Pascoe and Oberweis’ Chickens Coming Home to Roost
ArchPundit
There’s a price for pissing off your base.
Hysterical
Illinois Congressional Races
Workin’ to 72
Making Bill Pascoe’s faux outrage even worse, Oberweis talked about wanting to privatize social security during the Trib forum.
“In return for being able to direct one quarter of the total payments into the special account, the individual would be giving up…the first, approximately six years of social security payments. It would move him from, say, 66 retirement to age 72 retirement.”
How does Pascoe refer to this privatization plan:
“To begin: the Foster ad falsely claims that Jim ’supported Bush’s scheme to privatize Social Security, gambling your retirement in the stock market.’ Bill Foster knows this isn’t true, because he sat next to Jim Oberweis yesterday in the Chicago Tribune’s editorial board endorsement session and heard Jim talk about his plan to strengthen Social Security, to make sure it’s still there 30 years from now.
Err…Oberweis has what is called a privatization plan–as CATO originally called it and, not only that, he wants to raise the age of retirement to 72!
Today’s Tosser: Bill Pascoe, What’s Most Amusing About Bill Pascoe’s Fine Whine
Are his comments about how to run a campaign in 2004:
First, understand why your opponent has problems with significant elements of his base, and drive wedges where you can, to the maximum extent possible; second, recognize that it is not your campaign’s job to tell the objective truth, it’s your campaign’s job to tell the version of the truth that puts your opponent in the worst light possible (it’s his campaign’s job, after all, to do the same to you); third, don’t get suckered into the trap of only talking about issues the media says are important – instead, choose the issue matrix over which you want to wage war, and stick to it no matter what; and fourth, if need be, if you can’t make a legitimate argument against your opponent on a key issue, use your opponent’s party’s position on the issue as the battleground, and wrap it around his neck. Make him pay for the sins of his party. Guilt by association still works, so don’t be shy in exploiting it.
Live by the sword, die by the sword.
Oh wait, the claims about Oberweis are all true…
10 More Years
Bill Pascoe isn’t known for being a part of the reality based commmunity:
“Finally: Has anyone noticed that the quote the Foster campaign constantly uses — ‘I’ve supported the President on almost everything’ — comes from a newspaper article that’s more than FOUR YEARS OLD? That’s more than half the length of time George Bush has been in the White House! Has anyone noticed that the very title of the article cited — ‘GOP Senate rivals back away from Bush’ — has been deliberately hidden by Mr. Foster? Has Mr. Foster not read any newspapers between January 2004 and today? Has he not been made aware of the many instances in which Jim Oberweis has publicly disagreed with the President since then — particularly, for example, on the twin issues of immigration reform and management of the Iraq war?
The problem here is that immigration he disagreed with Bush in 2002 and, in fact, that’s why he was frozen out by Karl Rove. The same for re-importation of drugs. So that was even before the interview. And in terms of the Iraq war, this ‘disagreement’ with Bush is disingenuous. Supposedly he disagrees with something that Bush did, but he agreed with Bush at the time:
When asked about Bush’s temporary tax cuts, for example, all seven Republicans who answered the survey said they would make them permanent, while the six Democrats who answered said they would rescind the cuts for the wealthy but keep them for the middle class. Similarly, when asked to comment on Bush’s handling of the Iraq war, the Republican candidates were unanimous in their praise of him, and the Democrats were united in their criticism.
Post-Dipatch March 7, 2004
Oberweis’ argument in the below video indicates he disagrees with decisions after the initial invasion, but he was wholeheartedly in favor of the President’s policy while the President was implementing those policies. That’s not criticism of the President, that’s rewriting history.
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/tS60P6NZ1iQ" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
So the only thing that Oberweis seems to have changed since the 2004 quote is that he finds supporting the Iraq War a liability. He doesn’t want to change from Bush’s policy, he just wants to criticize Bush decisions that he supported at the time.
Writing a manifesto about how bad your opponent is might only be weird for Pascoe, but he’s not only weird, but entirely wrong about his own candidate.
