Showing posts with label Economy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Economy. Show all posts

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Curiously, California Auditor Discloses Extent of Democrats' Fiscal Havoc Just Days After Elections in Which Democrats Retain Power

Tyler Durden captions California's latest dilemma as the state disclosing a "Huge $25.4 Billion Budget Hole, [and Asking] If It Should Pass The "Huge Challenge" To "Future Californians""

The California Legislative Analyst's Office has just released the latest fiscal outlook. It's not pretty. The state discloses a $25.4 billion budget "problem" which consists of a $6 billion deficit for the remainder of 2010-2011, and a $19 billion budget deficit forecast for 2011-2012, thanks to a $8 billion plunge in revenues for the general fund, as temporary tax increases adopted in 2009 expire...

Furthermore, as the state admits: "One major reason to stop passing the state’s problems to future Californians is that the state’s long-term fiscal liabilities—for infrastructure, retirement, and budgetary borrowing—are already huge. The costs of paying down these liabilities already are reflected, to some extent, in the state’s recurring deficits, but these costs will only grow in the future. By deferring hard decisions on how to finance routine annual budgets of state programs to future years, the state risks increasing further the already immense fiscal challenges facing tomorrow’s Californians."

Based on the current rate of emigration from the state, tomorrow's Californians may consist entirely of illegal immigrants, Steven Spielberg and the Schwarzenegger family.


Tuesday, November 09, 2010

I didn't think Housing Wire was a horror website. Until today.

You wouldn't normally think of Housing Wire magazine as a horror periodical, but given the multi-decade rape of Fannie Mae by connected Democrats, you'd be wrong.

Two recent articles highlight the trouble we're in.

1. One In Five Distressed Homeowners At Risk of Losing Home:
Laurie Goodman, senior managing director at Amherst Securities, believes one in five distressed homeowners in the U.S. are facing, or may face, foreclosure... The analyst adds that little may be done to stem the tide of foreclosures without greater government intervention or significant principal reduction. Currently, she said 11.5 million home loans are non-performing or highly distressed.

...Goodman spoke at Thursday's State of Housing webinar today, hosted by HousingWire. Several charts produced during the event paint a picture of a highly distressed housing market.

2. Mortgage delinquencies are in 'serious trouble,' says LPS analyst:
Kyle Lundstedt, managing director of the applied analytics division at Lender Processing Services, said the housing market remains in "serious trouble" as current mortgage delinquencies are above 7 million distressed homeowners... Perhaps most alarming to Lundstedt is the rise in prime mortgage delinquencies. "The prime markets are the place we've seen the most increase in foreclosure," he said

..."It's shocking the 13% of mortgage in Florida are in foreclosure," he said. "Not delinquent, not in default, but in foreclosure."

Anyone have Franklin Raines' number? Or Jamie Gorelick's?

I've got a few choice words for them, which I can't repeat in polite company.


The Simple, Two-Color Pie-Chart That Perfectly Illustrates the Fiscal Suicide of the United States of America

Democrats can blame Bush, Greenspan, Reagan, Millard Fillmore and James Madison. But this year's deficit is on their heads alone.

Karl Denninger is using this chart to speak some truth to power: in a nutshell, the Democrats' era of vast unfunded, unconstitutional social engineering experiments -- Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the Department of Education, the Department of Labor and hundreds of other bureaucracies -- is drawing to a close, like it or not.

The Pelosi-Obama-Reid Democrats just hastened their demise.

And don't blink, but given Bernanke's QE2, the end may come quicker than any of us can possibly imagine. The only choice is to slash the government -- slash it wide and deep as fast as possible. The pie-chart doesn't lie.


Monday, November 08, 2010

Are Ben Bernanke and Paul Krugman Running California, Too?

Ben Bernanke and Paul Krugman must love California's economy.

Like Bernanke's game-plan of monetizing the debt by printing money, California is stamping out IOU's to make its payments. As for adhering to Krugman's Utopian vision of unchecked deficit spending, well, California appears to have set the record.

But don't have either of them try to explain any of these fun facts from the world's largest Democrat-controlled nuthouse:

• One of every eight workers in California is jobless.

• The state is borrowing $40 million a day from the federal government to pay unemployment benefits, but won't change any of the formulas used to calculate and fund those benefits.

• Cali's debt on unemployment benefits alone is projected to hit $10.3 billion this year and $16 billion by 2012. Last year, the state paid out $11.3 billion while collecting only $4.2 billion.

• The interest on that debt alone will require a $362 million payment to DC in little more than nine months.

• Fixing the imbalance requires doing one of two things: paying out less benefits or raising employer contributions. California's Democrat legislators have resisted doing either despite massive increases in benefits paid.

Of course, the delightful voters of California decided to reelect the very same nincompoops who got them into this mess, so relief is unlikely to come anytime soon.

