In this section of my site I will feature a few particular news articles of that day (or of "recent memory") and post a short summary. I will focus on no particular subject (except at my discretion), the topics will be diverse and hopefully interesting. Enjoy!
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11/12/09–Economy: First-time jobless claims fall to 502,000, the fewest since 1/3.
Economy/Federal Spending: Judy Shelton warns us about the Federal Reserve’s easy-money policies and how those policies are setting us up for another bubble.
Economy: James Pethokoukis gives us 12 reasons we’re going to see 12% unemployment. If this does happen you might see the GOP make historic gains in the midterm elections. The problem is, can we hold off this massive expansion of gov’t long enough?
This point has been made before: Part of the reason this recession might end up a lot worse than ‘82 is we have a massive number of people whose unemployment benefits have run out and many workers have been forced to take part-time work.
Obama’s no Reagan, that’s for sure.
***The Charleston, SC executive committee of the Republican party has censured Sen. Graham (R-SC) for acting like a Dumocrat on cap-and-trade, immigration and TARP. They should’ve booted him in ‘08 when he had a primary challenger.
***Universal Health Care: Dr. David Gratzer gives us some salient points about the health care bill, some which we have not talked about often.
Here's what it will change. First, there will be an immediate surge in employment (in Washington). In the bill, the secretary of health can spend billions right away to staff the new public insurance, to fund the National Health Corps and to pay for new committees, agencies and studies--a list that's actually too long to fit onto a newspaper page... Most Americans' first experiences of ObamaCare will be higher premiums, just as RomneyCare in Massachusetts led to higher costs. That's because new federal regulations will change how insurance is priced and sold.
Thirty-four states, for instance, do not force insurers to cover orthotic (think shoe inserts) or prosthetic equipment--partly because it's not worthwhile for most people to have this extra coverage. But this bill makes it a requirement nationwide, adding to insurance costs in all of those thirty-four states. While most of these new rules don't take effect immediately, insurers are free to act as if they do, hiking premiums steeply to profit from "tough new national standards." And since the bill includes a vague plan to eventually force insurers to justify increases, insurers have extra incentive to jack up rates now while they still can.
It’s not surprise that MA, NY and NJ have the highest insurance premiums in these United States. Guaranteed issue and community rating laws (as well as other added mandates) increase costs.
Universal Health Care: Sens. Nelson (NE) and Akaka (both Democrats) can’t show us where the Constitution gives the federal gov’t the authority to provide "affordable" health care or can compel its citizens to purchase health insurance.
Universal Health Care: Walter E. Williams sounds off on the unconstitutional aspects of the "public option" and the individual mandate provisions of health care reform. The money line:
Where in the U.S. Constitution does it authorize Congress to force Americans to buy health insurance? If Congress gets away with forcing us to buy health insurance, down the line, what else will they force us to buy; or do you naively think they will stop with health insurance? We shouldn't think that the cure to Congress' unconstitutional heavy-handedness will end if we only elect Republicans. Republicans have demonstrated nearly as much constitutional contempt as have Democrats. The major difference is the significant escalation of that contempt under today's Democratically controlled Congress and White House with the massive increase in spending, their proposed legislation and the appointment of tyrannical czars to control our lives. It's a safe bet that if and when Republicans take over the Congress and White House, they will not give up the massive increase in control over our lives won by the Democrats.
In each new session of Congress since 1995, John Shadegg, R-Ariz., has introduced the Enumerated Powers Act, a measure "To require Congress to specify the source of authority under the United States Constitution for the enactment of laws, and for other purposes." The highest number of co-sponsors it has ever had in the House of Representatives is 54 and it has never had co-sponsors in the Senate until this year, when 22 senators signed up. The fact that less than 15 percent of the Congress supports such a measure demonstrates the kind of contempt our elected representatives have for the rules of the game -- our Constitution.
Universal Health Care/Taxes: Sen. "Real Estate" Reid is surprise, surprise, surprise... planning on soaking the rich. The Dingy One want so raise the Medicare payroll tax from 1.45% to 1.75% on couples making over $250,000 and individuals making over $200,000.
Soak the rich, just like we did during the 70s and that worked great. We need more revenue, let’s raise taxes because there’s no such thing as the Laffer Curve.
Not to be outdone, Madam Nancy has her own soak-the-rich provisions:
House Democrats are funding their new entitlement with a 5.4% surtax on incomes above $500,000 for individuals and above $1 million for joint filers. The surcharge is intended to snag the greatest number of taxpayers to raise some $460.5 billion, and so the House has written it to apply to modified adjusted gross income. That means it includes both capital gains and dividends.
That surtax takes effect on January 1, 2011, or the day the Bush tax rates of 2001 and 2003 expire. Today's capital gains tax rate of 15% would bounce back to 20% because of the Bush repeal and then to 25.4% with the surtax. That's a 69% increase, overnight. The last time investors were hit with anything comparable was 1986, when the capital gains rate jumped to 28% from 20%, a 40% increase, as part of the Reagan tax reform that lowered income tax rates.
The 1986 experience was not a happy one. Tax revenues from capital gains surged before the increase took effect in 1987, as investors moved to cash in at the lower rate. Revenues then plummeted. Total realized capital gains didn't again reach their 1985 level of $172 billion until 1996. By 1992, the federal government was barely getting more in revenue ($29 billion) at the 28% rate than it did in 1985 ($26.5 billion) at the 20% rate. Rate reductions, as in 2003 when Republicans cut the rate to 15% from 20%, have typically had the opposite effect. Treasury receipts from capital gains climbed to an estimated $117.8 billion in 2006 from $49 billion in 2002.
There’s your Laffer Curve. We’ve been over those capital gains figures many times.
Universal Health Care/Pop Culture/Federal Spending: Another reason NPR needs to be defunded.
