Showing posts with label Reid. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Reid. Show all posts

Tuesday, August 03, 2010

The 10 Wackiest 'Stimulus' Scams

Please consider the following boondoggles, selected from the Coburn report issued earlier today (PDF). Each was chosen from projects funded by the $862 billion "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act", which -- by itself -- helped push the national debt 23 percent higher.

10. Coordinating Traffic Lights (Sebring, FL) - $1.1 million

The Florida Energy and Climate Commission, created by Governor Charlie Crist (Crist), blew more than a million bucks so that city officials wouldn't be inconvenienced by 14 traffic lights.

9. 'Low-income' housing at $300K apiece (Rochester, NY) - $3.3 million

One of north Rochester’s poorest and most crime-ridden neighborhoods just got a pricey upgrade. Your grandchildrens' money bought 23 new homes in 'El Camino Estates' at an average cost of $300K. Average median value in the neighborhood? $50K. Don't question the Democrats, peons. They know what they're doing. So shut up and pay your taxes.

8. iPods for one high school (Salt Lake City, UT) - $1 million

“About 1,600 students at Kearns High School in Utah will get iPod Touches next school year, thanks to a federal stimulus 'Enhancing Education Through Technology' grant" (that name was selected over 'F***ing Taxpayers Thoroughly' branding). They will use the devices during class, take them home after school, and according to one student, get to keep them if they graduate on-time. “I think that will be the coolest thing ever,” said a student. “I think that might be a little initiative for those who are thinking of not graduating to graduate, kind of a going-away present... [T]eachers will be trained to use the iPods to engage students so their attention doesn’t wander."

7. Study: Will a Soda Tax Stimulate Health? (Chicago, IL) - $521K

The Obama administration has repeatedly considered taxing soda and other sugary drinks. Finally, your grandchildren's money will be spent studying the relationship between taxes and obesity..

6. 'Museum' with less than 50 visitors a year (Raleigh, NC) - $250K

What is the best way to simultaneously preserve an insect collection, promote a haiku contest and produce bug baseball cards? Simple. A grant to the North Carolina State University Insect Museum. The museum boasts being an “internationally recognized resource for the study of insects and mites in North Carolina, the Southeastern United States, and, in several insect groups, the world.” The museum, which has “virtually no public presence” (it gets about 44 visitors a year), will also use the money for outreach efforts. It also hosts the annual Hexapod Haiku Challenge every March on its blog.

5. Liquor business gets big bucks (Colorado) - $5 million

Colorado liquor distilleries, breweries and wineries are getting $5 million in stimulus-backed business loans. According to the Colorado Recovery Act website, some of the alcohol-related recipients include $1.1 million for Stranahan’s Colorado Whiskey. The store, which claims to be the first whiskey distiller in the state, describes its whiskey this way: "It’s not often you can bottle up the Rockies, or cup your
hands in a mountain stream."

4. Commerce Dept. Makeover and Door Shift (Washington, DC) - $183 million

The Hoover building in Washington has been rehabbed at a cost of nearly $1 billion over the last decade. It houses approximately 3,500 federal employees at the Department of Commerce, the White House Visitor Center, and the National Aquarium. The money will be used renovating unused office space for temporarily rotating groups of up to 400 Commerce employees at a time and ripping out
walls to install 16 miles of insulation. And moving a door to the aquarium.

3. Snow-making equipment and chair lifts (Mt. Snow, Vermont) - $25 million

Mt. Snow will use the stimulus dollars to replace two chairlifts, construct a 120-million-gallon storage pond for snowmaking, and install additional snowmaking fan guns. "Mount Snow was pursuing the chairlift renovations when they learned that government stimulus funds were available for ski area capital improvements."

2. Fake News Videos Pitching ObamaCare (NYC, New York) - $25 million

What do you do when a key government program is unpopular with the general public? In the case of the stimulus, you sign a multi-million dollar contract with a public relations firm previously embroiled in controversy. For some time, the administration’s push for health information technology systems has faced significant public resistance because of privacy concerns. In response, the Department of Health and Human Services spent $25.8 million on a contract with Ketchum Inc. to help win over public opinion. Ketchum was criticized before, however, on other governmental work. The reason? Producing fake TV news stories for government agencies.

1. Restoring a 'national park' that's almost 100% underwater (FL) - $13 million

Visitors to Key West, Florida with enough time and money can explore one of the National Park Service’s less convenient destinations: Dry Tortugas National Park. Located 70 miles offshore, the park is almost entirely underwater and accessible only by airplane or private boat. Despite its relative inaccessibility, the park will get $13,304,484 in repairs for its barely above-water attraction, Fort Jefferson. Those willing to take the 4 1/2 hour round-trip ferry ride aboard the Yankee Freedom II have to pay as much as $165 per person, but will discover that only 40 of the park’s 65,000 acres are dry land.

