Monday, March 12, 2012

It's Another Historic Obama Record! U.S. Runs a Quarter of a Trillion Dollar Deficit... in One Month

This President has certainly been a trailblazer when it comes to economic records. Oh, and I blame Bush. And Martin Van Buren, too.

A few days ago we noted that based on preliminary data, the February budget deficit would hit $229 billion (yes, nearly one quarter of a trillion in one month, about where real Greek GDP is these days) - the largest single monthly deficit in history. Unfortunately, this number was low: the final February deficit was just released and the actual print is $231.7 billion...

...It also means that in the first 5 months of the fiscal year, the US has raked up $580 billion in deficits, oddly matched by $727 billion in new debt issuance, 25% more new debt issued than needed to fund deficits...

...through last Friday, and net of tax refunds, total US tax revenues were actually lower in the fiscal 2012 year to date period than compared to 2011, by just under $2 billion, at $625.5 billion. Which is the weakest link for any argument that the US is actually growing: what is growing is America's debt (now almost exponentially), while its revenues are at best unchanged. And the scariest: annualizing net tax revenues brings the number to $1.5 trillion. Which is just 50% more where total US debt interest will be in 2014 when debt is $20 trillion, assuming interest rates are somehow allowed to go back up... to the astronomical level of 5%.

So, despite all of the media cheerleading, it turns out the country's economy isn't growing at all. And the debts just keep on piling up, month after month, at a clip unprecedented in world history.

Another four years of Obama and we won't recognize this country.

Of that, there is no doubt.


Musical interlude: Obama mentor Derrick Bell sings reggae


Click here.


Start the Week Off With a Laugh [Dan from NY]

Dan from NY:

11 Mar 2012

Kofi Annan optimistic over Syria deal


U.N.-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan concludes he is "optimistic" after meeting with president Assad.

11 Mar 2012

Syria: Assad rebuffs Kofi Annan peace bid


Syrian government offensive against rebels leaves more than 130 dead.

* * * * * * * * *

Did you know this week is Diplomat Lifetime Employment week?


It's come to this: Tide laundry detergent being used as currency in some U.S. neighborhoods

Didn't this happen in Zimbabwe just before their currency collapsed under a tidal wave of hyperinflation?

...Theft of Tide detergent has become so rampant that some cities are setting up special task forces to stop it and retailers like CVS are taking special security precautions to lock down the liquid.

...Tide has become a form of currency on the streets. The retail price is steadily high -- roughly $10 to $20 a bottle -- and it's a staple in households across socioeconomic classes.

Tide can go for $5 to $10 a bottle on the black market, authorities say, and some thieves even resell it to stores.

"There's no serial numbers and it's impossible to track," said Detective Larry Patterson of the Somerset, Ky., Police Department, where authorities have seen a huge spike in Tide theft. "It's the item to steal."

To paraphrase Mark Steyn, when laundry detergent becomes a de facto currency, you're pretty much done for.

You feeling stimulated yet?


Hat tip: BadBlue.

Larwyn's Linx: Judging Obama by His Antisemitic Friends

Have a news tip or great story? Drop me an email. Bloggers: you can install a Larwyn's Linx blog widget!

Nation

Judging Obama by His Antisemitic Friends: Breitbart
Derrick Bell’s Jewish / Racialist Problem: ProWis
How much did Bell influence Obama's ideology?: Breitbart

The American Spring Bears Poisonous Fruit: NoisyRm
The Vetting Continues: Obama's Favorite Congressman: Breitbart
Nutty Alan Grayson runs red light, slams into bus, injures two: Malkin

Encyclopedia Propagandica (why you can't trust Wikipedia): WyBlog
Full Circle: From Bell, to the Panthers, to the White House: VS
O’Reilly exposes possible WH connection to Fluke: Greenroom

Economy

At long last, a Senate plan to balance the budget: Exam
“Food Stamp Program Doesn’t Check SSNs of Some Recipients”: ProWis
WaPo: Banks Use Government Loans to Repay TARP: MoneyNews

Rep. Chabot Introduces Bill to Curb the Blight of Section 8 Housing: Virtuous
The President’s Spiffy New Program: Blogmocracy
Being in Congress loses its thrill for some lawmakers: Politico

2012 Elections

Why is Romney being supported by the Global Warming Crowd?: RWN
Remember when severe conservative Mitt Romney said...: ProWis
Romney Campaign Swag! AOSHQ **EXCLUSIVE!!**: Ace

Scandal Central

120 in Congress now want Holder's resignation: DC
Guns used in killing of ICE agent draw scrutiny: Chron
Obama's energy abyss: Kelly