On Monday night’s All Things Considered newscast on National Public Radio, reporter Joseph Shapiro recounted the sympathetic story of Regina Holliday, who lost her 39-year-old husband Fred to kidney cancer. Holliday painted a mural in Washington demanding "We Need Health Reform Now." (It’s headlined "A Widow Paints a Health Care Protest" and it's the most popular story on Wednesday at NPR.org... The promotional video at NPR.org is also more openly political than the radio story.
But it’s taxpayer-funded and completely unbiased, yeah right. Mrs. Holliday is either woefully misinformed or just a shill to be used by the left (like Cindy Sheehan) and then discarded like trash when they’re done.
***Sen. Dodd trails former Rep. Simmons in the latest Quinnipiac poll by 11 points. Let’s hope this holds up and Dodd is history in ‘10. Linda McMahon (yes, Vince’s wife) leads Dudd by two points. Dudd might be in trouble. HT: Rush
***Big Oil: Oil falls to $76.94.
Big Oil/More Nukes/Wind Farms/Solar: We’ve been over all this on SOTD at one time or another in the last several years, but this is a must-read debunking several common energy myths that liberals and the antique media subject us to every day.
There are a lot of silly falsehoods being peddled such as: We get all our oil from the Middle East, oil companies have massive profits (pretty true, but their profit margin is not that high), offshore drilling is not safe, etc.
***Nanny-State/Federal Spending: The Federal Housing Administration warned Thursday its capital reserves have tumbled below mandated thresholds due to heavy loan losses, raising worries about the need of a federal bailout. An independent audit of the agency, which provides loans to many first-time home buyers, showed its capital reserve ratio slumped to 0.53% of total insurance in force this year, well below the 2% ratio mandated by Congress and the 3% ratio a year earlier.
Nanny-State: Republic of Georgia taking steps to ensure economic freedom for its citizens.
Last month, the government submitted a draft act to Parliament that calls for amending the country’s constitution so that it would safeguard various elements of economic freedom. The amendments would put caps on public debt, spending and deficits; and ban any kind of price controls, state ownership of banks and financial institutions and restrictions on currency convertibility, and any kind of control over the movement of capital. New taxes or increases in tax rates would require approval through a national referendum.
If our pols followed our Constitution, we wouldn’t have a lot of federal bureaucracies, but they chucked the Constitution a long time ago.
Nanny-State/(State) Federal Spending: The NH state gov’t is using taxpayer dollars to bail out the Claremont Eagle-Times. This is ridiculous. Let’s bail out the buggy whip industry too. This is setting a bad precedent.
***Federal Spending: October 2009 federal deficit: $176 billion.
***Abortion: The Community Healthcare Center, formerly the Ladies Center, made the news in 1984 when it was bombed, and again in 1995 when the clinic's abortionist and security guard were murdered at the hand of Paul Hill who was executed for the crime.
"This abortion clinic that's been operating for a couple of decades at least has finally closed down -- and interestingly enough, it did not close down because of violence or threats of violence, but because this place failed to obtain proper licensure from the state," reports Troy Newman, president of Operation Rescue. "And they were fined and ultimately put out of business because of those fines."
Newman tells OneNewsNow that "abortion clinics across the nation think that they're above the law [and] that they don't have to comply with municipal health codes, their ordinances or even state or federal laws." However, when it was discovered that this particular clinic had been operating for 413 days without a license, its fine of $1,000 for each illegal day of business held the clinic accountable for its illegitimate operation and shut the center down.
***Illegal Immigration: "In what appears to be a growing trend among those who live in the U.S. illegally, another undocumented alien has sued an American law enforcement agency for violating her constitutional rights by arresting her. Roxana Santos, an illegal immigrant from El Salvador, claims in a federal lawsuit that sheriff deputies in Maryland’s Frederick County unlawfully and unconstitutionally detained and interrogated her based solely on her race or ethnicity. By doing so the officers violated the Fourth and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution as well as the Civil Rights Act of 1964, according to the complaint.
Santos was approached by deputies about a year ago as she sat on a curb behind a food co-op during a lunch break. When the officers asked for identification she initially said she had none but subsequently provided a Salvadoran national identification card which is not valid in the U.S. Deputies booked her and she was later transferred to a Maryland immigration detention center. Santos was granted supervised release for "humanitarian purposes" and lives at an "undisclosed location in the United States" with her family. She seeks at least $1 million in damages and asserts that federal law does not allow state or local police to enforce immigration laws. The complaint also names the Frederick Board of County Commissioners and federal immigration officials as defendants.
Lady, you deserve a boot in the rear and a ticket home you pathetic, pitiful vermin. Come one, come all, everything’s free. No rules, no regulations, no problem.
***Unions: Union goons want the Employee Free Choice Act because private-sector unionization rates have been falling for decades. However, unions are powerful in the gov’t, no wonder they support Big Gov’t, it means more jobs for these idiots.
Union membership has fallen to 7.3% of private sector workers – the lowest rate since Roosevelt signed the National Labor Relations Act into law. But it is a completely different story in the public sector: 37.6% of government employees belong to unions, up almost a percentage point since last year. Those 7.9 million unionized government employees are 51% of all union members nationwide. Most union members today now work for Uncle Sam.
So when unions start lobbying, taxpayers should hold onto their wallet. Government employees don’t strike to get higher wages from a private business – they strike to get higher wages from you. Their pay is funded through your tax dollars. For government employee union members to get more your taxes need to go up. So that is what unions now lobby for. Just take a look at what the labor movement is doing to taxpayers on the Pacific Coast:
In Oregon the labor movement is donating hundreds of thousands of dollars to fund two ballot initiative campaigns to raise personal income and business taxes. The unions want tax hikes instead of cuts in the gold-plated medical benefits for state workers. In California the Service Employees International Union spent $1 million on a television ad campaign pressing for higher oil, gas, and liquor taxes instead of spending reductions. Washington State Democrats, however, have so far resisted the labor movement’s call for higher taxes. In response labor unions are threatening to fund primary campaigns against the Democrats who oppose the tax hikes.
