Vice President Joe Biden last year earned $20,900 in rental income from the Secret Service, which is paying him to host agents on his property so they can protect him.

Most high-profile people in need of protection pay people to keep them safe. Government officials are allowed to have taxpayers pick up the tab. Biden is unique in that he actually gets paid by his bodyguards for the right to protect him.

Biden’s tax records list rental income of $20,900 from a “cottage” on is property, which is reportedly being leased by the Secret Service and paid for at a rate that could earn him even more money next year.

But he means well.

If the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration makes its proposed 2025 fuel economy standards official, cars are going to be more expensive, and that’s going to shut millions of buyers out, argues the National Automobile Dealers Association. “If the price of a vehicle goes up by the government estimate of almost $3,000,” says David Wagner, an analyst for the NADA Used Car Guide, “millions of people will no longer be able to finance a new vehicle.”

The proposed standard is aiming for an average of 54.5 mpg for both cars and trucks by 2025, and is predicted to add $2,000 to the cost of a vehicle. Add to that the $1,000 or so that’s going to be added to the price of vehicles as the current fuel economy requirements phase-in between now and 2016, and the $30,000 average price of a new car rises to the point where lower income buyers may not be able to qualify for financing.

Many progressive policies lead to people surrendering the freedom and convenient of cars to trains and buses. (Mass transit is fine in dense urban locations.)

Higher mileage standards also mean more traffic deaths as automakers are forced to make lighter, less safe cars.

The most amusing, but weird, guy in politics.

Betsy Newmark:

The country’s worst PR adviser Hillary Rosen and the head of NOW, Terry O’Neill, are arguing that Ann Romney can’t understand the problems that working women face because she doesn’t “have the kind of life experience and if not, the imagination, to really understand what most American families are going through right now.” So their point is that the wife of a man who has been successful financially can’t understand the problems of most American families because her family is in a different income bracket.

Okay, if the argument is that people who have never experienced what others have experienced can’t understand or speak out on those sorts of issue, let’s just go with that. How about if we also say that no politician who has never met a payroll can not speak out on anything concerning business or the economy? I’d be willing to sacrifice Ann Romney’s voice on the economy if politicians like Barack Obama and Joe Biden were likewise permanently silenced from speaking out about business and the economy.

by Burt Prelutsky

Predictably, Nancy Pelosi applauded Rep. Bobby Rush when he donned a hoodie on the floor of the House to show his solidarity with the likes of Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson and the Black Panthers, in their calls for George Zimmerman’s head on a platter. Meanwhile, back in Chicago’s 1st congressional district, home to Mr. Rush, during one recent Thursday night, 13 people were shot, two of them fatally. I understand that the shooters all wore hoodies. I trust that Mrs. Pelosi can provide Bobby Rush with an alibi.

In the meantime, in the NCAA basketball tournament, the Final Four consisted of Kentucky, Ohio State, Louisville and Kansas. So, Obama got the first two heavy favorites right, but didn’t foresee Louisville and Kansas beating out Missouri and North Carolina. But to be fair, the prognosticator-in-chief, as usual, was playing politics, and clearly decided to ally himself with schools located in swing states.

Although I assume that the four conservative justices on the Supreme Court will decide what to do about ObamaCare on the constitutional merits of the bill, and that the four left-wing justices will decide the case based on their political bias, I pray that Justice Kennedy will not be overly reluctant to undo what Congress has done. I am hoping that he will at least consider the fact that, even with huge pluralities in the House and Senate, Obama, Pelosi and Reid, had to employ huge bribes and thug-like intimidation in order to get a number of their fellow Democrats to pass the damn thing.

Speaking of ObamaCare, the fact is I happen to support mandated health insurance. I just don’t believe that the federal government has any business being involved in it. Between the EPA, Homeland Security and a power-mad president, the liberals have already gobbled up far too much power. That said, I believe the individual states have every right to require that people purchase health insurance, just as they can require that drivers carry auto insurance. The argument that it’s not the same thing because people who don’t drive don’t have to pay for auto insurance ignores the fact that everyone, sooner or later, is going to have to go to a doctor, a clinic or a hospital, and the idea that those who are uninsured will simply have the costs covered by other taxpayers is immoral and should be made illegal.

That’s not to say I wouldn’t change the system. For one thing, I would allow people to buy their insurance across state borders, but I would see to it that the companies would be regulated by federal law, not according to 50 different state laws. Moreover, I would deny an insurance company the ability to drop someone simply because he or she had gotten sick and might actually need the health insurance they’d been paying for. Once an insurance company accepted a client, they would be stuck with him for his entire life so long as he paid his premiums. Heck, who wouldn’t start an insurance company if they only had to cover young, healthy people?

Living as I do in California, it’s not often I have any reason to praise any of our politicians. But, miracle of miracles, for perhaps the first time ever, Gov. Jerry Brown spoke for me when he nixed $300,000-a-year salaries for Cal State University presidents, pointing out that the job mainly consists of raising money. At that point, Gov. Brown only needed to be right one more time within 24 hours to be as good as a broken clock. But, as you would assume, he wasn’t up to the challenge, and the clock won the competition.

As we draw ever closer to November 6th, I have a feeling that the date will go down in history and rival the end of World War II, when a few other notable tyrants were defeated. The difference is that Obama will survive his defeat, and go on to become even wealthier, giving speeches to besotted liberals; get to spend four or eight years fuming about President Romney; and show up on “The View” to promote the third of his best-selling, ghost-written, books. He might even get to host his own talk show on MSNBC or, in tandem with Michelle, a cooking show on the Food Network, “In the Kitchen with the Obamas.”

Finally, I would like to tip my cap to Kinde Durkee, a Democratic campaign treasurer from California who was recently indicted for defrauding 50 state and national politicians, including Dianne Feinstein and the Sanchez sisters, Loretta and Linda, of $8 million over the previous decade.

Sad to say, there have only been a handful of Republicans who have done half as much for the conservative movement as Mrs. Durkee.