By the way, isn't a vast, unaccountable, centralized government awesome? Democrats are so very careful with your money, it's almost like they're spending their own dough.


Monday, August 02, 2010

Judge rules Virgina's challenge of DemCare can proceed; measured response of White House includes toddler-style temper tantrum

Federal District Judge Henry Hudson ruled earlier today that Virginia's challenge of DemCare's 'individual mandate' can proceed, rejecting the Obama administration's claims that the states' lawsuits are 'frivolous'.

...the district court ruled that Virginia has standing to challenge the federal individual mandate provision, not primarily because it was acting its “parens patriae” capacity to prevent general harm to its citizens, but because it was acting to protect its own sovereign interest in enacting a state provision that conflicts with the federal statutory scheme...

...On the merits, we are surprised the judge took as much space to conclude that Virginia stated a valid cause of action, namely, that Congress had exceeded its constitutional authority with the individual mandate... The only question is whether Virginia stated a legal cause of action (or legal theory) that is cognizable in law.  Virginia certainly has at least a valid substantive theory to challenge the law, because someone with standing is always able to challenge the constitutionality of a statute on the ground that Congress has no constitutional authority to enact it, QED.  Indeed, we think Virginia ultimately should win on the merits, but it is even easier to show that the correct form of the argument was set forth in the complaint.  Nevertheless, unless the district court’s jurisdictional rulings are overturned, Judge Hudson’s discussion of the constitutional issues is somewhat instructive.  It shows he is not hostile or dismissive of Virginia’s claims, which is surely good for liberty.

The Obama administration responded with the kind of maturity that we've come to expect from the likes of David Axelrod and Robert Gibbs (or, as they're referred to in the White House, The Puppetmasters™).

Since the enactment of health reform legislation in March, several state Attorneys General have filed lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act. Having failed in the legislative arena, opponents of reform are now turning to the courts in an attempt to overturn the work of the democratically elected branches of government. [Ed: Does the phrase 'budget reconciliation' ring a bell?]

...The Affordable Care Act falls well within Congress’s power to regulate under the Commerce Clause, the Necessary and Proper Clause, and the General Welfare Clause... [As does Congress' power to regulate your shower-head flow, toilet tank size, light bulbs, automobile engine type, and other personal aspects of your life -- like the Founders intended!]

...That’s why a number of groups representing breast cancer patients, children’s health advocates, people with disabilities, small businesses and others filed an amicus brief in support of the Affordable Care Act, citing evidence in seven states that “preexisting conditions provisions, absent a minimum coverage provision, are a failed experiment. At best, they result in premium increases. At worst, they can cause the total collapse of a state’s individual insurance market.” [Glad the Democrats never resort to the politics of fear!]

This administration is flat-out dishonest.

Cancer survival rates are higher in the U.S. than in any other country in the world. By far. And 75% of all medical and pharmaceutical innovation on the planet comes from our "broken" system.

At some point, the judiciary in this country -- even some of the more left-leaning judges -- are going to have had enough of Democrat whining, attempted intimidation and -- well, I'm too polite to say what I really think.

Suffice it to say that somewhere Hugo Chavez is beaming.


'This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow...'

"This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal." -- Barack Obama, 3 June 2008

In the late nineties, members of the UN's International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) were tasked with assessing the scientific validity of the Kyoto Protocol.

The Protocol was an international emissions reduction treaty which required signatories to cut overall greenhouse gas emissions.

The IPCC subsequently produced the Special Report on Land Use, Land Use Change, and Forestry.

The report found that "carbon offsets" and "carbon trading" were viable ways to barter the right to pollute, because they would fund new forestry initiatives.

But one critical detail was never disclosed in the report.

That is: members of the IPCC, such as Pedro Moura-Costa (above) and Gareth Philips, had major conflicts-of-interest. They owned, created and/or worked for businesses -- such as Ecosecurities and SGS Forestry -- that would directly profit from the report's conclusions.

In fact, the IPCC panel members' companies were positioned to earn millions of dollars from the report. But the mainstream media did not report these conflicts and instead piled on the "global warming" and "carbon offset" bandwagons.

The carbon offset market quickly exploded. And, just as quickly, it became the subject of rampant allegations of fraud.

In 2009 the market was estimated to be $100 billion; it was so rife with questionable trading that the United Nations suspended the world's largest auditor of 'clean-energy' projects.

Put simply, a wide range of respected scientists, environmentalists, researchers, agriculturalists, and activists believe that carbon offsets are a "scam", "fantasy", "fiction", "nonsense", "fraudulent" and worse. And they've been saying so since 2000, though to read the daily fish-wrap you wouldn't know it.