3 Years Before Bush Ever Had a Plan for Social Security?
Pascoe below makes the claim:
“The on-screen sources listed for Mr. Foster’s ridiculous allegation are the Daily Herald of Feb. 17, 2002, and Jeff Berkowitz’s ‘Public Affairs’ show of Dec. 7, 2007. NOWHERE in the contents of EITHER source is there ANY indication that Jim Oberweis ‘supported Bush’s scheme to privatize Social Security’ — in fact, that would have been quite impossible, given that the Bush Administration DIDN’T EVEN OFFER A PLAN TO ADDRESS SOCIAL SECURITY’S LONG-TERM STABILITY UNTIL 2005, THREE YEARS AFTER THE FIRST SO-CALLED ‘SOURCE’ CITED!!!
Let’s start with when did Bush offer a plan to address Social Security Long-Term Stability:
Social Security has emerged as a critical issue in this year’s presidential campaign, but neither candidate seems prepared to address the system’s long-term financial problems. Instead, Gov. George W. Bush wants to let individuals invest a small part of their Social Security contributions in the stock market, where he thinks they will earn a better return, and Vice President Al Gore proposes to keep the system largely intact with an infusion of general tax revenues. Neither proposal would really stabilize the system in the long run. In truth, though Social Security is projected to become bankrupt in four decades, the system is not all that far out of kilter. It would not be hard for bold politicians to devise a fix.Social Security may well be, as Governor Bush has said, “the single most successful government program in American history.” It was created in 1935, during the depths of the depression, to provide a guaranteed income to retired workers for as long as they live. Unlike private pension plans, Social Security benefits keep pace with inflation and, unlike 401(k)’s and other popular private plans, Social Security benefits do not fluctuate with stock and bond markets. Social Security provides the majority of income for most retirees and all the income for about a fifth of the elderly.
From its inception, the system has taken in payroll taxes from the working generation and turned almost all of them over to retirees. At the core of Social Security are the notions of social insurance — everyone participates in a common plan — and redistribution — the program tilts in favor of low-paid workers. The benefits for low-paid workers are about 80 percent of their average lifetime earnings, while benefits for high-paid workers are about 30 percent of average earnings. The progressive formula has cut the poverty rate among the elderly by two-thirds, reducing their poverty to below that of the general population. That is a remarkable triumph.
The question before voters is whether a program born out of depression — when poverty was rampant, few married women worked for pay and no one had 401(k)’s or I.R.A.’s to provide for retirement — needs to be revamped.
One reason for thinking so is the projected bankruptcy — a sobering but manageable situation. The system will run surpluses for the next 15 years, building a large reserve. But in 2010, the first wave of the baby boomers — the nearly 80 million people born between 1946 and 1964 — will begin to retire and collect retirement checks. The number of people in the work force for every retiree will fall from about five today to about three in only 30 years or so. That, and the fact that people are living longer, will put a strain on workers to support the retirement needs of the elderly. The system will begin to run deficits around 2015. By 2037, the trust fund is expected to be empty.
But for all the talk of bankruptcy, the system is not facing irreparable financial crisis. Even after 2037, payroll taxes will cover about 70 percent of promised benefits. Deficits over the next 75 years, the planning horizon for the program, will equal less than 2 percent of total payrolls — hardly a catastrophic shortfall. If the economy were to grow only slightly faster than the actuaries at the Social Security Administration now project, the deficit would disappear.
One proposed remedy for financial imbalance is partial privatization, the approach favored by Governor Bush. Under current law, workers and employers pay a 12.4 percent payroll tax that goes into a public trust fund. Under partial privatization, workers could divert, say, two percentage points of that tax to private accounts that the worker could then invest in stocks and bonds. Workers would collect less money from the trust fund when they retired, alleviating financial strain on the system. But they would expect to more than make up for the loss by drawing from their private accounts.
Mr. Bush’s sketchy proposal fails to answer where he would find the money to pay retirees as payroll taxes were diverted into private accounts. But there are other fundamental problems with the proposal as well.
New York Times, May 29, 2000
Hmmmmm….Pascoe has some issue with dates apparently.
But more interesting is there is a point here. Just it makes Oberweis look worse:
Specifically, Oberweis believes workers should be allowed to invest half of the current 6.2 percent tax in a personal account. Cox supports a lower percentage but would not specify a percentage. Durkin also has not offered details about what kind of personal savings account plan he would support.