***Culture of Corruption: This is interesting, remember Gerald Walpin (see 10/8/09; 6/19/09, 6/18/09)?
The acting inspector general of AmeriCorps said he shredded White House documents at the request of an agency press spokeswoman that pertained to the controversial firing of the previous inspector general, who was ousted after investigating a political ally of President Obama.
The e-mail message from agency spokeswoman Ranit Schmelzer seemed urgent, as she wrote: "WH documents were sent in error. Can you please destroy them? And can you confirm you receive this e-mail?" Acting IG Kenneth Bach responded 13 minutes later writing, "Confirmed, documents were shredded."
The email exchanges between Bach and Schmelzer, as well as other documents pertaining to the firing of the AmeriCorps inspector general, were obtained by CNSNews.com through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. The documents referenced in the Bach-Schmelzer email exchange included a draft of a letter to be signed by President Obama that would be sent to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to inform her that Obama was firing Gerald Walpin as inspector general for the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS), which runs AmeriCorps, and also a set of talking points to be used in explaining to the media why Walpin was being fired.
An inspector general is the designated watchdog for a public agency who is supposed to have autonomy from the agency’s officials in guarding against waste, fraud and abuse of taxpayer dollars. When interviewed by CNSNews.com, Walpin said he thought a request from an agency spokeswoman to an inspector general to destroy documents and an inspector general’s compliance with such a request to be "shocking."
11/11/09–Term Limits: This is another reason Sen. DeMint is one of my favorites. DeMint proposes amending the Constitution and constraining all members of Congress to three terms. AMEN!
***Big Oil/Pop Culture: The socialist, oil-rich paradise of Venezuela is having a lot of trouble keeping the lights on. HT: Rush
Cuba is ordering all state enterprises (is there any other kind of enterprise there?) to take "extreme measures" to cut energy use (HT: Drudge).
Big Oil: Oil up tp $79.15. Gold still surging.
***Pop Culture: The Puffington Host is so upset at conservatives dominating bestseller lists on the N.Y. Times that they want to have a separate conservative non-fiction category so some of these liberal losers who can’t sell books get the limelight. Hilarious! They admit liberalism can’t sell books.
Homosexual Marriage/Pop Culture/War on Terror: A repeal of "Don't ask, don't tell" will be included in 2010's Defense Department authorization bill, Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) said.
"Don't ask, don't tell" should be kept in place, allowing this to be shoved in everyone's face will result in less people joining the military.
***Abortion: Planned Parenthood doesn’t like Abby Johnson talking about how sick their organization is. They tried to do something about it.
After quitting her job at Planned Parenthood, the organization filed suit against Johnson to block her from revealing any confidential information through copies of documents she allegedly made. Steven H. Aden of Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) took the case to court, where the ruling fell in Johnson's favor.
***Affirmative Action: Leaders of the U.S. Naval Academy tinkered with the composition of the color guard that appeared at a World Series game last month so the group would not be exclusively white and male... Academy leaders removed two white men from the color guard line-up for a performance at the recent World Series and replaced them with a "non-white" man and a white woman for purposes of diversity... But here’s the twist: the "non-white" man forgot part of his uniform and had to be replaced. The line-up was all-white, anyway, and the Naval Academy ended up with bad PR.
Political correctness backfires.
***Ethanol/Big Oil: Now, I was hoping switchgrass could be a viable alternative fuel minus the subsidies and the fact that it won’t take food off the shelves. For now, switchgrass seems like a dud.
In 2007, to great fanfare and amid ever-greater expectations, a large-scale demonstration project was initiated to turn switchgrass into biofuel. For an investment of $70 million, the taxpayers of the state of Tennessee were promised a lucrative new industry that would benefit farmers and create thousands of other "green jobs." The project, which was expected to produce five million gallons of biofuel from switchgrass within two years, would soon be fiscally self-sustaining and afford a "significant return" on investment... When it began, "the University of Tennessee Biofuels Initiative," as it is called, excited favorable comments in newspapers and media across the country. Finally, there would be a practical alternative to those nasty fossil fuels, and the great thing was that it would be produced from a hearty plant that could be grown on marginal land almost anywhere...
[A]ccording to the Knoxville News Sentinel, the Biofuels Initiative has reported that it is not yet producing 5 million gallons of switchgrass fuel. In fact, according to published reports, it would seem that it is not producing any fuel at all. The 250,000 gallons of ethanol that it is producing have been distilled from corn cobs -- a process akin to one already quite common, if not notorious, in the state of Tennessee... The project has cost the state $55 million, not counting additional federal funding and state subsidies to farmers growing switchgrass. Now members of the legislature are quoted as saying that the project is "not good stewardship of taxpayer dollars" and that continued funding "may need re-evaluation." The director of the project insists that the State Building Commission approved changes, but it appears that the legislature at large was not aware of them. Whether the legislature will continue funding the Biofuels Initiative, and at what level, will be determined after November 15.
Altogether, more than $90 million has been spent on the University of Tennessee Biofuels Initiative with no end in sight. On the national scale, tens of billions of dollars are being spent on similar alternative energy subsidies and research with little to show for it.
All together now, "biofuels and other renewable sources of energy do not produce much energy and they suck up a bevy of subsidies at that." As for other sources of energy that can survive (and should anyways) without subsidies:
Meanwhile, the Obama administration seems determined to kill off as many jobs as possible in well-established energy businesses here in the United States. The administration has placed a moratorium on mountaintop coal mining, affecting jobs throughout Appalachia. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has delayed shale exploration in the western United States and reneged on promises to permit offshore drilling in Alaska and along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.
***Nanny-State: A recap of Sen. "Countrywide" Dodd’s financial sector/big gov’t overhaul legislation. The only good thing about it is making the Federal Reserve accountable and less autonomous.
Nanny-State: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, still costing us bundles after all these years.