The World Rainforest Movement, for example, investigated these bizarre financial ties and concluded that the IPCC report must "...be shelved due to their clear conflict of interest and a new report instigated which will be free of the taint of intellectual corruption."

To demonstrate the fraudulence of the carbon offset market, one need only request quotes from various carbon offset sellers. The price for offseting a flight from London to Toronto and back?
  • $85: from Climate Care (UK), which says 6 tons of CO2 must be offset.
  • $60: Carbon Neutral (UK), which says 4.3 tons of CO2 must be offset.
  • $195: Climate Friendly (Australia) asserts that 11.63 tons of CO2 must be offset.
  • $180: Green Seat (Netherlands) says 8.68 tons of CO2 must be offset.
Executive Summary: they're all making it up as they go along.

Whether you believe the world is warming or cooling, there is no arguing Democrats want more expensive energy for American citizens.

All that said, the real problem — and the reason Pelosi really does deserve blame — is that Democrats’ political goal of reducing carbon emissions continues to trump their populist rhetoric on gasoline prices. The two stances are impossible to reconcile. Try as they might to blame oil companies for the pain Americans feel at the pump, the Democrats want higher prices for gasoline — and for all forms of energy that emit carbon. Economic barriers against CO2 emissions are a requirement for environmental progress in the Democrats’ view, and this is the entire purpose of the carbon cap-and-trade system... to create economic disincentives for emitting CO2.

Because of the falsity of its premise, cap-and-trade is intended to do one thing: allow Democrats to control industrial policy.

It all comes back to carbon offsets, which represent the currency for the "global warming" scam promoted by the UN's IPCC and the Democrat Statists in Washington.

Whether it's through unelected bureaucrats at the EPA, outright cap-and-trade, or John Kerry's 'compromise' climate plan, the economic toll on Americans will be devastating. Even in the latter case, estimated GDP losses of $2.1 trillion and consumer electricity price increases of up to 42% are estimated in less than two decades' time.

Democrats want to control your life. Your health. Your private property. And they don't care what kind of scam they use to justify it.

Remember in November.


Linked by: Michelle Malkin. Thanks!

Saturday, July 31, 2010

Nikki Phelps, R.I.P.

This is Nikki Phelps.

This is Nikki's family.

Bill Phelps, Nikki's husband, and her two boys -- Harry and Jack -- watched Nikki waste away and die from kidney cancer.

Tragically, Nikki's form of cancer was treatable with a drug called Sutent. But Nikki's health insurer repeatedly denied her the drug, claiming it was too expensive.

Who was this despicable health insurer? Was it Anthem, Blue Cross, Humana? No, it was none of those companies.

Nikki Phelp's insurer was was Britain's National Health Service (NHS), the model for Barack Obama and his hand-picked appointment for the head of Medicare, Donald Berwick.

Donald Berwick loves the NHS and has said as much. He thinks it is doing a bang-up job and has praised its practices endlessly.

Berwick was a recess appointment for his powerful post as President Obama knew that he would never have survived Senatorial confirmation because of his infamous, bizarre and blatantly socialist statements.

"I am romantic about the NHS; I love it. All I need to do to rediscover the romance is to look at health care in my own country... [it is] such a seductress... a global treasure."

"[Among] the primary functions [of health regulation is] to constrain decentralized, individual decision making [and] to weigh public welfare against the choices of private consumers."

"Please don’t put your faith in market forces... In the United States... competition is a major reason for our duplicative, supply-driven, fragmented care system."

Berwick has routinely mocked the very free market and private enterprise systems that produce 75% of all medical and pharmaceutical innovations on the planet. The breakthrough devices and drugs aren't coming from the U.K., a simple fact Berwick appears to have conveniently ignored.

Sutent, the very drug that could have saved Nikki Phelps, was manufactured by an American company. As are three-quarters of all pharmaceuticals.

Worse, the UK's cancer survival rates are horrific compared to those of the United States.

British cancer outcomes don't just trail U.S. results; "they rival those of Eastern European nations." A 2008 study showed that cancer survival rates in the U.K. trail far behind those of the United States. American men, for example, "have an 80 percent better chance of surviving prostate cancer than do their English counterparts... [and there are] similar disparities in comparative survival rates for victims of breast, colon and rectal cancers."

• Breast cancer mortality is 52 percent higher in Germany than in the United States and 88 percent higher in the United Kingdom.

• Some "56 percent of Americans who could benefit from statin drugs, which reduce cholesterol and protect against heart disease, are taking them. By comparison, of those patients who could benefit from these drugs, only 36 percent of the Dutch, 29 percent of the Swiss, 26 percent of Germans, 23 percent of Britons, and 17 percent of Italians receive them."