Next year's budget deficit has been estimated at $12 billion on the low side and $19 billion on the high side... [observers question] if he will be willing to make state employees work longer to earn their full pensions, especially since they spent $30 million to get him elected.

Brown has promised to make the "budget process transparent..." [but nothing] about this first two days has been transparent. Will he stand up to unions, restore cuts made to schools and universities and where will he find the money to invest in green jobs?

Maybe he'll conjure some unicorns out of thin air... and the unicorns will poop diamonds and green jobs and food stamps and windmills and fairy dust! I mean, this is Cali-freaking-fornia!

Oh, I forgot. Brown also has to deal with a $500 billion unfunded pension liability which has some calling California "America's Greece".

I think they're being far too kind. Greece is Europe's California.

Democrats: if they weren't in power, they'd be good only as comic relief.


Sunday, November 07, 2010

New England Journal of Medicine Inadvertently Hands House GOP the Game Plan for Starving ObamaCare

On Wednesday talk show host and constitutional attorney Mark Levin pointed his Facebook followers to a curious article published in the October 28th edition of The New England Journal of Medicine (PDF).

In short, Dr. Henry J. Aaron -- an apparent fan of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) -- inadvertently handed the House Republicans a fiscal blueprint for crushing the wildly unpopular health care takeover.

The outcome of the 2010 congressional elections may well determine whether this landmark legislation succeeds or fails.

Put another way: the outcome of the 2010 elections reflects the electorate's desire to have the landmark legislation fail.

The evidence of party polarization is overwhelming (see table). A majority of both parties ended up voting for the original Social Security Act, although Republicans had campaigned actively against it. Many members of both parties voted for the legislation that created Medicare and Medicaid, that revamped welfare, and that created Medicare drug coverage (Part D). Not so in 2010.

Gee, you think that had anything to do with being completely shut out of the process? Or, as MSNBC put it, "House and Senate Democrats intend to bypass traditional procedures when they negotiate a final compromise on health care legislation, officials said Monday, a move that will exclude Republican lawmakers... in both houses."

The ACA is nothing if not ambitious. It proposes to enroll tens of millions of people in private health insurance plans through yet-to-be-created health insurance exchanges. It will provide millions of Americans with subsidies tied to income and health insurance costs. It will greatly expand Medicaid. It will set and enforce standards for private insurance... It will create a new commission to oversee Medicare... [and this] is but a partial listing of the provisions of the 906-page bill. If permitted to run its course, the ACA promises to transform the U.S. health care system...

But successful implementation poses remarkable challenges and will require adequate funding, enormous ingenuity, and goodwill from federal and state officials, as well as cooperation from private insurers, businesses and private citizens.

That would be the same private citizens that kicked record numbers of Democrats out of office for passing this Soviet-style plan.

A more serious possibility [than repeal] is that ACA opponents could deliver on another pledge: to cut off funding for implementation. Here is how such a process could work...

The ACA contains 64 specific authorizations to spend up to $105.6 billion and 51 general authorizations to spend “such sums as are necessary” over the period between 2010 and 2019. None of these funds will flow, however, unless Congress enacts specific appropriation bills. In addition, section 1005 of the ACA appropriated $1 billion to support the cost of implementation in the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS).... [and the] ACA appropriated nothing for the Internal Revenue Service, which must collect the information needed to compute subsidies and pay them. The ACA also provides unlimited funding for grants to states to support the creation of health insurance exchanges (section 1311). But states will also incur substantially increased administrative costs to enroll millions of newly eligible Medicaid beneficiaries...

Without large additional appropriations, implementation will be crippled.

Sweeter words I don't think I've ever heard.

Since most major provisions of the ACA do not take effect until January 1, 2014, [these] delaying tactics might eventually enable repeal...

Perhaps the more likely — and in some ways more troubling — possibility is that the effort to repeal the bill will not succeed, but the tactic of crippling implementation will. The nation would then be left with zombie legislation, a program that lives on but works badly, consisting of poorly funded and understaffed state health exchanges that cannot bring needed improvements to the individual and small-group insurance markets, clumsily administered subsidies that lead to needless resentment and confusion, and mandates that are capriciously enforced.

Zombie legislation. Perfect. After all, this bill was the result of a historic Democrat overreach. And everyone knows that the Democrat Party routinely employs zombies (along with felons and illegal aliens) in its election wins.

Thanks, Dr. Aaron. We appreciate your instructions for starving this vampire entitlement of the taxpayers' blood it requires.


Saturday, November 06, 2010

Post Dempocalypse, handful of 'centrist' Democrats admit the truth--while lefty bloggers remain trapped in Reality Distortion Field

Just how far out of touch is the leftist blogosphere? Let's put it this way: even Democrat politicians are pillorying Obama's Marxist policies.

Florida Democratic gubernatorial nominee Alex Sink pointed an accusatory finger Friday at what she called a “tone-deaf” Obama White House to explain why she narrowly lost her campaign.

