs.

Like Ron Paul, Franchi has a few good ideas, then turns them up to Ludicrous Speed, perhaps even going plaid. Ron Paul has won none of the beauty contests, er, primaries/caucuses, and will, mostly likely, win none in the future. He has a great core group, but no broader appeal, especially when people find out about his background.

A Lincoln County, West Virginia Sheriff and Clerk are to plead guilty to charges of vote fraud in the 2010 Democrat primary after the pair were arrested during an election fraud investigation conducted by state and federal authorities.

Sheriff Jerry Bowman and Clerk Donald Whitten were caught in a scheme to file fraudulent absentee ballots in an effort to get Whitten elected Circuit Clerk. Whitten will also plead guilty to lying to an FBI agent hired by WV Secretary of State Natalie Tennant to investigate the false absentee ballots.

Sheriff Bowman, who is at the tail end of a second term and is term-limited from running again, conspired with Whitten and a thus far unidentified candidate for county commissioner to help Whitten win a close election with the fraudulent absentee ballot scheme.

“The Candidates further agreed that they would complete absentee ballot applications for voters,” the agreement documents said. “The Candidates also agreed that on those applications they would state certain reasons that voters were legally eligible to vote absentee, regardless of whether those reasons were true.”

In 2004 several Lincoln and Logan County officials were convicted of vote fraud in a federal vote-buying case. Convicted included Lincoln County Circuit Clerk Greg Stowers and county Assessor Jerry Weaver. Amazingly, Weaver is now running for county sheriff.

But, remember… left-wingers and Democrats say there is no vote fraud in the USA.

One of the things that many Romney supporters are using to explain away their decision to ignore Romney’s many flip flops is Ronald Reagan’s one-time support for abortion and his signing of the Therapeutic Abortion Act as governor of California in 1967. But this comparison is a non sequitur. Reagan’s support of that abortion bill and his subsequent turn against it is less like a flip flop than Romney’s about face on the issue. In fact, a review of the two men’s record on abortion makes Romney look worse for the effort, not at all “just like Reagan.”

The first thing to realize about Reagan’s 1967 signing of the California abortion bill was that the whole national debate on abortion was, if you will, in its infancy. It was then not much of a national issue. The arguments for and against abortion had not crystallized into the well-worn positions we now know so well. After all, Roe v Wade wasn’t to catapult the issue to national prominence until 1973.

When this bill came before him in 1967, Reagan was admittedly unsure of what to do with the thing. He dithered for a long time before finally signing the bill because he simply had never given much thought to the issue. He quickly regretted placing his signature on the bill and firmly decided that hence forth he would be pro-life. He never supported an outright pro-abortion measure again.

Ronald Reagan had only been six months into his governorship when he finally signed the bill and his inexperience in the Governor’s office was something else that he said caused him to act without enough due deliberation. He was also shocked at the unintended consequences of the bill. The provision of “health of the mother” was so liberally interpreted by California doctors that the rate of abortions soared. Reagan Biographer Lou Cannon once noted that even the Democrat sponsor of the bill was surprised at how liberally doctors employed the provision to justify abortions.

This experience finally caused Reagan to choose life and eschew abortion. His final decision on pro-life issues was succinct. “If there is a question as to whether there is life or death, the doubt should be resolved in favor of life,” he said.

So, what can we learn of Reagan’s stance on abortion? While it is true that he once supported a major abortion bill, it was without zeal and was not with a fully thought-out philosophical position on the matter. As it happened, once he took full measure of the issue he stood for life and never much wavered afterwards.

One thing we cannot say about Ronald Reagan is that he campaigned in favor of abortion. The truth is he never claimed full-throated support of abortion and, despite signing the Therapeutic Abortion Act, once he made up his mind about the issue he didn’t fade back and forth. So, it is a bit precious for Romney supporters to act as if Reagan flip flopped on an issue that he had barely even considered before 1967. Few people in the whole country even had abortion issues on their radar back then.

On the other hand, Romney’s record on abortion and his miraculous “growth” on the issue smacks of politics instead of ideology. Some reports even claim that Romney purposefully chose the pro-abortion stance in order to win in Massachusetts.