• "British cancer patients are substantially more likely to die of the disease than those in other western European countries because of poor access to the latest drugs, according to an authoritative report to be published today." (Cancer survival rates worst in western Europe: Telegraph (UK) 2007)

This is the health care system that Barack Obama, Donald Berwick and the Democrat Party intend to emulate. No free market innovation. No competition. No initiative. Only government rationing with a monopolistic, single-payer in charge of all health care delivery.

Like East Germany in the Sixties.

November is our last chance to stop the kind of madness that killed Nikki Phelps.


Related: Nikki Phelps vs. Hymen Replacement Surgery. Hat tip: Tiger. Linked by: Don Surber. Thanks!

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Consumer Metrics Institute: Dude -- Brace for Impact

Runner-up headline: The unbridled success of the Obamaconomy continues to delight President Axelrod

The magenta (that's purple for you liberals) line represents the Bureau of Economic Analysis number that trails consumer data on a quarterly basis. The blue (that's the color of some ink pens for you liberals) line depicts the Consumer Metrics Institute's Daily Growth Index.

The green line represents the 2006 contraction; the red line 2008; and the blue line illustrates our current situation. In short: have you ever seen the movie Journey to the Center of the Earth?

The current weighted composite sector index -- which measures activity in various sectors of the economy like retail, housing, etc. -- appears to have the following reading: "ICEBERG, DEAD AHEAD!!"

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

Gee, a massive tax hike in the form of the expiration of the evil Bush tax cuts ought to really spur some growth. Right, Vladimir?


Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Behold: the Awesomeness of the Obama Recovery as Explained by Journolist Members, Apparently

You've got to love the desperate, wheezing hacks in the media who are still pitching an economic recovery to a disbelieving electorate. Please consider "A Surprise Upswing in the Housing Market."

After weeks of disappointing housing reports from the government and realtors, new data released Monday could offer some hope for a stalled market.

The annual rate of new home sales climbed in June to 330,000 units, up 23.6% from May. The rate was well above the 295,000 units a year that economists polled by Briefing.com had expected.

New home sales are still down 16.7% from June 2009, but last month's surprising data suggest the housing market may have a life even without the homebuyer's tax credit, which expired for most potential buyers at the end of April...

Mish and David Rosenberg expose the reality of these desperate numbers.

One can't help but laugh at headlines touting a huge 23.% jump in new home sales given that the "jump" was to the second worst month in history, dating back to 1963.

Dave Rosenberg puts the headline jump into perspective in Housing Data Are Not Supportive.

Market sentiment is positive and as a result of the market going straight up, people believe that the economic data are somehow getting better. Not the case at all.

April new home sales were revised DOWN to a 422k annual rate from 504k when the data for the month were first released. You know what that means? It means that the homebuyer tax credit was even a bigger dud than we thought it was previously. No bang for the buck from these spending gimmicks.

May new home sales were revised DOWN to 267k units from 300k. That sure puts a 23.6% "jump" to 330k into perspective, doesn't it? It's called bear market math.

At 330k in June, this goes down as the second worst month on record (data back to January 1963). And in per capita terms it is far worse than that considering the population has expanded 63% since then... [And] the average sales price was cut 9.8% MoM in the third steepest month ever in terms of discounting. At $242,900 for an average price of a new home sold, this represented the lowest number since October 2003 and off 26% from the 2007 peak.

But just think about that for a second. The third largest price cut in history managed to generate the second worst new home sales tally on record. This is something to get excited about?

Given that housing leads recoveries (more specifically housing starts followed by new home sales), this is another nail in the coffin that suggests there has been no recovery except in financial assets. Moreover, that financial recovery is only a result of unsustainable stimulus that is now quickly fading into the sunset.

Could someone let Ezra Klein know that the truth is slipping out again? Message discipline, folks... message discipline!

And Mish, I would keep your head on a swivel and stay away from plate-glass windows. The pencil-necked weasel named Spencer Ackerman is a lot more terrifying in person than you could possibly imagine.


Linked by: Michelle Malkin. Thanks!

Democrat Message Discipline Matches Their Fiscal Discipline: Reid, Harkin and Union Hacks Spill the Beans on Lame-Duck Cram-down

Even if Democrats suffer huge losses in November's midterm elections, it appears they will try to ram through more items from the radical progressive wish-list. Immigration reform, card-check and climate legislation could all be in play before January.

To combat public outrage prior to the midterms, Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) and Vice President Joe Biden are trying to tamp down the gossip wildfire, to little effect. That's because Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) and Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) are simultaneously anyone within earshot what they intend to do. Apparently they didn't get the memo, or they can't shut up, or they're just flat dimwitted ("all of the above" is also an acceptable answer).

“We’re going to have to have a lame-duck session, so we’re not giving up,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said at the weekend Netroots Nation conference of liberal bloggers, in reference to Democrats’ unfinished priorities. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has said the need for such a session depends on how much work lawmakers get done before the elections.

Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), the chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, has suggested the card-check bill, or Employee Free Choice Act, might be prime to move in a lame-duck session.

Bill Samuel, the legislative director for the AFL-CIO, said that the union had no specific agenda — from card-check to jobs bills — in mind for lawmakers for any such session, but that it would press lawmakers to work actively through the period...

Samuel went on to pooh-pooh Van Hollen's suggestion that the 111th Congress' heavy lifting is done: "My assumption is that he’s sort of responding to fear-mongering by Republicans."

Thus, at least three powerful insiders have confirmd that Democrats intend to shove their radical left-wing agenda down the throats of the American people -- even if they lose in a midterm landslide.

But they do so at their own peril. The American people are slow to anger, but socialized medicine, a quadrupling of the deficit, a takeover of two auto companies, and a faux financial reform bill have awakened the sleeping giant.

Democrats, meet the Whigs. Whigs, meet the Democrats.


Tuesday, July 27, 2010

City and County Government Associations: Obama Economy Will Create or Save, Eh, I Mean Destroy or Eliminate 500,000 Public Sector Jobs

A report by a consortium consisting of the National League of Cities, the U.S. Conference of Mayors and the National Association of Counties doesn't beat around the bush. It's title: "Local Governments Cutting Jobs and Services: Job losses projected to approach 500,000".

...just as families are increasingly turning to local governments for support, local governments are facing their own fiscal crisis. The effects of the Great Recession on local budgets will be felt most deeply from 2010 to 2012.1 In response, local governments are cutting services and personnel. This report... reveals that local government job losses in the current and next fiscal years will approach 500,000, with public safety, public works, public health, social services and parks and recreation hardest hit by the cutbacks...

...In May and June of 2010 NLC, NACo and USCM conducted a survey of cities and counties across the country for the purpose of gauging the extent of job losses. The survey was emailed and faxed to all cities over 25,000 in population and to all counties over 100,000 in population. The survey results presented below are based on 270 responses, 214 responses from cities and 56 responses from counties.

The surveyed local governments report cutting 8.6 percent of total full-time equivalent (FTE) positions over the previous fiscal year to the next fiscal year (roughly 2009-2011). If applied to total local government employment nationwide, an 8.6 percent cut in the workforce would mean that 481,000 local government workers were, or will be, laid off over the two-year period. Projected cuts for the next fiscal year will likely increase...

After lamenting the awful state of the economy, the Democrat-dominated organizations recommend -- you'll never guess -- more federal bailouts. Yes, even after the hundreds of billions in "Stimulus" dough that stole money directly from red states and deposited it into the coffers of blue states, a model that represents obvious fiscal suicide.

To secure economic recovery, Congress and the Administration must act now to create jobs quickly and help stabilize local government economies. An immediate opportunity exists in the Local Jobs for America Act (H.R. 4812/S. 3500), which would provide $75 billion in targeted and temporary fiscal assistance over two years to local governments and community based organizations to save and create local jobs. Other opportunities include investing in infrastructure through targeted spending to local governments and ensuring that small businesses and local governments can obtain access to credit. Federal investment that helps save local jobs and preserve local services will help stabilize communities across the country and ensure that all of America’s families are able to participate in the economic recovery.

Candy-gram, Mr. and Mrs. Mayor: the federal government is broke. Democrats stole all of the money and then some. We're letting our kids, grandchildren and great-grandchildren enter the world decades from now owing the principal and interest on Joe Schmoe's 99-week unemployment extensions.

99-weeks of unemployment isn't a safety net. It's welfare.

At some point soon, the public sector union membership will come to the uncomfortable realization that the bosses and their sycophants in the Democrat Party sold them down the river.

While John Kerry enjoys his wine selection on the Isabel and Andy Stern puffs on his massive Cuban cigars, the hard-working cops, teachers, firefighters and emergency personnel will be suffering. And they can thank the unholy marriage of incompetent Democrat politicians and greedy public sector union bosses who have conspired to defraud the taxpayer.


Monday, July 19, 2010

Ferguson schools Krugman: America's unsustainable debt -- 'world war finance without the war' -- can only be solved with regime change

Vernon L. Smith, a 2002 Nobel Laureate in Economics, doesn't mince words in addressing President Obama. In short: stop the spending and face the deficit without adding taxes.

Please, No More Government Spending!... my colleague, Steven Gjerstad [and I] examine[d] the last 14 recessions including the Depression. We have been surprised and dismayed to learn that in 11 of these 14 recessions the percentage decline in new house expenditure preceded and exceeded percentage declines in every other major component of GDP. Hence the sources of the current debacle are hardly new! Moreover, past recoveries in the housing market have been closely associated with recovery from recession. The latest data continue to tell us that the turnaround in housing, consumer durables, and business investment are all anemic.