***Global Warming/Environmentalism/Nanny-State: Here’s how recent Congressional climate bills (Waxman/Markey and Kerry/Boxer) give our President authoritarian powers the Founders never intended. HT: Rush
"The bills require a federal declaration of a "climate emergency" if world greenhouse gas levels reach 450 parts per million. Guess what? The Pacific Northwest National Lab says it is a virtual certainty that level will be reached within a few months. The bill then requires the president to "direct all Federal agencies to use existing statutory authority to take appropriate actions...to address shortfalls" in achieving needed greenhouse gas reductions. When Vitter asked EPA Administrator what would be done in such a situation, she refused to say. So it must be asked: Would the president be empowered to do things like nationalize whole sectors of industry, ban coal use, restrict private automobile use, or anything else the "emergency" requires?
The Examiner's David Freddoso reports that Sen. David Vitter, R-LA, is holding a news conference later today concerning this provision. Vitter wonders if companies that support cap-and-trade in the hope they will profit from going green realize what could happen to them soon after enactment. More to the point, we wonder what the American people will do when they realize what is actually going on here.
Global Warming/Environmentalism: This piece is not about overpopulation, but gives us some nifty demographic factoids.
In the 10 largest cities, no racial or ethnic group constitutes a majority; by 2010, white non-Hispanics will make up 80 percent of the population aged 65 and up but just 54 percent of Americans under 18. Also, the county's center of gravity is shifting fast; over the past decade, 85 percent of population growth occurred in the South and West, while the Northeast and Midwest shrank. The census will also give us a clearer picture of American families than we've ever had, as respondents will have 14 choices to describe their households. Francese projects that by 2010 the most prevalent household will be a married couple with no kids, followed closely by single-person homes -- while marrieds with kids will tally a mere 22 percent of all households.
***Culture of Corruption: Another edition of... name that political party. We’ve seen Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon (Democrat, cough cough) before (see also 1/9/09; 6/29/08 & 6/19/08):
The theft trial of Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon (D) began yesterday, but in covering the story, the Baltimore Sun failed to note Dixon's Democratic party affiliation... The mayor is accused of buying personal items with at least $1,500 in retail gift cards donated to her office for use by needy families.
***War on Terror/Pop Culture: Lou Dobbs takes Hussein Obama behind the woodshed for employing a double-standard. Dobbs compared Hussein’s remarks after the Cambridge police fiasco and his remarks after the Ft. Hood massacre.
Dobbs, on his Nov. 10 radio program, didn't reserve judgment and criticized President Barack Obama for telling people to do so in a speech following the tragic event. Dobbs played a clip from the speech Obama gave last week in which he warned, "We don't know all the answers yet and I would caution against jumping to conclusions until we have all the facts."
"Isn't that remarkable, telling the American people not to jump to any conclusions?" Dobbs said. "Not to speculate, not to be curious about what is happening to our men and women, who should be the center of all of our attention and concern and care. Let's compare that statement by our president to what he said at the end of a press conference about health care shortly after the arrest of Professor Henry Louis Gates, his good friend." In that press conference, Obama said, "I don't know, not having been there and not seeing all the facts, what role race played in that. But I think it's fair to say, No. 1, any of us would be pretty angry; No. 2, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home."
The victim in the former case was a liberal black professor and he was arrested by evil (and mostly white) police officers. The latter has a Muslim kook killing Americans just because they’re infidels in his mind.
Speaking of Lou Dobbs, he is quitting CNN effective immediately (HT: Drudge).
War on Terror: Justin Logan on why we should exit NATO. I have to agree with his sentiments. Here’s the money line: HT: CATO
It is easy to understand why these countries, given their experience with Russia, want increased American support. The trouble is that capitals across Central and Eastern Europe have shown precious little interest in carrying their own weight within the NATO alliance. This past summer, for example, the Czech Defense Ministry announced it was cutting its defense budget by more than 10 percent. Other countries complaining of the looming threat from Russia, such as Poland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, all spend less than 2 percent of their gross domestic product on defense, an anemic figure.
Note that the countries could afford a robust defense against Russia if they chose. In 2008, the combined GDP of the NATO members added after the Cold War was roughly equal to Russia's. Along with wealthier Western European countries, these nations could keep Russia from pushing them around. The simplest explanation for these countries' low defense spending is that their leaders know that Washington will do the work for them. And why should they pay for a service that will be provided anyway? That was more or less how things went during the Cold War.
Japan’s defense budget is 1% of GDP.
***Economy/Federal Spending: Rolfe Winkler on the coming inflation bomb. It’s a real threat and our debt is going to bury us. HT: Rush
The public debt will likely pass $12 trillion this week, up another trillion since March. With Obama’s left flank calling for a second stimulus – which is really a third stimulus if you count George Bush’s tax rebates – there’s still no serious discussion about how to deal with debt. The bond market is telling us not to worry. But if history is any guide, the bond market is wrong. I’m referring to Treasury Inflation Protected Securities, TIPS for short, in particular those that reflect long-run inflation expectations. The current spread tells us to expect annual inflation averaging a bit over 2 percent for the next 30 years. That would be fairly benign. And fairly wrong. Why? Because it assumes U.S. political leadership will put the country on a sustainable fiscal path. I highly doubt it will happen.
Winkler then goes over three possible scenarios, I’m doubting #3, because that would require fiscal responsibility from Washington and a cease-and-desist order pertaining to vote-buying legislation. We’re in serious trouble. Our entitlement obligations are the biggest hurdle.
Economy: Dow up to 10,291.26.
***CNN continues to get lambasted by FNC in prime time.
***DC Sniper John Allen Muhammad was executed last night. Film at 11. HT: Rush
***Universal Health Care: You have to love British health care.
The British National Health Service refused to provide the advanced cancer drug Avastin to Colette Mills, who was willing to pay for it herself. Mills was told that if she paid for the drug the NHS didn't cover because if its cost, the NHS would stop paying for her cancer treatment altogether.
In English: "The gov’t will control every facet of your life down to every little pill. You will be subservient and you will like it. Big gov’t rules." She can’t go to a private entity and buy it herself, how ridiculous.
