The Fundamentals of Nov 2nd, 2010

indyfromaz|

Newsweek’s Ben Adler was aghast at the clause in the GOP’s Pledge to America that Republicans will provide a “citation of constitutional authority” for every proposed piece of legislation. “We have a mechanism for assessing the constitutionality of legislation, which is the independent judiciary,” Adler wrote. “An extraconstitutional attempt to limit the powers of Congress is dangerous even as a mere suggestion, and it constitutes an encroachment on the judiciary.”
A progressive blogger, meanwhile, writes in U.S. News & World Report that such talk of requiring constitutionality is “just plain wacky.”
Before we get to the historical niceties, a question:
Does anyone, anywhere, think legislators should vote for legislation they think is unconstitutional? Anyone? Anyone?
How about presidents? Should they sign such legislation into law?
Yet, according to this creepy logic, there’s no reason for congressmen to pass, obey or even consider the supreme law of the land. Re-impose slavery? Sure! Let’s see if we can catch the Supreme Court asleep at the switch. Nationalize the TV stations? Establish a king? Kill every first-born child? Why not? It ain’t unconstitutional until the Supreme Court says so!
Nationalize Health Care, sure, why not. Mandate that all citizens will have health care or else they will pay a fine (that is actually a tax but we don’t call it that except in court when we have to) or possibly go to jail.
Yeah, that’s the ticket!
Mandate that Companies must provide Health care or pay a fine (that is actually a tax but we don’t call it that except in court when we have to).
Whoops!, sorry the Democrats ALREADY DID THAT.
And of course, that means the president can’t veto legislation because it’s unconstitutional, because that’s apparently not his job. Wouldn’t want to “encroach” on the judiciary!
Especially, the judiciary we’ve been packing with Liberals for a generation or two.
Like suing a State of The Union, Arizona.
Get a Liberal judge to rule that if we want to ignore Border Security you can’t do anything about it! ~ 
Oh, and you’re a “racist” if you disagree with us.
Of course, reasonable people understand how absurd all of this is.
There’s nothing in the Constitution — nothing! — that says the Supreme Court is the final or sole arbiter of what is or is not constitutional.
But for Liberals, let’s just pass whatever the hell we want, when we want it, and if we can get a Liberal enough judge to agree we can do it, Go for it!
Nor is there anything in Marbury v. Madison, the Supreme Court case that famously established judicial review. Nor is there in Cooper v. Aaron, the 1958 case in which the court ruled that its findings are the law of the land.
George Washington vetoed an apportionment bill in 1792 because it was unconstitutional. What was he thinking? If only he had a Ben Adler around to tell him what a fool he was.
Andrew Jackson vetoed the reauthorization of the national bank in 1832 because he believed it was unconstitutional. He added at the time that, “It is as much the duty of the House of Representatives, of the Senate, and of the President to decide upon the constitutionality of any bill or resolution which may be presented to them for passage or approval as it is of the supreme judges when it may be brought before them for judicial decision.”
“Even the Supreme Court has never claimed that it is the only branch with the power or duty to interpret the Constitution,” says Jeff Sikkenga, a constitutional historian at Ashland University’s Ashbrook Center. “In fact, it has said that certain constitutional questions like war and peace are left to the political branches to decide.”
The debate over whether the courts are the final word on the Constitution is more than 200 years old. The debate over whether they are the sole arbiter of constitutionality is extremely recent and extremely silly.
But it’s also necessary because too many politicians — in both parties — have abdicated their most solemn duty: to support and defend the U.S. Constitution. George W. Bush signed campaign finance reform even though he thought much of it was unconstitutional. Nancy Pelosi thinks the Constitution has as much relevance as a pet rock. When asked if the health-care bill was Constitutional, her perpetually wide-open eyes grew perceptibly wider as she incredulously asked, “Are you serious?”
The real issue is quite simple. If more politicians were faithful to the Constitution, the government would be restrained. And restraining government is “weird,” “wacky” and “dangerous” to so many liberals today. (Jonah Goldberg).
And people who propose it, The Tea Party Movement, are “racists”, “stupid”, “morons” ,”idiots” ,”dumb”,”ignorant”,”fools”.
Fascinating.