In an interview with POLITICO, Sink said the administration mishandled the response to the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, doesn’t appreciate the political damage done by healthcare reform and argued that her GOP opponent’s strategy of tying her to the president did grave damage to her candidacy in the state’s conservative Panhandle...

Of course, the usual cranks in the lefty blogosphere still haven't figured out what happened on Tuesday.

See, if Barack Obama and the Democrats had been even more extreme, they would have blocked the teabaggers with a huge economic rebound!

...if Barack Obama had pushed for the original stimulus plan using reconciliation, instead of stupidly seeking bipartisanship with Republicans determined to wreck America for political gain or blowing all of his and the Congressional Democrats’ political capital on an industry-written “health care reform bill” in exchange for a soon-to-be-broken promise not to aid Republicans, the recent loss of the House wouldn’t have happened. But we have the teabaggers to thank for softening the blow. Case in point: Minnesota.

The GOP electoral wave that was predicted for the entire country landed in the North Star State, just as it had everywhere else — and had been predicted for nearly a year, thanks to Washington Democrats’ refusal to push for a stimulus big enough to truly do the job and their insistence on putting more effort into passing a health care bill written by the the health care industry and which only the industry likes. As did over a dozen other states, we lost control of our legislature to the GOP (after only having had both houses for four years), and one of our best US congressmembers, Jim Oberstar.

Oh, my.

That's some world-class stupid, folks. I mean, even more moronic than the idiocy the leftist blogs routinely excrete.

It's like reading a real-life Flowers for Algernon.


Hat tips: Washington Monthly (graphs) and The Scott Rants. Linked by: Michelle Malkin. Thanks!

Thursday, November 04, 2010

Another Blue State Success Story: Illinois to raise taxes 33% while vendors stop supplying prisons with supplies for non-payment

Mish points us to two ominous stories out of the crazily corrupt Democrat stronghold of Illinois, where the dead are known to vote and a guy named Blago appeared to sell a Senate seat.

Illinois has a $13 billion and growing deficit. The current backlog of bills approaches $6 billion. The state has not paid some suppliers for seven months. In response some vendors have stopped doing business with the state.

Please consider Another vendor quits doing business with Illinois

Records show the Illinois Department of Corrections was forced to scramble this week when a vendor refused to deliver foam food trays to Menard Correctional Center because it hadn’t been paid. Industrial Soap Co., which holds the master contract for the foam trays, “will not deliver due to delinquent invoices,” prison officials noted.

...The state is facing a $13 billion deficit that could grow larger by next year. The current backlog of bills is listed by Comptroller Dan Hynes at nearly $5.6 billion. The state owes at least one vendor for services dating back to March.

Earlier this year, a company that provides ammunition to help train new guards stopped delivering bullets because it was owed money. Another company that supplies eyeglass lenses also stopped shipping the stock until it was paid.

Furthermore, it would appear that a 33% tax hike is about to slam the state's taxpayers.

Illinois voters likely returned Governor Pat Quinn to office. Their reward will be a 33% tax hike, if Quinn gets his way.

The election is still undecided 2 days later. Quinn's lead is 16,000 or so out of over 3.6 million cast. Absentee ballots have yet to be counted. However, the math looks improbable for challenger Bill Brady.

The problem for Brady is he barely got 20% of the vote in a packed Republican primary. 80% of Republicans wanted someone else. Brady generated little enthusiasm, and none from me, except for one thing: He was not Quinn.

For most voters, that was not enough.

Chicago voted overwhelmingly for Quinn, 86% to 14% or so. His solution is to the mess is a proposal to raise state taxes by 33%.

Excellent. Illinois gets what it deserves, which is another Blue State Meltdown.

Here's a simple suggestion for the House GOP:

Not one dime more in federal dollars for California, Illinois and New York.

Let them fix their cluster****s on their own.


What a Relief: Dodd-Frank Financial Reform Act Working Like a Champ as Fannie and Freddie Will Now Cost Taxpayers $700B, Up from $300B

The 111th Congress will go down in history as the worst, most irresponsible group of fiscal degenerates in all of American history. And you can quote me on that.

Unsatisfied with a trillion-dollar stimulus boondoggle... not content with taking over the health care industry... unhappy with "Cash-for-Clunkers" and nationalizing the auto industry and pillorying free enterprise and attacking the energy industry and...

[Cleansing breath]

..."fixing the financial system". That is, the very same men who protected the Fannie Mae crooks from a GOP crackdown, Chris Dodd and Barney Frank, cooked up yet another circle of stupidity by regulating the banking industry, Soviet-style.

And, like the rest of their disastrous programs, it too has failed.

Two weeks ago, the FHFA, using Moody's assumptions and modeling, said that a worst case scenario for Fannie and Freddie could result in total costs to taxpayers of $363 billion, an incremental $220 billion to the $148 billion already spent to keep the nationalized housing branch of the US government...