Universal Health Care: Chris Matthews needs to read the First Amendment. He has a problem with Catholic Bishops going to Capitol Hill and lobbying Congress to quash federal subsidies for abortions. The Bishops themselves weren’t lobbying and Matthews noted that later, but if it was, what’s the problem ferret-face?
Universal Health Care. Sen. Reed (D-RI) is an idiot. He thinks compelling people to buy health insurance is the same as compelling people to register for the military and possibly be forced into it via the draft.
The problem here is the Constitution does require the federal gov’t to provide for a military presence.
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense...
This is constitutional, the Constitution says nothing about health care, ergo, the federal gov’t cannot force its citizens to buy it. In addition Sen. Reed, just because the federal gov’t requires all kinds of other things that are not Constitutional, doesn’t give you the authority to enact another scam forcing U.S. citizens to purchase health care. That’s a "everyone is doing it" excuse.
Universal Health Care/Abortion: MO Dumocrat Senate candidate Robin Carnahan has a problem. She doesn’t like questions on whether she supports the House health scare reform bill and the Stupak Amendment prohibiting federal taxpayer dollars from going to abortions.
She didn’t answer those questions, she bloviated and wandered aimlessly for a thought.
***Federal Spending/Earmarks: Great use of your tax dollars.
The Patrick administration is pushing through a plan to spend $9 million in federal stimulus money to build a walking bridge connecting parking lots on either side of Route 1 near Gillette Stadium. The lots belong to Robert Kraft, owner of the New England Patriots, who is tied for number 468 on Forbes Magazine’s list of the world’s billionaires.
***Free Trade/Trade Deficit: We’ve been over this several times, the U.S. is dragging its feet on FTAs (funny, it started in about 2006 when the Democrats were poised to take over Congress) and the rest of the world is busy inking them.
"At least 266 bilateral or regional trade deals are in force, according to the World Trade Organization, and there are roughly 100 more of which the WTO has not yet been formally informed. The U.S. is a party to only five of the 64 trade pacts that have taken effect since 2005—with Australia, Morocco, Bahrain, Oman and Peru. In contrast, eight of those 64 deals involve the European Union (plus a round of EU expansion) and Japan has signed nine. Overall the U.S. has trade deals with only 17 countries including Canada and Mexico under Nafta. The EU has struck 29 deals on trade ranging from customs unions to larger free-trade agreements with 40 economies.
Of the deals the WTO knows about, an average of seven took effect each year in the five years after the WTO's founding in 1995. For 2004-2008, the annual average rose to 15. Another 12 have kicked in this year. New Zealand and Malaysia signed a pact last week, for instance, and China and India are in talks. Oh, and there's also the newly signed EU-Korea trade deal, and the one signed last year between Canada and Colombia. These deals are proliferating for many reasons. Some countries are losing patience with the Doha round of global trade talks that has dragged on for eight years. Others view bilateral deals as a way of liberalizing beyond what Doha would accomplish—including areas like intellectual-property protection. These deals can also firm up alliances or build political influence, which is one reason China is aggressively pursuing trade deals with its neighbors.
The article also notes as the deals are finalized, other countries will have a competitive advantage over businesses here, looking to capitalize on other countries’ needs for our goods. If another country produces the same product consumers will buy theirs because it’s probably coming in duty-free.
11/10/09–Pop Culture of Communism: Anita Dunn is history, she’s stepping down from her post as WH Communications Stooge. Her departure is no surprise, it was an interim position but she made it clear that she loves Mao. Dunn’s husband (Bob Bauer) will most likely become WH Counsel Stooge.
***War on Terror: The personal Web site for a radical American imam living in Yemen who had contact with two 9/11 hijackers is praising alleged Fort Hood shooter Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan as a hero. The posting Monday on the Web site for Anwar al Awlaki, who was a spiritual leader at two mosques where three 9/11 hijackers worshipped, said American Muslims who condemned the attacks on the Texas military base last week are hypocrites who have committed treason against their religion.
Speaking of radical haters of America, Daily Kos has a poll on the Ft. Hood "trajedy." (HT: Rush) Yes, they spelled "tragedy" wrong. Morons. Go read about it, it’s hilarious to see liberals inject their point-of-view onto everything and all things are filtered through the libtard lens.
We have this bit of alarming information concerning radical Islam too:
Imams preach jihad and extremism in 10 percent of the 2,000 mosques in the United States, the FBI estimates. That sums up the problem facing us as we ponder the meaning of Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan’s slayings of 13 people at Fort Hood, Texas. Given his association with a pro-al-Qaida imam in northern Virginia and his preoccupation with radical Islamic Web sites, it’s clear that the radical element of Islam influenced Hasan.
Dick Morris says the Ft. Hood massacre was an act of terrorism, not violence.
War on Terror: Hooray to the Times for honoring a Catholic Medal of Honor recipient, boo for their analysis and spin.
Andrea Elliott’s front-page article in Monday’s Times played up the thousands of Muslims in the U.S. military and how their "service... is more necessary and more complicated than ever before," but gave the false impression that a Medal of Honor recipient named near the end of her piece was a Muslim himself, when he was actually Catholic. The online version now contains this correction: "Earlier versions of this article misstated the religion and rank of Michael A. Monsoor and the act he performed that earned him the Medal of Honor."
***Nanny-State/Culture of Corruption: Imagine the backlash if the Bush Administration demanded visitor logs from Daily Kooks, I mean Kos. HT: Rush
In a case that raises questions about online journalism and privacy rights, the U.S. Department of Justice sent a formal request to an independent news site ordering it to provide details of all reader visits on a certain day. The grand jury subpoena also required the Philadelphia-based Indymedia.us Web site "not to disclose the existence of this request" unless authorized by the Justice Department, a gag order that presents an unusual quandary for any news organization.