A Reminder:
Unless something totally unforeseen occurs, Democrats are poised to take a real beating in November. Their response to the impending disaster has run the gamut. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi is in denial: “One thing I know for sure is that Democrats will retain their majority in the House of Representatives.” Massachusetts Senator John Kerry is condescending: “We have an electorate that doesn’t always pay that much attention to what’s going on, so people are influenced by a simple slogan rather than the facts or the truth or what’s happening.” President Obama is angry: “It is inexcusable for any Democrat or progressive right now to stand on the sidelines in this midterm election.” Why is the electorate ready to kick Democrats to the curb? Here’s why:
* An “unstimulated” economy. The original Mother of All Stimulus packages, $787 billion dollars, quickly grew to an astounding $865 billion. It wasn’t enough. Congress pumped out another $26 billion in “supplemental” stimulus in August. The results? Unemployment in the private sector remains well above the eight percent Democrats promised, even as public sector workers who support Democrats were rewarded; our Democratically-controlled Congress has amassed more debt in the last four years than nearly the previous two hundred and thirty combined; the Keynesian economic model Democrats stand by is a colossal failure; the Summer of Recovery was a propaganda fiasco.
* The health care bill. The absolute epitome of ideological, public-be-damned arrogance. A horrendous compendium of bribes, exploding bureaucracy, runaway costs, written in secret and unread by those who passed it. It includes a mandate, likely un-Constitutional, forcing people to buy health insurance or pay a fine. The same administration which originally claimed the commerce clause of the Constitution made such a fine possible is now saying that the federal governments’s “power to tax” justifies it. Irrelevant. 60% of Americans want this monstrosity repealed, ASAP.
* The federal lawsuit against the state of Arizona. Again, it’s the arrogance, stupid. Despite all the hectoring from Democrats and the Obama administration about racist this, and xenophobic that, fair-minded Americans recognized four things: people have a right to protect their life and property, and if the federal government can’t or won’t do it, they have a right to do it themselves; the idea that anyone opposing the “rights” of illegal aliens is a bigot is nonsense on stilts; the ruling class in Washington, D.C. is holding genuine border control hostage to “comprehensive reform;” the glaring double-standard of suing Arizona for violating federal immigration statues, even as the feds turn a blind eye to hundreds of “sanctuary cities” with illegal protection directives unquestionably in conflict with federal law.
* The demonization of the Tea Party movement. Take your pick: teabaggers, racists, angry white men, fringe elements, bigots, Astro-turfers, etc. etc. Democrats and the media have tried every one, and every one has been a miserable failure for one overwhelmingly simple reason: decent Americans know they’re decent, and getting insulted by Democrats running the country into the ground has only stiffened their resolve. Progressives want to demonize people who believe in smaller government, fiscal responsibility and a desire to return to Constitutional principles? Why not attack people who believe in guns, and religion too? Oh wait. The president already did that as well.
* A hopelessly compromised media. Air America tanked, CNN is tanking, and ABC, NBC and CBS news programs have been shedding viewers at historically unprecedented rates—even as Fox and the Wall Street Journal prosper. Americans don’t mind people in the media expressing their opinions, as long as they’re characterized as opinions, but they seethe when such opinions are portrayed as “hard news.” They get even angrier when certain stories are “omitted” by those same organizations, especially when Americans recognize such omissions are calculated to protect the progressive agenda. I wonder if it occurs to either Democrats or their media water-carriers that a majority Americans may savor whacking both groups in November. Depressed looks on the faces of Nancy Pelosi and Katie Couric? In theater circles, that’s known as a “two-fer.”
* The Ground Zero mosque. Yet another reminder of the contempt progressives and their media enablers have for ordinary Americans who had the “temerity” to allow their feelings to be known. Despite every attempt to characterize these Americans as Islamo-phobic bigots, the public wasn’t buying, again for one overwhelmingly simple reason: decent Americans once again demonstrated their decency by separating the legality of the project from the appropriateness of it.