Climate & Energy

How Obama Is Choking Off U.S. Oil Production: Loyola
Arctic Fraud : Worse Than It Seems: RealScience
Obama Pitches Energy Plan, Fails To Mention His Brilliant Algae Idea: WZ

Media

Old and Busted: This is the Summer of Obama. The New Hotness: Obama's Incomplete Greatness.: Ace
Top 10 Lies of HBO's Game Change: BigHollywood
You’ll Never Guess Who’s the Least Popular Person in Congress: LoneCon

Stunning study on anti-white racism in America: Lifson
Cass Sunstein: Derrick Bell Wanted To End America's White Supremacy: Riehl
WaPo Six Months Ago: The President Has A Real Woman Problem: Glob

Is the New York Times cheerleading for a bad economy?: Greenroom
McCain Blasts HBO's 'Game Change': 'Based on a Book That's Completely Biased': NB
Jane Fonda, CNN Smear Limbaugh With Out Of Context Quote: Riehl

World

Iran rattles sabers: ’11,000 missiles ready to launch’ at Israel, US targets: DC
World's first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, 'the Big E' makes final voyage: Fox
U.S. Soldier in Custody After Killing 16 Afghan Civilians: AtlWire

Déjà Vu: Obama's Military Actions in Syria May Be Impeachable: NewAm
Unreal… Obama Tells Israel Not to Strike Iran Until After Campaign Season: GWP
Saudi women students boycott classes in rare protest: Reuters

Afghanistan on the Brink: Is the One-Man ‘Kill Team’ the Last Straw?: RS
Washington Post-ABC News Poll: 60 Percent in U.S. Say Afghanistan War Not Worth It: AmPower
Sudan's Islamic Government Gives Christians 30 Days To Leave Or Be Treated As Foreigners: WZ

Sci-Tech

Who should control e-book pricing?: Dispatch
Tech giants back effort to revolutionize teaching: CNet
iTether is back with HTML5 app skirting App Store: SlashGear

Cornucopia

Burns or Romney?: iOTW
Carney Barker Bob: Hussein Obama's Information Minister: Cube
Rotten Animals: iOTW

Image: Hope n' Change Cartoons
Today's Larwyn's Linx sponsored by: Rick Santorum for President

QOTD: "I guarantee you if Ronald Reagan was president of the United States, [Iran] wouldn't think twice about continuing this nuclear arms program. I think Reagan would make it clear that not only do we stand with Israel and give them the weapons they need; we'll use the weapons ourselves." --Mark Levin

Sunday, March 11, 2012

Peace-seeking misunderstanderers of Islam rocket Israel for third straight day; 200,000 students ordered to stay home

I wonder how residents of, say, Texas would react to days of rocket fire from Mexico?

Residents of southern Israel suffered another day under siege on Sunday as Palestinians in the Gaza Strip fired about 50 more rockets at the Negev.

Two Grad-type Katyusha rockets fell in Be'er Sheva after the Iron Dome battery that had been protecting it suffered a technical malfunction...

...One rocket hit a school, which was empty since schools in the city were closed Sunday, and the other hit a parked car. Fifteen people were treated for shock, though there were no other casualties. The rockets - and the ball bearings that they ejected hundreds of meters - caused heavy damage to buildings and vehicles...

...Since Friday, 104 rockets were fired toward Israel, 43 of which were intercepted by the Iron Dome defense systems. The IAF carried out 23 strikes in the Gaza Strip.

...Some 200,000 pupils will remain at home again on Monday, as schools remain closed in Be'er Sheva, Ofakim, Ashdod, Yavneh, Ashkelon, Kiryat Malakhi and Netivot, and in all the other smaller communities that are between seven and 40 kilometers from the Gaza Strip.

Until these barbaric throwbacks are sufficiently punished, there will be no peace anywhere, least of all in the Middle East. Because it pays.


Hat tip: BadBlue.

Unexpected: job growth consistently higher in right-to-work states

Why, this must be some sort of strange coincidence:

Currently, the U.S. has 22 right-to-work states. All of them are in the South, West, and Central Midwest. During the past 15 years, these states have collectively outperformed the rest of the nation to an almost embarrassing degree:

• “From 1995 to 2005, incomes of residents in right-to-work states grew by 142 percent more than the incomes of Ohioans,” and “private-sector job growth was 500% greater.”

• After passing right-to-work legislation in 1986 and 2001, respectively, Idaho and Oklahoma both experienced explosive growth in their economies and overall employment.

• An after-tax dollar earned in a right-to-work state has more real purchasing power than it does in other states, “because union labor tends to raise (the) costs of goods and services.”