You see, unlike Reagan, Mitt Romney had for years campaigned forcefully in support of abortion. Both during his 1994 Senate campaign against Teddy Kennedy and as Governor of the State of Massachusetts Romney stood up for abortion.

Far from non-committal, Romney’s position on abortion was strong. In 1994, for instance, a spokesman for the then Senate candidate announced that Mitt’s stance in favor of abortion had grown “firmer” as he studied the issue. Again this is unlike Reagan.

During a senate debate in 1994, Romney said, “I believe that abortion should be safe and legal in this country. … I believe that since Roe v. Wade has been the law for 20 years we should sustain and support it.”

By 2002 when he was running for Governor of the Bay State, Mitt was still a pro-abortion guy. Romney then said, “I will preserve and protect a woman’s right to choose, and am devoted and dedicated to honoring my word in that regard. I will not change any provisions of Massachusetts’ pro-choice laws.”

In a gubernatorial debate Mitt said, “I do not take the position of a pro-life candidate.”

Yet only a few years later as he geared up for his first run at the White House, Mitt was suddenly pro-life. He had an epiphany, he claimed. It was the issue of human cloning that caused the shift, he said. “It hit me very hard that we had so cheapened the value of human life in a Roe v. Wade environment that it was important to stand for the dignity of human life.”

Newly christened a pro-life candidate Mitt then sallied forth to vie for the GOP nomination for President — an endeavor in which few pro-abortion candidates are welcome. One can easily assume this epiphany to be a political calculation as opposed to an honest changing of his mind.

Of course it is perfectly logical to assume that someone can legitimately change positions on something after serious reflection. There is nothing inherently hypocritical about changing one’s mind. And we cannot say what is in Mitt Romney’s heart to be sure. But we don’t need to read his heart to understand that his shift on abortion is nothing like Reagan’s.

First and most importantly, Mitt Romney’s entire political life was led in an era when the issue of abortion was a main political battle. Unlike Reagan, Mitt Romney did not come to age politically in a day when abortion was little known. Positions had hardened long before Mitt Romney was in any political position to affect policy on the matter.

Secondly, Mitt campaigned for decades fully in favor of abortion. This is also unlike Reagan who tepidly supported abortion but once and then only before he had given much thought to the issue.

The facts are indisputable. There was no major flip flop on abortion for Ronald Reagan. His record shows a man that, once he fully decided where he stood on the issue, never again wavered. Romney’s record, though, shows a flip flop easily portrayed as a cynical political ploy to get elected, one that came after decades of strongly campaigning for the opposite.

In the final analysis, all we can say is that, at least on the abortion issue, Mitt Romney is nothing like Ronald Reagan.

(The Hill) The White House and Democrats have seized on legislation barring lawmakers from making insider stock trades as a political weapon to use against House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and his GOP colleagues.

The Senate voted 93-2 on Monday evening to advance the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act, which prohibits lawmakers from using non-public information for financial advantage.

The overwhelming vote came after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) charged behind-the-scenes GOP opposition was holding up the debate. A senior GOP aide denied the allegation.

This raises the issue that it was done for purely partisan political purposes, not for any notion that it is wrong and distasteful for elected officials and government workers to engage in stock trades based on non-public information.

Because the House has yet to schedule a vote on a similar bill, Democrats in the Senate hope their quick action will suggest Republicans are resistant to the popular bill, which gained national attention after a November report on “60 Minutes.”

The Dems are crowing that the STOCK act was removed from markup last fall, but, um, wait a second

The STOCK Act was originally introduced in the 109th session of the House of Representatives on Mar. 28, 2006 by Brian Baird (D-WA) and Louise Slaughter (D-NY) where it died in committee. It was reintroduced in the 110th (May 16, 2007) and 111th (Jan. 26, 2009) House sessions where it also died in committee.

On Mar. 17, 2011, Tim Walz (D-MN) introduced the STOCK Act into the 112th House session where it gained one co-sponsor and was referred to various committees. Eight more co-sponsors joined by Nov. 4, 2011.

So, it died multiple times while Democrats controlled the House? And couldn’t get more than a few co-sponsors in 2011? And Dingy Harry never bothered with it previously, despite the legislation being out there? And that this looks more like a political stunt? Though, this stunt does have real teeth. S.2038 does say, in Sec. 605

A Member of Congress or an employee of Congress who violates the prohibition under section 602 shall be subject to appropriate punitive, disciplinary, and other remedial action in accordance with any applicable laws, resolutions, rules, or regulations.