* The complete disconnect between the First Family and ordinary Americans. The golfing, the soirees, and the high-priced vacations have created the perception that we are living through another “let them eat cake” moment in history. On Tuesday, the president called the public schools in Washington, D.C. a “‘struggling’ system that doesn’t measure up to the needs of first daughters, Sasha and Malia.” Those would be the same public schools Congressional Democrats tossed 3,300 low-income kids back into when they killed funding for vouchers that had freed those kids from D.C.’s educational ghetto. The First Lady is hectoring Americans to eat healthier. Perhaps more Americans would if they could afford to: the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) stated in their Producer Price Index that the price of food increased 2.4% for March 2010. That’s the biggest increase in almost 30 years.
* The war on terror. A politically correct contingency operation against unnamed insurgents with a specific draw-down date? Democrats once again prove that all the talk about Afghanistan being the “good war” was complete rubbish. They want out, and victory—along with the heroic efforts of our men and women in harm’s way—be damned. Once again: has America ever fought another war where they knew the exact location of the enemy, had the ability to inflict possibly irreparable damage on them—and decided to split the difference instead? If you answered “Vietnam,” another progressively-instigated catastrophe resulting in the deaths of fifty-eight thousand American soldiers and three million innocent Asians, go to the head of the class. And when is that civilian trial of the 9/11 perpetrators scheduled to begin?
* Czars and nationalization. The Obama administration and Congressional Democrats may bristle when Americans call them socialists, but the nationalization of banks, car and insurance companies, student loans and healthcare sure isn’t free-market capitalism. Neither is wiping out oil jobs in Louisiana with a government-mandated ban on offshore drilling—after the feds completely bungled their role in cleaning up the spill which engendered it. Unelected czars who answer to no one but the president, along with out-of-control government agencies such as the EPA have made it clear to many Americans that this administration often considers Congress a completely unnecessary component of governance, especially if they don’t kowtow to the president’s agenda.
* “Unexceptional” America. Progressive contempt for the values and traditions which make this the greatest country on earth can no longer be disguised. An American president who “believe(s) in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism” has made it plain that this is not a great nation which needs tweaking, but a fundamentally flawed one needing a complete progressive make-over. Once one understands this basic premise, everything this administration and Democratically-controlled Congress does makes sense. All of it centers around the ridiculous premise that America owes the world an apology for any number of shortcomings, many of which can only be alleviated by government-mandated “social justice.” That would be the same social justice which demanded—and still demands—that Americans manifestly unqualified to own homes be given mortgages, regardless.
Unknown to the majority of Americans, this precise mindset was part of the financial “reform” bill which also requires banks to lend a certain percentage of capital to minority-owned businesses, even if it means lowering their lending standards. Apparently progressives won’t be satisfied with their odious social-engineering schemes until every sector of the American economy bears a striking resemblance to the housing sector. So far, Americans support financial reform because it’s been framed as “Main Street versus “Wall Street.” It’s not. Like every other initiative undertaken by this Congress and this administration, it’s the elevation of irresponsible and dishonest Americans over those willing to accept the consequences of their own behavior.
There you have it. Democratic control for four years in Congress, and two in the White House has been exactly what many predicted: an ideologically-driven disaster of epic proportions. For years, progressives obfuscated their true intentions, because even they knew most Americans couldn’t stomach them. The elections of 2006 and 2008 changed everything. Progressives bought into their own hype, believing they had pulled off a multi-generational transformation of the American mindset. As a result, they showed Americans their true colors: unbridled arrogance, utter contempt for the average citizen’s intellect, and a ham-fisted, never let a crisis go to waste determination to bend the electorate to their will, using government as a club.
That’s why they’re going down in November. And the most satisfying aspect of the whole scenario is this: despite every attempt they’ve made to blame anyone and everyone else for their problems, they brought it on themselves. (Arnold Ahlert)
And don’t forget the LARGEST TAX INCREASE IN AMERICAN HISTORY during a recession (or “jobless recovery”) that Congress was too chicken to vote on stopping.