Chicago Daily Herald, February 17, 2002
Oberweis actually would have had larger private accounts than Bush at the time in 2002.
Perhaps Bill Pascoe should know something about his own candidate?
Today’s Tosser: Illinois Review, Apparently Jim Oberweis’ Web Site is Lying About Him
Illinois Review, with issues of honesty themselves, attack Bill Foster’s commercial as being untrue because it claims:
The false claim in the ad is that somehow Jim Oberweis doesn’t support employer provided health care. However, according to the correction that ran in today’s Chicago Tribune, Foster’s charge is false. You have to read the fine print, but hey, it’s there . . .
Well, let’s look at Jim’s web site:
In the long run, then, a fundamental element of health care reform must be to move away from the third party payer system, and reintroduce incentives for managing one’s own health care expenditures. Tax-free Health Savings Accounts are an excellent first step in the right direction.
[kml_flashembed movie="http://youtube.com/v/hobjGiNadCc" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
So, Oberweis does say he wants to end employer provided health care insurance. It’s on his web site. Did someone hack into it and put it there to smear him?
What’s the problem here?
Do Steve Greenberg’s Loyalties Lay With Israel over the US?
That’s the kind of bullshit line you find all of the time about Jewish candidates at White Supremacist and Anti-Semitic sites–like JewWatch, the site run by a gay Nazi.
I think we’d all be appalled by such a line. And we get such a line from the Greenberg campaign:
Republican challenger Steve Greenberg circulated a news release Wednesday referring to the Barrington Democrat as Melissa Luburich Bean, adding her Serbian maiden name.
The news release blasted Bean for not supporting Kosovo’s move to separate from Serbia and her backing by pro-Serbian organizations.
Greenberg defended the news release Wednesday, saying her maiden name was fair game and her support for Serbia is disturbing, especially in light of last week’s attack on the U.S. embassy in the Eastern European country.
“I think ultimately when you run for office you are being vetted many ways — your middle name and last name and you get called many names,” said the Long Grove businessman. “If we are thin-skinned about it … we are probably in the wrong business.”
Bean has a long record of supporting Serbian groups and Serbia’s efforts to prevent a Kosovo succession. The position is in conflict with the official stance of the Bush administration and that of several key Western European allies.
The attack on the embassy was reportedly carried out by rioters upset with the U.S. support of a separate Kosovo state. The Serbian government denounced the attack.
Bean was not available for comment Thursday, but her spokesman did issue a one-sentence statement.
“As a rule, the congresswoman does not respond to ethnically and religiously divisive statements,” Jonathan Lipman said.
Disagreeing with Bean over policy on Serbia is fine and I’m frankly closer to Greenberg on this very narrow issue. However, trying to slur her ethnically is beyond the pale.
The Professional Oberweis Campaign Continues
His ads got pulled off of the local television stations for violating disclaimer rules in political advertising. That Bill Pascoe sure is on top of everything:
From the Foster Campaign
Oberweis Ad Pulled Off Local Stations
In continuing pattern of breaking the law, Oberweis’ TV commercial violates FCC regulations(Geneva, IL) – A television commercial by 14th congressional district candidate Jim Oberweis has been pulled from rotation by WGN and NBC-affiliate WMAQ, in response to violations of Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
The ad in question contains multiple failures to comply with disclaimer requirements, representing an attempt on the part of Oberweis to evade responsibility for the allegations levied against Mr. Foster contained in the ad.
This violation comes on the heels of the revelation yesterday that Oberweis appears to have broken federal election law by triggering the Millionaires’ Amendment without notifying his opponent as required by law.
This is not the first time that Oberweis has run afoul of FEC law. After his 2004 U.S. Senate campaign, he was fined $21,000 by the FEC for benefiting from a television ad, in which he appeared, for the Oberweis Dairy. The FEC found that the ad constituted a prohibited corporate contribution to his campaign. [Associated Press, 7/27/07]
In addition, Oberweis used fabricated newspaper headlines to attack his opponent in his 2006 run for Illinois Governor. [St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 3/2/06, Chicago Tribune, 3/1/06]
Wow, talk about incompetence.