At least until the Senate quietly passes legislation that invalidates that section, or the whole bill. Of course, in order for most criminal penalties to be assessed, a member of Congress has to be kicked out, and we’ve seen how well that has worked with tax cheats like Charlie Rangle.

That said, the GOP needs to get off their butts in the House and pass this. They also need to proactively pass legislation extending the payroll tax break for at least one year. Perhaps pushing a 2 year extension, put Democrats on the defensive.

It’s as if the conservative media over the past 24 hours decided Gingrich is for real, and they need to come clean about the man they really know before it’s too late. This is just a sampling of what’s hitting Newt:

• The overnight Drudge Report banner: “Insider: Gingrich repeatedly Insulted Reagan.” The headline linked to a devastating takedown by Elliott Abrams in the National Review, who wrote, among other things, that Gingrich had a long record of criticizing and undermining Reagan’s most transformative policies.

• Drudge also linked prominently to the American Spectator’s R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.’s similarly harsh takedown of Gingrich over character: “William Jefferson Gingrich.” In it, Tyrrell writes: “Newt and Bill are 1960s generation narcissists, and they share the same problems: waywardness and deviancy. Newt, like Bill, has a proclivity for girl hopping… His public record is already besmeared with tawdry divorces, and there are private encounters with the fair sex that doubtless will come out.”

Drudge runs hundreds of links to stories of all stripes about candidates, but has been seen by Republicans as favorable to Romney in the past.

• Bob Dole issued a scathing statement Thursday that the Romney campaign provided to the National Review in which he said “it is now time” to rally to stop Gingrich, blamed the former Speaker for losing House Republican seats in 1996, and warned that it could happen again, at all levels of government.

NRO joins in trying to make Newt, the candidate endorsed by Reagan’s son, seem anti-Reagan. Anne Coulter has an article linked at Drudge saying “Re-elect Obama! Vote Newt!

He’s also losing his edge to Mitt in quite a few polls. He is already fighting back though and Rush Limbaugh noticed the attacks and disagrees with them too. It will be interesting to see if he gains his momentum back through tonight’s debate.

Others that noticed: Legal Insurrection

Against the anti-Newt crusade stands a wealth of counter-viewpoints of people who were in a position to know and who share very differenct recollections of Newt and Reagan, via Josh Painter in the comments:

Reagan Nat’l Security Advisor Bud McFarlane: http://bit.ly/zd9eAF

Reagan Economist Art Laffer: http://bit.ly/xEDETi

Reagan WH political director Jeffrey Lord: http://bit.ly/zw2ZMb

Reagan Policy Analyst Peter Ferrara http://bit.ly/zq1QxI

Reagan media consultant Richard Quinn: http://on.msnbc.com/y2sPM2

Reagan’s Speechwriting Dir. Bently Elliott: http://thedc.com/xOkDvA

Reagan’s older son Michael Reagan: http://bit.ly/yYVy7L

Reagan’s beloved wife Nancy: http://bit.ly/zrWvAw

Wake Up America!

Republican voters can be influenced if the party establishment declares all out war against a candidate as they are doing against Gingrich, but voters should also be allowed and encouraged to see both sides of the issue, all the information available and not be forced toward one candidate or another by those with the loudest voices.

(Washington Times) Fighting to curry favor with Florida’s large pool of Hispanic voters, Newt Gingrich on Wednesday called for a guest-worker program for most illegal immigrants, but his campaign could not say whether those people would be on a path to citizenship – the key question in the immigration debate.

Under close questioning by Univision’s political host, Jorge Ramos, Mr. Gingrich said he would grant quick citizenship rights to illegal immigrants who join the military or to those who have been in the U.S. between 20 and 25 years. He said the rest of the estimated 11 million should be given access to a guest-worker program.

“With most of them? I would urge them to get a guest-worker permit,” he said, calling for a substantial rewrite of immigration laws that would cancel existing penalties and instead let illegal immigrants stay.

But his campaign said it was unclear whether at the end of that guest-worker period the immigrants would be allowed to stay and gain citizenship, essentially jumping the legal immigration line, or whether they would be required to return home.