But don’t worry, it’s all those damn Republican’s fault!!
And George W. Bush.
The Banks.
CEOs
Corporate America.
Wall Street.
Teabaggers.
The Right Wingers.
Christians.
“The Rich”
FOX News
Rupert Murdoch (who owns Fox)
Talk Radio
Did I leave anyone out?
Oh, yeah, DEMOCRATS!

Come Hell or High Water

indyfromaz|  

The Congress that took the last week of July until Sept 13 off has now left Washington for all-out-war campaigning after working an exhaustive 17 days since late July and won’t be back until after they have had their heads chopped off by the American people.

Poor babies.
They left town without the House passing a budget for the first time since 1974. The 4th time the Senate has done it since 1974.
So the government that started a new fiscal year today with resolutions.
I bet your household budget works the same way. You just fake it. right?
They also left town without dealing with the Tax Increases coming on 1/1/11. They were too chicken. So they split town to save their own asses rather than tell you, your employer, or any potential employers if they were going to get hit with the largest Tax Increase in American History (for real).
Failure to extend the Bush tax cuts will also mean a reinstatement of the marriage penalty that makes some married couples pay higher taxes filing jointly than they would if they were single and filing individual returns. It will mean cutting in half the child tax credit from $1,000 to $500. It will increase tax rates on dividends from a maximum of 15 percent to 39.6 percent, which affects seniors who depend on dividends to supplement their Social Security and pensions. And it will raise the top capital gains tax rate from 15 percent to 20 percent, stifling business investment.
It will also raise taxes anyone who pays taxes. Regardless of income.

The President repeatedly says he want to raise taxes on the rich as a class warfare tactic, but in all these months has he actually proposed an actual bill for it?
Or was he hoping Pelosi or Reid would do it for him? Be the good Lieutenants and get all the troops in line to set up for the firing squad one more time?
But the fact remains it was all talk and no action. Much like the Congress since the passage of the business buzzsaw killing Financial Reform bill the Democrats have done nothing useful since (not that they did it before to be fair).
And who is to blame for the President not proposing and the Democrats not disposing of this part of the agenda, The Republicans.
The Minority party is at fault for the President not even sending a bill containing his Tax proposals to the House and the House not willing to come up with the bill and vote on it.
It’s all those damn Republicans fault!
HUH??
Now that’s a “transparent” “drain the swamp” “most ethical congress” “responsible”, “post-partisan” government isn’t it?
The real problem was there were enough Democrats  who were willing to join Republicans on an across-the-board extension of the Bush tax cuts that it made the Reid-Pelosi position of raising taxes on some higher earners untenable, so no tax bill moved forward.
But that was the Republicans fault too.


Members of Congress have now returned home to try to save their own jobs, never mind helping the millions of Americans who have lost theirs. “When we come back this fall, the election will be over,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told the Washington Post. “I hope that it also means that Republicans will finally be able to put the American people ahead of their short-term political interests and ambitions.”
Now that’s responsible government.  and very “post-partisan”.


So it’s time to get your Lame Duck Poisoning Prevention Shot.
The New Roman Empire is being invaded by a hoard of Barbarians are the gate. So it’s time to prep the wells for poisoning and to raze the crops and poison the soil.
What Reid and his counterpart in the House, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, are hoping is that Democrats who lose their seats in the election will be willing to pass legislation in a lame duck session that they know the voting public doesn’t support. In Reid’s logic, they will be free to vote their liberal ideology. And it won’t matter because they will have already lost their jobs. But it is precisely this kind of arrogance that has Democrats in such poor shape heading into the mid-term elections. (Linda Chavez)
Some say you have to admire our “rock star” (in his own mind and the media’s) President for sticking to his ideology as he is 200% in campaign mode, 2008 campaign mode, that he doesn’t care about moving to the center. He wants to move even farther LEFT. Hoping to spike turnout amongst those who were fainting in his presence 2 years ago.
Now their fainting from working so hard. But that doesn’t matter. And once again, it’s supposed to be how he says it, not what he says.
Let’s party like it’s 2008!