Kristina Clair, a 34-year old Linux administrator living in Philadelphia who provides free server space for Indymedia.us, said she was shocked to receive the Justice Department's subpoena. (The Independent Media Center is a left-of-center amalgamation of journalists and advocates that – according to their principles of unity and mission statement – work toward "promoting social and economic justice" and "social change.") The subpoena (PDF) from U.S. Attorney Tim Morrison in Indianapolis demanded "all IP traffic to and from www.indymedia.us" on June 25, 2008. It instructed Clair to "include IP addresses, times, and any other identifying information," including e-mail addresses, physical addresses, registered accounts, and Indymedia readers' Social Security Numbers, bank account numbers, credit card numbers, and so on.
Nanny-State: Sen. "Countrywide" Dodd unveils his financial regulation scam. I found this statement funny. "We will end for all time I hope, too big to fail." Dodd also wants to end the era of bailouts. Uh, why did you vote for TARP you idiot? We already had OFHEO "regulating" Fannie and Freddie, how many regulators do we need?
***Global Warming/Environmentalism/Federal Spending/Pop Culture: Your kids get indoctrinated with envirokook philosophy, with your tax dollars. HT: Rush
"This week marks the start of Sesame Street’s 40th season. As announced in an article in National Geographic, the show will be focusing on a green storyline this year: As another example of the show’s forward thinking, Davis said, the new Sesame Street season that begins next week will introduce children to the basic ideas of sustainable living. "It’s a curriculum about nature and caring for the world that is just right for today," he said. "This show continues to stay very current with ideas that are in the zeitgeist"...
Spend just ten minutes reading up on the various aspects of sustainability, sustainable living, sustainability and de-growth, sustainability and population control… These concepts all start with the same basic premise: We humans, are the problem. There are too many of us, we are exploiting the earth’s resources… If we don’t radically change how we live, the earth will not be able to sustain us.
Sesame Street, indoctrinating your children to a liberal, environmentalist point-of-view. All public broadcasting at the federal level should be cut-off permanently.
Global Warming: The average October temperature of 50.8̊F was 4.0̊F below the 20th Century average and ranked as the 3rd coolest based on preliminary data. For the nation as a whole, it was the third coolest October on record. HT: Drudge
Global Warming/Environmentalism/Culture of Corruption: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has ordered two of its attorneys to remove a video they posted on YouTube about problems with climate change legislation backed by the Obama administration or face "disciplinary action", according to documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). The couple had received clearance for posting the video but EPA took issue with its content following publication of an op-ed piece by the two in The Washington Post on October 31. PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch remarked, "EPA is abusing ethics rules to gag two conscientious employees who have every right to speak out as citizens. EPA reversed itself because someone in headquarters had a tantrum about their Washington Post essay."
Global Warming/Environmentalism/Pop Culture: Al Gore has a new favorite quote, but what Newsweek doesn’t tell you is that it has a Marxist origin.
"His favorite quote in [his new book] Our Choice is from the philosopher Theodor Adorno (1903–1969): "The conversion of all questions of truth into questions of power … has attacked the very heart of the distinction between true and false." Adorno, and his colleagues in what is called the "Frankfurt School," are Marxists. Al Gore and his liberal admirers in the press... aspire to make it through Adorno's impenetrable prose. British journalist Alastair McKay brightly reported that in Scotland in 2006, Gore lauded the entire school of Marxists.
***Federal Spending: This is hilarious, FL Gov. Charlie Crist is still out there telling everyone he didn’t support Obama’s stimulus (American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) sham. It’s true that he did not have a vote, but he supported it and lobbied for its passage.
***Universal Health Care: This is good news. Soon-to-be VA Governor McDonnell says "no thanks" to the "public option." He said his state and administration will not participate in it.
Universal Health Care/Federal Spending/Earmarks: Back-scratching in Washington at it’s best.
Two last-minute supporters of the House healthcare reform bill boasted of the funds they had won for their districts Monday morning. California Democratic Reps. Jim Costa and Dennis Cardoza touted new funding for projects and facilities in their districts coming as a result of the House's health legislation. Both of the lawmakers, who hadn't pledged their support for the bill — which ultimately passed — until shortly before the vote, released statements promoting their successes.
Universal Health Care: More than 200 amendments were rejected by the House Rules Committee ahead of Saturday's vote on the Democrats' health care bill, including 11 that would have required members of Congress and other government officials to be enrolled in the same federal insurance plan proposed for the American people. Critics of the health care bill said they offered the 11 amendments – including some that would require the president, vice president, and Supreme Court justices to give up their Federal Employees Health Benefit Program (FEHBP) to enroll in the "public option" or Medicaid – to showcase the problems with the massive legislation.
Universal Health Care: Obama’s approval rating drops after the House passes health care reform legislation. I’m reading the tea leaves Barack and you’re going to lose in 2012 if this continues.
Universal Health Care/Federal Spending: The always brilliant Dan Mitchell gives us 12 reasons why Obama Care will not lower deficits.
Universal Health Care/Taxes: On how the pending health care legislation breaks Obama’s pledge not to raise taxes on families making under $250,000/yr. and individuals making under $200,000/yr. Here’s one, read the rest for yourself:
Individual Mandate Excise Tax (Page 296): If an individual fails to obtain qualifying coverage, he must pay an income surtax equal to the lesser of 2.5 percent of modified adjusted gross income (MAGI) or the average premium. MAGI adds back in the foreign earned income exclusion and municipal bond interest. There is no exception for families making less than $250,000.
***Culture of Corruption: "On October 15th, local ACORN spokesman David Lagstein was the special guest of the East County Democrat Club in El Cajon, CA. Lagstein is ACORN’s chief organizer in the San Diego area. The meeting was held at Coco’s Restaurant, a very public venue. Because of ACORN’s close ties to the Democrat party, Mr. Lagstein clearly felt he was among friends. These two clips suggest the investigation of ACORN announced by California Attorney General Jerry Brown already has a pre-determined outcome... Lagstein notes that the Attorney General is a "political animal." He states that he has been in communication with Brown’s office and assures the crowd that "the fault WILL be found with the people that did the video — not ACORN." HT: Drudge
***Homosexual Marriage: After weeks of uncertainty and pleas for action by Gov. David Paterson, New York's Senate failed to vote on a bill legalizing same-sex marriage during a special session Tuesday. Advocates and opponents say the Senate lacked the 32 votes needed to approve the measure, which Paterson strongly supports and the Assembly already passed.