Today, S&P has released a stunner which says that actually fixing the GSEs, and "resolving and relaunching" the bankrupt entities, would actually cost as much as $685 billion, or over another half a trillion in taxpayer costs. And as for the reason why the market is surging, and will be until the US annexes Zimbabwe, now that it is pricing in QE 7, S&P says that according to its estimates, the backlog of shadow inventory is 40 months! Tomorrow: another trillion dollar capital defficiency hole, uncovered somewhere in the ponzi that is the US economy, will cause QE 8 to be priced in. And so on.

This economy still teeters on the precipice of disaster thanks to the massive deficit spending of the 111th Congress.

And the GSEs -- Fannie and Freddie -- are still fiscal time-bombs, still ticking away, thanks to the idiotic social engineering policies of the Statist Left.


Image: Woody.

Staunch, Fiscally Conservative Blue Dog Democrats Bravely Challenge Nancy Pelosi (After Running Up $5 Trillion in New Debt)

Bravely bold Sir Shuler rode forth from Asheville.
He was not afraid to lose, O brave Sir Shuler!
He was not at all afraid to be shat upon in nasty ways,
Brave, brave, brave, brave Sir Shuler!


Gee, just in time. Four years ago Nancy Pelosi promised 'no new deficit spending' -- and then proceeded to ring up $5 trillion in new deficits with her Democrat cohorts.

Without a single, noteworthy protest of any kind, the 'fiscally conservative' Blue Dog Democrat coalition folded like cheap lawn chairs and walked in lock-step with Pelosi on the most massive spending program in world history. Which helps explain why 22 of their 46 members were crushed on Tuesday.

Now that the horse, the cart and all of the satchels containing gold have left the barn, the few surviving Blue Dogs are bravely challenging the ex-Speaker.

...Utah Rep. Jim Matheson, a co-chair of the Blue Dogs, told POLITICO Thursday that Pelosi should not be a candidate for minority leader – a sign that other Blue Dogs are ready to pounce if Pelosi doesn’t voluntarily cede her power...

..."I’m just suggesting that when you have the largest turnover since 1948 then it’s time to shake things up"... His comments come on the same day that fellow Blue Dog leader Heath Shuler (D-N.C.) told CQ-Roll Call that he would run against Pelosi if she runs for minority leader — echoing an earlier suggestion that he would have challenged her for speaker had Democrats held the House.

I've said it before and I'll say it again.

There are no moderate Democrats. There are no fiscally conservative Democrats.

They can posture all they want each and every election cycle, but they are just as malevolent as the rest of the Soros-controlled leftists who control Obama, Pelosi and Reid.

That's why none of these people ever run on their records. They always run as fiscal conservatives, as if they are stand-up folks that will challenge the Democrat establishment. In other words, they lie -- relentlessly and continuously.

Best I can tell, the last fiscally conservative Democrat was John F. Kennedy.


Hat tip: Memeorandum.

Tuesday, November 02, 2010

ABC Notifies Breitbart They're Canceling His Town-hall Gig Due to Scheduling Conflict and Crazed Nutroots, But Mostly Crazed Nutroots

Cub Reporter Biff Spackle, whose annual review is on December 1st, said he snatched the following letter from ABC's fax machine just after it was sent to Andrew Breitbart. You may recall that, after inviting Breitbart to participate in a town hall telecast, ABC was hit with a firestorm of controversy by liberal progressive bloggers who oppose free speech.

Dear Mr. Breitbart,

We are writing to confirm the decor of your dressing room... oh. Excuse me. Hold on. I have to take this call.

Yes, Mr. Boehlert. Uh, okay. Yes sir. I pinky-promise.

Uhm, Mr. Breitbart, I regret to inform you that the Soros leftists who control the Democrat Party several scheduling conflicts prevent us from airing your valued opinions during the election broadcast.

It has come to our attention that an employee in our bookings department sent you an unauthorized offer letter to appear on election night. We were forced to fire him, at which point he blamed you. While he is a steroid-engorged bodybuilder who owns more than two dozen hunting rifles, please don't be alarmed.

Would you consider taking another analyst position for less pay than we originally discussed, even though we would never offer you such a position?

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Andrew Morse


Monday, November 01, 2010

Last Call for Liberty

"You would think they’d be saying thank you" -- Barack Obama, 4/15/2010

When they spent a trillion dollars of your money to repay union bosses for their support, they were laughing at you.

When they put 25,000 small businesses at risk by banning non-unionized shops from bidding on government construction projects, they were laughing at you.

When they nationalized the auto companies and flouted bankruptcy law to pay off the UAW bosses, they were laughing at you.

When they shoved the wickedly unpopular ObamaCare bill down your throats using bribes, cajolery and strong-arm tactics -- without even bothering to read their own disastrous bill, they were laughing at you.

