Senator Kent Conrad: Is He a Clown, Hack, or Demagogue?
by Dan MitchellActually, the answer is all of the above.
He pontificates about debt, but he voted for the fake stimulus and budget-busting Obamacare legislation.
He’s a preening self-styled deficit hawk, but the nation’s four largest deficits have occurred since he became Chairman of the Senate Budget Committee.
As Chairman of the Budget Committee, with a bloated staff and a budget of millions of dollars, his only responsibility – under law – is to produce a budget resolution every year, yet it’s now been more than 800 days since he’s bothered to fulfill this obligation.
You may be asking why I’m going after Senator Conrad. Is it because I’m upset that he has played a key role in tricking some gullible Republicans into supporting tax increases, based on a laughably vague set of talking points?
Sure, that galls me, but I’m used to Republicans engaging in self-immolation. I can’t really get too upset with Conrad for taking advantage of GOP naiveté.
What irks me is that this buffoon went to the Senate floor last week to make an impassioned plea for higher taxes. But rather than honestly say that he wants to take more of our money, he demagogued about a building in the Cayman Islands.
According to our financial-wizard friend from North Dakota, there is something inherently criminal about this structure (offices of a top-flight international law firm) because it is the home of more than 18,000 companies.
Here’s an image I captured from one of Conrad’s earlier speeches, where he made the same accusation.
So why am I irritated about his speech? Is it because Senator Conrad lied about the number of companies at Ugland House? No, the Senator is correct (unlike Obama, who demagogued about the same building during the 2008 campaign, but said there were 12,000 companies).
What bothers me is that Conrad presumably is educated enough to understand that he is being disingenuous. While he’s been sucking on the public teat his entire life, surely he knows that a company’s home is merely the place where it is chartered for legal purposes. A firm’s legal domicile has nothing to do with where it does business or where it is headquartered.
But just to make things clear, here’s a picture of another building. This building is smaller than Ugland House, yet it is the home of more than 200,000 companies.
So why isn’t the empty suit from North Dakota attacking this building? Maybe we should ask the Vice President. After all, this building is in Wilmington, Delaware.
The moral of the story is that companies like to make their legal homes in jurisdictions that have honest courts, sensibly light levels of red tape, and business-friendly reputations. The Cayman Islands is such a place, as is Delaware.
To Kent Conrad, that’s de facto evidence of criminal activity. To normal and honest people, that’s evidence that good policy generates more economic activity.
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52 Comments
Clown, Hack or Demagogue?
Why no, he is a Democrat, and that encompasses all three.
As a point of reference, in conjunction with your point about Conrad NOT attacking the office at 1209 in Delaware ( a lot of folks will recognize what it is), there was an article where the liberals were attacking just a couple weeks ago a similar address in Cheyenne, Wyoming, another state with favorable corporate laws.
Not to belabor a point, there is a similar structure in corporate, and tax friendly Nevada.
Perhaps Harry Reid could check on that.
What double standards they have, when it is politically expedient!
Add fraudulent liar and corrupt douche and you'd get the complete description of "Kent"…(if that's his real name). And if you asked Biden about this suite he'd just say it's a big f__king deal, order another drink and take a nap.
I thought he was a doo doo head.
Thanks to the US having one of the highest corporate taxes on the planet and our ever increasing blood sucking regulations is it no wonder that American business have moved offshore. Jobs won't return until we become a corporate friendly nation again, a concept that our socialist overlords can't grap. Only useful idiot suck-ups like GE's Immelt are escaping the carnage.
____"What double standards they have, when it is politically expedient!"_______
It does not even have to be politically expedient,it can be personal or laws that the libs feel don't apply to them.
-Clinton-A Bl@w job is not sex
-Rangle- Cause I write tax law I am exempt
-Obama-I started a war with Libya and what are you gonna do about it ?
-Weiner -I was hacked by Breitbart
/ I could go on all day
_____"Only useful idiot suck-ups like GE's Immelt are escaping the carnage."_______
Well personally I think Immelt has hitched his life boat to a sinking ship.
And it will end up destroying GE (One of the worlds oldest companies)
Immelt is helping draft legislation to benefit GE and pump up Imam Obama's Ego,it will not end well for GE.
Because services and products are being government mandated and GE is profiting,it will not be long before GE has to fight anti-trust suits locally and globally.
