Last week the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its latest update on our country’s fiscal situation. According to the CBO, the federal deficit shrank $19 billion over the past 5 months. Additionally, CBO projects the deficit will be $90 billion less than 2006. Is this because of the Democrats policies? No.

Is this because the Democrats have cut spending? No.

This decrease is the continued result of President Bush’s tax cuts. In fact, if the Democrats have their way, they will increase federal spending – the spending bills passed by the House are $48 billion higher in non-emergency spending than the CBO baseline, which accounts for inflation related growth. Without any proactive legislation to continue the tax relief already provided for by Congress, taxpayers will see $150 billion in tax increases go into effect in 2011.

Republican tax policies do work. We can have lower taxes and higher federal revenue. Federal tax revenue grew by 14.5 percent in 2005 and 11.8 percent last year, receipts this year are expected to grow by about 7.1 percent.

We are midway through the August Congressional recess, and as people who know me have heard me say often, the best thing about a Congressional recess is that you can relax for a short period knowing your pocketbook is safe while Congress is not in session.  I guess one month of recess is not too much to ask after nearly 4 months of record breaking spending.  All the appropriations bills have now passed the House and how many the Senate will take up is yet to be determined.  Recently the group Club for Growth came out with their 2007 "RePORK Card" listing the 50 earmark stripping amendments and how each member of Congress voted for these amendments.

Even after the new Democrat majority pledged to restore "fiscal responsibility" to Congress, only 1 of the 50 amendments to strip pork from the appropriations bills passed.  Only 16 members of Congress, all Republican, scored a 100% voting for all 50 amendments to cut pork spending.  The average Republican score was 43% and the average Democrat score was 2%.  The average score for appropriator members of Congress was 4%.  Out of 435 members of Congress, 105 of them received a 0%, voting against every pork-cutting amendment.

Fiscal responsibility?  I will let you be the judge.  To see the RePORK Card, click here.

Early in the morning on Sunday, as we were finishing up amendments on the Defense Appropriations bill, I debated an earmark challenge with the Chairman of the Defense Subcommittee on Appropriations, Congressman John Murtha (D-PA). The earmark allocated $2 million to Sherwin-Williams Paint Company to develop what they described as a "paint shield to protect against microbial attacks." As the sponsor of the amendment, Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs-Jones (D-OH) did not come down to defend her earmark. The defense was left to Congressman Murtha.

Here is a link to this brief debate, now keep in mind all I wanted to know was:

1) Is this project requested by the Department of Defense? The correct answer is NO.

2) Is this a project that was competitively bid among other potential suppliers? The correct answer again is NO.

3) Will the taxpayer own the rights to any successful product developed? Again, the correct answer, according to Sherwin-Williams’ own brochure for this project is NO.

4) How do we know that this particular company is the best supplier? There are many great paint companies in America, how do we know that Sherwin-Williams is the right company to do this job? Answer never given.

5) What investigations have they done to ensure that this is the right price? Is $2 million just an arbitrary amount? Answer never given.

For those of us in Congress fighting to reform our earmark process, this video is a good example of where we need to start.

It is a rare Saturday blog but that is because we are in a rare Saturday session of Congress. I won't bore you with the circumstances that led to this weekend's legislative endeavor, I am sure you have heard or read about the mess the Democratic leadership has created over the past two days, but know that even on a weekend your pocketbooks & wallets are not safe from the tax & spenders in Congress.

One of the first items Pelosi and her team will attempt to ram through today is an Energy bill that is divided into two parts. The fiscal part of this bill is the "Renewable Energy & Energy Conservation Tax Act." Now, I am the first to admit there are several good things in this legislation and I have been an advocate of alternative energy development my whole political career including solar and nuclear energy.

However, these small concessions are overshadowed by the $15.3 billion in tax increases this bill contains on domestic energy exploration & production, creation and sale of renewable diesel, and international creation & sale of biodiesel & ethanol fuels. In addition, while the program in the bill that provides $2 billion in renewable energy bonds for the creation of renewable energy facilities is admirable, the mandate that any renewable energy facility built with these funds must submit to Davis-Bacon standards is not.

This bill will only hurt domestic energy production, increase energy costs to consumers and small businesses, and increase our dependence on foreign energy providers. This is not what should be at the core of a sound domestic energy policy, no matter how appealing the smaller pieces around the edges may be.

Last night, Republicans walked off the House Floor after Democrats changed the outcome of a vote after the final tally had been called. And this was not just any vote. The vote would have barred illegal immigrants from receiving food stamps and subsidized housing. Republicans had just enough votes to pass the motion, and we won the final vote 215-213.

That should have been the end of it. But not under the Pelosi Congress.

After the gavel had fallen, Stockton, California Freshman Democrat Jerry McNerney (CA-11) changed his vote to oppose the motion, and even though the vote was closed, they allowed the outcome to go the other way.

Last night’s walk-out didn’t happen just because of this one vote. The Democrat’s agenda is so liberal and so out of touch with the American people, that all year, they have not permitted debate or objections on legislation because they don’t want the American people to see what they’re doing. Nancy Pelosi believes that the politics of San Francisco and America are the same. They are not.

As the Majority party, they have the right to pass legislation. But they don’t have the right to suppress differing opinions and disregard the outcome of elections. That’s un-American, un-democratic, and just plain wrong.

The House is currently shut down. I will keep you posted.

Yesterday afternoon, the House Financial Services Committee of which I am a member, passed a bill on a mostly party-line vote to create a National Housing Trust Fund, or as I like to call it, the National Housing Slush Fund. This fund is supposed to help build 1.5 million new units of affordable housing; the problem is that the Democrats who designed this bill ended up creating a new bureaucracy and taxing many of the same people they are trying to help.

First, at a cost of at least $1 billion per year, this program draws money out of a slush fund created by, guess what...a new tax on every mortgage in the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac portfolios. These government sponsored enterprises, which have a mandated mission to help provide home loans to low and middle income families, would be taxed to the tune of $3 billion over the next 5 years. You think those costs won’t be passed along to those low and middle income families making affordable housing more expensive? Also, the Slush Fund would use excess premiums from the Federal Housing Administration's loan guarantee program, which helps many first time homebuyers, to the tune of $350 million a year. This is one of the few programs in the federal government that actually puts money into the Treasury.

Second, the Slush Fund creates a new bureaucracy that duplicates an already existing program within the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). The HOME program at HUD makes grants to qualifying applicants who are in the business of constructing affordable housing. Guess what the Slush Fund does – yep, that’s right – the exact same thing. I wonder how many more units they could have built with the new administrative costs created by the Slush Fund.

Lastly, the way this program doles out money is a cause for concern. Instead of making all grants directly to entities that actually construct affordable housing, the Slush Fund can make grants to intermediaries even if they have only a small interest in affordable housing. Many of these organizations also have grassroots political activist wings and considering this money from the Slush Fund is fungible, taxpayer dollars could be used to promote political activities.

This National Housing Slush Fund is just another example how the majority party in Congress is not interested in lessening the burden on the American taxpayer, but rather appeasing constituent groups through larger government programs. If they were truly interested in creating affordable housing, we should probably cut the loan rates rather than throw more money at the problem.