The perception that he’s The Anointed One is supposed to trump the reality of the last 21 months.
A couple of back-to-back statements by President Obama at a town hall rally in Des Moines, Iowa, tell us all we need to know about his economic philosophy and that we aren’t going to climb out of his recession and begin to slow the growth of the national debt as long as he’s calling the shots.
Voters, he said, tell him to “cut government spending.” But “most spending is for veterans, for education, for defense. … Finding $700 billion is not easy.”
Yet a few minutes earlier, in response to criticism over illegal immigrants getting health care in the United States, he had said, “It is very important that we have compassion as part of our national character.” (How about compassion for future generations of Americans?)
Does anyone see the disconnect here? If Obama believes our national character is deficient unless we expand the welfare state to illegal immigrants, then how could he ever preside over a balanced budget?
His wildly inaccurate statement about where the money is spent is equally revealing. For fiscal year 2010, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and other sources, benefits for veterans constituted about 3.5 percent of the budget; education expenditures were 3 percent; and defense and security totaled about 20 percent.
Even worse than these errors is his defeatist statement that “finding $700 billion is not easy.”
Well, of course it’s not easy if you have no desire to trim the size, functions and intrusiveness of government.
Didn’t he just say again the other day that he is “committed to fiscal responsibility”? Hasn’t he incessantly argued that President George W. Bush is the one who ran up these outlandish deficits?
We all know what a distortion and exercise in scapegoatery that is. President Bush fulfilled his promise to cut the deficit in half by 2006. In fiscal year 2007, the deficit was $161 billion. Hard to believe, isn’t it?
That’s just three years ago, and Obama says it’s nearly impossible to trim much? Even the final Bush year, which Obama continues to blame for all “this mess” and which Obama has used to establish his new deficit base line, was not actually the alleged $1.3 trillion, but closer to $800 billion when TARP repayments are factored in.
Assuming Obama even wants to bring down the deficit, his economic philosophy precludes him from advancing policies likeliest to do it. You cannot make much headway on the deficit in a period of recession, and his policies are leading us toward a double-dip recession.
Indeed, the dirty reality is that Keynesian policy works as a double whammy against fiscal sanity. It involves government’s spending money it doesn’t have, which, by definition, increases the deficit and debt. And it also increases the deficit by smothering the private sector and deterring real economic growth. There is no appreciable “multiplier effect” from monies that are spent by government fiat, as opposed to those spent in response to true market forces, including real consumer demand — as opposed to government  command.

We saw the devastating impact of reckless Keynesian policies during the Great Depression, and we’re witnessing them again today. As long as Obama is married to his redistributionist profligacy, we cannot reduce the deficit. And it’s even worse when you consider that Obama wants to raise taxes on the primary generators of economic growth, small businesses, during a slow economic period.
With his signature audacity, Obama told town hall attendees their taxes haven’t gone up in his administration. Puleeze! Obamacare, anyone — for starters? He also said Republicans haven’t been honest with voters about what needs to be done to revive the economy. “We can’t pretend that there are shortcuts,” he said.
Sorry, but he’s the one being dishonest. The Bush years saw robust economic growth until the last year of Bush’s second term. The policies that led to the subprime collapse, the recession and the skyrocketing deficit in his final year were brought upon mostly by liberal Democrats hellbent on demonstrating their “compassion” for people by insisting on loans to people who couldn’t repay them and cynically resisting President Bush’s efforts to rein in Fannie and Freddie.
President Reagan didn’t continue to blame Jimmy Carter for his malaise-ridden economy during his term. He didn’t implement policies that didn’t work after promising they would and then whine that it would “take 10 years to get out of this mess because it took us 10 years to get into this mess.” He passed tax cuts that launched an unprecedented period of peacetime growth — and not at the expense of federal revenues, as has been falsely alleged.
I don’t expect President Obama to come clean with the American people or to ever accept responsibility for his disastrous policies, much less to voluntarily change course, but it’s gratifying to see that people, including some of his supporters, are finally onto him. (David Limbaugh)

And if you were expecting the Media to do their job, of journalism. Forget it. The Propaganda ministers for Obama are in full damage control, but unlike 2008, people are less inclined to believe their spin.
But it’s all they have and if they say it often enough people will believe their lies.

Gallup: Distrust in Media Hits New High and Three Times as Many See Media as ‘Too Liberal’ Over ‘Too Conservative’

They are too busy kissing up to Rep. Alan Grayson’s so-blatant-it’s-a-supernova misrepresentation attack ad, Obama’a 2008 “glory days” (they actually use that term repeatedly) and the manipulation by the far left of a Maid of California Gubernatorial Candidate Meg Whitman who was an illegal alien (she was fired last year for this by Whitman) and now is being paraded around the media with a prepared speech and lots of crying in the most cynical of acts.

