If you’re worried about your job, the terrible economy, massive unsustainable government spending, hefty tax increases and suffocating government regulations, do not re-elect Rep. Lois Capps for the 23rd Congressional District.
Capps voted for Obamacare, bragging that it would reduce medical costs lower health insurance premiums and would be “the largest deficit reduction measure in a generation.” These claims are all bogus. The bill is 2,700 pages long, costs $2 trillion, includes 1,400 new regulations, creates 32 new government agencies, contains a half-trillion dollars in job-killing new taxes, will reduce access to doctors and advanced medical services, and removes $575 billion from Medicare funds for seniors. Capps even introduced an amendment to the health-care bill to allow federal funds to pay for abortions.
Capps voted to increase the minimum wage in 2009 by 41 percent to $7.25 an hour. This was ill advised because labor economists have found a significant drop in teen employment as a direct result of the minimum wage hikes. The law is especially detrimental to minority workers who may have less education and less work experience. The unemployment rate for black teens was 39.9 percent in June compared with the overall teen unemployment rate of 25.7 percent.
Capps voted for and publicly gave a “full throated” defense of the $840 billion taxpayer supported federal stimulus act of 2009. President Barack Obama admitted recently that this bill is a turkey. The unemployment rate was at 8.2 percent when it was passed, compared with 9.6 percent now. More than 2 million jobs have been lost during the interim. Moreover, this bill has increased our national debt to $2.5 trillion — more than the cumulative total amassed by all U.S. presidents from George Washington through Ronald Reagan. Wonder why the dollar is so weak?
Capps voted for the 2,319-page Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act which has led to more regulations, but is ineffective because it completely ignored oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the 800-pound gorillas in the room. Taxpayer liability for cleaning up their toxic books could run as high as $1 trillion.
Capps voted for the $700 billion TARP program that has turned into a politicized auto and bank bailout fund.
Lastly, Capps voted for the notoriously ill-conceived Waxman-Markey cap-and-tax bill that the Treasury Department estimated would cost the average American household $1,800 per year in higher energy bills. To reach the environmental goal of cutting CO2 emissions in half by 2050, a study concluded that the United States would have to reduce its economy by 88 percent. Spain, which earlier had embarked on a green jobs agenda, found that for every green job created 2.2 existing jobs were destroyed.
We need fossil fuels. Although wind, solar and biomass are growing much faster than overall energy use, studies suggest they will provide only 11 percent of supply in 2035, up from 5 percent in 2008.
Capps, a member of the House Energy Commission, is notorious for voting against natural gas drilling which is plentiful, cheap and clean, as well as new nuclear plants that provide clean and cost-effective energy. The result is that Capps helps push jobs overseas and helps cause us to import 60 percent of our energy needs. This leads to our current huge trade deficit and makes us vulnerable militarily.
For obvious reasons, Congresswoman Capps has not debated her opponent, Tom Watson. When voting, remember your ABCs — Anyone But Capps.
Jeffrey Wiese
Oxnard