***Illegal Immigration: AZ passes reforms to nail businesses that knowingly hire illegal aliens and what are the results?
[T]wo years later no one has been prosecuted and at least $1.44 million sits idle because authorities in nine of the state’s 15 counties say there have been few complaints about employers violating the law. In Maricopa County, Arizona’s largest, none of the 22 businesses that have been caught hiring illegal aliens have been punished, even though more than 300 employees have been arrested for identity theft and using fake identification to work.
***SCOTUS: Another chapter in the judicial nomination of David Hamilton. This guy is a nut (see 6/15/09). Judicial "empathy" and legislation from the bench on steroids.
11/9/09--Food Police: I could've told you this before anyone even thought about it. Just like the yuppie who buys a 45 MPG econobox ends up driving so much more that he doesn't save any gas, calorie requirements for restaurants do not help people make healthier choices.
Efforts to require fast food restaurants to post nutritional information on their menus have been gaining ground across the country. Sixteen municipalities including California, Seattle, and Portland have passed laws similar to NYC's, and the Menu Education and Labeling Act, which would impose labeling regulations nationwide, is pending in Congress. The bill would extend the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act of 1990, which requires food manufacturers to include nutritional information on their packaging, to restaurants. We all know how effective that law was. Since 1990, obesity has more than doubled. Published online in the journal Health Affairs, the NYU and Yale study is noteworthy because it considers the practical significance of food labeling laws. The researchers examined 1,100 restaurant receipts from McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King and KFC franchises in low income, high-minority neighborhoods where obesity is most prevalent. They found that the poor fast-food customers that the law intended to help weren't affected.
Only half of the customers said they noticed the caloric information, and only about 15% said they used the information. But the researchers' most striking finding was that customers actually ordered more caloric items after the law went into effect than before, despite the fact that nine out of ten customers who reported using the information said they made healthier choices as a result of the law. This disconnect can partly be explained by response bias in which people tell surveyors what they think the surveyors want to hear. But the problem may also be more complex. It's possible that people who are less educated may actually think they are eating more healthily than they are notwithstanding the calorie numbers staring them in the face. Calories as a measure of food intake (or more precisely, energy consumption and output) may be as foreign to them as the metric system is to many Americans.
Here's the solution: It is not the job of the gov't to control your weight or what you eat, do it yourself! Thanks and have a nice day!
***Tort Reform: 101 ways to improve state legal systems.
***Free Trade/Trade Deficit: While Congress drags its feet on an FTA with S. Korea, we are losing a chance to get in on their market with a lot of exports which would create jobs.
The European Union (EU) and Korea concluded negotiations on July 14, 2009, for a comprehensive FTA that is expected to be signed in late 2009 and implemented in 2010. Separately, the Canadian government describes its negotiations with Korea for an FTA as "well advanced"...
If the EU and Canada implement their trade agreements with Korea and the United States does not, exporters in the EU and Canada will enjoy a competitive advantage over U.S. exporters in the Korean market. Some U.S. export sales will be lost to exporters in the EU and Canada and the loss of export sales will have a negative impact on U.S. companies, national output and consequently U.S. jobs. Failure by the United States to implement its trade agreement with Korea will cost related exports, output and jobs... Specifically, failure to implement the U.S.-Korea FTA while our trading partners go forward with their FTAs with Korea would lead to a decline of $35.1 billion in U.S. exports of goods and services to the world and U.S. national output failing to grow by $40.4 billion. The Chamber estimates that the total net negative impact on U.S. employment from these trade and output losses would total 345,017 jobs.
All we're doing is punishing our consumers by giving them fewer choices (which means less competition, which usually means higher prices) and we're punishing businesses that produce goods that S. Koreans wants. If S. Koreans are buying the same product from Canada, how is that helping U.S. businesses?
***More Nukes/Wind Farms/Solar: I need to make a crucial point and this article is the perfect example. The author says this of renewable energy and our current energy crisis:
To meet our [energy] needs we have several options. One is to increase our dependence on fossil energy sources. Unfortunately, this will only add to the environmental burden caused by burning carbon-based fuels. Another option, the Obama administration's goal, is to increase the supply of energy sources that reduce the country's carbon footprint. These sources include solar, wind, hydro, biofuels and geothermal energy, as well as new domestic sources of natural gas, which burns cleaner than oil or coal.
Toward that end, the proposed Senate climate-change bill, sponsored by Sens. Barbara Boxer (D., Calif.) and John Kerry (D., Mass.), provides incentives to electric companies to use energy sources that reduce carbon emissions. The bill also expands federal loan guarantees to support the financing of new nuclear plant projects. These loan guarantees are crucial for providing the financial security that's needed to build advanced nuclear energy plants. These new plants will promote energy independence, improve our country's economic competitiveness, and help provide a cleaner environment for future generations.
Nuclear is a good alternative to coal (most of our electricity comes from coal, not much from oil) and it is void of greenhouse gases after you mine the uraniun. However, I oppose central planning and these taxpayer-financed loan guarantees whether it's ethanol, hydroelectric or even nuclear power.
When you look at how central planning has failed in so many areas, you'll see why. A centrally-planned energy policy will be no different.
***Universal Health Care/Federal Spending/Abortion: (HT: Rush, 1st link): A health care bill did pass the House this weekend, here's the roll call vote, happy reading. 28 of 52 fiscally "conservative" Blue Dog Democrats voted for it. The CBO says the House health care bill will cost $3 trillion. UGH!
Despite what people may or may not be saying, there still is a loophole in the public option where I get to pay for some idiot's abortions. It's still in there. Rep. Boren (D-OK) gets it, he knows this bill will lead to a single-payer health care system.
***Pop Culture/Federal Spending: Newsweek still doesn't get it, abstinence only works when it's tried and when it's tried, it always works. I will reitarate again, it's not the job of mother gov't to teach your kids to practice abstinence, put condoms on, masturbate, etc. This is a parental job.