When they passed a financial reform bill, spearheaded by the same men who had helped create the crisis in the first place and had shielded corrupt, Democrat-controlled institutions like Fannie Mae from oversight, they were laughing at you.

When they publicly demonized the nation's biggest banks while privately taking millions in contributions from them, they were laughing at you.

When they opened up the borders to murder, rape and mayhem -- disregarding the safety of citizens across the country -- to increase the odds of their reelection, they were laughing at you.

When they tried to tell you that "We Are All Socialists Now", they were laughing at you.

When they paid illegal aliens to openly canvas for Democrat votes, they were laughing at you.

When they called you racists, though you supported Allen West and 37 other wonderful black conservatives running for national office, they were laughing at you.

When they relentlessly tried to corrupt the voting process with amnesty for illegals, permitting felons to vote, and ACORN's skulduggery, they were laughing at you.

When they used your tax dollars to tar you as "tea-baggers", when your philosophy is that of America's founders, they were laughing at you.

When they tweeted birthday wishes to this era's Hitler while he builds nuclear weapons and plots America's destruction, they were laughing at you.

When they hand-delivered ballots to prisoners in jail but couldn't find a way to get military ballots to our armed forces in time for this election, they were laughing at you.

I will walk on f***ing broken glass to get to the polls tomorrow.

Are you fired up to save this country? Are you?? Well then I want to see you at the polls at zero-six-thirty-sharp. Hooah!


Sunday, October 31, 2010

How to use your power as a senator to send $8 million in cold cash to your son, by Barbara Boxer (D-CA). Also: The Hill scrubs story from website

Can we call this burgeoning scandal Boxer-gate yet? After all, when a Democrat finds a way to secretively transfer $8 million in cold cash to her son using unabashed power in the Senate -- which is what The Hill alleges that Barbara Boxer did -- then it seems an apt title indeed.

Step 1: Find a defunct American Indian tribe that officially ceased to exist decades ago.

Step 2: Jam legislation through that reinstates the tribe and discretely tack on an amendment that gives the tribe the right to open a casino near San Francisco.

Step 3: Have the tribe turn over all real estate and policy details for the construction of the casino to two advisory firms, both of which were co-owned by the Senator's son.

Step 4: Profit! Boxer's son reportedly cleared a cool $8 million for his, uhm, help.

To avoid immediate citizen concern about a casino popping up in their posh neighborhood, Doug Boxer’s Kenwood Investments 2 kindly fronted for the casino interests in purchasing a tract of land in Rohnert Park, as well as helpfully taking options on adjoining parcels of land for themselves to sweeten the pot... Then Platinum Advisers sprang into action to try to gain community support for the casino...

What makes the story timely is that the federal government just a couple of weeks ago was compelled to declare the land that Boxer’s son had purchased on behalf of the Indian casino a reservation, effectively killing the local zoning and lawsuits that had tied the project up in knots for most of the past decade.

As an aside, The Hill's Rick Manning -- who first reported this in the national press -- must be in very deep doo-doo indeed.

This is the story as it appeared yesterday morning.

And this is the story as it appears now.

Scrubbed as clean as a whistle, perhaps because The Hill was threatened with every form of reprisal possible. And as a Beltway news periodical, the opportunities for malfeasance by political hacks are almost limitless.

Spread the word. Support Carly Fiorina for U.S. Senate. And stop this malevolent crackpot from harming this country further.


Hat tip: Hot Air. Linked by: Michelle Malkin. Thanks!

Saturday, October 30, 2010

Democrat 'Skidmarks in the Skivvies' Watch: Internal Polling Shows Meg Whitman Ahead of Moonbeam

The Snow Report posts the results of the latest internal polling performed in California regarding the gubernatorial race. And the results have likely set off shock waves not only in the Brown camp, but also that of the tiny Marxist, Barbara "Don't call me Ma'am" Boxer.

With 5-days remaining before election-day, the race for governor of California has tightened to a dead heat between Meg Whitman and Jerry Brown. Two separate polls confirm that the race is too close to call. In a survey conducted by Hill Research Consultants among 604 likely voters on October 26th and 27th, the race for governor is tied 43% Whitman to 43% Brown with 4% voting for another candidate and 10% being undecided or refused to respond...

...In a separate McLaughlin & Associates survey conducted among 900 likely voters on October 25th, 26th and 27th (300 each night), Meg Whitman has a slight lead over Jerry Brown 44% to 43% with 6% voting for another candidate and 7% remaining undecided or refused to respond. This neck and neck race represents a marked improvement for Meg Whitman who trailed Jerry Brown from October 17th to 25th in Hill Research Consultant polling, by as much as 7 percentage points at one point.

Early Voting: In McLaughlin & Associates survey of 900 likely voters, the early voting is helping Meg Whitman. As of last night, 25% of the voters say that they have already voted by absentee mail in and among these voters Meg Whitman leads 43% to 40%. There are another 27% who tell us they will vote by early absentee mail between now and Saturday and Meg Whitman wins among those voters 48% to 43%. Among the 43% who tell us that they will vote in person on election day, it’s a virtual tie with Meg Whitman 43% and Jerry Brown 45%.