...Our best shot at increasing employment and output is to reduce business taxes and the cost of creating new start-up companies. Don’t subsidize them; just reduce their taxes even as they become larger; also reduce any unnecessary impediments to their formation. This is strongly indicated by the business dynamics program of the Bureau of Census and the Kauffman Foundation which has tracked new startup firms in the period 1980-2005. The entry of new firms net of departing firms in this period account for a remarkable two-thirds more employment growth (3 percent per year) than the average of all firms in the US (1.8 percent per year). The invigorating turmoil created by new technologies, with accompanying growth in output, productivity, and employment lead to new business formation as old firms inevitably fail. Reducing barriers to that growth encourage a recovery path which does not mortgage future output.

Of course, this common sense counsel defies the ideology of Alinsky and is certain not to be followed. And what comes next should strike fear into every American.

We'll muddle along somehow, until -- suddenly -- we won't


Joe Weisenthal says that the US financial system will have collapsed before Moody's gets around to downgrading its debt.

It probably bears worth repeating that if there were much about about Moody's clout in the sovereign debt arena, it should have be erased today: Moody's has no clout.

A downgrade of Ireland early on barely produced a blip on any market anywhere... That follows a recent spectacularly uneventful downgrade of Portugal.

Every once in a while Moody's lobs a very vague warning about debt and spending in the direction of London and Washington DC, and occasionally the subject of the US losing its AAA rating comes up... But really, Moody's is not going to be ahead of the US downgrade curve.

Writing at The Financial Times, Niall Ferguson clearly states that "the latter-day Keynesians have learnt nothing".

...what we are witnessing today has less to do with the 1930s than with the 1940s: it is world war finance without the war.

...Today’s warlike deficits are being run at a time when the US is heavily reliant on foreign lenders, not least its rising strategic rival China (which holds 11 per cent of US Treasuries in public hands); at a time when economies are open, so American stimulus can end up benefiting Chinese exporters; and at a time when there is much underutilised capacity, so that deflation is a bigger threat than inflation.

Are there precedents for such a combination? Certainly. Long before Keynes was even born, weak governments in countries from Argentina to Venezuela used to experiment with large peacetime deficits to see if there were ways of avoiding hard choices. The experiments invariably ended in one of two ways. Either the foreign lenders got fleeced through default. Or the domestic lenders got fleeced through inflation. When economies were growing sluggishly, that could be slow in coming. But there invariably came a point when money creation by the central bank triggered an upsurge in inflationary expectations.

...economists, like New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, who liken confidence to an imaginary “fairy” have failed to learn from decades of economic research on expectations. They also seem not to have noticed that the big academic winners of this crisis have been the proponents of behavioural finance, in which the ups and downs of human psychology are the key.

The evidence is very clear from surveys on both sides of the Atlantic. People are nervous of world war-sized deficits when there isn’t a war to justify them. According to a recent poll published in the Financial Times, 45 per cent of Americans “think it likely that their government will be unable to meet its financial commitments within 10 years”. Surveys of business and consumer confidence paint a similar picture of mounting anxiety.

The remedy for such fears must be the kind of policy regime change Prof Sargent identified 30 years ago, and which the Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan governments successfully implemented. Then, as today, the choice was not between stimulus and austerity. It was between policies that boost private-sector confidence and those that kill it.

If you don't mobilize everyone you can to vote in November... if you don't help to effect regime change... if you don't get your friends, neighbors, family members, and everyone else you know to vote... and if you don't vote out every Democrat traitor... well, my friends, it could be time to turn out the lights.


Saturday, July 17, 2010

Health Care Bill Mandates Tracking of Your Gold and Silver Coin Purchases

Remember the manufactured outrage and criticism leveled at the Bush administration over its international terror wiretaps? Every leftist front group imaginable -- from the ACLU to MSNBC -- screeched of constitutional crises and White House imperialism.

Now, as the Obama administration inserts all sorts of bizarre and intrusive dictates into its various takeovers of the private sector, these very same leftists are silent. It's clear that "civil liberties" are of little concern so long as the federal government gets to intrude further and further into our lives.

They're watching you... buy gold

Economic Policy Journal relays word from the coin-collecting magazine Numismaster that:

...[s]tarting on January 1st in 2012, US federal law will require coin and bullion dealers to report to the Internal Revenue Service all gold and silver coin purchases and sales greater than $600.

No that is not an error, they tacked the gold coin tracking regulations into the health bill. They are just tacking stuff on wherever they can.

Venturing a guess as to the Democrats' rationale, two tactics come to mind:

• The tracking directly targets a major advertising force on conservative television programs, websites and radio shows (e.g., GoldLine) and puts the cross-hairs on conservatives who purchase bullion.

Like FDR, who confiscated gold from individuals, the Obama Democrats want to begin controlling the flow of real currency -- not just the fiat paper that Ben Bernanke has been printing like a madman.