GE will not have a leg to stand on,I think it would be called conflict of interest, because Immelt is part of the Administration.
In a sane world, what Conrad is doing, is called "blaming the victim." Businesses seek to location their homes in places that won't bleed them dry, and they get smacked with the collectivist stick for doing it.
Conrad should be wearing a wife beater for this presentation. It'd be far more appropriate than the uniform of business.
thankfully , Conrad, the last of our 3 stooges is retiring in 2012.
Pomeroy and Dorgan saw the writing on the wall in 2010 and jumped ship, Conrad followed suit once he saw how handily Hoeven and Berg won their vacated seats.
Seeya later carpet bagger!
"As Chairman of the Budget Committee, with a bloated staff and a budget of millions of dollars, his only responsibility – under law – is to produce a budget resolution every year, yet it’s now been more than 800 days since he’s bothered to fulfill this obligatio"
This is fact, but for some odd and unknown reason the republicans don't use this as a weapon……
The democrats have set no budget for over 800 days!
The democrats have spent like drunken sailers with no regard to America's money
This spending is at unprecedented levels never seen before
The republicans are trying to come up with meaningful measures to tackle our debt crises
The democrats are fooling the American people about now wanting fiscal restraint
WAKE UP AMERICA!
Just another statist believer in the goodness of big government and, of course, the need to keep the gravy train going so his constituency will vote him in again. The transparency of government is finally here, Hosanna in the highest!
Please help!!! If the 1974 budget reform act makes it a law that a budget must be produced by the congress, why can the senate ignore or thumb their noses at this? Does the law get satisfied if just the house produces a budget? I keep reading where the senate is in violation, but never a word of sanctions that can be done.
I would suggest that this sorry excuse to represent a state is actually a progressive marxist. He spews the same rhetoric and supports spreading the wealth. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, it is more than likely a duck, except a marxist duck. We can hope he loses in his next reelection bid. What a jackass. He is definitely a solid representative of the Peter Principle in action.
Delaware….. ah yes, Someone should ask Joe Biden about that, I bet he has an answer. Self righteous indignation only works if you are not guilty of participating in the same activity you cast the blame on.
We are still waiting for these Democrats to show some kind of plan other that the ones that have caused our country's slippery slide into financial ruin. Taxing me more will only make me incapable of making the simplest of minor purchases. This is what their ultimate goal is though….. Reflectively we know it and are fighting back with all we have… our vote! We need to protect our vote… Every state, every county and every city is going to be assaulted by not "Angry Birds… so get off your I-Phones" but the get out the vote people and Acorn pod people which have re-branded themselves and cloned across the nation (funded by us still) will be going after assisted living facilities, homeless shelters, intercity strongholds and union cronies.
They will put an extreme amount of pressure for the Republican's to agree to "Increased Revenue" i.e. TAX INCREASES. The Republican leadership had better understand they are not ever going to fix this irresponsible fiscal calamity by giving this government one more dime. Cut, Cap, and Balance is not just a whim it is a necessity to stop our out of control elected officials from destroying our country and our people. As these guys retire to their safe havens they've built up for themselves (tax shelters, and retirement benefits), they stick us with a bill we are incapable of ever paying.
They will be able to persuade the rhino's and the naive to sidle up with some of these schemes of the Democrat party of demagogs. They have to stand firm, the Republican and better yet fiscal conservative people of this country needs for this to be the battle we win. NO MORE extensions. Cut the duplicity. Cut the waste. Cut the crap, get out of our way and let us as a free nation get back to work.
Interesting, a Federal legislator and a President vilifying a country for something that our Federal Government can not do. Our Federal government can not control the articles of incorporation of large businesses in this country. That is a State function. As a matter of fact our states used to have complete control of every business that operated in that state. The Constitution contains no provision for the regulation of business except a uniform procedure for bankruptcy. The commerce it describes our government being able to regulate has to do with imports and exports between the individual sovereign States and the outside nation States. Not the businesses themselves.
He could have picked Bimini, where Clan Kennedy shelters their assets. Now that's criminal.
Its one of those laws that was passed to make us think that they were passing meaningful legislation. I do not think that they prescribed any penalties not to produce one. Like most of the laws they pass, they are exempt from the law.