Californians: do you want the same crackpot who got you into this mess as Governor twice before? Or do you want someone who actually knows how businesses work and what they need to thrive and grow?

The choice is clear, California: save your state. Vote for Meg Whitman and reject the twice-failed Brown who has already proven himself a miserable failure and an economic train-wreck.


Thursday, October 28, 2010

They're Not Even Trying to Hide It Any More: Communist Party USA Openly Collaborating With Obama Campaign, DNC and Unions #cpusa

They're not even trying to hide it any longer.

The Communist Party USA is openly and actively collaborating with the Democrat National Committee, Obama's personal campaign (Organizing for America), MorOn.org, Rock the Vote and the AFL-CIO.

Notice the creepy, ubiquitous Obama iconography.

You can't escape it. And consider -- you're putting your ballot in a cardboard box with an Obama logo on it -- what could go wrong?

Just wondering: when did it become acceptable among Democrats to openly collaborate with Communists, whose stated goal is the destruction of the American economy?

Or, put another way, when did it become acceptable for Democrats to intentionally destroy the economy in order to "transform" (their word, not mine) America.

Socialism, Communism and any other branch of Marxism is completely incompatible with the United States Constitution. And any Democrats who sympathize with these philosophies have automatically disqualified themselves from holding office. Because they simply can't honestly take an oath to uphold that which they despise.

Patrick Leahy: we're looking at you.


Hat tip: Mark Levin.

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

It's official: world's most powerful financier calls the Obama-Pelosi-Reid spending spree the most brazen Ponzi scheme ever

Since Nancy Pelosi took over the federal purse-strings in 2007 and promised 'no new deficit spending', the Democrats have added $5 trillion to the national debt.

And investor Bill Gross believes America's debt-financing days may be nearing an end. Only he doesn't say it that nicely.

One more thing: Gross runs Pimco, the world's largest bond house. It oversees assets totaling more than $1 trillion. Yes, with a 't'. So he is arguably the world's most powerful financier.

Wednesday is the day when the Fed will announce a renewed commitment to Quantitative Easing – a polite form disguise for 'writing checks.' The market will be interested in the amount (perhaps as much as an initial $500 billion)...

...the American people should recognize that Wednesday, even more than Tuesday, represents a critical inflection point in determining our future prosperity. Of course we’ve tried it before, most recently in the aftermath of the Lehman crisis, during which the Fed wrote $1.5 trillion or so in “checks” to purchase Agency mortgages and a smattering of Treasuries. It might seem a tad dramatic then, to label QEII as "critical," ...

...Check writing in the trillions is not a bondholder’s friend; it is in fact inflationary, and, if truth be told, somewhat of a Ponzi scheme. Public debt, actually, has always had a Ponzi-like characteristic. Granted, the U.S. has, at times, paid down its national debt, but there was always the assumption that as long as creditors could be found to roll over existing loans – and buy new ones – the game could keep going forever...

Now, however, with growth in doubt, it seems that the Fed has taken Charles Ponzi one step further... One and one-half trillion in checks were written [by the Fed] in 2009, and trillions more lie ahead. The Fed, in effect, is telling the markets not to worry about our fiscal deficits, it will be the buyer of first and perhaps last resort. There is no need – as with Charles Ponzi – to find an increasing amount of future gullibles, they will just write the check themselves. I ask you: Has there ever been a Ponzi scheme so brazen? There has not. This one is so unique that it requires a new name. I call it a Sammy scheme, in honor of Uncle Sam and the politicians (as well as its citizens) who have brought us to this critical moment in time...

...The Fed wants to buy, so come on, Ben Bernanke, show us your best and perhaps last moves on Wednesday next. You are doing what you have to do, and it may or may not work. But either way it will likely signify the end of a great 30-year bull market in bonds and the necessity for bond managers and, yes, equity managers to adjust to a new environment.

Which is precisely why we must elect Constitutional conservatives -- who will stand for limited, fiscally responsible government.

We must slash the unconstitutional federal bureaucracies, we must outlaw public sector unions, and we must begin spending within our means.

But we must start on Tuesday. If not, I fear the great American experiment may be near its end.


Tuesday, October 26, 2010

I've Got Mail!

A delightful individual using the moniker "Further than you" offers his well wishes for the coming election.