Did Jim Oberweis Violate the “Millionaires’ Amendment”?
DCCC Release:
Jim Oberweis, the Republican Congressional candidate in IL-14, appears to have broken federal election law by triggering the Millionaires’ Amendment without notifying his opponent as required by law. This would not be the first time Oberweis broke the law or tried to deceive voters.
“Jim Oberweis has a disturbing pattern of violating federal election law and deceiving voters” said Jennifer Crider, Communications Director at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. “This time, it looks like Jim Oberweis personally and deliberately failed to follow the law, pouring money into this race that he made investing in Chinese companies that threaten American jobs. Jim Oberweis acts like the rules and law don’t apply to him – Illinois voters deserve better.”
According to his most recent FEC filing, Oberweis put in $640,000 of his own money. [http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/dcdev/forms/C00436642/324695/sc/ALL]
- $300,000.00 on February 7, 2008
- $340,000.00 on February 11, 2008
The Millionaires’ Amendment is a part of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform law. McCain-Feingold increases contribution limits for candidates facing opponents who put substantial sums of their personal funds into their own campaigns. An individual who puts in more than $350,000 into their House race risks triggering the Millionaires’ Amendment. Once the millionaire candidate trips this threshold, the candidate must notify his opponents and the FEC by filing a FEC Form 10 within 24 hours. The opponent can have access to higher limits depending on his or her own spending and fundraising. [http://www.fec.gov/press/bkgnd/MillionairesAmendment.html]
Jim Oberweis’ Pattern of Violating Federal Election Law and Deceiving Voters
- Oberweis was previously fined $21,000 by the FEC for breaking federal election law. The FEC said Oberweis benefited from a television ad he appeared in for the Oberweis Dairy in the 2004 Senate race and that the ad constituted a corporate contribution which is prohibited by federal campaign laws. [Associated Press, 7/27/07]
- Oberweis used fake headlines in his 2006 gubernatorial campaign. Oberweis ran two TV ads that use made-up newspaper headlines to attack his opponents integrity. The words were displayed as if they appeared on the front pages of the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and the State Journal-Register. The St Louis Post-Dispatch ran a story with the headline “Ads for Oberweis using Fake Headlines…” after TV spots he ran attacking is opponent used replicas of real newspapers with fake headlines.” [St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 3/2/06] [Chicago Tribune, 3/1/06]
Candidates That Violate the Millionaires’ Amendment Receive Significant Fines
- $91,000 Fine for Former Representative Charles Taylor. In December 2006, the FEC Taylor On December 27, the FEC fined Taylor, R-Brevard, $91,000 for failing to properly report loans and contributions totaling more than $800,000 that he made to his 2004 congressional campaign. [Asheville Citizen-Times, 1/6/07]
- $71,000 Fine for J. Edgar Broyhill II (NC-05). In July 2006, the FEC fined for J. Edgar Broyhill II, a candidate in the 2004 primary election, for violating the reporting requirements of the Millionaire’s Amendment, along with other reporting requirements of federal election law. [$71,100 CIVIL PENALTY PAID BY BROYHILL FOR VIOLATIONS OF MILLIONAIRE’S AMENDMENT States News Service July 19, 2006 Wednesday]
- $68,250 Fine for James R. Socas (VA-10). In March 2006, the FEC fined James R. Socas, a candidate in the 2004 general election for for violating the reporting requirements of the Millionaire’s Amendment. [SOCAS PAYS CIVIL PENALTY FOR VIOLATIONS OF MILLIONAIRE’S AMENDMENT States News Service March 16, 2006 Thursday]
Hysterical
Hiram: Jim Oberweis Believes In Health Care For Cows – Not People
Jim Oberweis supports health care for all cows in his business. But the Chicago Tribune points out Jim Oberweis is against employers providing health care insurance for people – he says employees should go it alone. Cows get guaranteed health care while people go without. Should we treat cows better than people? Yes, it sounds strange, but you know where Jim Oberweis stands.
Here’s the Skinny:
What’s fascinating is that Oberweis is talking about a health care system that existed 20 years ago and not what exists today. There are incentives to avoid overusing health care, but more importantly health care now is starting to focus on more preventative care which is the only way to truly reduce the rising health care costs.