And the Liberal media eats it up and regurgitates it.

So don’t expect anything from them expect spin.

“I’m sad to report today a death of a good friend to all of us…..Journalism, the once esteemed 4th estate of our nation and the protector of our freedoms and a watchdog of our rights has passed away after a long struggle with a crippling and debilitating disease of acute dishonesty aggravated by advanced laziness and the loss of brain function.” — Gov. Mike Huckabee in 2009.

Doubt me?:
Watch ABC’s World News Runs White House Produced Pro-ObamaCare Video as ‘News’: http://www.eyeblast.tv/public/video.aspx?v=hdkUkUQueu

CNN urging liberals to promote the “Amazing Achievements” of the liberals: http://www.eyeblast.tv/public/video.aspx?v=hdkUSUZunz

Matt Lauer (Today Show) urging the President to be more forceful about attacking the Republicans: http://www.eyeblast.tv/public/video.aspx?v=hdkUSUqG6U

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

All aboard the Democrats Unsinkable Ship of Keynesian Economic  State, The Titanic!

And don’t forget to destroy the land behind you.

If they can’t have it, no one can!

Film at 11.

Boo Hoo Economics

Michelle “Antionette” Obama’s husband signed a Union Apparatchiks Bailout bill on Tuesday. It gave $26 Billion to state employees, primarily teachers (4 states of which that don’t even need it because there is no shortage!) and being the political animals in an election year what did they do to “offset” that spending?
They cut Food Stamps.
Or so the bill signed says (wait for the punchline, it’s coming).

Which prompts the liberal Boston Globe to complain:

ON TUESDAY, President Obama signed a $26 billion bill to help state and local governments cover Medicaid payments and avoid having to lay off teachers and other public employees. In what passes for high drama in Washington, the House of Representatives was called back from its summer recess to vote on the package, and the successful outcome was hailed as a major Democratic victory. “We can’t stand by and do nothing while pink slips are given to the men and women who educate our children or keep our communities safe,’’ Obama said. “That doesn’t make sense.’’

No, it doesn’t. But only by the occluded standards of contemporary Washington could this aid package be considered a victory. What began three months ago as a $50 billion emergency spending bill limped to the president’s desk at half that size and was largely paid for — “offset’’ in the clinical terminology of the budget — by cutting $12 billion from the food stamp program. In other words, a measure designed to help one group struggling in the recession came at the expense of another that is even worse off — and growing rapidly.

The number of people receiving food stamps stands at a record 41 million, or one out of every eight Americans. Driven by the downturn, that number has risen every month for the past 18 months. Last year alone, it grew by 20 percent. It’s grown by 50 percent since the recession began.

Then they say : The “good news’’ from an economic standpoint is that food stamps are a terrific vehicle for stimulus, because recipients spend them quickly.

Is that related to Nancy Pelosi’s unemployment comment that benefits are actually “Job creating” and that unemployment benefits “Create jobs faster than almost any other initiative you can name.”

Bad news is Good News and Good News is Good News. Orwell would be proud of them.

But I find this “offset” target very curious. And makes me wonder just how politically motivated it was, as in, they picked something that made it look like they were being “responsible” knowing they’d never really do it.

And it was less than they wanted to begin with, so they were being more “responsible”.

But the truth is, it was in part a Campaign Slush Fund transfer anyhow.

Along with a bailout of his apparatchiks.

It goes like this, they give these Billions to teachers unions and then the teachers unions turn some of that money right back around as PAC contributions to Democrats running for re-elections. So it’s free campaign money.

They have effectively porked their own candidates without actually looking like it.

Now isn’t that just peachy.  