This kind of trivial focus on a similar video style when there are HUGE issues not being addressed by the RIGHT, is exactly why the entire country (and world) are laughing at the conservative (bowel) movement. All you "patriots", listen up:

We have an insane amount of "patriots" in this country talking about "watering the tree of liberty with blood" and carrying guns to rallies, exuding hate, intimidation, and calling their opponents traitors, socialists, communists, nazis, whatever damning title they can think of, all while dancing perfectly as their puppet masters planned, in order to distract us all from their constant game of bubble inflation and fraudulent profiteering that left our country in shambles. A few crooks deregulating markets to buy a few islands to retire on is simply criminal. But a systematic raping of our nation's wealth, a calculated funneling of money from the poorest to the richest, from Americans to foreign entities, resulting in class wars and violent division? That's called TREASON. And those that defend said treason, through blind ignorance or willful greed, are enemies of the state, in my book.

THIS MEANS YOU, ignorant teabagger, protesting Dems who want to tax companies for sending our jobs overseas. YOU ARE A TRAITOR.

THIS MEANS YOU, conservative sycophant, crying about Obama's wasteful spending (which keeps teachers in the classroom trying to teach your smug offspring something besides the bible) whilst on YOUR watch, spending reached UNPARALLELED HEIGHTS in order for your puppet masters to rake in oil profits and war contracts and tax cuts for the richest. YOU ARE A TRAITOR.

THIS MEANS YOU, forgetful republican: YOU whine about freedom while constantly treading on others'. YOU rave about your founding fathers, who started this country to have religious freedom for all, then fail to uphold that same freedom for others based on your own bigotry and fear. YOU support wars to "spread democracy" with a boot heel on one neck and a bullet in the other, exponentially increasing the very terror you claim to be fighting against. YOU preach Christian Family Values while engaging in a never-ending parade of scandals, affairs, molestations and sex acts that you rail against. YOU clap as your elected frauds block every single move to improve the damage they did during BUSH, not because they truly believe it's the right thing to do, but because crippling America into a panic-turned-hate-fest is the ONLY way to make enough of our country forget how HORRIBLE 2000-2008 was for your team to win back seats. And that's their only chance of winning. And you lick every bit of that s--- right off their boots, like starving retards at all-you-can-eat s--- buffet.

YOU ARE ALL TRAITORS.

YOU are endangering OUR country's global standing and future, our health care needs, our financial safety , and the rights of our women. And OUR PERSONAL LIBERTIES, which you SCREAM ABOUT, are most at risk when YOU are in charge.

We are a family in America. And you are the senile grandpa who's storming about the house with a loaded rifle, threatening the children. Too stupid to see the damage you cause, too blind to glimpse your own role in the travesty that enrages you . We no longer care if it's because you were raised that way or you're just brainwashed by Faux Noose or whatever. If you don't pass away from natural causes soon, we may have to put you down for the safety of everyone.

So when it comes time for blood to water that tree of liberty, WHO'S BLOOD DO THINK WILL BE SPILLING? Because all fingers (and sights) point at YOU, TRAITOR.

Breathtaking!

I know I shouldn't bother, but let's clear a few things up -- not for the rocket scientist author -- but for the (thankfully) few Democrats remaining that have a willingness to learn.

• Yes, I blame those gun-carrying teabaggers, too. Carrying all of their guns at rallies (shhh, humor him), exuding hate and intimidation by begging their representatives not to pass thousand and thousands of pages of massive new entitlements sight unseen... quite unseemly, that. As for calling people Nazis, you're right. Unlike the tolerant left, conservatives are awful, nasty extremists.

• Yes, I blame deregulation, too. That is, if George W. Bush had actually created Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, the FHA, OFHEO and every other job shop for well-connected Democrats that completely destroyed the housing market by manufacturing a trillion-dollar market for subprime loans.

• Say, and about that spending that "keeps teachers in the classrooms"... how are those Blue State Utopias of California, Illinois and New York doing? Oh. You say they're bankrupt? And the federal government's bankrupt? Well, gee-zel-pete, who's gonna pay the tab? You say we should let our grandchildren pick it up? Oh. Okay.

• And you're right -- that "never-ending parade of scandals, affairs, molestations and sex acts" by those hypocritical Republicans are awful. Can't think of any recent ones, but you're right nonetheless. I like it that liberals don't have any family values or moral principles. That way they can't be considered hypocritical when they, say, get fellated in the Oval Office, then perjure themselves and end up disbarred! Or when they run a male prostitution ring out of their condo. Or when they abuse a series of male Congressional pages. And they don't suffer any reputational damage! Genius!

And speaking of "trivial focus", why concentrate on a wide stance when we can discuss illegal immigrants canvassing for votes, ACORN, Project Vote, the New Black Panthers, Black Liberation Theology, crushing charter schools, increasing the power of public sector unions at the expense of the taxpayer, paying off trial lawyers and increasing the Democrat core constituencies of felons, illegals, and the dead?

• And you're so right. President Obama has greatly improved our "global standing and future, our health care needs, our financial safety, and the rights of our women." It's our allies' fault that they think our relationships are at new lows. And who cares if Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are at least $50 trillion dollars underwater -- we've got wealth to redistribute in the form of socialized medicine -- the better to control the populace with. And it's Bush's fault that even though Nancy Pelosi vowed "no new deficit spending" in January of 2007, she's added $5 trillion to the national debt. As for the "rights of our women" -- yes, that abortion clause in the Constitution is a real page-turner.