I took a look at economic growth in the individual states during the past decade as measured by gross domestic product (GDP). What I found also shows that right-to-work states clearly outperformed the others [see table at right]...

...2001-2010 economic growth weighted by average population in all right-to-work states was 21.7%; in the rest of the states and the District of Columbia, it was only 13.6%. During the past thirty years, the tremendous leads in per-capita GDP industrial states like Ohio and Michigan once had over the right-to-work states have mostly and in a few cases entirely evaporated.

Wealthy union bosses like Dick Trumka proudly proclaim their hatred of capitalism and their desire to push America into a Soviet-style, socialistic economy.

Furthermore, union leadership has aligned itself with the environmental, flat-earth, no-growth "green" movement that has dedicated itself to the de-industrialization of America. Labor bosses support -- of all things -- the EPA, which is gutting energy exploration, pipeline construction, the drilling business, the mining industry, all power generation facilities, refinery construction, and the like.

In their rapacious quest for power, union bosses have thrown their members to the wolves.

At some point in the very near future, union members are going to rise up against their bosses -- who have aligned with far Left Marxists -- to destroy the economy and all of their members' jobs. A good start will be voting to pink-slip the top union boss, one Barack H. Obama, in 2012.


The Tinderbox That Is Europe

True, the Middle East is boiling over with the rise of Al Qaeda in Libya, the mass slaughter of Syrian dissidents, and the takeover over of a one-time ally by the Egyptian strain of the Muslim Brotherhood. But Europe too, as Tyler Durden explains, is on the precipice of widespread civil unrest.

The last time we plotted European youth unemployment in what was dubbed "Europe's scariest chart" we were surprised to discover that when it comes to "Arab Spring inspiring" youth unemployment, Spain was actually worse off than even (now officially broke) Greece, whose young adult unemployment at the time was only just better compared to that... of the United States. Luckily, following the latest economic (yes, we laughed too) update from Greece, it is safe to say that things are back to normal, as Greek youth unemployment is officially the second one in Europe after Spain to surpass 50%. In other words, Europe's scariest chart just got even scarier.

And so while the Greek economy is in tatters, following another downward revision to its GDP as reported last week, this time dragging Q4 GDP from -7.0% to -7.5%, that's only the beginning, and it now appears that a terminal collapse of not just the Greek financial sector, but its society as well, has commenced, as the number of people unemployed in the 11 million person country is now 41% greater than its was a year ago...

You would think that the failure of their model -- the European social welfare state -- would cause Democrats to rethink their approach to governance.

But then, that would require substantial measures of reason, logic, and rationality, all of which are woefully lacking in the modern, Marxist-controlled Democrat Party.


Every road is an on-ramp to fun with the startlingly new, surprisingly sexy Dodge Deflation™

The new Dodge Deflation appears to be the logical successor to the Buick Bureaucrat and the ultra-popular Chevy Volt.


Ephemeral dreams of an ideal society

Can Americans trust the claims of temporary politicians who promise that their grand dreams and intricate plans will solve humanity's most vexing issues?

Consider their track record...

Social Security


THEN: President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 14 August 1935, Washington, D.C.:

Today, a hope of many years' standing is in large part fulfilled. The civilization of the past hundred years, with its startling industrial changes, had tended more and more to make life insecure. Young people have come to wonder what will be their lot when they came to old age. The man with a job has wondered how long the job would last...

...This social security measure gives at least some protection to 50 millions of our citizens who will reap direct benefits through unemployment compensation, through old-age pensions, and through increased services for the protection of children and the prevention of ill health...

...It is, in short, a law that will take care of human needs and at the same time provide the United States an economic structure of vastly greater soundness...

NOW: Social Security Is Failing Even Faster Than We Thought:

In last year's Trustees Report, the Social Security Administration warned that the program's trust fund was likely to run out of money in 2036, leading to deep cuts in benefits. If that weren't bad enough for anyone expecting to be alive then, a more recent projection from the Congressional Budget Office paints a much worse picture.

This year's CBO report forecasts that by the end of this decade, the combined Social Security Old Age and Disability Trust Funds will be about $800 billion smaller than last year's SSA projections. That's a very substantial drop -- and a sign that this year's Trustees Report will likely bring another downward revision to the year it expects those Trust Funds to dry up and benefits to be cut.

Medicare


THEN: President Lyndon Baines Johnson, 30 July 1965, Washington, D.C.

