Category Archives: Economy

“The Lie” Got Obama A 4-Point Win

Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber said Tuesday that he regrets saying that aspects of Obamacare needed to be concealed from the public due to the “stupidity of the American voter.”

BUT, makes NO APOLOGY for purposefully deceiving Americans in order to pass legislation that usurped 16% of the economy, representing the largest government control over everyone’s lives since the 16th Amendment (income tax), Social Security, and Medicare.

But it’s worst than that. It was this lie that helped (got) Obama get elected in 2008. No apology for that either.

Link: Obama Lied, And Won By 4 Points

2014 Mid-Term Analysis

The people who voted yesterday sent a clear message to Washington. STOP! Turn this ship around. Republicans did not win because they ran on a platform of issues, because they didn’t. Republicans won last night, big time, because Americans (from all parties) don’t like (66% of all Americans) the consequences of liberalism and the transformation Barack Obama is committed to. Still, the day after, committed to. They don’t like the flagrant violation of the Constitution. The Republican victory last night was to stop Obama. It was a rejection of Democrat incumbents. It was, to stop Democrats.

Pardon me while I gloat.

Other notable victories last night . . .

  • Mike Hill, a true conservative Republican who happens to be Black, is the first Black elected to the Florida House of Representatives since reconstruction, was President and founder of the local Tea Party in Pensacola, and won by a 2 to 1 margin.
  • The first Black senator from the South was elected last night. A Tea Party-supported conservative republican. Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC)
  • Utah elected the first Black woman to the House of Representative, Rep. Mia Love (R-UT)
  • Gov. Scott Walker, Wisconsin, wins third election in four years. Successfully fought Big Labor, turned a deficit into a surplus, and lowered taxes.
  • Illinois elected the first republican governor in over 30 years. Cook County, (Chicago) went Republican by a 2 to 1 margin.
  • Anthony Brown, Obama’s Mini-Me and Democrat Governor in Maryland got beat by 10 points by Republican Larry Hogan.
  • Republicans also unseated Democrat governors in Massachusetts, and Arkansas.
  • All of the federal representatives from Arkansas are now Republican. Home of the Clinton Library and Massage Parlor.
  • Texas AG Greg Abbott (R) beat Wendy Davis (D) of abortion and war on women fame, by 21 points.
  • Perdue (R) beat Nunn (D) (Sam Nunns daughter) by 8 points overall in the Georgia Senate race, and by 31 points in Fulton County (Atlanta).
  • Deal (R) beat Carter (Jimmy Carter’s grandson) by 8 points overall for Georgia Governor, and by 29 points in Fulton County.

The mandate is clear, should the Republicans decide to accept it. Turn this ship around. Do what the people elected you to do. The stakes could not be any higher. The question is not what part of Obama’s agenda you will accept. The election wasn’t about walking across the aisle to Obama’s side. It was 180 degrees from that. The question is what part of your agenda the loser will accept. And keep in mind, there’s nothing wrong with gridlock if that’s what it takes to keep the country from going over the cliff. Use your power of the purse to do what you can. It’s a tool, and responsibility, that the Constitution gave you. Use it.

Raise My Taxes, Please!

One of life’s truisms is, we’re all going to die. Another one is, there is no such thing as a temporary tax. Escambia County residents today voted for a 1.5% tax increase. Only they don’t call it that. They call it a half-cent and a one-cent tax. With that kind of deception, I’ll make a deal. I’ll go to the tax collector’s office and give them a nickel. Then don’t ask for another cent. People of Escambia County, learn how to live with what you have.

Link: Election returns for Escambia, Santa Rosa counties

Communist Environmentalist News

According to the United Nations (aka Useless Nations), the end is near, it’s our fault, and we’re all going to die. Well, only one thing there is certain.

From the AP:

Climate change is happening, it’s almost entirely man’s fault and limiting its impacts may require reducing greenhouse gas emissions to zero this century, the U.N.’s panel on climate science said Sunday.

Here’s the plan.

  1. Everyone who has anything to do with the United Nations and the IPCC must not exhale for the next 24 hours.
  2. Continue to monitor the weather and take up the matter again in 2214.

