Flashback 1992 . George McGovern ;who had done a lifetime of public service as a WWII Airforce hero ;a member of Congress and the Senate from 1963 until he was defeated in the Reagan sweep .He was the Dem's peace candidate in the 1972 election and was roundly defeated by Richard Nixon.

But this isn't about that . This is the rest of the story .
When he left office he invested his teaching and lecture circuit earnings in 1988 in purchasing the lease of the Stratford Inn ;150 room Inn and restaurant in Stratford Connecticut . This is when reality hit him right between the eyes . It went belly up 2 years later .

1992 he wrote an op-ed in the WSJ .He wrote how his business was the victim of things he did not consider as a senator. He didn't realize just how costly regulatory compliance is. He was unaware of how well-intentioned regulations often produce bad outcomes, how taxes dampen investment and how mandates make it harder to innovate or survive, especially during recessions.

"the concept that most often eludes legislators is: 'Can we make consumers pay the higher prices for the increased operating costs that accompany public regulation and government reporting requirements with reams of red tape.'" .... "In short, 'one-size-fits-all' rules for business ignore the reality of the marketplace."He ended his op-ed with
The problem we face as legislators is: Where do we set the bar so that it is not too high to clear? I don't have the answer. I do know that we need to start raising these questions more often.

A Politician's Dream Is a Businessman's Nightmare - WSJ (https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052970203406404578070543545022704)


He would not survive as a Dem in 2023 .


Fast forward to a Dem that the Dems would like to purge.

Joe Manchin has written an op-ed in the WSJ called 'Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act Betrayal'


Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act Betrayal - WSJ (https://www.wsj.com/articles/biden-inflation-reduction-act-betrayal-joe-manchin-debt-ceiling-budget-fossil-fuels-green-energy-dc37738e)

It speaks to some of the concerns in the McGovern piece.


Yet instead of implementing the law as intended, unelected ideologues, bureaucrats and appointees seem determined to violate and subvert the law to advance a partisan agenda that ignores both energy and fiscal security. Specifically, they are ignoring the law’s intent to support and expand fossil energy and are redefining “domestic energy” to increase clean-energy spending to potentially deficit-breaking levels. The administration is attempting at every turn to implement the bill it wanted, not the bill Congress actually passed. Ignoring the debt and deficit implications of these actions as the time nears to raise the debt ceiling isn’t only wrong, it’s policy and political malpractice.



The complaint is basically the same .Government imposes burdens on businesses that makes it difficult to be prosperous. The difference is that McGovern misunderstood what being in business was about . Manchin has been naive about what being a responsible representative is about . Why is he surprised ? This betrayal by Clueless Joe was predictable .

semi socialist (askmehelpdesk.com) (https://www.askmehelpdesk.com/showthread.php?t=849716&p=3886473#post3886473)

To expand on McGovern's epiphany ; not only does Congressional lawmaking have unintended consequences on the private sector ;it often goes against what Congress itself is trying to accomplish. Once regulators get their claws into a law ;much of the resources allocated get gobbled up in the bureaucratic process. Manchin wanted the permitting process streamlined. Forgetting the outright betrayal of the administration ; the deep state operatives don't make a living streamlining anything. Their job security requires them to gum up the works and make the system ever more dependent on the deep state.

Manchin's complaint is they are adding more deficit burden on a bill that was intended to reduce the deficit . Those pesky unintended consequences again.

Here is the Manchin op-ed for those without access to WSJ .


America is fast approaching another needless emergency—the raising of the national debt ceiling. This impending crisis isn’t an accident but a result of the inaction of various actors who refuse to confront fiscal reality, sit down, negotiate and make hard decisions for the sake of our nation’s future. While all parties have a responsibility to negotiate in good faith, recent actions make clear to me that the Biden administration is determined to pursue an ideological agenda rather than confront the clear and present danger that debts and deficits pose to our nation.

Our national debt stands at nearly $31.5 trillion, or close to $95,000 for every man, woman and child, and represents 120% of our gross domestic product. Annual budgetary deficits have averaged $2.71 trillion since October 2019. Since Covid-19 began, we have added more than $8 trillion to the national debt. Despite explicit direction from Congress to pay down our debt in the Inflation Reduction Act, the administration seems more determined than ever to pervert that law and abuse existing authorities to increase spending.