According to the Washington, D.C.-based Labor Union Report, the National Education Association in 2009 “raked in a whopping $355,334,165 in ‘dues and agency fees’ from (mostly) teachers around the country.” It spent close to $11 million more than it took in — $50 million of which union leaders poured into “political activities and lobbying” for exclusively left-wing and Democratic partisan causes and candidates.
Its primary mission? No, not educational excellence. Not “the children.” Political self-preservation.
Last July, the National Education Association’s retiring top lawyer, Bob Chanin, speaking at the NEA’s annual meeting in July, made the union’s true interests transparent: “Despite what some among us would like to believe it is not because of our creative ideas. It is not because of the merit of our positions. It is not because we care about children, and it is not because we have a vision of a great public school for every child. NEA and its affiliates are effective advocates because we have power.
“And we have power because there are more than 3.2 million people who are willing to pay us hundreds of millions of dollars in dues each year, because they believe that we are the unions that can most effectively represent them, the unions that can protect their rights and advance their interests as education employees . . .
“This is not to say that the concern of NEA and its affiliates with closing achievement gaps, reducing dropout rates, improving teacher quality and the like are unimportant or inappropriate. To the contrary.
“These are the goals that guide the work we do. But they need not and must not be achieved at the expense of due process, employee rights and collective bargaining. That simply is too high a price to pay.”
Left-wing radical Saul Alinsky taught his education acolytes well. Teacher organizers, he counseled, must commit to a “singleness of purpose.” No, not serving children’s needs, but serving the “ability to build a power base.” If that isn’t the dictionary definition of “special interest,” what is? (Michelle Malkin)

Back to the Boo-Hoo Globe: The justification offered by proponents was that food prices haven’t risen as much as Congress expected them to, and therefore cutting benefits to hungry kids isn’t really so bad, especially since the cuts won’t take effect until 2014.

Ta Da!  there’s the magic bullet!!

So they are cutting food stamps 4 years from now to pay for a Union Stimulus now!

Kinda sounds like Wimpy from The Popeye cartoons, “I will pay you tomorrow for a hamburger today”.

That’s Liberal economics for ya.

Which leads to….

The U.S. government spent itself deeper into the red last month, paying nearly $20 billion in interest on debt and an additional $9.8 billion to help unemployed Americans.

Federal spending eclipsed revenue for the 22nd straight time, the Treasury Department said Wednesday. The $165.04 billion deficit, while a bit smaller than the $169.5 billion shortfall expected by economists polled by Dow Jones Newswires, was the second highest for the month on record. The highest was $180.68 billion in July 2009.

The government usually runs a deficit during July, which is the 10th month of the fiscal year. So far in fiscal 2010, the government spent $1.169 trillion more than it made. That figure is about $98 billion lower than during the comparable period a year earlier.

For all of fiscal 2009, the U.S. ran a record $1.42 trillion deficit. Fiscal 2010 might run a little higher—the Obama administration sees $1.47 trillion.

Wednesday’s monthly Treasury statement said U.S. government revenues in July totaled $155.55 billion, compared with $151.48 billion in July 2009.

Spending was higher, totaling $320.59 billion. July 2009 spending amounted to $332.16 billion.

Year-to-date revenues were $1.75 trillion, compared with $1.74 trillion in the first 10 months of fiscal 2009. Spending so far in this fiscal year is $2.92 trillion, versus $3.01 trillion in the prior period.

Spending for benefits for the unemployed year to date totaled $121.4 billion; for July, the tab was $9.8 billion, the Treasury statement said.

Years of deficit spending by Washington have led to a mounting national debt. Interest payments so far in fiscal 2010 amount to $185.25 billion; by contrast, corporate taxes collected by the government during the same 10 months were $139.71 billion. Interest payments in July alone were $19.9 billion. (WSJ)

But don’t worry, this was all George W. Bush’s Fault! He made them do it!!  

Then Boston Globe ends with this sobbing whine: But the idea that they’ve won anything overall is hard to sustain. They sacrificed the most effective form of stimulus and capitulated to the Republican idea that deficits matter above all else. Their decision about who should bear the brunt of the offsets, and the silence that greeted it, suggests a moral capitulation as well. It may be a victory. But it’s nothing to brag about.

They have to be dishonest even to themselves in their Insufferable Perceived Moral Superiority and Outrage.

The cuts aren’t until 2014 ya dirtbags! You know, the same year the Health Care Mandate kicks in!   

So they are sobbing about cutting something 4 years from now to pay for pork spending now and they are boo-hooing “it’s so unfair” about it.

Meanwhile the Deficit is climbing towards 15 Billion dollars and they just can’t stop the addiction to spending, especially on their own apparatchiks.

But that’s all George W. Bush’s Fault!

Where’s that Industrial Strength Barf Bag…

It's Not You, It's Me...