Republicans that were duped by Coburn shouldn't be in office. Republicans are not victims. They have been willing accomplices. The ones in that gang of 6 should be replaced, including, especially Coburn. He wasn't thinking about what's good for the country, he was thinking about himself. And what did he and the rest of the gang of 6 have to show after drawing attention away from CC&B and to themselves, and therefore, giving BO another opportunity to play games? Nothing but hot air. These people are more than useless, they are destructive.
Not that Hoeven and Berg are much for us to brag about. I fear they are RINO's. Also at least I received responses from the other congressman, I've written numerous times to these two and have yet to hear back. Personally I'm not happy with these two we put in office.
Conrad is doing what he has done all his life. He speaks for whoever gives him the largest campaign contributions. He doesn't really care what he says.
Hell, Congress doesn't really consider itself constrained by the Constitution, let alone a stupid little law.
Isn't it amazing how many post office boxes you can squeeze into a building? I wonder how many businesses reside at my local post office? Is it criminal for them to have their headquarters in a government building?
Silly little document that Constitution. Obviously it is outdated and not up to modern standards. Individual sovereign States? Another outmoded principle. States, and the benighted citizens are too stupid to know what is good for them. Thank heaven we have enlightened self-sacrificing individuals like Kent Conrad to pick up the reins and provided for us our rights and sustenance. /sarc
Yes!
Yah, when you let the clowns take over, don't be surprised when a circus breaks out.
There are Real shipping companies like UPS that also have mail box addresses in locations. This would reduce their competion, probably. Just a thought to ponder.
God help this country if more than a few clueless idiots are buying the debt disinformation projectile vomited by Democrat demagogues like Tom Harkin and Charles “Chuck You” Schumer.
Note how they try to trick us into assuming that not giving them carte blanche to spend our money up to infinity is the same thing as advocating default on the debt they’ve run up. It is the opposite. If no one stops Obama et al, they will keep spending and monetizing until our money is worthless, at which point default will go without saying.
Obama’s insane spending spree may already have exceeded the country’s crippled economic capabilities. If he were yanked from office tomorrow — and run out of Washington on a rail, covered in the tar and feathers he so richly deserves — your grandchildren might not live long enough to pay the debts he’s accumulated with wasteful spending in only two and half years. The only way we can possibly pay our debts is if we stop spending more than we have. Even Tom Harkin is intelligent enough to understand this, or is he?
If Michele Bachmann wouldn’t raise the debt limit no matter what, this is the equivalent of a bartender saying he wouldn’t give a customer another double martini no matter what, as the customer lies comatose on the floor, nearly dead of alcohol poisoning.
Unfortunately nothing really surprises me anymore. Oh, the bliss of cynicism!
I think the basic problem is that as long as the Democrats control even one wing of the House, any chance of investigations and/or punitive action against other Democrats is nil.
The same problem arises from the impeachment question – the republican Congress may vote for impeachment, but the democrat controlled Senate will never pass the subsequent vote for removal from office (see Clinton).
Beyond that, for some reason (likely the good old boy network in Washington), new batches of congressmen and senators very rarely do serious investigations into previous houses and their members, probably fearing to set a precedent that could come back and bite *them*.
One of the basic dysfunctions of the way congress and the senate are set up, is that they are self-policing, and the only semblance of control over them is the general election. And they've found ways to work around that, playing on the public's collectively short attention span
"This is fact, but for some odd and unknown reason the republicans don't use this as a weapon…."
Why? It could be that the Repubs plan to do the same only diverting the "pork" to their supporters. Granted the Demoncats are outright Criminals or Communists. The Repubs also are Criminals and Big Government Progressives. In my opinion only approx. 30% of Elected Repubs are Constitutional Patriots. Progressives like the Bushie's or Romney are lingering about to "reform" Obamacare and the Obamanations into the status quo once they regain power. The Ryan Plan does not "solve" our debt crisis.Hard to follow but I heard the Repubs most aggressive plan is to cut 400 billion, (over 10 years?) We have a deficit of 1,500 billion yearly and increasing! The water is coming over the railings, Lifeboat Time!
"Senator Kent Conrad: Is He a Clown, Hack, or Demagogue?"
You forgot one:
IDIOT!
Isn't Charley Rangel's bungalow just dowm the street from that building ? Just kidding,I know it's in Costa Rica, but you get the point.
DeviousEgotisticalMorals-neutralOrwellianCalculatingRepugnantAnti-AmericanTyranticalSocialists.