On one hand, Gingrich is correct in that he previously said that it is unrealistic to deport every illegal, nor stop them fully from coming, and, yes, we could show some compassion to those who came to this country and attempted to be a part of America and do things like joining the military. It’s not like people didn’t just come to America in the past, without any sort of immigration programs and such. If someone is putting their life on the line to join the military to protect America, perhaps some accommodations could be made.

On the other hand, why pander to Hispanics who can’t vote because they are here illegally? Why pander to Hispanics who are here legally, but still can’t vote because they aren’t citizens? And a good chunk of Hispanics who are legal citizens tend to get a little ticked off when politicians want to give illegals who did it wrong a pathway to citizenship when they themselves followed the onerous and burdensome rules.

Do we want guest workers? Yes, we do. But it is a bad idea to suddenly give people who came to this country illegally guest worker visas after doing the illegal thing with no penalties. Let them leave the country and apply for a worker program that should be expanded. What Gingrich is doing is telling people who are thinking of coming to America illegally to just come on in, no problem, we’ll take care of you. He might want to rethink this line of thought.

Remember back in the days of the debate over Obamacare when unions were the biggest voices screaming in support of the legislation? Many labor union bosses said that nationalized healthcare was exactly what they wanted. Further they said it was what was good for the country. Yet now we learn that Obama has given waivers to some 550,000 union members so that they don;t have to suffer under Obamacare.

Paul Connor reports that a classic Friday evening document dump from the White House shows that unions employing up to 543,812 members have received waivers from the Obama administration.

Fridays are often the one day of the week when government agencies satisfy transparency rules and release documents that show what they’ve been up to. They release them on Friday in the early evening because they understand that reporters are already headed home for the weekend and TV news departments have already programed their evening newscasts. These agencies also understand that news agencies don’t often cover heavy news on weekends. Further, by the time Monday rolls around the document will be “old news” and many of them will simply escape attention.

But all these waivers really do make one ask a central question. If Obamacare is so great, why all the waivers? Why any waivers? More specifically, if Obamacare is such a well-accepted panacea for all that ails us, why are the unions who pushed so hard for Obamacare trying to get out from under it all?

It’s yet one more example of left-wingers making rules for the rest of us that they don’t want to suffer under themselves and then getting the politicians they bought and paid for to make sure that everyone but they have to suffer under those rules.

Rules are for you people, not liberals.

Romney did it again. On Fox News he linked Romneycare to conservative principles, an outrageous act in the eyes of any conservative. But hold the boat, people, because Romney didn’t exactly say that Romneycare itself is a conservative policy. And therein lies the weasel words that Romney has used to describe the Massachusetts healthcare plan he was so proud to pass when he was the Governor of the state.

To the video…

Transcript:

I’m happy to stand by the things I believe. I’m not going to change my positions by virtue of being in a presidential campaign. What we did was right for the people of Massachusetts. The plan is still favored there by 3:1 and it is fundamentally a conservative principle because the people take personal responsibility rather than turning to the government for free care.

Now, let’s look at what Romney said here. He didn’t exactly say that Romneycare itself is “fundamentally conservative.” He said the concept that people should take responsibility for their own healthcare is a fundamentally conservative idea.

Such as it is, he’s right. That IS a fundamentally conservative idea.

But as Romney has repeatedly done since he signed that disastrous, socialist, far from conservative piece of legislation, he has weasel worded his description of that law. As he’s done before, in this clip he illicitly linked conservative principles to Romneycare by focusing at a micro level on the single idea that we should take care of our own healthcare and linking that real conservative principle to his actions as if conservative principles are the guiding forces behind Romneycare. The problem with Romney’s characterization of the issue is that his legislation is fundamentally not conservative. It is big government, socialist, authoritarian nonsense. It’s not conservative at all. Romney tries to [sell] us that one tiny conservative idea buried under miles of socialist ideas as misdirection for the ills that Romneycare forces on the people of the Bay State.