What's Your Federal Obesity Index?

As for your body, by 2014 you will be legally required to have an "electronic health record". This lovely little dictate was craftily inserted into the $1 trillion "Stimulus" bill of 2009.

Your electronic record will include an "obesity rating", which will be "securely shared" with government agencies and health care providers.

I'll let you imagine the consequences: federal nutrition laws, government-sponsored nutrition initiatives, federally approved healthy food products, etc.

Welcome to Central Planning U.S.A.

Like East Germany in the sixties, the Obama Democrats are turning the country into a statist's dream of authoritarian government, central planning and -- ultimately -- slavery.

Thousands and thousands of pages of new laws -- replete with payoffs, bribery and benefits for special interests -- will be filled in with tens of thousands of pages of regulations.

New bureaucracies, agencies and offices will control more and more aspects of your life. How much you can eat. What kind of health care you can receive. How much money you can earn and save.

This is only the first phase -- accomplished in less than two years -- by a federal government so out-of-control that the founders of this country wouldn't recognize it. Consider what the next few years will hold unless we obliterate the Democrat Party in November.

And from the ACLU hippies and media drones? Crickets are chirping as the White House begins its surveillance of your money and your body.


Friday, July 16, 2010

In their Bogus Financial Reform Bill, Democrats Create Another Fannie Mae

Rather than doing the hard work of actually repairing the financial system, the architects of the 2008 mortgage meltdown -- Chris Dodd and Barney Frank -- have instead created a maze of new financial regulations that none have read and fewer understand.

Consider: it's not yet certain that the United States has even weathered the collapse of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac; the economy is still wobbling and real unemployment is around 20%. Yet Frank and Dodd have constructed another monument to themselves and to authoritarian government.

While the "reform" bill completely ignores Fannie and Freddie, it does fulfill one desire of the hard left Democrat Party: it funnels millions of dollars to unions, community activists and other anti-American special interests.

Diversity Cops: buried deep inside the thousands of pages, article 342 commands each financial regulatory agency to add an "Office of Minority and Women Inclusion". Each office is charged with assessing the diversity policy of all the institutions it regulates. In other words, bribery on a grand scale will be commanded by federal statute. Don't want to pay off ACORN? My guess is you'll get your financial institution shut down.

Corporate Control: the bill gives unions, environmental groups and other activist fronts special abilities to put their representatives on the boards of every corporation in America. The "proxy access" provision is opposed by nearly every business consortium because it is wholly unrelated to financial services; it is simply a change in corporate governance that benefits radical Democrat Statists.

Regulates Airlines and Utilities: the "financial reform" bill also regulates unrelated businesses in other ways. Any company that uses derivatives -- like airline companies that hedge on fuel prices to protect against wild swings in their costs -- now come under the jurisdiction of new laws. This kind of hedging had absolutely nothing to do with the financial crisis; yet Democrats wanted to control these industries -- and therefore included them.

Payoffs for Community Organizers: The flagship of the "reform" bill is a so-called "consumer protection agency" . It provides "substantial employment opportunities and funding for Democratic and social-activist groups such as the Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now (ACORN)" -- the same groups that precipitated the mortgage meltdown with false accusations of 'redlining'.

Executive Summary: there's no financial reform in this bill. It is intended to expand government control over the private sector. Like "health care reform". And the takeover of GM and Chrysler. And "Cap-and-Trade".

This is how societies collapse, folks.

A reminder: it's November or never.


Thursday, July 15, 2010

The Obama Tsunami

Mish says to prepare for an economic tsunami as states go belly-up and consumers hunker down, preparing for the inevitable tax hikes. They'll include carbon cap-n-trade, the expiration of Emperor Chimpy McBushitler's tax cuts, a possible VAT tax, new health care taxes and dramatically increased entitlement bills.

• Illinois let $5 billion of bills go unpaid.
• Minnesota is delaying corporate and sales-tax refunds, postponing school and medical aid and setting up a $600 million bank line of credit.
• New Jersey is planning to refinance about $250 million of general-obligation bonds to push $202.5 million of debt-service costs into future fiscal years.
• Illinois, is selling $900 million of bonds for capital projects this week.
• 22 states put staff on temporary leave.
• Arizona sold its House of Representatives and Senate buildings.
• California solicited bids for 11 of its office complexes.
• Delaware saved $29,000 by eliminating flowers at the state psychiatric hospital and health department.
• California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, facing a $19 billion budget deficit for the year that began this month, is trying to force 200,000 state workers onto minimum wages temporarily.

All of those half-assed measures assume the economy is going to get better later this year. Instead I suggest states should expect a Second-Half Housing and Durable Goods Crash.