When President Biden and I spoke before Congress passed the Inflation Reduction Act last summer, we agreed that the bill was designed to pay down our national debt and shore up America’s energy security. It was designed to generate $738 billion in new revenue, with more than $238 billion dedicated to debt reduction, the first serious piece of legislation in more than two decades that the Congressional Budget Office estimated would have done that.
Yet instead of implementing the law as intended, unelected ideologues, bureaucrats and appointees seem determined to violate and subvert the law to advance a partisan agenda that ignores both energy and fiscal security. Specifically, they are ignoring the law’s intent to support and expand fossil energy and are redefining “domestic energy” to increase clean-energy spending to potentially deficit-breaking levels. The administration is attempting at every turn to implement the bill it wanted, not the bill Congress actually passed. Ignoring the debt and deficit implications of these actions as the time nears to raise the debt ceiling isn’t only wrong, it’s policy and political malpractice.

I believe the only person who can rein in this extremism is Mr. Biden.
The first step is for the president to sit down with fiscally minded Republicans and Democrats to negotiate common-sense reforms to out-of-control fiscal policy. While we can all acknowledge that raising the debt limit is an absolute necessity and Republicans shouldn’t threaten otherwise, are we seriously to believe there is no room to negotiate? Does the federal government operate so efficiently and effectively that there truly isn’t a dollar of waste, fraud or abuse? Let’s get serious.
The second step is for Mr. Biden to instruct his administration to implement the Inflation Reduction Act as written and stop redefining its credits and other subsidies. That alone would save the American taxpayer hundreds of billions of dollars in needless spending.
Unless common-sense actions are taken now, America’s energy security will not only be jeopardized, but we will soon approach a debt-ceiling calamity that is completely avoidable. What we must avoid is the typical Washington game in which Democrats attack Republicans and Republicans respond in kind. The American people are sick and tired of these games—and they should be.
Mr. Biden was elected to lead us all to solve problems. We can’t allow them to be made worse by ignoring them. The president has the power, today, to direct his administration to follow the law, as well as to sit down with congressional leaders and negotiate meaningful, serious reforms to the federal budget. Failing to do so may score political points with left-wing partisans, but generations of Americans will ultimately pay the price. We must do better, and it starts with all of us working together and doing what is right for our nation.
Mr. Manchin, a Democrat, is a U.S. senator from West Virginia.

I believe the only person who can rein in this extremism is Mr. Biden.

A few observations.
1. Man you sure were up early!
2. If this is true, then there's not much hope.
3. It should not be true. The Congress has the constitutional power to stop this, but the dem majority in the Senate will prevent that from happening. But even at that, who's to say the repubs have the stomach for it. The American people have become so addicted to these spending levels that I don't know they will tolerate what needs to be done. It's like a man having to go to his family and tell them they must downsize the house, sell one of the cars, and switch to a community college because the family debt has become too high.

I discovered the early morning is the most productive time of the day when I was a manager . I had to review the 2nd and 3rd shift work and set the schedule for the 1st shift by 6:30 AM . It also allowed me to respond to the emails the desk jockeys fired off before they went to happy hour .

Congress abdicated their responsibilities before the turn of the 20th century . The 1st biggie was with the progressive revolution . The Interstate Commerce act and Commission was the camel's nose in the tent . That was 1887 .The Congressional delegation of responsibilities to the administrate state and by default to the Executive Branch began there.

This all comes from a gross misreading of the Commerce Clause .(Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3 )
SCOTUS has also been complicit as it has ruled in favor of expanded central government power culminating in the Chevron Decision that compelled the courts to give wide deference to Federal agency interpretation's of the law. (something the Roberts court is finally beginning to roll back).

WE the People are ultimately responsible .WE have gone from creating a more perfect union to the utopian goal of equity for all.
And of course Tocqueville warned us where that would lead.


One can conceive of men having arrived at a certain degree of freedom that satisfies them entirely. They then enjoy their independence without restiveness and without ardor. But men will never found an equality that is enough for them.Whatever a people's efforts, it will not succeed in making conditions perfectly equal within itself; and if it had the misfortune to reach this absolute and complete leveling, the inequality of intellects would still remain, which, coming directly from God, will always escape the laws.
However democratic the social state and political constitution of a people may be, one can therefore count on the fact that each of its citizens will always perceive near to him several positions in which he is dominated, and one can foresee that he will obstinately keep looking at this side alone. When inequality is the common law of a society, the strongest inequalities do not strike the eye; when everything is nearly on a level, the least of them wound it. That is why the desire for equality always becomes more insatiable as equality is greater.

In democratic peoples, men easily obtain a certain equality; they cannot attain the equality they desire. It retreats before them daily but without ever evading their regard, and, when it withdraws, it attracts them in pursuit. They constantly believe they are going to seize it, and it constantly escapes their grasp. They see it from near enough to know its charms, they do not approach it close enough to enjoy it, and they die before having fully savored its sweetness.

Tocqueville, Democracy in America, Why the Americans Show Themselves So Restive in the Midst of Their Well-Being (uchicago.edu) (https://press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/805328chap13.html)

We have compelled our leaders to be the nanny state .