D E M O C R A T S………..that about sums it!
Senator Kent Conrad is (so he thinks) a magician at smoke and mirrors manipulation. I tend to view him as a CHARLATAN.
From my good friend Merriam Webster:
Definition of CHARLATAN
1: quack
2: one making usually showy pretenses to knowledge or ability : fraud, faker
AND HE WAS ALSO INVOLVED IN THE HOUSING SCANDAL, TAKING SWEETHEART LOANS FROM MOZILO, REMEMBER HIM? CONRAD CLAIMED TO DONATE HIS LARGESSE (WHEN IT BECAME KNOWN) TO CHARITY, WHICH WAS SUPPOSED TO MAKE HIS RECEIVING SPECIAL FAVORS, ALL RIGHT. IT DIDN'T. THE CRIME WAS STILL COMMITTED AND HE DIDN'T FACE THE PUNISHMENT. ANOTHER TWO FACED DEMOCRAT.
A double-tongued and double-minded man can never, ever be trusted in anything! That goes for all you Republican 'fence sitters' out there along with the false messiah in our White House!
~~~
IT IS NOT OVER ON THE DEBT LIMIT…AMERICA…KEEP UP THE HEAT! RAISING IT WILL ONLY POSTPONE THE INEVITABLE…LET’S JUST GET IT OVER WITH AND CALL THEIR BLUFF! CALL/EMAIL YOUR REPS TODAY…AND SPECIFICALLY SPEAKER BOEHNER TO ENCOURAGE THEM TO BE STEADFAST AND STRONG…’WE THE PEOPLE ARE WITH THEM’~
http://www.usa.gov/Contact/Elected.shtml
Senator Rand Paul only CONSERVATIVES standing up and saying NO on the debt ceiling vote?
http://www.c-span.org/Events/Senator-Rand-Paul-R-...
Call/email Senator Paul for standing up for ‘real’ Americans everywhere on the Patriot Act, the Budget and the Debt Ceiling.
http://paul.senate.gov/?p=home
He's not running for re-election. He sees the writing on the wall. Watch him carefully though, I believe these arse holes are most dangerous when they know they'll soon be gone! And yeah, up here he's known as Kent-for-rent or Countrywide Kent.
Thus the nickname, Countrywide Kent/Kent-for-rent
Senator Kent Conrad: Is He a Clown, Hack, or Demagogue?
ALL OF THE ABOVE!
It's the DEFAULT condition of Progressives/ Dems and RINOS.
One of your best comments!
Interesting that actually trying to run a business is a crime to people like Sen. Conrad and The Marxist.
Thank you.
Sincerely.
Not sure why anyone thumbed you down, Keltic…
Makes no sense whatever, since you were only adding factual material to the discussion.
(My business has a UPS mailbox AND a post office box. I much prefer the UPS mailbox.)
That's good stuff! Funny, but also makes a real point.
Kent Conrad is a Flaming Liberal.
What did you excpect out of Kent Conrad?
Kent Conrad is merely doing what all Liberals do.
Bozo is a clown. Conrad is an assclown. Conrad is worse than a demagogue, hes a commie pig.
and the GOP WILL win his seat. North dakota has had it with assclown commies like Pomeroy, Helmethead Dorgan and Hans Conrad.
Conrad, in short, is the last Democrat who will be sent to Washington from North Dakota.
Keep in mind the Republicans win basically 30 states in every presidential election. If we just elect two republican senators in each one of those states we have a filibuster proof majority in the Senate. Fortunately, in 2012 we get the other ND Senate seat back in the hands of a Republican for years to come.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
Why would I be surprised about this guy? We, the people, are dealing with an addict. Say anything, pretend anything to keep that addiction. Unsupervised politicians=power addiction. Vote in the primaries. Have a national Primary day. Make the outcomes of presidential primaries be a suggestion to the delegates who go to convention. Repeal the 17th amendment. Pay attention.
Is he a clown, hack, or demagogue? No he is a democRAT! Synonymous with LOON, tax and spend, fiscally irresponsible, advocate of social programs that don't work, cut the military even though we live in the most dangerous of times, etc. etc. etc. Another words, he is your typical democRAT LOON!
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain…
He needs to be held accountable for not doing his job! Put him in front of an inquiry panel! Investigate his inability to do his job!
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