Link: UN climate report offers stark warnings, hope

Update: 11/3/2014 Are you suffering from CD? There is help for Climate Depression. Take one of these.

fukitall

Presidential Paralysis Cost Private Sector Billions

TransCanada has waited more than six years for the Obama administration to make a decision on the line, which would take as much as 830,000 barrels per keystone-xl-mapday of Alberta tar sands crude to refineries on Texas’ Gulf Coast.

The delay has pushed up the cost of the line, which would run from Hardisty, Alberta, to near Houston. The company said last month that Keystone XL’s original $5.4 billion estimate is likely half of what it will now cost to build the pipeline.

Trying to make the delay look like an abundance of caution is causing Canada to look for a route to a port of their own. Secretary Kerry’s visit there is nothing more than the optics of giving the impression that the U.S. might actually want the XL pipeline. The real, and only, reason the administration is dragging its feet is because of the environmental lobby. You know, the lobbyists that then Senator Obama said would not be a part of his administration or decision-making. Because they are the only ones that are against it, it is clear that the administration values their campaign money more than the nation’s economy, security, and energy independence.

The delay is really a twofer for the president. Increasing cost on the energy sector is (in his mind) a good thing. Anything that increases the cost of fossil fuel energy is a good thing where Obama’s ideology lives. That the cost increase is not falling on taxpayers’ shoulders, but on the private sector, is the other “good” thing.

Link: Kerry wants Keystone pipeline decision ‘sooner rather than later’

Obamacare Premiums Increasing In Florida 13.2% Average

We already know that the Obama administration has illegally delayed the open enrollment period until two weeks after the mid-term elections. And, with the exemptions, delays, low new enrollment, dependent-heavy enrollment, and elimination of major funding streams for Obamacare, we now know that premiums will be going up. Not down as promised. What we in Florida didn’t know is by how much.

Here’s how much, over and above the outrageous increase an individual got last year. The surprise for businesses will come next year, after the government stops bailing out the insurance companies for their losses.

From my congressman Jeff Miller (R-FL1) . . .

In August, the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation reported that premiums for insurance plans available in Florida are set to rise by an average of 13.2 percent next year, based on rate proposals filed by Florida’s health insurance providers. Yet, many Floridians will have to wait another month to see just how much their premiums will change thanks to a decision by the Administration to delay enrollment for 2015 Obamacare plans until November 15, nearly two weeks after the midterm elections.

Govt. Outsourcing Lead Blind To The Unemployment Line

Sibyl Mikell, laid off after 34 years on the job at the Mississippi River docks

In a scenario that could only (by the media) be pinned on an evil republican like Mitt Romney, what would you call it when the Obama administration outsources jobs that cause 42 blind workers in New Orleans to lose theirs?

A government program called AbilityOne, is a program that awards government contracts to nonprofits that employ the disabled to produce basic products for the military. A noble program for sure. Especially so when President Obama keeps saying how he won’t rest until everyone who wants a job can get a job. And how outsourcing jobs is un-patriotic. How ironic it is to learn that the administration cares about the economies in Asia over our own, and will take jobs away from workers here to give to people there?

This operation is an integral part of AbilityOne, a program that awards government contracts to nonprofits that employ blind and disabled people to produce basic products for the military. But Ms. Mikell and 42 coworkers were recently and abruptly laid off from their jobs at Lighthouse for the Blind in New Orleans because of a little-known change in federal procurement rules that encourages military forces in Afghanistan to buy from manufacturers and brokers in Central Asia.

“The fact is, the people feeling the impact are the most underemployed people in our country,” said Renee Vidrine, president of Lighthouse for the Blind, who said the changes break both the intent and the letter of the law.

Aside from what President Obama might call a “boneheaded decision,” the lesson here for everyone leading up to the mid-term election is this, what government gives you, government can take away.

Meanwhile, where is the outrage? Where is the so-called media watchdog?

Links: Feds take jobs from disabled Americans, send them to Central Asia  |  Lighthouse Louisiana

h/t Rodger Hedgecock

Capitalism, Socialism, Or Communism

The impression this image and statement gave me was rather profound. One of those truths of life. But of course, not everyone agrees. America exceptionalism isn’t just a phrase, it is unique to America.