Romney also tries an additional rhetorical trick by focusing on Tenth Amendment ideals, saying that his effort in Mass. was a “state only” effort, one that he would not recommend for every state. Romney correctly notes that one of our founding principles is that the states should be free to experiment with policy and implement what voters want free of interference by the federal government — a Tenth Amendment ideal. But what Romney is doing here is slyly trying to cloak his monumentally non-conservative healthcare law in the conservative idea of the Tenth Amendment as if Romneycare is conservative when it isn’t conservative in any way at all.

It would be like using a cop’s position as an officer of the law as cover for his breaking, entering, and stealing from a citizen’s home, like saying it is OK simply because he’s a police man. Just because this mythical cop is an officer of the law does not mean his actions are legitimate. In a like way, just because we have a conservative idea of the Tenth Amendment this does not mean that a Romneycare law implemented under the principle of that Amendment is a conservative idea or even an advisable policy, for that matter.

We should also point out that even as this particular issue is the only item he’s not fully flip flopped on — much to the consternation of conservatives everywhere, Romney has flip flopped on whether or not he thinks Romneycare is as good for the nation as it was for Massachusetts. Not long ago Romney was saying that he felt Romneycare was a model for the nation. Now, all of a sudden, he says he never said that, he says that Romneycare was only good for Massachusetts (even though it clearly isn’t) and that he would not recommend it for the nation.

In any case, the point here is that Romney makes it impossible to logically sustain the idea that Obamacare is bad and should be repealed when there isn’t anything substantively different between Romneycare — which he constantly defends and says is great — and Obamacare. The core issue that Republicans and many independents would rally to vote for Romney over is nullified by his constant defense of Romneycare.

This is the main reason why Romney cannot beat Obama in 2012.

(Fox News) Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn on Tuesday released his annual “Wastebook” highlighting what he’s labeled some of the government’s most wasteful spending items, including $113,000 for a video game preservation center and $765,000 to subsidize “pancakes for yuppies” in Washington.

Coburn, a Republican who is known around Washington as “Dr. No” for his opposition to excess spending, said in a press release Tuesday that his “Wastebook 2011″ details the “most egregious ways your taxpayer dollars were wasted” — items he claims total more than $6.5 billion in “unnecessary” spending.

Coburn’s statement includes

“Video games, robot dragons, Christmas trees, and magic museums. This is not a Christmas wish list, these are just some of the ways the federal government spent your tax dollars. Over the past 12 months, politicians argued, debated and lamented about how to reign in the federal government’s out of control spending. All the while, Washington was on a shopping binge, spending money we do not have on things we do not absolutely need. Instead of cutting wasteful spending, nearly $2.5 billion was added each day in 2011 to our national debt, which now exceeds $15 trillion,” Dr. Coburn said.

A few choice bits of waste Coburn highlights

• $75,000 to promote awareness about the role Michigan plays in producing Christmas trees & poinsettias.
• $15.3 million for one of the infamous Bridges to Nowhere in Alaska.
• $113,227 for video game preservation center in New York.
• $550,000 for a documentary about how rock music contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
• $48,700 for 2nd annual Hawaii Chocolate Festival, to promote Hawaii’s chocolate industry.
• $350,000 to support an International Art Exhibition in Venice, Italy.
• $10 million for a remake of “Sesame Street” for Pakistan.
• $35 million allocated for political party conventions in 2012.
• $765,828 to subsidize “pancakes for yuppies” in the nation’s capital.
• $764,825 to study how college students use mobile devices for social networking.

That’s what he highlighted. Digging into the report itself, we also find

• $120 million in benefits for dead federal employees
• $492,005 to study whether or not to trust Tweets
• $742,907 grant to Montana State University to research the use of targeted sheep grazing to control weeds
• $50,000 for cowboy poetry
• $5.2 million for the Steamboat Overlook Interpretive Center
• $592,527 to study feces throwing in Occupiers chimps
• $74,470 – The Treehouse Museum Spends Taxpayer Dollars to Teach the Art of Puppetry
• $6,279 for snow cone makers for emergency situations

Gotta stop there, I could keep going on and on with the list. And some might say “sheesh, come on, it was only $6k for the snow cone makers.” OK, let’s see you spend your own money on them. Not such a pleasant purchase now, is it? Your significant other, children, parents, friends, would excoriate you and call you a fool, right? Why should the federal government wasting your taxpayer money be treated any differently?

Crossed at Pirate’s Cove. Follow me on Twitter @WilliamTeach.