As for the idiotic threats? Well, given that you're a doughy Internet troll who lives in Mommy's basement, it's kind of touching, really. But I'll offer nonetheless: three rounds in the ring or the octagon. Your call.


Sunday, October 24, 2010

Party of Locusts: a Roundup of Fiscal Destruction Wrought by Democrats in Their Awesome Utopias of California, Illinois and New York

Rhetorical question: Why aren't Democrats running on their accomplishments?

Rhetorical answer: Because they're like locusts, destroying state after state after state; running from one to the other and leaving a trail of destruction.

And they have now controlled Congress for four long years. The nation is trembling.

California: State unemployment benefits fund billions in debt
California's now-resolved $19 billion budget shortfall got plenty of attention in recent months, but a state report released Wednesday highlights the state's other massive deficit - in the unemployment insurance fund, which will be $10.3 billion in the hole by year's end.

The report by the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office warns of dire consequences if California's leaders do not tackle the fund's insolvency: The federal government could impose steep taxes on California businesses beginning in 2012, and the state could lose $400 million in federal dollars annually.

The deficit is the result of the state paying out more in unemployment benefits than it collects. The shortfall is offset by federal loans, but the state must begin paying interest on those loans next year.

The report warns that the only way for the crisis to be resolved without drastic change, such as tax increases, is for the state's unemployment rate to drop to 4 percent - a near impossibility...

Illinois: 'Illinois' financial situation is worse than any other state in the country'
Illinois' financial situation is worse than any other state in the country according to a study by the National Conference of State Legislatures. The state ended Fiscal Year 2010 in worse shape than any other state (the state’s general fund balance was the lowest it has ever been at negative $4.7 billion) and the state's budget situation has been called "tenuous at best."

...State employee layoffs are not part of the plan due to a deal earlier this year in which the AFSCME agreed to defer part of its scheduled pay raises in exchange for a guarantee of no layoffs or facility closures through June 30, 2011. The study by the National Conference of State Legislatures reported in its study that the state plans to boost spending for FY2010 by 15.1%.

Illinois has a total state debt of $120,743,173,392 when calculated by adding the total of outstanding debt, pension and OPEB UAAL’s, unemployment trust funds and the 2010 budget gap as of July 2010...

New York: State faces budget gaps of $37B in next three years
The state faces budget gaps of at least $37 billion over the next three years, and state spending is far outpacing revenue.

County and city governments are proposing budgets with layoffs and service cuts — on top of the ones they've already made. Upstate is suffering from population losses, struggling urban cores and a dwindling manufacturing base.

Meanwhile, the cost of living in New York continues to rise, putting further strain on its population and economic base. The Tax Foundation last month showed that Monroe County has the highest percentage of taxes paid compared with home values in the country...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

It's up to all of us next Tuesday. To stop the spread of the Locust Party. Vote the straight Republican ticket. While the Republicans aren't perfect, most of them also aren't locusts destroying our society from within.


Hat tip: Mark Levin.

Deroy Murdock's Three Charts To Make Your Blood Boil

Deroy Murdock nails it. He presents three jaw-dropping illustrations that should infuriate every taxpayer in America.

Number 3: Who got stimulated by the Stimulus bill?

This graph’s whiff of Marie Antoinette should boil every patriot’s blood. While the American people live increasingly ascetic lives, and even city halls and statehouses have displayed some restraint, Washington, D.C., increasingly resembles Versailles — an out-of-touch, extravagant, and callous place that fuels little beyond the nation’s disgust, fury, and organized rebellion.

Number 2: The rich (by that I mean: the public sector workers) get richer.

These nauseating numbers show federal employees earning 201 percent of the average private worker’s compensation. Federal benefits equal 395 percent of private-sector benefits.

Number 1: This is your brain on Obamacare.

Staff members at the Congressional Joint Economic Committee “spent four months, night and day, and weekends” assembling this amazing graphic, Rep. Kevin Brady (R., Texas) tells me by phone. “They vetted it based on all 2,801 pages of the Obamacare legislation. They captured this new law’s stunningly complexity... "

[But the JEC] personnel could not fit all of this new law’s boards, commissions, mandates, and other elements onto this chart, [therefore] 151 additional items within Obamacare do not appear individually on this diagram. As Representative Brady explains, "If we included all of these units, this chart would be three times larger."

...The JEC’s 25-megabyte creation is difficult to transmit via email. However, a convenient link opens a PDF that allows readers to zoom in and explore this chart in amazing and shocking detail...

Even those who believe that government actively should heal the American people must wonder if that goal really required something this staggeringly convoluted.

Read the whole thing. And forward the link today to your entire mailing list. The time for action grows very short indeed.


Hat tip: Adrienne.