That’s why I want to share a reaction of a FB “friend” who (I think) lives in India. Gita Sabet Azm thinks capitalism is the world’s worst.

i believed Communism was the most dirty system but now i believe capitalism is the most corrupt and dirty system.there is one big problem in our world ,people who live under communism system admitted their system is bad and has a lot of problems ,but American without any knowledge believe capitalism is the best and insisting in their idea .i am really sorry for them

To which I responded

There are “problems” with any system that is run by people. Systems run by law generally do better by, and for, the people, compared to systems run by dictators or despots. The basis of capitalism is freedom, liberty, and private property rights. They don’t have to be insisted upon or forced upon anyone. They are things that people want, especially when they don’t have them. If you ask me, the solution to poverty around the world is capitalism. When everyone has a stake in their own future and in their own production, and their own property, everyone benefits. Control and ownership by the state is not required. If you were to consider how the United States became a superpower, by any measure, in less than 200 years, you would have to conclude that freedom, liberty, private property rights, and a government created by the people to guarantee those rights and limit what the government can do, instead of a government that limits what the people can do, are central to the success of both the country and its people as a whole.

Of course that’s just my opinion. I’d like to know from Gita what her conclusion is to the rise of the American experience if it isn’t about freedom, liberty, private property rights, and limited government? And if you see it differently than I, please let us all know in a comment below.

U.S. Economy At Half-Mast

Running out of topics to brag about and ways to spin them just before the mid-term elections, President Obama is up to his usual community organizer tactics. This time, telling us that his economy is better now than when he took office. Maybe in his own mind, but nowhere else.

The record national debt aside, President Obama ignores the trillions of dollars in government spending and conflates that with economic growth. Government spending is not the U.S. economy. It’s government spending. The U.S. economy is private sector business transactions.

Reality is the economy is not healthy. In fact, the economy is at half-mast. How could that be when the Dept. of Labor reports a decrease in unemployment to 5.9%, you ask? It is because the Dept. of Labor did not count 698,000 unemployed Americans as being unemployed. And for as much as President Obama cares, they may as well be dead. He can’t run on killing 698,000 Americans. He can run on an unemployment rate of 5.9%.

Taking into account those 698,000 Americans and all the millions of other Americans that the Dept. of Labor stopped counting, the real unemployment rate (knows as the U-6) is exactly double what the administration is touting as their great success, 11.8%. And long term unemployment comprises one-third of all those unemployed. Try running and campaigning on that Mr. President.

Today, the U.S. Dept. of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics released their weekly jobs data. They report that 248,000 jobs were created in the month of September. Disconnected from that number is the number of new jobless claims from the DOL which were 287,000 for the week ending September 27. According to the Dept. of Labor, the seasonally adjusted 4-week moving average ending September 27 was 294,750. That amounts to 1,179,000 jobs lost in the 4-weeks ending Sept. 27. Here’s a picture of Obama’s economic success. 248,000 jobs created (most of them a second job), and 1.18 million jobs lost. For those educated in a government school, or the hopelessly devoted Obama acolyte, that’s a net job loss of 931,000 jobs.

So NO, the economy is not doing well. Armed with the truth, watch how the president will tell you with a straight face how well it (he) is doing.

 

Executive Order 13658, Reducing Costs By Raising Them

How do you get “increase efficiency and cost savings?” According to our community organizer president, you do it by increasing labor cost on contractors. You heard it right. You save costs, by raising them. By Executive Order 13568. But only to contractors doing business with the federal government. According to Labor Secretary Thomas Perez, the executive order, which will go into effect on Jan. 1, 2015, will benefit “hundreds of thousands of workers.” A little over two of them. The president says 2,000,000 but, you have to consider the source.

What this amounts to is political fluff, throwing a bone to the low-information crowd, giving the appearance that he’s helping the “working people.” There’s no point in trying to improve the economy now. There never was. There’s an election coming.

Link: Notice of Proposed Rulemaking: Executive Order 13658, Establishing a Minimum Wage for Contractors – Wage and Hour Division (WHD) – U.S. Department of Labor.