...No longer will older Americans be denied the healing miracle of modern medicine. No longer will illness crush and destroy the savings that they have so carefully put away over a lifetime so that they might enjoy dignity in their later years... And no longer will this Nation refuse the hand of justice to those who have given a lifetime of service and wisdom and labor to the progress of this progressive country...

...During your working years, the people of America--you--will contribute ... a small amount each payday for hospital insurance protection. For example, the average worker in 1966 will contribute about $1.50 per month. The employer will contribute a similar amount. And this will provide the funds to pay up to 90 days of hospital care for each illness, plus diagnostic care, and up to 100 home health visits after you are 65. And beginning in 1967, you will also be covered for up to 100 days of care in a skilled nursing home after a period of hospital care.

NOW: Medicare’s Worsening Finances: The Other Shoe Drops:

A week ago, the Medicare Trustees issued their annual report, which showed that the program is on the fact track to insolvency. The 2011 analysis projected that the Hospital Insurance Trust Fund (which funds Medicare Part A) will be insolvent in 2024, and the program’s long-term unfunded obligations—promised benefits that are not paid for—amount to $24.6 trillion...

...[new] across-the-board cuts would cause 15 percent of hospitals, skilled nursing facilities, and home health agencies to become unprofitable by 2019. This number would climb to 25 percent in 2030 and 40 percent by 2050.

Obamacare


THEN: President Barack Hussein Obama, 23 March 2010, Washington, D.C.:

...And we have now just enshrined, as soon as I sign this bill, the core principle that everybody should have some basic security when it comes to their health care...

...I said this once or twice, but it bears repeating: If you like your current insurance, you will keep your current insurance. No government takeover; nobody is changing what you’ve got if you’re happy with it. If you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor. In fact, more people will keep their doctors because your coverage will be more secure and more stable than it was before I signed this legislation.

NOW: Obamacare's Broken Promises:

Hard times continue for the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare). The administration has scrapped the law's long-term care insurance program, covering nursing homes and home health care. The program was deemed unrealistic. This is a harbinger...

...Writing in The New York Review of Books, [Arnold Relman, the former editor of The New England Journal of Medicine] says that "the law does very little or nothing to address some of the most important causes of the high cost of care and its rapid inflation.” Note: Relman isn't a conservative crank. He's a critic of insurance companies and advocates a single-payer, government-run health-care system.

The ACA, Relman writes, doesn't alter fee-for-service reimbursement... [he is also] unimpressed with the ACA provisions intended to control costs: for example, the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB). It's a group of 15 experts who would recommend changes if government health spending rose too rapidly... Relman also dismisses "accountable care organizations” (ACOs) that supposedly save money through coordinated care by doctors and hospitals. The regulations governing ACOs will be so complicated that there won't be many of them, he writes.

...Many of [the ACA's] promises rest, like CLASS, on unrealistic assumptions. Disappointments loom, and the needed debate is deferred.

We are living in Ameritopia


Mark Levin explains:

The reason I say that liberalism is the philosophy of the stupid is because we can look at what's going around in the country today. If, in your own lives, you were pursuing policies that were destroying your own home ownership, that were destroying your own job, that were creating a massive, impossible debt for your family and your children in particular, you'd stop it. You wouldn't keep doing it!

And yet for the liberal, if it's imposed on you -- and they feel that they can be immune from it -- they're for it. They wouldn't do to themselves and their own family what they're doing to you, and your family, and the whole nation! Take Barack Obama. Does Barack Obama conduct himself in his own, personal affairs, in his family's affairs, as recklessly as he conducts the affairs of the nation? No. Would he run up the kind of relative personal debt that he's running up for the nation? No way.

...So they do to us -- and they do to our society -- what they would never do to their own families. They do not live in their own lives as they seek to have the rest of us live. Or as they seek to have our society conduct itself.

The only question that remains is whether the country can be saved. 2012 may be our last, best chance to save this Republic from the Utopian Statists, whose pursuit of impossible, narcissistic dreams have set the country on a course for national fiscal suicide.


Larwyn's Linx: Barack Obama to Khalid Muhammad: Two Degrees of Separation

Have a news tip or great story? Drop me an email. Bloggers: you can install a Larwyn's Linx blog widget!