California alone is $19 billion in the hole and that is after California enacted a temporary 1 percentage point increase in the sales tax rate (expected to generate about $4.5 billion in fiscal 2010) and after it accelerated income tax collection.
It is also after patching a $24 billion hole earlier in the year.

Literally no state is remotely prepared for the second-half tsunami coming down the pike.

Aren't these Democrat policies great? Like open borders, limitless welfare and public sector unions that control government spending priorities?

Oh, and trial lawyers. Can't forget the trial lawyers!


Kewl: Obama Stimulus Program 'Saves or Creates' Three Million Homeless!

When a relatively affluent town like Annapolis, Maryland begins suffering from wave after wave of homelessness, you know the Democrats' "trickle-up economics" program is working to perfection.

In Annapolis, less than half a mile from the State House and Governor's Mansion, a colony of homeless people live under the College Creek Bridge on Rowe Boulevard. On Friday, no one was there when a reporter and photographer visited, but clothing, chairs and drying laundry showed the site to be home to at least two groups of people.

Figures provided by the county Department of Social Services show that homelessness is indeed on the rise. In 2009, the department recorded more than 1,000 homeless adults, compared with 550 two years earlier. The number of homeless children jumped from 429 in 2007 to 960 last year, figures show.

"We are seeing an increase, mostly in the area of homeless adults, because people are losing their jobs and their homes," said Marci Kennai, county director of social services.

...Zerhusen founded HOPE in 2004 .. Last year, the charity helped 83 families. This year, volunteers have assisted nearly 100 - and the year's only half over... "A lot of what's happening is because of the economy," Zerhusen said.

Other charities are experiencing the same crushing need... The Rev. Ed Jansen, director of the Emmaus Center in Glen Burnie, said he is "absolutely swamped" with people in need. The center, which he opened with his wife in 2008, serves breakfast and lunch to homeless people and also provides counseling services. Jansen estimates that he serves about 1,200 meals a month.

"We're adequately serving our people, but we're just overwhelmed by the need," Jansen said.

Obama's wealth redistribution model -- "trickle-up economics" -- makes about as much sense as teaching trigonometry to reindeer.

So -- you feel stimulated yet?


Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Slavery, Democrat-style

Is there anything worse than a person who intentionally hurts a child? Who abuses a child? Who steals from a child?

Last year in Greenville, South Carolina, a man approached a mother and daughter selling Girl Scout cookies at the Bi-Lo on West Wade Hampton Boulevard.

He asked to buy a box of lemon cookies. When the mother turned around, he grabbed their cash box -- which contained $300 -- and fled.

The suspect was described as "a white male with dirty blonde hair between the ages of 25-35, approximately 5’8 and 170 pounds, wearing blue jeans, a denim coat and a baseball hat."

The little girl -- a first year Girl Scout -- was heartbroken. The suspect was never identified.

In the spring of 2009, Idaho high school students visited Washington and carried with them a petition. The students -- fearful of massive deficit spending -- called for a balanced budget.

Democrat budgets for the foreseeable future quadruple the annual deficit: the record-setting figure for 2010 is roughly $1.9 trillion. Obama's claim about cutting the deficit in half in a few years is a fairy tail -- like "slashing prices" by 50 percent the day after you’ve doubled them.

And the administration blatantly lied, stating that tax increases would not affect 95 percent of taxpayers. New taxes on energy -- under the fraudulent "cap-and-trade" regime -- will force every business in America to raise its prices. Taxpayers will be wounded... directly and indirectly.

Democrats also used every budgeting gimmick, every payoff and bribe, every sleazy tactic possible to pass socialized medicine, a failure everywhere it's been tried -- into the Statists' plans. As for the $45 trillion dollars in unfunded liabilities represented by Medicare and Medicaid? On that subject, Obama is utterly silent.

Obama and the rest of the Democrats want to tell you how much energy you can use (smart grids that can automatically shut off your air conditioner), whether you can give money to charities and which kinds of toilets you can buy.

Even ignoring his oppressive energy taxes, every dollar of Obama's new debt means that future taxes must be $1 higher in present-value terms. This translates to a discounted present-value legacy of $6.5 trillion of new, future taxes.

The tax burden each family of four can expect? $163,000. Let me repeat that: $163,000 for each and every tax-paying household in America.

Your children... my children... our grandchildren... are all slaves to the Obama budget. Because Barack Obama and his comrades in Congress are ideologues. They could care less about the economy.

They're beholden to ACORN, the SEIU, the NEA, the AFT, the ACLU and trial lawyers of every vintage and variety.

As subscribers to a failed ideology, Obama, Pelosi, Reid and the rest of the radical Statists are consigning our descendants to slavery. Girl Scouts. Boy Scouts. Toddlers. Infants. The unborn.

If you don't vote in November to throw out every Democrat possible, I would simply apologize in advance to your kids for the inevitable destruction of their unchecked policies.