You either think government is the solution to the problem, or it is the problem. And, unless your worldview shifts, no amount of clever wordsmithing, or smokescreens, will ever change your opinion.

Have you ever heard, “it’s not you, it’s me?”  I know that I have.  People employ this phrase to distract from, and even soften, the blow of ending a relationship.  The dirty little secret – that we all know – is that it simply doesn’t work.  The words do nothing to distract from the fact that, at least to one party, what’s about to happen is very undesirable.
Yet, this is exactly what the media suggests that the Obama White House do.  “If only they made it sound nicer,” the theory goes, “the American people would finally accept President Obama’s liberal agenda.”  Apparently, we just need to have our ears tickled because we mistakenly thought we disliked the president’s policies because they are bad for the country. (Daily Caller)

Imagine that.
If they just explained it better we’d all rush to the wonders and fascination for government control of every second of our lives.
Imagine that.
One Obama adviser was even quoted as saying, “‘I tell you, it’s very frustrating that [the message] is not breaking through.”
Remember they said the same thing due the Health Care “debate” as the popularity of it went into the tank.
Some things that are old are new again.

Dan Gerstein is a smart, centrist Democrat who usually has insightful things to say about the political landscape, but this column entitled, “Fire David Axelrod” is a symptom of the same disease he is trying to cure. Gerstein is shocked that according to poll taken by fellow-Democrat James Carville, 55 percent of Americans think Barack Obama is a socialist. He concludes that this statistic along with similar negative feelings among voters for the stimulus legislation and Obamacare are all part of the White House’s message problem. David Axelrod was a fabulous choice for the campaign, Gerstein says, but he sucks at developing and controlling Obama’s message. Gerstein’s solution is that more Democrats should be demanding that the president shake-up his staff and bring in someone else who will not fail to drive the conversation.
But when it comes to perceptions about health care reform and the stimulus, Gerstein has diagnosed the wrong disease. It isn’t a matter of losing the message that Obamacare is leading us toward more government control of the health care industry, it is the truth and voters know that. As for the stimulus, well, Gerstein may be right that lots of economists think that it was better than nothing. But that doesn’t mean it was actually helpful to the vast majority of Americans. The stimulus has been great for government jobs, but even Obama now admits that he’s going to focus on the private sector to help them create more jobs . Isn’t that what he was supposed to be doing since he came into office nearly two years ago?
David Axelrod may indeed be a net negative for Obama, but it isn’t because a better spinmeister would be able to make lemonade out of lemons. Voters are smarter than most pundits and journalists give them credit for and these folks recognize that the changes afoot are not going to make their lives better. Axelrod or no Axelrod, Obama’s problem isn’t the message. It’s the policies that make people think he’s a socialist. (NY Post)

Don’t shoot the messenger, just replace him with a better one!
It’s not you, darling, It’s me…

And now the Arizona Republic (Repulsive) has run a story with pictures. “Do I Look Illegal?”
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Since that is impossible. I guess you’d have to ASK!!
But if you do you’re a racist!
See how that works. It’s not them, it’s YOU!  You’re the Racist!
Now doesn’t that make you feel better, honey…


Arianna Huffington: “George, the truth is that right now we have precisely the regulatory system that the Bush-Cheney administration wanted. Full of loopholes, full of cronies and lobbyists filling the very agencies they’re supposed to be overseeing the industry.”
George Will: “So, it’s Bush’s fault? Just clear this up.”
Huffington: “It is absolutely a thousand percent Bush-Cheney’s fault.”
It’s not me, it’s Bush!


The fact that the Financial Reform package exempted the largest mortgage holder in the country from the rules changes, oversight, and regulations is Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, a government entity, is not worth mentioning.
That the government itself is now the largest mortgage lender in the US.
It’s still not me, darling, it’s you!
What happens when the government drives business to a few banks in collusion with the government to control your activities and funds.  The government will be able to identify what you do, what your habits are, when you use money and what you spend it on?
After all, it’s for you own good.
Don’t you just love how government turns everything on it’s head.
And it’s not You, It’s Me!
I’m too stupid to understand the complexities of Social Justice and Social Engineering and you’re not able to communicate it’s brilliance properly.
So it’s not you, it’s me.