Nation

Obama to Khalid Muhammad: Two Degrees of Separation: PL
The media trashed Reagan too – he won in a landslide: Scoop
CalGuns Foundation Sues LA County Sheriff Lee Baca: CDN

Illegal 'Women of the 99%' Robo-Calls Target Rush in Illinois: RSM
Shady group behind illegal calls likely tied to DNC: GWP
Genocide in America: Can We Talk?: JPA

Economy

Hearing Shines Light on Food-Stamp Fraud: Foundry
Food Stamps Exchanged For Drugs, Weapons, Contraband: JW
Who's behind Sandra Fluke?: VS

The One Chart Liberals Hate: Surber
Whiny Liberal Punk Whines About Obama Unemployment Chart: Cove
Unemployment Definition - Abbott and Costello: AmDigest

2012 Elections

Bauer to GOP: Clear the deck for Santorum: Exam
Kansas Republican caucuses results: Rick Santorum wins: Politico
Conservative leaders 'all in' for Santorum: Politico

Climate & Energy

Top 10 Obama energy blunders: Events
Thanks Fracking: NJ Citizens Saving $100 Million On Their Gas Bills: SAB
Enviros Whack 100 Coal-Fired Plants: Townhall

Obama Weekly Address: “Soon You’ll Be Able To Only Afford To Fill Up Every Two Weeks!”: STACLU
Dear Energy Chief Chu: You know where you can shove your $50 lightbulb?: CDN
Global warming may drive you nuts: Surber

Media

Team Obama Really Excited To Treat Women As An Uninformed Voter Block: RWN
Carbonite’s Saturday Night Massacre: LI
Time's Alinsky Attack on Breitbart: Riehl

Damage Control: Obama’s Harvard Pal Says He Was Joking About Hiding Damaging Video: JWF
Soledad O'Brien & That Guy From Cheers Get Really, Really Mad: AmSpec
Hey, Remember When NBC Thought Calling Someone a 'Slut' Was Hilarious?: NB

The Feminazis Go Hunting For Rush: Wolf Howling
Andrew Breitbart: a White Plume Over the Battle: Jason Jones
Nation of Islam Attacks ‘Minion of the Synagogue of Satan’ : Blaze

Fossilized Feminist Hags Jane Fonda And Gloria Steinem Call For FCC To Ban Rush Limbaugh: WZ
Aide Jason Recher on ‘Game Change’ Palin Portrayal: I Would’ve Quit: C4P
Governor Palin Dismisses Game Change In An E-Mail To Jake Tapper: C4P

World

Is Obama stabbing Israel in the back?: Power Line
Gaza jihadists fire 40 rockets into Israel, wound 8 people: JihadWatch
At least 90 Iraqi teenagers stoned to death for “emo” haircuts: Creeping

The Skeletal Outlines of Islam's Rage: Gates of Vienna
Some 100 rockets hit Israel since Friday: ynet
Israel…Jews saving Christians from Islam: CFP

Reza Aslan equates Rick Santorum with murderous Iranian Supremo: JihadWatch
The Revival of (Islamic) Blasphemy Laws: Creeping
Honor Killings: National Geographic Video: Creeping

Sci-Tech

Cool cars from Europe that you can't have: Fox
New Titanic Map Shows 'Entire Crime Scene': ABC
Quake shifted Japan coast about 13 feet, knocked Earth 6.5 inches off axis: USA Today

Cornucopia

Thoughtcrime: Western Rifle Shooters
What will happen to your investment if Obama is re-elected: Munch Ado About Nothing
Lurid Lawsuit Against Arpaio & Steven Seagal: Courthouse News

Image: JihadWatch: Reza Aslan equates Rick Santorum with murderous Iranian Supremo
Today's Larwyn's Linx sponsored by: Rick Santorum for President

QOTD: "By the [2008] general election, very rarely did we communicate through the press anything that we didn't absolutely control." --Anita Dunn, former Obama communications director and avowed Maoist

Saturday, March 10, 2012

Obama's 9-9-9 plan



Hat tip: The Looking Spoon.

10 disasters America will face if Obama is reelected

Anyone who plans on sitting out this election -- no matter who the GOP candidate is -- has only themselves to blame for the collapse of this society. Think I'm overstating things?

Marc Thiessen explains the simple math:

I asked a number of conservative thinkers what they feared most from a second term, and compiled this list of the top ten disasters that would befall America if Obama were re-elected this fall

1. Obamacare will not be repealed.

2. The unprecedented levels of spending in Obama’s first four years will become the new floor, as America sets new records for fiscal profligacy and debt.

3. Job creators will face massive tax increases, and more Americans will come off the tax rolls—resulting in fewer citizens with a stake in keeping taxes low and more with a stake in protecting benefits.

4. Government dependency, already at record levels, will continue to grow.

5. Four lost years in dealing with the entitlement crisis will become eight—digging us into a hole from which we may not be able to emerge.

6. Obama, unworried about the impact of gas and electricity prices on his reelection, will finally wage the regulatory war on fossil fuels the Left demands.