Newsweek does favor your tax dollars going to teach kids how to masturbate, put condoms on and sing "I'm ok, you're ok." We spend a lot more on "comprehensive" sexual education than we do abstinence.
***Taxes: The battle concerning the Death (Estate) Tax will begin soon, I thought the budget extension signed in March brought it back to its pre-2001 levels, but I was incorrect. This tax should be shelved, but look for Obama and Congressional Democrats to attempt to eliminate the 2010 repeal and bring it back to pre-2001 levels immediately.
This isn't taxing people to death, it's taxing them because they died and after they died. This tax, along with the capital gains tax should be shelved.
***Eminent Domain: This really makes my blood boil.
The private homes that New London, Conn., took away from Suzette Kelo and her neighbors have been torn down. Their former site is a wasteland of fields of weeds, a monument to the power of eminent domain. But now Pfizer, the drug company whose neighboring research facility had been the original cause of the homes’ seizure, has just announced that it is closing up shop in New London.
To lure those jobs to New London a decade ago, the local government promised to demolish the older residential neighborhood adjacent to the land Pfizer was buying for next-to-nothing. Suzette Kelo fought the taking to the Supreme Court, and lost. Five justices found this redevelopment met the constitutional hurdle of "public use."
First, they take the land of private citizens unconstitutionally, then the corporation who received it does nothing with it! Double whammy, I hope the pols in New London are happy, their tax base has shrunk.
***Illegal Immigration/Federal Spending: A Democrat congressman from Ohio has introduced innovative legislation that would require foreign countries to reimburse American taxpayers for the exorbitant medical expenses of illegal immigrants. Appropriately titled, PAYBACK Act (Preventing All Your Bucks from Aiding non-Citizens is Key), the measure would save the U.S. government billions of dollars annually and ensure that taxpayer dollars are not used to fund health care services for illegal immigrants, according to its author, U.S. Representative Zack Space.
Medical bills for illegal aliens would be passed along to their country of origin, according to the proposed law, which was introduced in the House this month. The government would mostly collect by deducting the cost of illegal immigrants’ healthcare from the foreign aid their home countries would normally get from the U.S. If the U.S. does not offer foreign assistance the country would get billed for 110% of the medical costs. In the case where illegal immigrants are from nation’s to whom the U.S. owes money, the cost of medically treating their citizens would be reduced from the debt. The money would be applied to strengthening border security. "It is fundamentally unfair and outrageous to foot the bill for immigrants unlawfully in the United States," said Space, who has represented Ohio’s 18th congressional district since 2007.
U.S. taxpayers spend tens of billions of dollars annually to provide free medical care for illegal immigrants with states that border Mexico taking the biggest hit. The expense has become so unbearable in California—long an illegal alien sanctuary—that several municipalities eliminated the perk this year to save tens of millions of dollars in the midst of the state’s dire financial crisis.
***War on Terror: More information on the Ft. Hood massacre. HT: Rush
U.S. intelligence agencies were aware months ago that Army Major Nidal Hasan was attempting to make contact with people associated with al Qaeda, two American officials briefed on classified material in the case told ABC News. It is not known whether the intelligence agencies informed the Army that one of its officers was seeking to connect with suspected al Qaeda figures, the officials said. One senior lawmaker said the CIA had, so far, refused to brief the intelligence committees on what, if any, knowledge they had about Hasan’s efforts.
It's also becoming apparent that he has a been a problem for some time and numerous people complained about some of his statements and actions prior to going off the deep end.
War on Terror: 20 years ago today, the Berlin Wall begins to crumble.
***Unions: Whoops! The SEIU lets an internal document out in the public eye concerning talking points on the Employee Free Choice Act. One of the "no-nos" according to these union pukes is do not call the Employee Free Choice Act the "card check" bill.
It might become a problem if people being asking "what is card check" instead of being for "free choice." Who's against "free choice"? Not me, but I'm certainly not for "card check" which will allow unions to gain power without those nasty private ballot elections.
***Federal Spending/Global Warming/Environmentalism: This is hilarious and galling at the same time.
If you believed all the talk from Chrysler about how our tax dollars would help finance its fast-track electric-vehicle future, you're in for a big disappointment. Chrysler has disbanded the engineering team that was trying to bring three electric models to market as a rush job, Automotive News reports today. Chrysler cited its devotion to electric vehicles as one of the key reasons why the Obama administration and Congress needed to give it $12.5 billion in bailout money, the News points out.
First of all, I don't want any taxpayer money doled out to prop up a loser of a business and secondly, I don't want taxpayer dollars directed for useless electric cars that most people couldn't use. Try driving one of those to work in a snowstorm in ME.
***Abortion: FNC interviews a former Planned Parenthood clinic executive director (we've focused on her story before--Abby Johnson) who had a change of heart after watching an abortion procedure.
Abortion: A drive for a Personhood Amendment has been launched in Alaska. The proposed amendment would call for recognition of all human beings from the biological beginning of their development. Chris Kurka, who is leading the campaign, talked with television station KTUU.
"The state's responsibility is to protect our rights -- and the most fundamental of those rights is the right to life," he explains. "So what we're doing...is asking the people of the state to sign this initiative to get it on the ballot, and then to vote for it so that the unborn will be recognized as a person -- just like the rest of us."
***Big Oil: Oil up to $79.43. Gold continues its skyward surge.
***Economy: Dow up to 10,226.94.
***Culture of Corruption: "Dollar" Bill Jefferson, this is your life. HT: Drudge
Federal prosecutors are seeking the harshest prison sentence ever handed out to a member of Congress for former Rep. William Jefferson (D-La.), arguing that his "stunning betrayal of public trust" warrants what could be a life sentence for the long-time lawmaker. The Justice Department is asking a federal judge in Alexandria, Va, to lock up Jefferson, 62, for up to 33 years, according to documents filed by prosecutors on Friday.
