New 2011 Contract with America

Little-Acorn

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Newt Gingrich is releasing what he calls a "New Contract with America". I guess it's part of his Presidential run.

The original one in 1994 actually worked out pretty well. In addition to getting Democrats kicked out of every majority in the Federal government for the first time in fifty-some years, it also actually did some useful legislation. And Republicans actually kept every promise they made in it... which was another historic first.

THis new 2011 Contract is quite different from the 1994 one, though the overall idea is the same.

http://caucuses.desmoinesregister.c...-releases-21st-century-contract-with-america/

Looks like the Des Moines Register is having a tough time with their web versions. Their article (linked above) has a summary of this new 2011 Contract with America. The article also has two links of its own, that it says lead to a "Digest" version, and the Full-text version. Neither link inside the article, works.

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A summary from the article:

CONTRACT, 2011 version

Here’s a summary of Newt Gingrich’s “21st Century Contract with America,” which he releases today in Iowa:

1. REPEAL “OBAMACARE” AND REPLACE IT: The federal health care law is unconstitutional because it coerces people to buy health insurance by threat of fines, and it creates 1,986 grants of power to bureaucrats, he wrote.

Gingrich would replace it with a system “with no individual or employer mandate of any kind.”
Instead, Americans would get the choice of a tax credit or the ability to deduct the value of their health insurance up to a certain amount.

The plan would increase price competition in health care, improve patient safety, digitize all medical records, let Americans purchase insurance across state lines and introduce medical lawsuit reform, he wrote.

2. OPTIONAL FLAT TAX AND OTHER REFORMS: All tax filers would have a choice on income tax: Use the current provisions, or pay under a lower single rate with limited deductions.

Gingrich envisions a single-page tax return, where marital or military status doesn’t affect taxes owed.

“Subtract your income from a standard deduction and deductions for charity and home ownership, multiply the result by a fixed single rate of taxation, and the process is over.”

Other reforms he likes would reduce the corporate tax rate to 12.5 percent. It’s now 35 percent. Abolish the capital gains tax to lower the cost of investments. Abolish the “death tax” — the inheritance tax on large estates. Allow companies to write off 100 percent of the expense of new equipment in one year.

3. ENERGY PRODUCTION IN AMERICA: Replace the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency with a Environmental Solutions Agency, Gingrich wrote.

Allow development in places currently blocked by the federal government such as the Atlantic and eastern Gulf of Mexico. End restrictions on oil shale development in the western United States. Authorize the Keystone XL pipeline.

4. MEDICARE AND SOCIAL SECURITY: Seniors could choose to remain in the existing Medicare program. Or they could select their own health insurance provider and get government help covering the premiums.

With Social Security, younger Americans would have the option to put a portion of their contributions into personal savings accounts. “There are many exciting solutions … and I look forward to discussing these.”

5. BALANCE THE BUDGET: Gain federal revenue through development of federally owned land, “including the 69 percent of Alaska and the 85 percent of Nevada that we the people own through our government.”

Use credit card companies’ fraud detection techniques and industry waste-cutting techniques such as Lean Six Sigma.

Don’t raise taxes. Pass a balanced-budget amendment.

6. ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION: Control the border with Mexico by January 2014, Gingrich proposes.

If necessary, move half the bureaucrats who work for the Department of Homeland Security in the Washington, D.C., area (11,500 people, he says) to the borders in Texas, New Mexico and Arizona.

Reform the legal visa system to make it much easier to deport criminals and gang members while making it easier for law-abiding visitors to come to the U.S. go to college and do business.

7. NATIONAL SECURITY: The country needs to restructure and adequately fund our security agencies, Gingrich wrote.

Develop a new security strategy, he said. Update dangerously outdated military infrastructure. Prepare to deal with technologies such as electromagnetic pulse weapons and cyberwar .

8. DISEASES OF THE BRAIN: Maximize the speed and impact of medical breakthroughs.
Transform the Food and Drug Administration, whose regulatory guidelines are scaring off new investment, he wrote.

Invest in brain science to help people who struggle with Alzheimer’s, autism, Parkinson’s and mental health trouble.

9. JUDGES: Rein in lawless judges, re-establish a constitutional balance among the three branches of government, and bring the courts back under the Constitution.
Use “the clearly delineated powers available to the president and Congress to correct, limit or replace judges who violate the Constitution.”

Gingrich doesn’t spell out precisely what he’d do, but said President Thomas Jefferson abolished over half the federal judgeships.

10. STATES’ POWERS: Over the next year, Gingrich will ask state and local officials and citizens to identify areas of the federal government that can be transferred “back home.”

There are 184 means-tested entitlement programs that states could handle on their own with block grants from the federal government, he said.

“One program alone — Medicaid — could save the federal government over $700 billion in the next decade according to Congressman Paul Ryan’s 2012 Republican budget.”
 
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