7. He will unleash the Environmental Protection Agency to impose crushing new burdens on U.S. business.

8. His administration’s assault on religious freedom will go on and expand to new areas.

9. The Defense Department will be gutted, with cuts so deep that America will no longer be a superpower.

10. Obama could have the opportunity to appoint more liberal Supreme Court justices, ending the Roberts court in all but name for a generation.

In short, Obama's reelection guarantees a debt-fueled depression; much higher real unemployment (not the propaganda marketed by media); single-payer health care and medical rationing; blackouts and brownouts as his EPA continues shutting down electric generation capacity; and an America in decline as China becomes the world's largest economy.

It's what Derrick Bell and Jeremiah Wright wanted, after all.


Peace In Our Time



Obama and Iran: The Man Who Didn't Bluff

Little more than a week ago, President Obama again addressed growing concerns that Iran's Mullahs were preparing nuclear weapons for regional attacks. He insisted that more time be given for diplomacy, noting that, "as president of the United States, I don't bluff."

Yet, on May 18, 2009, President Obama was asked about Iran and any deadlines for his “policy of engagement.” He responded: “You know, I don’t want to set an artificial deadline ... We should have a fairly good sense by the end of the year as to whether they are moving in the right direction.”

On September 15, 2009, a deadline issued by President Obama for Iran to come to the nuclear negotiating table was ignored by Iran's Mullahs.

On October 11, 2009, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said, "The international community will not wait indefinitely for evidence that Iran is willing to live up to its international commitments."

On October 23, 2009, an Obama-backed UN deadline for Iran to begin drawing down its nuclear stockpile was ignored by Iran's Mullahs.

On November 29, 2009, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said, "Time is running out for Iran to address the international community’s growing concerns about its nuclear program."

On December 31, 2009, President Obama's deadline for Iran to respond to his diplomatic outreach was ignored by Iran's Mullahs.

On January 31, 2010, President Obama's new deadline of the end of the month was ignored by Iran's Mullahs.

On May 25,2011, Hillary Clinton stated: "Time is running out for Iran to address the world's concerns over its nuclear intentions."

On March 1, 2012, a bill signed by President Obama that required his administration "to begin enforcing new financial penalties on foreign firms that do business with Iran passed... with no fresh action from Washington."

On March 6, 2012, Obama said: “To resolve this issue will require Iran to come to the table and discuss in a clear and forthright way how to prove to the international community that the intentions of their nuclear program are peaceful. … They know how to do it, and the question is going to be whether in these discussions they show themselves moving clearly in that direction.”

When war comes, and it will, the ramifications will be all the more dire because of the intransigence and cowardice of the Democrat Party. Somewhere, Neville Chamberlain is smiling, because -- very soon -- history will no longer look upon him as the world's most pathetic and gullible weakling. It will instead view Obama as history's greatest appeaser.


Bonus Party of Weakness Quote: Hillary Clinton warned Syrian dictator Bashar Assad, that "time is running out [to] begin a genuine transition to democracy"... on July 11, 2011.

Larwyn's Linx: Reaching Critical Mass

Have a news tip or great story? Drop me an email. Bloggers: you can install a Larwyn's Linx blog widget!

Nation

Reaching Critical Mass: Just One Minute
Liberals and the Suborned Media Employ Hegel’s Dialectic: XCV
10 disasters America will face if Obama gets a second term: Thiessen

Shock: Obama’s Mentor Derrick Bell Hated Jews: RSM
Surprise! “Cosmic Slop” Director a Big Obama Donor: JWF
When even casual sex requires a welfare program...: Steyn

First American President to Embrace Critical Race Theory: Nice Deb
Obama's Supreme Court and Critical Race Thory: Breitbart
Gingrich Says Panetta Should Resign Over Syria Remarks: NatlJrnl

Economy

Laying the Groundwork for Nationalizing Food: MB
Jobs Recession Now 49 Months: Longest Since WWII: IBD
Buffett's NetJets Sued By Feds For $366MM In Unpaid Taxes: WZ

Obamacare mandate will destroy Little Sisters of the Poor: Pundette
Frances Fox Piven: “We Have to Give the Banks a Big Scare”: VS
The European Bailout-And-Borrow Train Has Run Out Of Track: ZH

Scandal Central

Lawyers Who Backed Obama Advised on Failed Loan Programs: NLPC
The Racist Ravings of Derrick Bell: FPM
Obama's Supreme Court and Critical Race Theory: Breitbart

Climate & Energy

Wife of Climate Kook Energy Secretary Drives Gas-Guzzling BMW Sports Car: Times
Study: 30% of People With OCD Obsess Over Effects Of Global Warming: WZ
Legal Incandescent Bulbs are Here: Rush

Media

Scandal at The Washington Post: Fraud, Lobbying & Insider Trading: NoisyRm
Soledad O'Brien: Derrick Bell Fan: Breitbart
Ed Schultz Paid Nearly $200,000 By Unions in 2011, According to Labor Dept.: NB

Turns out the media did vet candidate Obama – they just hid what they found: IBD
What will happen to all the left-wing comedians after all the attention to Limbaugh's "slut" controversy?: Althouse
Do We Burn It To The Ground?: TL in Exile

This is the Disgusting Racism of the Left…: Publius
MRC President on Louis C.K.’s Pulling out of Radio & TV Association’s Correspondents Dinner: MRC
Some newspapers refuse to run 'Doonesbury' comics on abortion, Texas ultrasound law: Fox

The Left's War on Christianity: Hawkins
Mark Levin Interview with Reagan Foundation about 'Ameritopia': My Freedom Post
Thomas Sowell Destroys Derrick Bell: Breitbart

World

NAACP Asking U.N. Human Rights Council to Condemn American Voter ID Laws: CNS
U.S. State Department Actively Promoting Islam in Europe: Creeping
Muslim & Arab Nations Walk Out of UN Meeting on Anti-gay violence: GayPatriot

Obama vs. Israel: Krauthammer
Iceland May Adopt Canadian Dollar: MB
Palestinian Terrorists Fire Barrage of Over 40 Rockets At Southern Israel: WZ

Sci-Tech

What the new iPad tells us about the next iPhone: CNet
Brand new bags: expandable, collapsible luggage wins awards: USA Today
Teen Exploits Three Zero-Day Vulns for $60K Win in Google Chrome Hack Contest: Wired

Cornucopia

Weakly Review: Only the Schtrong Survive: MOTUS
Research finds women feel happy when their husband or partner is upset: Telegraph
Hiker missing for almost a month found in New Mexico: USA Today

Image: iOwnTheWorld: The Not-So-Lovely Randi Rhodes
Today's Larwyn's Linx sponsored by: Rick Santorum for President

QOTD: "Ever since Plato’s “Republic,” imaginative writers have promoted the idea of utopia, a paradisiacal existence in an ideal, managed society. Combine this with democracy’s tendency to descend over time into a soft tyranny and you have what Mark Levin calls “Ameritopia,” the title of his latest book, subtitled “The unmaking of America,”

Levin went to great lengths to validate his assertion that, in defiance of our founding principles, an insidious, managed collectivism is permeating our culture and supplanting the individualism under which we prospered. Levin believes that the centralization and consolidation of power in a political class similar to Plato’s “guardians,” that insulates its agenda in entrenched experts and administrators, is apparent all around us and growing more formidable. He reminds us of Ronald Reagan’s warning that “freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.” He puts us on notice that, while the tea party limited government movement is a hopeful sign, “many more blissfully indifferent citizens must be aroused and enlisted lest our civil society continue to unravel and eventually dissolve into despotism.”

Can passionate writers and aroused citizens change America’s course? Maybe. But I recall the words of a Persian poet: “The moving finger writes and, having writ, moves on. Not all your piety or wit can lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all your tears wash out a word of it.”" --Elbert Menees

Friday, March 09, 2012

Climate clowns curiously silent: Air Force pulls nine (9) cargo planes from military ops to support Obama campaign events

But I thought it was a "Climate Emergency"!?!

Eh, I guess not.

The U.S. Air Force is pulling nine cargo aircraft from military operations to support President Barack Obama’s stepped-up visits to campaign events.

The five medium-capacity C-130s and four heavyweight C-17s will be used to ferry security vehicles, armored limousines and communications gear into cities ahead of Obama’s campaign appearances.

In the months before November, the president is expected to fly into multiple cities per week, and speak at multiple sites per day. On Mar. 8, for example, the president will fly to Richmond, and then drive over to a Rolls-Royce aircraft-parts factory. That evening, he’ll fly down to Houston, Texas.

His wife, Vice President Joe Biden and many of his cabinet secretaries are using the Air Force’s fleet of VIP aircraft to visit more states as the election season speeds up.

The nine cargo aircraft will begin operations in April, said Maj. Michelle Lai, communications officer for the Air Force’s 89th Airlift Wing. “They’ll stand down in November 2012,” she said.

Of course they will.

Does any liberal out there want to venture a guess how many years I'd have to drive my sports car to equal the carbon footprint of a single Obama campaign trip?

I've got $15 burning a hole in my PayPal account, just waiting to be awarded to the first drone fine progressive to get within an order of magnitude.


Hat tip: Paco Enterprises.

Truck Dealers Association: EPA 'Grossly Underestimated' The Enormous Costs of Their Byzantine Regulations

Gee, this news comes as quite a surprise. And who needs freight hauled around by trucks, anyhow?

A report released yesterday by The National Automobile Dealers Association and American Truck Dealers questions the Environmental Protection Agency's cost analysis of 2004-2010 emissions control mandates. Data collected by ATD shows EPA's cost estimates were off by a factor of between two and five.

As a result, ATD says, last decade's emissions mandates resulted in substantially higher prices for commercial vehicles, which depressed vehicle sales and created massive disruptions in normal business cycles, as well as delaying the environmental benefits that the EPA originally sought.

"While EPA can mandate what truck and engine makers have to build, they can't dictate what customers will buy," said Dave Westcott, vice-chair of NADA... the study sounds a stern warning about EPA's cost projections on the upcoming fuel economy standards for heavy and light vehicles -- which extend out to the 2017 to 2025 timeframe...

The study notes that when the EPA implemented its 2004-2010 rules for heavy trucks, it failed to predict and account for what truck and engine manufacturers had to accomplish to comply with those rules, and how the market would react...

Everything this enormous federal leviathan touches turns to crap.

The EPA can't even figure out ahead of time how much damage their insane regulations will cause the private sector. So they continue anyhow, issuing reams of new rules in their unceasing efforts to de-industrialize America. To centrally manage the economy. To create a Utopian society that can't be and never was.

I can't wait until these geniuses run the entire health care system. It'll be kinda like the medical version of the Bureau of Motor Vehicles, only without the great customer service.


I Told You He Was Historic, Melvin: Jobs Recession Now Officially Longest Since World War II

It's another Obama record!

The U.S. economy added 227,000 jobs in February vs. expectations for 206,000, continuing a recent trend of decent hiring activity. The unemployment rate held at 8.3%.

But America remains mired in the longest jobs recession since the Great Depression. It's been 49 months since the U.S. hit peak employment in January 2008. And with nonfarm payrolls still 5.33 million below their old high, the jobs slump will continue for several more years.

The previous jobs recession record — 47 months — came during and after the comparatively mild 2001 recession, which saw unemployment climb to only 6.3%... The labor market won't truly return to health until some 10 million positions are created to rehire all those who lost their jobs and to absorb new workers.

The longest jobs recession in decades coincides, not coincidentally, with the longest stretch of anemic economic performance on record.

And the jobs recession also coincides, not coincidentally, with the regulation-happy Obama administration.

As for the "8.3 percent unemployment rate" reported earlier today, well, that's about as reliable as everything other statement this administration makes. Which is to say, it's about as genuine as a Hillary Clinton $11 bill.

Even if it were a legit number, the 8.3% February unemployment rate, released today by the Labor Department, would be simply terrible—and unacceptable. It would still extend the longest streak of 8%-plus unemployment since the Great Depression. The U.S. economy hasn’t been below 8% unemployment since Obama took office in January 2009. And back in May 2007, unemployment was just 4.4%.

But, unfortunately, the true measure of U.S. unemployment is much, much worse.

...If the size of the U.S. labor force as a share of the total population was the same as it was when Barack Obama took office—65.7% then vs. 63.9% today—the U-3 unemployment rate would be 10.8%.

...Then there’s the broader, U-6 measure of unemployment which includes the discouraged plus part-timers who wish they had full time work. That unemployment rate, perhaps the truest measure of the labor market’s health, is still a sky-high 14.9%.

Maybe next month the Bureau of Labor Statistics will pull another million Americans "out of the workforce" to get unemployment down to, say, 7.5 percent.

That way useful idiots like Mike Dorning at Bloomberg can continue spewing the administration's propaganda without a hint of thoughtful analysis.


Good News! Eight Decapitated Bodies Turn Up In "Safe As It's Ever Been" Texas-Mexico Border Region

Thankfully the border -- true to the promise of our beloved, baritone DHS secretary Janet Napolitano -- is "as safe as it's ever been".

Eight decapitated bodies were found in the Mexican border state of Tamaulipas, according to multiple Mexican news media outlets.

Details are still coming, but the bodies were found today by the Army on the highway that connects Matamoros with Ciudad Victoria, according to El Universal, the Mexico City based media company.

Authorities have not shared any insight into the killings, but the region has been marked recently by intense fighting between two factions of the Gulf Cartel drug-trafficking organization.

Because this is a family blog, I've refrained from posting pictures of the decapitated heads found on the border and here in the United States.